Prenominal Adverbs, or Apparent Selectional Violations in Coordination

Abstract

Abstract A robust generalization about coordinate structures is that X and Y may be conjoined in position P if and only if each of X and Y alone may occur in P. In particular, different grammatical categories (e.g., the NP a Republican and the AdjP proud of it) may be coordinated in a position that allows for either (e.g., Pat is [a Republican and proud of it]; Sag et al. 1985). Apparent violations of this generalization are sometimes taken as evidence for an asymmetric structure of coordination, where a single conjunct determines categorial features of the coordinate structure. Bruening and Al Khalaf 2020 and Bruening 2023 posit that one such violation involves coordination of AdvPs and AdjPs in prenominal positions that apparently do not allow for AdvPs alone; e.g., The [Once and Future] King (a book title) is grammatical, while the once king alone is claimed either to be ungrammatical or to involve a hypothetical compound once king that only a minority of English speakers accept. On the basis of rich attested data and acceptability judgment experiments, we demonstrate that adverbs such as once, now, soon, and twice combine with nouns in regular syntax, rather than via hypothetical compound forming processes. Hence, constructions exemplified by The Once and Future King do not violate the discussed generalization and do not provide an argument against the symmetric nature of coordination.