Clauses in Noncanonical Positions at the Syntax‐Phonology Interface

Abstract

Abstract. In this paper, I discuss the distribution of null complementizer clauses in English. I argue that two factors are interwoven to yield the observed distribution: first, unlike what is standardly assumed, not only the emptiness of C but also that of Spec,CP matters; second, the relevant clauses are obligatorily parsed as separate intonational phrases. I show that these properties lead to a new generalization that can be derived from independent assumptions about the syntax-phonology interface, according to which an intonational phrase whose boundary cannot be properly demarcated is disallowed in PF. I argue that this is exactly why null complementizer clauses are ruled out in certain syntactic positions. I also discuss a parallelism between intonational phrases and the notion of phase proposed by Chomsky (2000, 2001).