WH-Ellipsis and the Theory of Ellipsis

Abstract

Korean has a special form of ellipsis construction, [xp...N]-un/nun, which produces a WH-question reading with a WH-word elided, as observed in Chung (2000). To account for various interesting syntactic and semantic properties that such a WH-ellipsis construction (WEC) displays, Chung (2000) proposed a structure, where the remnant XP is generated in IP-SPEC and then moves to the topic position. This paper proposes to modify the structure such that (i) the remnant in the WEC is generated as a nominal predicate in a small clause complement of a copular verb and moves to the topic position; (ii) the silent WH-element functions as the subject in the small clause; and (iii) its content is copied from the head of the remnant XP. With the newly proposed structure, this paper accounts not only for the syntactic and semantic properties observed in Chung (2000), some of which were not satisfactorily explained there, but also for some newly observed facts. This paper also addresses theoretical implications that the WEC gives rise to as to the theory of ellipsis: (i) the LF-copy approach is favored over the PF-deletion approach and (ii) some subpart of an X。can be copied, as far as the result of the copy is licensed as another X。, as in the relation between a pronoun and its antecedent.