Polarity and predicate anaphora

his dissertation is an investigation into the syntax of polarity and predicate anaphora and shows that the latter cannot be accounted for without reference to the former. The framework adopted is that of the Minimalist Program (Chomsky 1993, 1994).;The third chapter discusses the grammar of Predicate Ellipsis in English. It argues that Predicate Ellipsis is an unstructured pro-form that adjoins to a higher functional head. Empirical evidence is presented and it is shown that this adjunction is forced by the assumptions of Chomsky's (1994) Bare Phrase Structure. A discussion of semantic recoverability ensues and it is argued that reconstruction (Fiengo and May 1994) is untenable and instead Hardt's (1993) dynamic approach is adopted. The chapter finishes with a discussion and critique of the deletion hypothesis for VPE.;Chapter four's main claim is that the elided proform adjoins to the head ;The last chapter analyzes the overt predicate anaphor 'so' in detail, and it is argued that it is of category Pr;The first chapter is an introduction to the issues discussed in this dissertation; it also presents the assumption that predication be represented as a syntactic node (Bowers 1993). The second chapter explores the syntax of polarity under two assumptions: that polarity is expressed in the syntax by means of the functional category...