Empirical Data and The Evaluation of Approaches

Abstract

In this chapter the two most influential approaches to root infinitives and null subjects, namely the truncation and the missing tense hypothesis, will be evaluated in the light of acquisition data. Especially new data from Danish and French will be decisive. The three observations which any theory of root infinitives and null subjects has to deal with and which I want to examine from an empirical point of view are the asymmetry in 0-subject use in finite and non-finite constructions, the asymmetry in null subject use with auxiliaries and main verbs, and the close developmental parallel of root infinitives and null subjects. Data on these areas will be discussed in sections 3, 4, and 5 of this chapter. Moreover, there is another observation which any theory will have to account for and this is the fact that children acquiring a true pro-drop language like Catalan, Italian or Spanish do not go through a pronounced root infinitive stage. This will be discussed in section 6.