Resolving conflicts between locality and anti-locality: Evidence from Luganda and Haya
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3765/plsa.v4i1.4527Keywords:
syntax, locality, passive, anti-locality, BantuAbstract
It has been proposed that grammars generally prefer to make the shortest possible move [Shortest], given the choice between two or more movers. It has also been proposed that there are general bans on movement which is in some sense too short [anti-locality]. What happens when the shortest move is too short? In this paper, I argue that elements which cannot move as a result of anti-locality are rendered irrele- vant for Shortest, and show that this provides a novel account of patterns of symmetry and asymmetry in Luganda and Haya passives. There we will see a curious pattern: internal arguments may move across no more than one other postverbal argument. The theory developed leads to a simple explanation of these effects. Movement of one ele- ment across another indicates that the crossed element is too close to the landing site to undergo movement; but given a particular definition of anti-locality, only one element may be anti-local to a given landing site.
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Published by the LSA with permission of the author(s) under a CC BY 4.0 license.