In this paper I assume that syntactic structures contain items that function as variables over possible worlds (or things like possible worlds). I show that in certain syntactic positions we can use some variables but not other. I accordingly motivate a "binding theory" for the items that occupy these positions, and I discuss some consequences of this binding theory.

Specificity has been defined in the linguistic literature according to two different criteria: one corresponding to Quine's opaque and transparent contexts, and the other to criteria closely related to Donellan's referential/attributive distinction. The paper argues that only the former definition is a semantic one since it alone manifests linguistic correlates. The meaning changes involving referential/attributive factors are pragmatic in nature. In the concluding section is is argued that the semantics of specificity is completely independent of the relative scope interpretation of (...) an indefinite noun phrase in relation to other quantified nouns in the sentence. This is demonstrated using sentences which contain an indefinite interacting with both an opaque operator and a second quantifier. It is shown that such sentences can be four ways ambiguous. (shrink)

This paper studies the distribution of ‘list readings’ in questions like who does everyone like? vs. who likes everyone?. More generally, it focuses on the interaction between wh-words and quantified NPs. It is argued that, contrary to widespread belief, the pattern of available readings of constituent questions can be explained as a consequence of Weak Crossover, a well-known property of grammar. In particular, list readings are claimed to be a special case of ‘functional readings’, rather than arising from quantifying into (...) questions. Functional readings are argued to be encoded in the syntax as doubly indexed traces, which straightforwardly leads to a Crossover account of the absence of list readings in who likes everyone?. Empirical and theoretical consequences of this idea for the syntax and semantics of questions are considered. (shrink)

"This monograph will provoke a great deal of constructive discussion and debate among syntacticians of all kinds. Collins has done an especially good job of making the work accessible to those of us who didn't "grow up" in Building 20." -- Molly Diesing, Cornell University Any theory of grammar must contain a lexicon, an interface with the mechanisms of production and perception (PF), and an interface with the interpretational system of semantics (LF). A traditional way to relate these three components (...) in generative theory is through a derivation. Noam Chomsky's Minimalist Program postulates that grammatical derivations are constrained by economy conditions, requiring that derivations be minimal. One of the most important questions of syntax is what the economy conditions are and how they operate. In "Local Economy," Chris Collins proposes that economy conditions are local. According to this theory, evaluating economy conditions does not involve comparing whole derivations. Rather, economy conditions are evaluated at each step in the derivation. Collins shows that locative inversion and quotative inversion provide strong arguments for local economy. In addition, he explores the far-reaching consequences of this proposal for other areas of syntax, including the strict cycle, binary branching, successive cyclicity, and expletive constructions. He demonstrates that local economy is superior to global economy on conceptual as well as empirical grounds. "Local Economy" is one of the first books other than Chomsky's "The Minimalist Program" (MIT, 1995) to deal in a general way with economy of derivation and Minimalism. "Linguistic InquiryMonograph No. 29". (shrink)

In these essays the minimalist approach to linguistic theory is formulated and progressively developed.

A more extensive discussion of certain of the more technical notions appears in my paper "On Binding" (Chomsky,; henceforth, OB). ...

Written by two of the leading figures in the field, this is a lucid and systematic introduction to semantics as applied to transformational grammars of the ...

The investigations reported here are the result of three lucky events. The first occurred in 1986. I had recently done the work reported in Pesetsky (1987), and received in the mail a copy of Kiss (1986). Since I had argued at length that D-linked wh-phrases do not display Superiority effects. I was astonished by a paradigm reported by Kiss, which appears here as example (98). These facts remained stubbornly in my mind for the next decade as an unsolved puzzle. Kiss (...) did not publish this paper in the form that I received — and, in fact, did not even recall discovering the crucial facts when she heard this work presented as a talk in 1998. But the facts are hers nonetheless. (shrink)

The paper investigates the scope properties of indefinites.

A method now popular for fixing the scopes of arguments involves a covert movement operation, named QR (for Quantifier Rule) by Robert May. May envisioned QR as a kind of adjunction operation, attaching the arguments so affected to phrases dominating that argument. From the surface representation in (1a), for instance, QR can fashion the representations in (1b) and (1c) by adjoining the object and/or subject argument to IP. (1) a. [IP Someone [VP loves everyone ]]. b. [IP everyone1 [IP someone (...) [VP loves t1 ]]]. c. [IP someone2 [IP everyone1 [IP t2 [VP loves t1 ]]]] As the representations in (1a,b) suggest, QR has syntactic consequences rather like those displayed by Topicalization, the process that derives (2b) from (2a). (shrink)

This paper argues that “covert” operations like Quantifier Raising (QR) can precede “overt” operations. Specifically we argue that there are overt operations that must take the output of QR as their input. If this argument is successful there are two interesting consequences for the theory of grammar. First, there cannot be a “covert” (i.e. post-spellout) component of the grammar. That is, what distinguishes operations that affect phonology from those that do not cannot be an arbitrary point in the derivation (“spellout”) (...) before which the former apply and after which the latter do; all syntactic operations apply in the same component (henceforth ‘single component grammar’). Second, there must be some alternative means for distinguishing “overt” from “covert” operations. One such alternative, which we can call the ‘phonological theory of QR’, was suggested by Bobaljik (1995), Pesetsky (1998), Groat and O’Neil (1994). These authors proposed that the distinguishing property has to do with principles of the syntax-phonology interface. Assume that movement is a copying operation with phonology targeting one copy in a chain for pronunciation. The distinction between “overt” and “covert” movement, these authors suggest, is this: “overt” movements are the result of phonology targeting the head of a chain for.. (shrink)