On T-Movement in English

Abstract

This article explores the possibility of providing a unified explanation for T-movement in English. The major claims of this article are three-fold. First, T can have an uninterpretable feature independently of C. In particular, T has an uninterpretable feature when the denotation of TP is not taken to be true. Second, the uninterpretable feature of T is deleted when T, or its projection, is merged with a constituent that has a matching feature. Third, T undergoes head movement as a last resort when its uninterpretable feature cannot be deleted in situ. This claim is shown to provide a unified account for subject-aux inversion in a variety of English constructions including interrogatives, negatives, optatives, and counterfactuals.