Reviewed by Roberta D’Alessandro, Leiden University

This volume is a collection of selected papers from a conference on phase theory organized by the editor. In the spirit of the conference, the book features leading linguists and promising young scholars discussing cutting-edge issues in syntactic theory. The volume is divided into three parts: ‘Conceptual issues’, ‘Articulatory issues’, and ‘Ordering issues’.

After Kleanthes Grohmann’s extensive introduction to the concepts of phases and interfaces, Wolfram Hinzen’s chapter discusses the possibilities of shaping the language model starting from interface conditions. Hinzen concludes that syntax is not to be considered pure one-dimensional seriation (pure Merge). Merge, hence recursion, is not the distinctive feature of human language; but rather, syntactic hierarchies and the ability to ‘project’ are. Next, Takashi Munakata examines ‘The division of C-I and the nature of the input, multiple transfer, and phases’, proposing that the conceptual-intentional system, usually conceived as unitary, should be considered two distinct systems. Hedde Zeijlstra’s chapter on conflicting interface conditions observes how all parametric variation is governed by Noam Chomsky’s standard minimalist thesis: language is the optimal solution to interface conditions. If these conditions conflict, several optimal solutions become available. Finally, Petr Biskup’s article explores adjunction and condition C of binding theory in a phase-based system.

Part 2 begins with a chapter by Franc Lanko Marušič demonstrating how both reconstruction and quantifier raising, usually believed to constitute a problem for derivational models of syntax, can be performed in a purely derivational system by postulating non-simultaneous Spell-Out to both interfaces. Next, Kayono Shiobara offers a phonological view of phases, showing how phonology calls for a left-to-right structure-building in the computational component. The syntax-phonology interface is also the topic of the third article in this section, in which Anthi Revithiadou and Vassilios Spyropoulos present a case-study of the prosody of clitic-doubled arguments in Greek. Last, in ‘Spelling out prosodic domains’, Yosuke Sato proposes a general syntax-prosody mapping hypothesis.

Part 3 opens with a contribution on the position of postverbal sentential complements in German by Jiro Inaba. It continues with a study of across the board movement, right-node raising, and delayed Spell-Out by Asaf Bachrach and Roni Katzir, in which they propose a reformulation of movement, not a primitive of grammar, in terms of syntactic sharing, or Remerge. Next, Masanori Nakamura presents a generalization on the co-occurrence of ellipsis and movement: if a language allows ellipsis of a certain category in a structure, that category cannot undergo movement. This generalization can be captured by an extended theory of phases. The concluding chapter by Howard Lasnik presents some questions on the reformulation of covert movement in a derivational, Spell-Out based system and opens the way for further advancements (or reformulations) of syntactic theory.

This is a must-read volume for anyone interested in the theory of phases.