“Inversion” as Focalization

Abstract

Abstract The main empirical area studied in this chapter concerns Inversion structures with a subject that linearly follows the inflected verb, displaying the word order VS. Seemingly unrelated structures that involve reordering of complements (in the sense of Belletti & Shlonsky 1995; henceforth B&S) are also considered and are assumed to involve the same derivational process at work in Subject Inversion. Both are argued to be instances of clause-internal Focalization.1 The term “Subject Inversion” is thus a purely descriptive label, referring to a subset, albeit an important one, of a more general clause-internal process. The descriptive term “Inversion,” with reference to Subject Inversion structures, implicitly capitalizes on the idea that the order VS reverses the canonical order SV(O). However, that Subject Inversion configurations cannot be derived through a lowering operation, moving the preverbal “high” subject to some clauseinternal position, has been assumed ever since Romance Subject Inversion phenomena have undergone serious examinations in Government and Binding (GB) terms.

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