V1 in Kipsigis: Head movement and discourse-based scrambling

Abstract

Kipsigis (Nilo-Saharan, Kenya) is a verb-initial language that exhibits a VSO/VOS alternation, in which the felicity of postverbal word orders is dependent on information structure. Specifically, the lexical item occupying the immediately postverbal position is discourse-prominent. We propose that V1 in Kipsigis results from head movement of the verb to a functional projection between TP and CP and that discourse-prominent material raises to Spec,TP. Movement to the immediately postverbal prominence position is a joint EPP/prominence effect (motivated by [D] and [uδ] features, respectively). We demonstrate that this prominence movement cannot be reduced to familiar notions like topic and focus, arguing that prominent phrases are highlighted or salient.