Left Branch Extraction in Korean

Abstract

This paper aims to examine the possibility of the Left Branch Extraction (LBE) and the presence/ absence of the Left Branch Condition (LBC) in Korean in relation to Bo?kovi?s (2005) NP/DP parameter. Based on Bo?kovi?, it is assumed that Korean belongs to NP languages in contrast to DP languages. Extending Choe (2009) and Kim (2011) with a critical review, it is argued that LBE in Korean is basically possible and hence LBC is not operative in spite of the prevalent LBC effects. Evidence comes from the overt movement of null operators by Choe (2009) and the overt movement of lexical operators. A response on grammaticality judgements on the data of lexical operators is provided and the grammaticality seems to be marginal with a wide range of speaker variation. However, the marginality in grammaticality shows a sharp contrast to English data which are completely ungrammatical belonging to DP languages. Based on the improvement of data with heavy syllable and stress followed by a pause, I propose that LBE in Korean is motivated by the focus feature and constrained by the weight of prosody. Furthermore, I suggest that LBE in Korean is allowed as long as an association could be made between the fronted elements and the host noun by prosody while the association is made by agreement in SC type languages. The semantic import brought by the focus feature and the movement possibility constrained by the prosodic weight gives an implication that LBE in Korean should be treated involving both syntax-semantics and phonology.