Particle ellipsis and focus projection in JapaneseShûichi Yatabe
ABSTRACT:The nominative case particle ga in Japanese cannot be dropped whenthe expression it marks is focused, i.e., when the expression it marks
is interpreted as contrasting with some other object(s) of the same
type. This simple constraint, in conjunction with a theory of theinteraction between focus and intonation, automatically accounts
for several facts about ga-ellipsis that have hitherto been subjected
to various misinterpretations, including (i) the fact that ga appears
to be harder to drop when it marks an unergative subject than when
it marks an unaccusative subject and (ii) the fact that ga is harder
to drop when it is not adjacent to a predicate. The results of twoquestionnaire surveys, in which I obtained acceptability judgmentsfrom a relatively large number of speakers, will be shown to support
the proposed account.

1

Introduction

The nominative case particle ga in Japanese is omissible under certain circumstances, as in the following sentence.
(1) [Ame ga/∅ futtara] dô shiyô
ka.
[rain nom fall-prov] how do-presump q‘What shall we do if it rains?’ <18, 11, 0, 0>
The 4-tuple immediately following the gloss in (1) (as well as those in (2), (15),(31), (32), (35), (36) below) is based on the questionnaire survey that I did at
Ritsumeikan Daigaku in 1994, in which I obtained acceptability judgments from29 college students who, as far as I am aware, knew nothing about linguistics.
The notation <m, n, o, p> means that, of the m + n + o + p speakers asked,
m people said the example is perfect even when ga is elided, n people said it
becomes slightly unnatural when ga is elided, o people said it becomes considerably unnatural when ga is elided, and p people said it becomes incomprehensible1when ga is elided. In the case of example (1), the figures show that most speakers found the ga-ellipsis in this example perfectly acceptable. Particle ellipsis is
not always allowed, however, as shown by the following example.
Kimi ni wa rainen
ga/?*∅ aru
ja(2) (Nakuna yo.)(Don’t cry I tell you) you dat top next year nom be-pres inst.top
naika.
neg-pres q‘(Stop crying.) You’ve got next year, haven’t you?’ <3, 7, 17, 2>
The figures indicate that most speakers felt that the sentence becomes considerably unnatural when the nominative case particle is elided.
The goal of this article is to determine exactly under what circumstances thenominative case particle is allowed to be absent. In section 2, I will enumeratesome phenomena which superficially appear to be relevant to this investigation
but which I regard as irrelevant and hence will either disregard or try to circumvent. In section 3, I will examine two previous analyses of ga-ellipsis, witha view to enumerating some fundamental facts about ga-ellipsis that are to beaccounted for. In section 4, I will argue that ga-ellipsis is subject to what I willcall the Antifocus Constraint, a constraint which prohibits ellipsis of a nominative case particle when an expression immediately preceding that particle isfocused. Then, in section 5, I will argue that the Antifocus Constraint alone
captures all the relevant facts about ga-ellipsis that have remained unaccounted
for in the literature.

2

Some caveats

In this section, I will enumerate phenomena which superficially appear to be
relevant but which I regard as irrelevant and hence will either disregard or try
to circumvent in this article.

2.1

Bare topics

As shown in (3), a topic phrase, which is usually accompanied by the particle
wa in written Japanese, can appear without any particle in spoken Japanese.
(3) Kono hôchô
wa/∅, ano hitogakinô
kami othiscooking knife top that person nom yesterday paper acc
kittetayo.
cut-ger-be.past I tell you‘Speaking of that cooking knife, that person was cutting paper with ityesterday.’2

Although (3) cannot be analyzed as an instance of ga-ellipsis, there are cases
where it is impossible to tell whether a given NP that is not accompanied byany particle is a bare topic phrase of the kind we see here or a ga-marked
NP from which the nominative case particle has been deleted. Some authors,
including Niwa (1989), have gone so far as to suggest that a sentence like (1)and a sentence like (3) should be seen as two instances of one and the same
construction type.
In this article, I will focus my attention to sentences that cannot be analyzed
as involving bare topics of the type we see in (3), and simply dodge the issueof whether the bare topic construction and the ga-ellipsis construction should
be regarded as the same construction in some sense. This means that I will
try to use exclusively clauses in which no topic phrases are allowed, such as thebracketed clause in (4) below.
(4) Dôshite na
no kana,[kono hôchô
de/*wa/*∅ ano
why
cop.attr nml I wonder [this cooking knife inst/top/∅ that
hito ga kami okitteta]no.
person nom paper acc cut-ger-be.past] nml‘I wonder why that person was cutting paper with this cooking knife.’

2.2

Quantifier floating

In the following sentence, the NP dareka ‘somebody’ is not accompanied by any
particle and the sentence could be analyzed as involving ga-ellipsis.
(5) Dareka
tabako sutta
desho.
somebody cigarette smoke-past am I right‘Somebody smoked a cigarette, right?’
Such an analysis, however, is not the only possible analysis of this sentence. It
could be the case that the real grammatical subject of this sentence is a zeropronoun referring to the people being addressed and that the NP dareka here
is a floated quantifier semantically linked to that zero pronoun. The following
examples show that the NP dareka can indeed function as a floated quantifier.
(6) a. [Koko ni
ita
hito
ga]
darekatabako sutta[here dat be-past person nom] somebody cigarette smoke-pastdesho.
am I right‘Somebody who was here smoked tabacco, right?’
b. Dareka[koko ni
ita
hito
ga]
tabako sutta
somebody [here dat be-past person nom] cigarette smoke-pastdesho.
am I right3

In this article, I will use examples where the relevant NPs cannot be interpreted
as floated quantifiers.

2.3

Literary relative clauses

Although particle ellipsis is usually impossible in written Japanese, there are
exceptional cases, such as the following relative clauses.
(7) [yakudô-kan ga/no/∅afureru]
mei-engi[vervenom/gen/∅ brim with-pres] great performance‘great performance that brims with verve’(8) [chihô-shoku
ga/no/∅
yutakana][local characternom/gen/∅rich
cop.attr]
dentô-geinô
traditional performing arts
‘traditional performing arts that is rich with local character’Constructions of this type, which are probably remnants of earlier historicalstages of the language, will be ignored in what follows.

2.4

Derogatory use

As pointed out in Yatabe (1996), ga-ellipsis is not allowed in a sentence like thefollowing.
(9) Sakkâ ga/*∅ nan dai.
soccer nom what cop.pres-emph‘I don’t give a damn about soccer.’ (‘Soccer is what?’ (lit.))
It seems that the nominative case particle on an NP cannot be elided when
the NP is embedded in a sentence frame that idiomatically expresses contempt
toward what is denoted by the subject NP. I believe this is an idiosyncratic
property of idiomatic sentence frames of this sort in general, and will not try tocome up with any deeper explanation for it.

2.5

Dialogic ellipsis

It has been pointed out by Tsutsui (1983) that there are some differences regarding ga-ellipsis between first-person or second-person nominative subjects ofmatrix clauses and other kinds of nominative subjects. As shown by the following examples, first-person and second-person subjects of matrix clauses seem toallow ga-ellipsis more readily than other types of nominative subjects.

4(10) a. A, are wa, boku ga/∅ nomimashita.
ah that top I
nom drink-pol.past‘Ah, I drank that up.’ (<15, 5, 2, 0>, according to Tsutsui (1983))
b. A, are wa, Tarô ga/?*∅ nomimashita.
ah that top Tarô nom drink-pol.past‘Ah, Tarô drank that up.’ (<0, 2, 5, 15>, according to Tsutsui)(11) a. Ano bı̂ru wa anata ga/∅ nonda
ndeshô.
that beer top you nom drink-past nml am I right‘You drank that beer, right?’ (<13, 5, 4, 0>, according to Tsutsui)b. Ano bı̂ru wa Hanako ga/?*∅ nonda
ndeshô.
that beer top Hanako nom drink-past nml am I right‘Hanako drank that beer, right?’ (<0, 5, 10, 7>, according to Tsutsui)(12) a. [Anata ga/??∅ kaita
no wa] kore desuka.
[you nom write-past nml top] this cop.pres q‘Is this what you wrote?’ (<3, 5, 8, 6>, according to Tsutsui)b. [Hanako ga/?*∅ kaita
no wa] kore desuka.
[Hanako nom write-past nml top] this cop.pres q‘Is this what Hanako wrote?’ (<0, 2, 8, 12>, according to Tsutsui)
It seems reasonable to regard the type of ga-ellipsis responsible for examples like(10a) and (11a) as something distinct from the type of ga-ellipsis responsible
for examples like (1) (see Yatabe (1996)); I will focus my attention to the latterin this article.

3

Previous analyses

In this section, I will review and criticize Tsutsui’s (1984) and Tateishi’s (1989)
analyses of ga-ellipsis, with a view to enumerating some fundamental facts about
ga-ellipsis that are to be accounted for.

3.1

Tsutsui (1984)

Tsutsui’s (1984, chapters 3–4) theory of ga-ellipsis is composed of four conditions
pertaining to particle ellipsis in general (i.e. not only ga-ellipsis but also o-ellipsisetc.) and two conditions partaining specifically to ga-ellipsis.
Let me first examine Tsutsui’s four conditions on particle ellipsis in general,
which are stated as follows.

5(13) a. “Case Particle Ellipsis Rule 1 (CPER1)”
The lower the formality level is, the more natural the ellipsis of caseparticles is.
b. “Case Particle Ellipsis Rule 2 (CPER2)”
The ellipsis of the case particles (CP) of an NP-CP is unnatural if the
NP-CP conveys the idea of exclusivity.
c. “Case Particle Ellipsis Rule 3 (CPER3)”
The ellipsis of a case particle is unnatural if it is in a generic sentence.
d. “Case Particle Ellipsis Rule 4 (CPER4)”The ellipsis of the case particle marking a monosyllabic NP is lessnatural than that of the case particle marking a multisyllabic NP.
I am convinced by Tsutsui’s arguments that CPER1 and CPER2 are on the righttrack. For instance ga-ellipsis in the following sentence, which is stylisticallyvery formal, is unacceptable, as predicted by CPER1.
(14) Kore ga/?* ochita
no de aru.
this nom drop-past nml inst be-pres‘It is that this thing fell.’
Ga-ellipsis in the following sentence, in which the ga-marked NP is given an “exclusive” interpretation, or an exhaustive-listing interpretation, is unacceptable,
as predicted by CPER2.
(15) [Atashi ga/?*∅ warui]
tte
yû
n
desu
ka?
[I
nom be bad-pres] comp say-pres nml cop.pres q‘Are you suggesting that I am to blame?’ <0, 5, 12, 12>
CPER4 is also essentially correct. A nominative case particle cannot be elided
when it marks an unaccented monosyllabic noun, although it can be elided
when it marks an accented monosyllabic noun. This is shown in the following
examples. (I owe the example in (16a) to Yukiko Morimoto. Ka is unaccented,
whereas me is accented.)(16) a. Ka
ga/?*∅ tonderu.
mosquito nom be flying-pres‘A mosquito is flying around.’b. Me ga/∅ itai.
eye nom hurt-pres‘My eyes hurt.’
CPER3 is, however, questionable. Generic sentences that allow ga-ellipsis are
not difficult to find. The following is one such sentence.
6

(17) Zôwa karada ga/∅ ôkii
kara
nâ.
elephant top body nom big-pres because I must tell you‘Elephants have big bodies, I must tell you.’Thus I submit that we discard CPER3 and slightly modify CPER4, while retaining CPER1 and CPER2. (I will argue in section 4, however, that CPER2
is too narrow if not incorrect and thus needs to be generalized somewhat.)
Let me next examine Tsutsui’s (1984) two conditions pertaining specificallyto ga-ellipsis, which are stated as follows.
(18) a. “Ga Ellipsis Rule 1 (GER1)”
The ellipsis of the ga of an NP-ga is natural in informal speech if the
NP-ga is preceded by the subject of the sentence and immediately
followed by the predicate.
b. “Ga Ellipsis Rule 2 (GER2)”
The ellipsis of ga in a sentence is natural if the sentence satisfies oneof the following conditions:(i) the speaker believes the sentence carries expected information.
(ii) the speaker believes the sentence carries shared information.
(iii) the speaker expects the hearer to take some action in response to
the sentence.
The intended interpretation of these two rules, although never stated, seems tobe that ga can be dropped only if either GER1 or GER2 applies. As it turns
out, GER1 is partially correct while GER2 is fundamentally incorrect.
Two distinct claims are embodied in GER1; the first half of GER1 (“precededby the subject of the sentence”) claims that ga can be elided only when it
marks a non-subject, and the second half of GER1 (“immediately followed by
the predicate”) claims that ga-ellipsis takes place only in positions immediately
preceding a predicate. In my view, the first half is incorrect, while the second
half is correct as a statement of a tendency. The first half of GER1, which is arecapitulation of Kuno’s (1973) theory of ga-ellipsis, is likely to be off the mark;we have already seen several examples, such as (16b), which appear to refute it.
On the other hand, the second half of GER1 correctly captures the following
contrast.
(19) (from Tsutsui (1983))
a. Kimi ate
ni gakkô etegami ga/∅ todoita
yo.
you address dat school loc letter nom arrive-past I tell you‘A letter has arrived at school for you.’ (<12, 5, 3, 2> according toTsutsui)7

b. Kimi ate
ni tegami ga/?∅ gakkô etodoitayo.
you address dat letter nom school loc arrive-past I tell you(<1, 8, 8, 5> according to Tsutsui)
Turning now to GER2, it is my opinion that the “observations” that GER2
is based on are illusory. For instance, Tsutsui (op. cit., 130) claims that thefollowing sentence is acceptable only if the speaker expects the hearer to takesome action (say, running into a house) in response to it.
(20) Ame ∅ futte
kimashitayo.
rain fall-ger come-pol.past I tell you‘It’s started raining.’
According to my intuitions, however, there is nothing wrong with uttering thissentence without expecting the hearer to do anything. The fact that the following variant of (20) is acceptable corroborates my view.
(21) [Ame ∅ furanakattara] iku
yo.
[rain fall-neg-cond] go-pres I tell you‘I’ll go if it doesn’t rain.’
It is relatively easy to imagine a situation in which the speaker utters (21)without expecting the hearer to do anything in response to it. Furthermore,neither (21) as a whole nor the bracketed clause in it carries what is believed by
the speaker to be expected information or shared information (where “expected
information” is “information that expresses a proposition which the hearer is
expecting to hear” (op. cit., 119) and “shared information” is “propositional
information which is shared by the speaker and the hearer not as common
knowledge but as personally shared knowledge” (op. cit., 122)). Thus (21),which obviously does not satisfy the condition stated in GER1, does not satisfy
the conditions stated in GER2 either, and is hence incorrectly predicted to beunacceptable, supposing that the intended interpretation of Tsutsui’s analysis
is that ga can be dropped only if either GER1 or GER2 applies.
To summarize this subsection, I have argued (i) that CPER1, CPER2, andthe second half of GER1 are on the right track, (ii) that CPER4 becomes correct
after a slight modification, and (iii) that CPER3, the first half of GER1, andGER2 are incorrect.

3.2

Tateishi (1989)

Next, let us examine Tateishi’s (1989) theory of ga-ellipsis, which is presented
as part of an exploration of Japanese clause structure. The gist of Tateishi’s
claim is that ga cannot be dropped if it marks either the subject of an unergative
predicate (which is, roughly speaking, a predicate whose logical subject is either8an agent or an experiencer)1 or the subject of an individual-level predicate(which is a predicate expressing a more or less permanent property, as opposed
to a transient property). In his theory, this claim amounts to saying that gaellipsis is allowed only inside V0 , as the subject of an unergative predicate andthe subject of an individual-level predicate are assumed to be realized outside V0
whereas the subject of an unaccusative predicate and the subject of a stage-level
predicate are assumed to be realized inside V0 .
Let me first examine whether it is really impossible to drop ga when it marks
the subject of an unergative predicate. It turns out that counterexamples tothis claim can be found in the previous literature; sentence (22), in which thesubject of the verb happyô suru ‘make a presentation’ (or suru ‘do’ alone, if
happyô is not to be regarded as part of the verb) appears without ga, is one
such example.
(22) (from Niwa (1989))
Kondo
Gengogakkai
deYamada sanga/∅shortly
Linguistic Society meeting
inst
Yamada sannom
happyô surundatte.
make a presentation-pres nml they say‘They say that Yamada san is going to make a presentation at the next
Linguistic Society meeting.’
The claim that it is impossible to drop ga when it marks the subject of anindividual-level predicate is also incorrect, as shown by the following example.
(23) a. Komaru
yonâ,[mado ga/∅ chı̂sakattara].
have a problem-pres am I right [window nom small-prov]‘We’ll have a problem, won’t we—if the window is small.’b. Komaru
yonâ,[sono gakusei ga/∅ nihonjin
have a problem-pres am I right [that student nom Japanesedattara].
cop.prov]‘We’ll have a problem, won’t we—if that student is a Japanese.’(23a) and (23b) both involve ellipsis of ga that marks the subject of anindividual-level predicate, and they are both acceptable, in contradiction to
Tateishi’s claim. The following pair of sentences constitute a minimal pair, one
involving a stage-level predicate ôi ‘be present in great numbers’ and the other
involving an individual-level predicate yasashii ‘be kind’; they both turn out tobe unacceptable, again in contradiction to Tateishi’s claim that there is a contrast between the two types of verb. (The 4-tuples following these two examples
represent the acceptability judgments by the four linguists I consulted.)9

(24) a. Tôkyô eittesaisho ni kizuita
no wa, [furôsha
Tokyo loc go-ger first dat notice-past nml top [homeless person
ga/?*∅ ôi]koto.
nom be present in great numbers-pres] nml‘The first thing I noticed when I got to Tokyo was that homeless people
are present in great numbers.’ <0, 1, 3, 0>
b. Tôkyô eittesaisho ni kizuita
no wa, [furôsha
Tokyo loc go-ger first dat notice-past nml top [homeless person
ga/?*∅ yasashii]koto.
nom be kind-pres] nml‘The first thing I noticed when I got to Tokyo was that homeless people
are kind.’ <0, 0, 4, 0>
Tateishi’s claim that ga cannot be dropped when it marks the subject of anindividual-level predicate is based on the following one example.
(25) Onna ga/?*∅ utsukushii.
woman nom beautiful-pres‘Women are beautiful.’This sentence is expected to be unacceptable for independent reasons, and therefore its unacceptability does not justify Tateishi’s view. The subject NP in
this sentence is assigned a so-called exhaustive-listing interpretation, because
the subject of an individual-level predicate is obligatorily given an exhaustivelisting interpretation when it heads a matrix clause (see Kuno (1973)); in otherwords, this sentence means “It is women that are beautiful,” not simply “Womenare beautiful.” Thus, given Tsutsui’s CPER2, the nominative case particle inthis example is expected not to be omissible, regardless of whether there is aconstraint that prevents a nominative case particle marking the subject of anindividual-level predicate from being dropped.
There are some examples, however, that suggest that the first of his claims is
not off the mark. Consider the following examples, which constitute a minimal
pair, (26) having a verb detekita, which can be interpreted as an unaccusative
verb and (27) having a verb donatta, which can only be interpreted as an unergative verb. The verb donatta ‘swear-past’ can be said to be unergative because
one cannot swear unless he or she intends to swear; on the other hand, it canbe said that the verb detekita ‘come out-past’ can be interpreted as an unaccusative verb because one can come out of a building, etc. even if one does notintend to, for instance if he or she is on a moving sidewalk.
(26) — Dô shitano?
how do-past nml‘What happened?’10— Ima,hennahito ga/?∅ detekitano.
just now strange cop.attr person nom come out-past nml‘A strange person came out just now.’<17, 34, 22, 8> (<11, 29, 21, 6>+<6, 5, 1, 2>)(27) — Dô shitano?
how do-past nml‘What happened?’— Ima,
hennahito ga/?*∅ donattano.
just now strange cop.attr person nom swear-past nml‘A strange person swore just now.’<5, 9, 39, 28> (<5, 6, 32, 24>+<0, 3, 7, 4>)
The 4-tuples following the glosses in examples (26) and (27) (and (37a), (37b),and (38) below) are the results of the questionnaire survey that I did in 1997,
in which I obtained acceptability judgments from 67 non-linguists (students at
Numazu Kôgyô Kôtô Senmon Gakkô)2 and 14 linguists (graduate students atTôkyô Daigaku). The first 4-tuple represents the overall results, whereas thetwo parenthesized 4-tuples show the non-linguists’ responses and the linguists’responses respectively. In the 4-tuples based on this 1997 survey, the fourth
number represents the number of people who felt that the sentence becomes“extremely unnatural” when the nominative case particle is elided; as I statedearlier, in the 4-tuples based on my 1994 survey, the fourth number represents
the number of people who felt that the sentence becomes “incomprehensible”
when the nominative case particle is elided.
My interpretation of the facts shown in (26) and (27) is that ga-ellipsis is
acceptable in the second sentence of (26), but not in the second sentence of (27).
If this interpretation is right, then it means that there are cases where an unaccusative predicate appears to allow ga-ellipsis more readily than an unergative
predicate. The fact that the number of speakers who found the particle ellipsis
in the second sentence in (26) slightly unnatural was greater than the numberof speakers who found it perfect is something of an embarrassment, but I wish
to note the following three observations as support for my interpretation. First,
the majority of respondents felt that the particle ellipsis in the second sentencein (26) is either perfect or only slightly unnatural. Second, the number of linguists who found the ellipsis perfect was greater than the number of linguists
who found it slightly unnatural. And third, a sentence involving ga-ellipsis isalways judged to be slightly unnatural by a significant percentage of speakers
even when it is judged to be perfect by the majority of speakers (see (1), (36),etc.).

11

3.3

Summary

To summarize, we have reviewed two previous analyses of ga-ellipsis, and haveconfirmed the following observations.
(28) a. The particle cannot be dropped in a formal register.
CPER1)(Tsutsui’sb. The particle cannot be dropped when it marks an NP that receives an
exhaustive-listing interpretation. (Tsutsui’s CPER2)
c. The particle cannot be dropped when it marks an unaccented monosyllabic noun. (Tsutsui’s CPER4, modified)d. The particle is harder to drop when the particle is not adjacent to a
predicate. (The second half of Tsutsui’s GER1)
e. The particle is harder to drop when it marks an agentive NP. (Tateishi
and Kageyama)
I will have nothing more to say about (28a) and (28c). (28b), (28d), and (28e)will be the central concern of the remainder of this article. I will argue thatthese three facts are consequences of a single constraint on ga-ellipsis, which I
will call the Antifocus Constraint.

4

The Antifocus Constraint

In this section, I will argue that ga-ellipsis is subject to the following constraint,
which I would like to see as a generalized and refined variant of Tsutsui’s CPER2.
(29) The Antifocus Constraint:
A nominative case particle cannot be dropped when a string immediately
preceding it is focused.
In stating the Antifocus Constraint, I am using the term focus in roughly thesame way that Rooth (1992) does (see 5.2 below for a difference between Rooth’s
conception of focus and mine). Simply put, an expression is said to be focused
when the expression is understood as contrasting with some other object(s) of
the same type. The objects that the expression is interpreted as contrastingwith are usually supplied by the context. Consider the example shown in (30).
(30) A, [[+F] Tarô] ga soba o tabeta!
‘Wow, Tarô ate the noodles!’The subject NP Tarô is focused in this example; in other words, the expression
Tarô is understood as contrasting with some other object(s) of the same type.
12

The sentence alone does not make it clear what it is that Tarô is being contrasted
with. Tarô might be understood as contrasting with Hanako, yielding a reading
which would be felicitous if the speaker had been expecting Hanako to eat
noodles and was surprised to see Tarô eating them. Tarô might be understoodas contrasting with ‘nobody’, yielding a reading which would be felicitous if the
speaker had been expecting nobody to eat the noodles and was surprised to see
Tarô eating them.
The Antifocus Constraint captures everything that Tsutsui’s CPER2 captures, because an exhaustive-listing interpretation is a type of contrastive interpretation. In general, an exhaustive-listing interpretation is a contrastive
interpretation in which the expression being focused is understood as contrasting with everything else. For instance, in (15), the subject NP, which refers to
the speaker, is understood as contrasting with everyone other than the speaker,
thus giving rise to an exhaustive-listing interpretation. The contrast between(31) and (32) below is likewise captured by the Antifocus Constraint; in example (32), the noun phrase oyu ‘hot water’ is understood as contrasting witheverything other than hot water.
(31) [Koko kara oyu
ga/∅ deru]
no shitteta?
[here from hot water nom come out-pres] nml know-ger-be.past‘Did you know that hot water comes out of this?’ <19, 9, 1, 0>(32) Koko kara deru
nowa mizu jaa
naihere from come out-pres nml top water inst.top be.neg-presyo.
Koko kara wa [oyuga/?*∅ deru]n
I tell you here from top [hot water nom
come out-pres] nml
dayo.
cop.pres I tell you‘What comes out of this is not cold water. Hot water comes out of this.’<1, 8, 16, 4>
The Antifocus Constraint is not equivalent to Tsutsui’s CPER2. There arecases that are accounted for by the Antifocus Constraint but not by CPER2.
Consider the following example.
(33) Tarô dake ga kita
n
jâ
nai
yo.
[Tarô
Tarô only nom come-past nml inst.top be.neg-pres I tell you [Tarô
to Jirô to Hanako ga/?*∅] kitandayo.
and Jirô and Hanako nom] come-past nml cop.pres I tell you‘It’s not the case that only Tarô came. Tarô, Jirô, and Hanako all came.’
In (33), the subject NP of the second sentence, Tarô to Jirô to Hanako ‘Tarô,
Jirô, and Hanako’, is understood as contrasting with the subject NP of the first
sentence, Tarô dake ‘only Tarô’, thus creating a situation in which ga-ellipsis is13

prohibited by the Antifocus Constraint. Note that CPER2 does not prohibit gaellipsis in this example. What the second sentence in (33) asserts is not that noone other than the three people mentioned came; the sentence can be true evenin a situation where more than three people came to the contextually specified
place. What the second sentence in (33) does assert is that, contrary to theaddressee’s belief, Jirô and Hanako, as well as Tarô, came to the contextuallyspecified place. (34) is another example that can be captured by the Antifocus
Constraint but not by CPER2.
(34) (from Tsutsui (1983))
Boku wa [sake no hô ga/?*∅] ii
desu.
I
top [sake gen side nom] good-pres cop.pres‘I prefer sake.’In (34), sake is being contrasted only with some other, contextually specified
drink; the sentence does not assert that the speaker dislikes every drink otherthan sake. Thus the low acceptability of ga-ellipsis in this example is not accounted for by CPER2, although it is accounted for by the Antifocus Constraint.
The following contrast is also explained by the Antifocus Constraint, but notby CPER2.
(35) Konna tokoro kara nani ga/?*∅ detekuru
kayo.
such place from what nom come out-pres let me ask you‘Let me ask you, what could possibly come out of something like this?’<1, 2, 9, 17>(36) Nani ga/∅ detekita?
what nom come out-past‘What has come out of it?’ <14, 10, 4, 1>(36) is a garden-variety wh-question, whereas (35) is a rhetorical question andin effect asserts that nothing could possibly come out of ‘this’. There is nosense in which the nominative NP in (35) can be said to receive an exhaustivelisting interpretation, and thus the low acceptability of particle ellipsis in thisexample cannot be attributed to CPER2. The Antifocus Constraint, on theother hand, does capture the contrast. (36) does not violate the Antifocus
Constraint, because the nominative NP in this example is not being contasted
with anything. On the other hand, the subject NP in (35) is being contrasted;in uttering this rhetorical question, the speaker is (i) expressing his or her belief
that nothing could possibly come out of ‘this’, (ii) noting the addressee’s belief
that something (as opposed to ‘nothing’) comes out of ‘this’, and (iii) challenging
the addressee to tell him or her for which x it is the case that x (as opposedto ‘nothing’) comes out of ‘this’. If this semantic analysis is correct, then thesubject NP in (35) is being contrasted with ‘nothing’, and is expected not to14

allow ga-ellipsis. The impossibility of particle ellipsis in (2) receives a similar
explanation in terms of the Antifocus Constraint. In uttering (2), the speakeris (i) noting the addressee’s belief that he or she has nothing left, and (ii)asserting that the addressee actually has next year, as opposed to ‘nothing’.
If this semantic analysis is correct, the nominative NP in this example is bydefinition focused, and expected not to allow ga-ellipsis. Again, it is not possible
to account for this example in terms of CPER2, as the speaker of this sentence
is obviously not saying that the addressee has nothing but next year.
There is one respect in which the scope of the Antifocus Constraint is narrower than that of CPER2. While CPER2 is intended to apply to all types ofparticle ellipsis, the Antifocus Constraint is intended to apply only to ellipsis of
ga. This restriction is motivated by examples like the following.
(37) a. Igirisu-jin ga yakyû o/∅ yaru
no, hajimete
mita.
Brit
nom baseball acc do-pres nml for the first time see-past‘This is the first time I see Brits play baseball.’<69, 8, 3, 1> (<56, 7, 3, 1>+<13, 1, 0, 0>)b. Kuriketto oyaru
no wa Amerika-jin jâ
nakutecricketacc do-pres nml top American inst.top be.neg-ger
Igirisu-jin dayo.
Amerika-jin wa [yakyû
o/?∅
Brit
cop.pres I tell you American
top [baseball acc
yaru]
n
da
yo.
do-pres] nml cop.pres I tell you‘It is not Americans but Brits that play cricket. Americans play baseball .’<25, 37, 13, 6> (<22, 31, 11, 3>+<3, 6, 2, 3>)
The noun phrase yakyû is focused in (37b), but ellipsis of o is acceptable in there,
as it is in (37a), where that same noun phrase appears unfocused. The resultof the questionnaire survey indicates that ellipsis of o is slightly less acceptablein (37b) than in (37a), but the majority of the respondents felt that the ellipsis
is either perfect or only slightly unnatural.

5

Focus and intonation

In this section, I will first argue in 5.1 that the fact noted in (28e) is a consequence of the Antifocus Constraint.3 Then, after precisely formulating the
proposed theory in 5.2, I will argue in 5.3 that the fact noted in (28d) is also a
consequence of the Antifocus Constraint.

15

5.1

The contrast between unergatives and unaccusatives

I submit that the second sentence in (26), which is headed by an unaccusative
verb, constitutes a single focus, whereas the second sentence in (27), which isheaded by an unergative verb, does not constitute a single focus but instead
is composed of two foci, a focused subject and a focused verb. If the second
sentence in (26) constitutes a single focus, that is, if the sentence as a wholeis focused but neither the subject nor the verb is individually focused, thenthe sentence does not violate the Antifocus Constraint. On the other hand, if
the second sentence in (27) is composed of two foci, that is, if the subject andthe verb in this sentence are both individually focused, then the sentence does
violate the Antifocus Constraint. Given the definition of focus that I statedin the previous section, what I am suggesting here amounts to saying that thesecond sentence in (26) contrasts the event of a strange person coming out withsome other type of event (as in “<a strange person came out> (as opposed to<nothing was happening> etc.”) and that the second sentence in (27) contrasts
a strange person with some other type of person and the action of swearing withsome other type of action (as in “<a strange person> (as opposed to <a highschool student> etc.) <swore> (as opposed to <walked away> etc.)”).
This line of analysis is supported by the following two observations.
First, when put in a context where the subject NP clearly does not need to
be focused, a sentence like the second sentence in (27), which I will henceforthrefer to as an unergative sentence, allows ga-ellipsis as readily as a sentence likethe second sentence in (26), which I will henceforth refer to as an unaccusative
sentence. Consider the following example, in which the same unergative verb
used in the second sentence of (27) is used. Notice that the noun phrase ano
hito here cannot be interpreted as a bare topic even when it is not accompaniedby the nominative case particle; bare topics are not allowed in this environment,
as shown in (4) above.
(38) Dôshite na
no kanâ,[ano hito ga/?∅ donatta]no.
why
cop.attr nml I wonder [that person nom swear-past] nml‘I wonder why it was that that person swore.’<18, 26, 21, 16> (<15, 19, 18, 15>+<3, 7, 3, 1>)
The result of the questionnaire survey, shown after the gloss, indicates that gaellipsis in this sentence is roughly as acceptable as that in the second sentenceof (26), which is headed by an unaccusative verb. This is an expected result, inthe proposed account. When a speaker utters the indefinite subject NP (hen na
hito ‘a strange person’) of the second sentence of (27), he or she is singling out
a specific unfamiliar individual out of the set of individuals that he or she could
have chosen to talk about, inevitably contrasting that individual with the otherindividuals that he or she could have singled out instead. On the other hand,when a speaker utters the sentence in (38), he or she is not necessarily singlingout the individual referred to by the subject NP ano hito ‘that person’. The
16

individual referred to by the definite NP could have already been singled out
when the sentence is uttered; the speaker’s attention could have already been
focused on this particular individual, in which case the speaker would see noneed to contrast that individual with any other individual.4 Thus the sentencein (38) is correctly expected to be acceptable, on the assumption that what rulesout the second sentence in (27) is the Antifocus Constraint.
The second observation that supports the proposed analysis is that anunergative sentence and an unaccusative sentence have different prosodic patterns, which arguably reflect the different patterns of focus distribution in the
two types of sentence. When an unaccusative sentence is used as a reply to aquestion such as “What happened?”, only the subject receives prosodic prominence; on the other hand, when an unergative sentence is used as a reply tosuch a question, both the subject and the verb receive prosodic prominence.
This is illustrated by the following examples, in which (39b) and (39c) are bothintended to be answers to the question in (39a). As indicated by capitalization,
only the subject is prosodically prominent in (39b), whereas both the subject
and the predicate are prosodically prominent in (39c).
(39) a. DÔ shita
n
desu
ka?
how do-past nml cop.pres q‘What happened?’b. HEN na hito ga/∅ detekita n desu. ‘A strange person came out.’c. HEN na hito ga/?*∅ DONATTA n desu. ‘A strange person swore.’
Let me be clearer about what I mean by the term prosodically prominent. I
say that an expression in a Japanese sentence is prosodically prominent (or it
receives prosodic prominence) when (i) either the initial mora of the expression
has audibly undergone Initial Lowering (i.e., it is pronounced audibly lower inpitch than the second mora)5 or the initial mora of the expression is accented6
and hence incapable of undergoing Initial Lowering and (ii) none of the hightones associated with the expression is downstepped (i.e., pronounced lower inpitch than the preceding high tone)7 or otherwise subdued. This definition isadmittedly somewhat vague, but it determines reasonably clearly which words
in a given sentence are prosodically prominent, as long as we are dealing withrelatively short sentences such as (39b) and (39c). According to this definition,(39b) has only one prosodically prominent word while (39c) has two, as indicated. The verb in (39b) is not prosodically prominent; the high tone associatedwith the initial mora of the verb in (39b), detekita, is downstepped, that is, pronounced audibly lower in pitch than the preceding high tone, which is realizedon the subject NP. On the other hand, the verb in (39c) is prosodically prominent; the initial mora of the verb in (39c), donatta, audibly undergoes Initial
Lowering, and the high tone associated with the second mora of the verb is notdownstepped and is pronounced as high in pitch as the preceding high tone,
17

which is realized on the subject NP. This contrast can be taken to indicatethat the sentence as a whole is being focused as a single unit in (39b) while
the subject and the verb are both individually being focused in (39c); (39b) has
only one prosodically prominent expression presumably because there is only
one focus in the sentence, and (39c) has two prosodically prominent expressions
presumably because there are two foci in the sentence.
Am I justified in assuming that there is a one-to-one correspondence between
foci and prosodic prominences? It is my contention that I am. Observe firstthat an expression that is clearly focused indeed receives prosodic prominencein the sense defined above and that an expression that is clearly not focusedindeed does not receive prosodic prominence.
(40) a. —DONNA hito ga detekita n desu ka? ‘What kind of person came
out?’
—HEN na hito ga detekita n desu. ‘A strange person came out.’
b. —DONNA hito ga donatta n desu ka? ‘What kind of person swore?’—HEN na hito ga donatta n desu. ‘A strange person swore.’c. —Ano hito ga NANI o shita n desu ka? ‘What did that person do?’—Ano hito ga DETEKITA n desu. ‘That person came out.’d. —Ano hito ga NANI o shita n desu ka? ‘What did that person do?’—Ano hito ga DONATTA n desu. ‘That person swore.’
In the second sentences of (40a) and (40b), the subject NPs provide the information sought by the preceding wh-questions and hence are focused, while theverbs are not focused. Accordingly, the verbs are not prosodically prominent
in these sentences; the high tone on the verb detekita in (40a) and the hightone on the verb donatta in (40b) are both clearly downstepped. In the second
sentences of (40c) and (40d), on the other hand, the verbs provide the information sought by the preceding wh-questions and hence are focused. Accordingly,
the verbs are prosodically prominent in these examples; the high tone associated with the first mora of the verb detekita in (40c) is not downstepped orotherwise subdued, the first mora of the verb donatta in (40d) audibly undergoes Initial Lowering, and the high tone associated with the second mora of theverb in (40d) is not downstepped or otherwise subdued. Thus, as far as these
simple examples are concerned, there seems to be a straightforward one-to-one
correspondence between foci and prosodic prominences.
Next, I would like to examine Culicover and Rochemont’s (1983) interpretation and Selkirk’s (1995) interpretation of the English counterpart of (39b) and(39c). They are both incompatible with my interpretation, and if one of themis correct, then the contrast between (39b) and (39c) cannot be said to provide
any support for my theory of ga-ellipsis. It turns out that there are reasons toprefer my interpretation over the alternatives.
18

In Culicover and Rochemont’s (1983) view, the English counterpart of asentence like (39b) (for example The HOUSE is on fire) does not constitutea single focus. In their view, what is being focused in a sentence of this type
is not the sentence as a whole but the subject NP. Apart from its semantic
implausibility, there is an obvious problem in applying this interpretation to
the relevant Japanese examples. If their interpretation were to be applied tothe sentence in (39b), for instance, the sentence is expected not to allow gaellipsis, due to the Antifocus Constraint, when the fact is that the sentence
does allow ga-ellipsis. Thus Culicover and Rochemont’s interpretation of thecorresponding English facts cannot be profitably applied to the Japanese facts
at hand.
In Selkirk’s (1995) view, the English counterpart of a sentence like (39b)constitutes a single focus, as I claim it does, but the English counterpart ofa sentence like (39c) (for example A proFESSor SWORE ), which I claim iscomposed of two foci, optionally constitutes a single focus as well. Her theory
is stated as in (41)–(43), and is coupled with the assumption that the subjectof an unaccusative verb is an internal argument of the verb while the subject ofan unergative verb is not. Note that, when an English expression is said to beaccented , it means that the expression is associated with a certain pronounced
pitch movement, usually a rise followed by a fall (see Ladd (1996) for a detailed
discussion of the notion of accent).
(41) An accented word is F-marked.
(42) a. F-marking of the head of a phrase licenses the F-marking of the phrase.
b. F-marking of an internal argument of a head licenses the F-marking of
the head.
c. F-marking of the antecedent of a trace left by NP- or wh-movement
licenses the F-marking of the trace.
(43) a. . . . the Focus of a sentence (FOC) is defined as an F-marked constituent
not dominated by any other F-marked constituent.
b. . . . F-marked constituents which are not a Focus are interpreted as new
in the discourse, while a constituent without F-marking is interpreted
as given.
Let us see how her theory applies to the following two examples, taken from
Faber (1987).
(44) (from Faber (1987))
a. It’s just the SECretary TYPing.
19

b. It’s just the DOOR slamming.
In (44a), the noun secretary and the verb typing are accented and hence Fmarked, due to (41). The noun phrase the secretary is optionally F-marked, due
to the first clause of (42). The sentence the secretary typing is also optionally
F-marked, due to the first clause of (42). If the sentence the secretary typing
is F-marked, then the subject NP the secretary cannot be the Focus of thesentence, due to the first clause of (43). If the noun phrase the secretary is Fmarked but the sentence the secretary typing is not F-marked, then the subject
NP can be the Focus of the sentence. In (44b), the noun door is accented andhence F-marked, due to (41). The verb slamming, which is an unaccusative
verb, is optionally F-marked, due to the second clause of (42), and if it is Fmarked, the sentence the door slamming in turn is optionally F-marked, due tothe first clause of (42). If the sentence the door slamming is F-marked, thenthe subject NP the door cannot be the Focus of the sentence, due to the firstclause of (43). If the sentence is not F-marked, then the subject NP can be the
Focus of the sentence. Notice that, in Selkirk’s analysis, the subject NP of asentence like (44a) and the subject NP of a sentence like (44b) have the same
status: they are both optionally interpreted as new in the discourse, due to thefirst clause of (41) and the second clause of (43), and they may or may not beinterpreted as the Foci of the respective sentences, depending on whether the S
nodes dominating those NPs are F-marked. Thus, if Selkirk’s analysis is correct,
then there will be no way for the Antifocus Constraint to be relevant for thecontrast between unaccusative sentences and unergative sentences.
Selkirk’s failure to state exactly what she means by the term Focus makes her
theory difficult to evaluate. There are, however, at least two reasons to be skeptical about her theory. First, her theory predicts that, if a sentence is composedof a subject NP and a verb and the verb but not the subject NP is accented(as in The door SLAMMed ), the sentence as a whole can still be interpreted
as constituting a single focus. This seems to be the wrong prediction, at least
if the term focus is interpreted in one of the standard ways (Hirotani (1997)).
Second, Selkirk’s theory predicts that, as far as focus distribution is concerned,
the set of interpretations that can be given to an unaccusative sentence whose
subject and whose verb are both accented (e.g. The DOOR SLAMMed ) is asubset of the interpretations that can be given to the corresponding sentence inwhich only the subject is accented (e.g. The DOOR slammed ). This is a false
prediction. The former type of sentence has an interpretation in which the subject NP and the verb are individually focused (in the sense that I defined earlier
in this article), an interpretation that the latter type of sentence does not have.
My theory of the interaction between focus and prosodic prominence, which will
be given a precise formulation in the next subsection, does not encounter eitherof these difficulties.
Thus there are some reasons to prefer my interpretation over Culicoverand Rochemont’s and Selkirk’s interpretations. Therefore the contrast between
20

(39b) and (39c) does provide support for my theory of ga-ellipsis.

5.2

A more precise formulation of the theory

It is obviously not enough to state that there is a one-to-one correspondence
between foci and prosodic prominences. A more precise formulation of mytheory is given in (45) and (46).
(45) a. A string can be focused only when (i) the string is immediately preceded by and immediately followed by an f-boundary and (ii) there isno f-boundary inside the string.
b. When a string is focused, the leftmost word in that string becomesprosodically prominent.
(46) a. There are f-boundaries at the beginning and the end of an utterance.
b. An f-boundary can be optionally inserted anywhere.
c. There is an f-boundary between a predicate and its subject except
when (i) the clause expresses the existence, the appearance, or thearrival of the denotation of the subject and (ii) there is no f-boundary
inside the predicate.
The proposed analysis is based on the view that what is focused as a single
unit is not necessarily a morphosyntacic constituent, a view shared by Gussenhoven (1983, 391), who defines the notion of focus domain as “one or moreconstituents whose [+focus] status can be signalled by a single accent,” and by
Pierrehumbert and Beckman (1988, 109), who speculates that “the accentualphrase, rather than the word, is the minimal domain for focus in Japanese,”
where the term accentual phrase refers to a prosodic, rather than morphosyntactic, constituent. This view receives support from examples like (47) and (48).
In the latter half of (47), the string kyanpasu e itta is being contrasted with theearlier string konpyûta o tsukatta, and in the latter half of (48), the string koe gakikoeta is being contrasted with the earlier string kao ga mieta. None of thesefour strings form syntactic constituents.
(47) [Sutanfôdo no KONPYÛTA otsukatta] koto wa aru
kedo,[Stanford gen computeracc use-past] nml top exist-pres though[Sutanfôdo no KYANPASU e
itta]koto wa NAI.
[Stanford gen campus
loc go-past] nml top exist.neg-pres‘I’ve used a computer of Stanford University before, but I’ve never <visitedthe campus> (as opposed to <used a computer>) of Stanford.’

21

(48) [Kanojo
no KAO ga/∅ mieta]
koto wa aru[that woman gen face nom can be seen-past] nml top exist-preskedo,[kanojono
KOE ga/∅ kikoeta]
koto wathough [that woman gen voice nom can be heard-past] nml top
ICHIDO mo nai.
onceeven exist.neg-pres‘There has been a situation in which that woman’s face was seen, butthere’s never been a situation in which that woman’s <voice was heard>(as opposed to <face was seen>).’The proposed theory entails that something that is not assigned a semanticinterpretation can nevertheless be focused as a single unit, as a string is not assigned a semantic interpretation unless it forms a morphosyntactic constituent.
This feature of the proposed theory, which makes it incompatible with Rooth’s(1992) theory of focus semantics, enables us to make sense of examples like thefollowing.
(49) Boku GA oidashita
n
desu.
I
nom drive out-past nml cop.pres‘I drove him/her/them out; it’s not the case that he/she/they drove meout.’
In this example, a nominative case particle ga, which arguably does not havesemantic content, is focused. It seems to be the case that the particle is being
contrasted with other particles such as the accusative case particle o. This typeof example cannot be dealt with in Rooth’s theory, where it is claimed that it is
not a focused expression itself but the denotation of a focused expression thatis interpreted as contrasting with some other object(s) of the same type.
Another point to note in connection with the proposed theory is that it does
not make reference to the distinction between unaccusative verbs and unergative
verbs or, for that matter, to the distinction between individual-level predicatesand stage-level predicates. The theory instead makes reference to the distinction
between clauses that express the existence, the appearance, or the arrival ofthe denotations of the subject NPs and clauses that do not. It turns out tobe this distinction, and not the distinction between unaccusative verbs andunergative verbs or the distinction between individual-level predicates and stagelevel predicates, that focus distribution is sensitive to. Consider the following
examples.
(50) (from Kori (1992))
a. Sakki
TSUKI ga KAKURETA.
a moment ago the moon nom go out of sight-past‘The moon went out of sight a moment ago.’22

b. Sakki
TSUKI ga mieta.
a moment ago the moon nom come in sight-past‘The moon came into sight a moment ago.’(51) (adapted from Hirotani (1997))
a. ME ga AKAI nê. ‘Your eyes are red, isn’t it?’b. ME ga KUROI nê. ‘Your eyes are black, isn’t it?’(52) —Gengo-gakkai de NANI ga atta? ‘What happened at the LinguisticSociety meeting?’—YAMADA SAN ga happyô shita yo. ‘Yamada san made a presentation.’(50a) and (50b) are both headed by an unaccusative verb, but the verb is prosodically prominent only in (50a). (51a) is headed by a stage-level predicate while(51b) is headed by an individual-level predicate, but the two sentences share thesame intonational pattern in which the subject and the verb are both prosodically prominent. The second sentence in (52) is headed by an unergative verb,
just like (27), but its verb is not prosodically prominent. All these examples
are correctly accounted for in the proposed account. (50a) does not express theexistence, the appearance, or the arrival of the moon, so an f-boundary must
be inserted between the subject and the verb, preventing the whole clause fromfunctioning as a single focus. (50b), on the other hand, expresses the appearance of the moon in the sky, and hence an f-boundary does not have to beinserted between the subject and the verb. If no f-boundary is inserted between
the subject and the verb, the whole clause can be focused as a single unit bymaking the first word of the clause prosodically prominent. Neither (51a) nor(51b) expresses the existence, the appearance, or the arrival of the denotation of
the subject, so these sentences behave the same way that (50a) does. The second sentence in (52) expresses the appearance of Yamada san at the LinguisticSociety meeting, so it behaves the same way that (50b) does.

5.3

Word order

In this subsection, I will argue that the fact noted in (28d) (namely the fact that,as shown in (19), ga is harder to drop when it is not adjacent to a predicate) is
also a consequence of the Antifocus Constraint.
The key component of the proposed account is the second clause of (46c),
which requires there to be an f-boundary between a predicate and its subject
when there is an f-boundary inside the predicate. Let us see how this allows
us to explain the contrast between (19a) and (19b), which are reproduced in aslightly different form as (53a) and (53b) below.

23(53) a. KIMI ate
ni GAKKÔ e
TEGAMI ∅ todoita
yo.
you address dat school
loc letter
arrive-past I tell you
b.?KIMI ate
ni TEGAMI ∅ gakkô etodoitayo.
you address dat letterschool loc arrive-past I tell you
The second clause of (46c) is irrelevant to (53a), as there is only one wordin the predicate here and there cannot be an f-boundary inside a word. In
the case of example (53b), on the other hand, the second clause of (46c), in
conjunction with the Antifocus Constraint, has the effect of ensuring that noword following the subject NP receives prosodic prominence. If the noun gakkô
were prosodically prominent, it would mean that the subject and the predicate inthis sentence were individually focused, and the sentence would be ruled out by
the Antifocus Constraint. If any of the words following gakkô were prosodicallyprominent, it would mean that there was an f-boundary inside the predicate,
and an f-boundary would be obligatorily inserted immediately after the subject
NP, resulting in a violation of the Antifocus Constraint. Now, a sentence tends
to become awkward when there is a long series of words that are not prosodicallyprominent, as evidenced by the examples in (54).
(54) a.?KANOJO no konpyûta no disupurê no ue no hokori
her
gen computer gen display gen top gen dust
‘the dust on the top of her computer’s display’b. KANOJO no konpyûta no DISPURÊ no ue no hokori
her
gen computer gen display
gen top gen dust
Poser (1984, 155) and Kubozono (1993, 164) are referring to the same phenomenon, when they state that there is a tendency to avoid constructing excessively large minor phrases;8 what they call a minor phrase is, roughly speaking,a sequence of words in which only the first word is prosodically prominent.9
Whatever the ultimate reason for the unnaturalness of sentences like (54a) turns
out to be, the slight awkwardness of (53b) can now be seen as a consequence ofthe fact that the second clause of (46c), together with the Antifocus Constraint,
forces there to be an excessively long sequence of words that are not prosodicallyprominent.
The second clause of (46c) is independently motivated by an example likethe following.
(55) ?*KIMI ate
ni TEGAMI ∅ gakkô e
TODOITA yo.
you address dat letterschool loc arrive-past I tell you
This example is identical to (53b), except that the verb is prosodically prominent in this example. Given the second clause of (46c), the low acceptability of24this example is expected, as the clause requires there to be an f-boundary immediately after the subject NP, yielding a violation of the Antifocus Constraint.
Without the second clause of (46c), the prosodic prominence on the noun tegami
could be taken to focus the string tegami gakkô e, and the low acceptability ofthis example would remain unaccounted for.
I would like to close this subsection with the speculation that the slight awkwardness of ga-ellipsis in examples like (26) and (38) might receive an essentially
identical explanation.

6

Summary

In this article, I have critically reviewed two previous analyses of ga-ellipsis(section 3), proposed a constraint that prohibits the nominative case particle
ga from being dropped when it marks a focused expression (section 4), andargued that the constraint accounts for two puzzling facts about ga-ellipsis thathave been reported in the literature, namely the fact that ga appears to beharder to drop when the particle marks an unergative subject and the fact thatga is harder to drop when it is not adjacent to a predicate (section 5). The
proposed theory was shown to have some implications for the general theory of
the interaction between focus and intonation (subsection 5.1).

25

NOTES∗
I would like to thank Toshikazu Kikuchi, who did a questionnaire survey
at Numazu Kôgyô Kôtô Senmon Gakkô for me in 1997. Without his help,
the empirical basis of this article would have been a lot shakier. An earlier
version of this paper was presented at Stanford University in 1997. I would liketo thank the audience there, in particular Joan Bresnan and Peter Sells, for
helpful comments.
1
Kageyama (1993) also claims that ga cannot be dropped when it marks
the subject of an unergative predicate.
2
The questionnaire survey at Numazu Kôgyô Kôtô Senmon Gakkô was infact carried out by Toshikazu Kikuchi.
3
The idea that the observation stated in (28e) might be reducible to the
Antifocus Constraint was first suggested to me by Masaki Sano (personal communication) in 1995.
4
The speaker could choose to contrast that individual with some other individual(s). When such a reading is intended, the sentence in (38) is unacceptable.
5
For information on Initial Lowering, see Pierrehumbert and Beckman(1988), Kubozono (1993), and the references cited there.
6Here, and throughout this article, when I say that a Japanese expression isaccented , what I mean is not that the expression is pronouced higher or louder
than usual but that the expression contains a mora that is lexically linked toa high tone. See Pierrehumbert and Beckman (1988) and Kubozono (1993) for
more information on this subject.
7
See Pierrehumbert and Beckman (1988) and Kubozono (1993) for detailed
discussion of downstep (which Pierrehumbert and Beckman refers to as catathesis.)
8
In fact, Kubozono (1993) claims that this is not the correct way to characterize the phenomenon in question. The present discussion is not affected bythis disagreement.
9
In fact, their definition of minor phrase is slightly different from what I
describe in the text, but the difference is irrelevant in the present context.

26

REFERENCES
Culicover, Peter W., and Michael Rochemont (1983) “Stress and focus in English,” Language 59, 123–165.
Faber, David (1987) “The accentuation of intransitive sentences in English,”
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