OV is More Basic than VO

Abstract

This paper defends the claim that head-final structures are principally less complex than head initial structures. The additional complexity of head-initial structures is the result of head movement within the lexical projection. Head movement guarantees the convergence of a head-initial phrase structure, given a universal constraint that admits only a right-branching projection structure. On the theoretical level, this position is in competition with the hypothesis that OV structures are derived from VO structures by evacuation of the VP. In a detailed comparison of the empirical implications, this paper attempts to demonstrate that on the empirical level an evacuation theory is less successful than a head movement theory.