Syntactic change as chain reaction: the emergence of hyper‐raising in Brazilian Portuguese

Abstract

This chapter discusses the emergence of hyper‐raising constructions in Brazilian Portuguese (BP). Assuming Dresher's (1999) cue‐based approach to language acquisition, it argues that the loss of Romance‐type pro‐drop in BP prompted a chain reaction that led to a reanalysis of finite Ts as optional Case‐assigners/checkers (Ferreira 2000) and, therefore, to the incorporation of hyper‐raising structures into the grammar.