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A Defective Auxiliary in Danish

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 August 2011

Michael J. Houser ,
Line Mikkelsen  and
Maziar Toosarvandani
Michael J. Houser*
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
Line Mikkelsen*
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
Maziar Toosarvandani*
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles
*
Department of Linguistics, University of California, Berkeley, 1203 Dwinelle Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA, [mhouser@berkeley.edu]
Department of Linguistics, University of California, Berkeley, 1203 Dwinelle Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA, [mikkelsen@berkeley.edu]
Department of Linguistics, University of California, Los Angeles, 3125 Campbell Hall, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1543, USA, [mtoosarvandani@ucla.edu]
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Abstract

In English, auxiliaries form a cohesive category—unlike main verbs, they all raise to T. In Danish, it is not so obvious that auxiliaries form such a unified category. In root clauses, all verbal elements can raise to T (and then to C), while in embedded clauses they always stay in situ. Therefore, determining the position of a verbal element in the extended verbal projection is a challenging task. We examine the Danish verbal element g⊘re ‘do’ that shows up when the verb phrase has been topicalized, elided, or pronominalized. Even though on the surface g⊘re might appear to be of category T or v, we argue that it is located right in the middle. We argue that it is an auxiliary, but, unlike other auxiliaries, g⊘re is defective because it only subcategorizes for vPs that are pronominal.*

Type
ARTICLES
Information
Journal of Germanic Linguistics , Volume 23 , Issue 3 , 11 August 2011 , pp. 245 - 298
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Germanic Linguistics 2011

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