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Peas and pancakes: On apparent disagreement and (null) light verbs in Swedish

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 June 2009

Gunlög Josefsson
Gunlög Josefsson*
Affiliation:
Scandinavian Languages, Centre for Languages and Literature, Lund University, Box 201, 221 00 Lund, Sweden. gunlog.josefsson@nordlund.lu.se
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Abstract

Two variants of what looks like disagreement between a subject and a predicative adjective are explored:

  1. (i)

  2. (ii)

Having shown how Construction NOM and Construction PROP differ, I demonstrate that the subject of Construction PROP is clausal. I argue that the topmost XP of the subject phrase of both constructions contains a null neuter element. This accounts for the neuter predicative agreement; hence the idea of default agreement or semantic agreement can be dismissed. I also argue that the subject in (ii) contains a vP, the head of which is a null light verb. Other instances of null light verbs in Swedish are identified too. Finally, I propose an analysis that accounts for the close relation between Construction PROP and the corresponding construction with a med-phrase ‘with-phrase’.

Keywords

agreementÄrter är gott-sentencesdefault genderdisagreementlight verbmed-phraseneuterPannekaker er godt-sentencespassepartoutssemantic agreement
Type
Research Article
Information
Nordic Journal of Linguistics , Volume 32 , Issue 1 , June 2009 , pp. 35 - 72
Copyright
Copyright © Nordic Association of Linguistics 2009

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