The anti-locality signature of quirks of subject extraction
Michael Yoshitaka ERLEWINE, National University of Singapore, mitcho@nus.edu.sg
Workshop on Quirks of Subject Extraction, August 20171

Anti-locality and subject extraction

One property that often distinguishes subjects from other arguments is their exceptionally high position in the clause, e.g. in Spec,TP. In the context of A-extraction, this meansthat subjects are exceptionally close to the target position of extraction, e.g. Spec,CP.
+ If an anti-locality constraint blocks movement that is “too short,”� this may
force subject extraction to proceed diﬀerently. This may result in an observablediﬀerence between subject vs non-subject extraction—a subject extraction “quirk.”(1)

Anti-locality may block movement from canonical subject position:
a. Movement from Spec,TP to Spec,CP may be “too short”:* ... [CP subject [TP...
⇥b. But movement to Spec,CP from lower may be long enough:X ... [CP non-subject [TP ... [ ...

For concreteness, here, I discuss (2), schematized in (3).
(2)

Spec-to-Spec Anti-Locality (Erlewine, 2016):
A-movement of a phrase from the Specifier of XP
must cross2 a maximal projection other than XP.

This logic makes a certain set of predictions.

(3)

YP
↵

Y

XP
t↵

X ···

For discussion at various stages, I thank especially David Pesetsky and Hadas Kotek.
�Diﬀerent authors have proposed diﬀerent anti-locality constraints:• Comp-to-Spec: Pesetsky and Torrego (2001) and Abels (2003) argue against movement from
Compl,XP to Spec,XP, which is not relevant for our discussions here. See also Kayne (2005).
• Spec-to-Adj: Saito and Murasugi (1999) argue against the adjunction of Spec,XP to XP.
• Saito and Murasugi (1999); Bošković (1994, 1997, 2005) propose that movement must cross at least
one phrase, which unifies Comp-to-Spec and Spec-to-Adj. See also Boeckx (2009).
• Spec-to-Spec: Erlewine (2016) specifically proposes the anti-locality constraint in (2).
• Grohmann (2003) proposes a ban against movement within certain “prolific domains.” Clausal
spines regularly have three such domains.
See Grohmann (2011) for a review of formulations from the 90’s and 2000’s.
�Movement from position ↵ to crosses if and only if dominates ↵ but does not dominate .
1

(4)The signature of quirks of subject extraction that are due to anti-locality:
Suppose a particular quirk Q canonically aﬀects the extraction of subjects.
If this is an anti-locality-driven behavior, we might observe:A

obviation of Q when additional material is added above the subject,Bapplicability of Q to non-subjects that are exceptionally high, andC

no correlation of Q with other subjecthood properties such as case.

A X ... [CP subject [XP ... [TP...

An additional projection makes movement from Spec,TP to Spec,CP grammatical,
allowing for the straightforward extraction of subjects from Spec,TP.
B* ... [CP non-subject [XP...
⇥If a particular non-subject is exceptionally high and close to the clause edge, thequirk may aﬀect such non-subjects too.

C

The anti-locality approach is purely configurational. (By itself,) it predicts no sensitivity to other subjecthood properties, such as being nominal, in a particularmorphological case, or having been in a local relationship with T/Subj, etc., incontrast to e.g. Pesetsky and Torrego (2001), Rizzi (2006), Deal (2017, yesterday).

Today: Three examples of subject/non-subject extraction asymmetries which exhibit
the properties A , B , C : anti-agreement eﬀects (§2), complementizer-trace eﬀects (§3),
Highest Subject Restrictions on resumption (§4).

2

Anti-agreement eﬀects

Anti-agreement refers to the disappearance of regular -agreement with an argument
which is A-extracted (Ouhalla, 1993). See Baier (2016) for a recent review.
Consider nominative agreement in Fiorentino, discussed in Brandi and Cordin (1989):(5)

Preverbal subjects agree with the auxiliary and preverbal clitic:
Le ragazze l’ hanno telefonato.
the girls
3�� has.3�� phoned‘The girls have phoned.’(Campos, 1997)(6)

No agreement with wh-fronted subjects:
Quanteragazze {*le hanno, Xgli ha}parlato con te?
How many girls
3�� has.3�� 3��� has.3��� spoken with you‘How many girls talked to you?’

Subject agreement is unaﬀected by non-subject extraction.
2

Brandi and Cordin (1989) relate the anti-agreement in (6) to the fact that postverbal
subjects—possible when the subject is focused (their fn. 6)—are also not agreed with:(7)

No agreement with postverbal subjects:{*Le hanno, XGli ha}telefonato delle ragazze.
3�� has.3�� 3��� has.3��� telephoned some girls‘Some girls have telephoned.’

Following Rizzi’s (1982) analysis of standard Italian, Brandi and Cordin (1989) proposethat subjects skip the Spec,TP position when wh-extracted. -agreement correlateswith movement to the canonical Spec,TP position:(8)

Anti-agreement due to anti-locality:
a. T agrees with the subject in Spec,TP:[TP subject •—• T [vP ...
...
b. Movement of subject from Spec,TP to Spec,CP is ungrammatical:* [CP subject C [TP•—• T ... [vP ...
...
⇥) movement too short!
c. Movement of subject to Spec,CP instead skips Spec,TP:
X[ subject C [...
CP
TP T(no agreement) ... [vP ...
) anti-agreement!

2.1 Obviation by negation and Ouhalla’s generalization A
Ouhalla (1993) notes that, in some languages, the addition of negation can obviate antiagreement: i.e. normal agreement with the extracted argument reappears.
(9)

Breton (Celtic):(Borsley and Stephens, 1989)
X
a. Petore paotred a {*lenn-ent, lenn-e} al levrioù?
which boys
C read-3��, read-3�� the books‘Which boys read the books?’b. Petore paotred ne {Xlenn-ent, *lenn-e} ket al levrioù?
which boys
��� read-3��, read-3��} ��� the books‘Which boys did not read the books?’

However, there are languages where negation does not aﬀect anti-agreement:(10)

Turkish:(Ouhalla, 1993, pp. 484, 500)
a. [RC hoca-yi
gör-en-(*ler)] öǧrenci-ler
lecturer-��� see-����-(*��) student-��
‘the students who saw the lecturer’b. [RC hoca-yi
gör- me -yen-(*ler)] öǧrenci-ler
lecturer-��� see-���-����-(*��) student-��
‘the students who did not see the lecturer’
3

(11)

Ouhalla’s (1993) Generalization:
The addition of negation obviates anti-agreement if and only if negation is syntactically higher than the agreement controller.

This generalization is supported by the eﬀects of two diﬀerent negators in Welsh, notdiscussed in Ouhalla 1993.� The Welsh copula has a special non-agreeing “relative”
form (sy be.���) used in subject extraction constructions.
(12)

Welsh (Celtic):(Borsley, Tallerman, and Willis, 2007, pp. 130–131)a.
Dinas hardd
yw
Caerdydd.
city beautiful be.����.3�� Cardiﬀ‘Cardiﬀ is a beautiful city.’�
b.
Caerdydd {Xsy,*yw}’n ddinas hardd.
Cardiﬀ
be.���, be.����.3�� ���� city
beautiful‘It’s CARDIFF that is a beautiful city.’

Welsh has two diﬀerent negators, na(d) and ddim, which diﬀer in structural height. Seee.g. Borsley et al. (2007, p. 79) for discussion.
(13)

Welsh subject wh-questions:(Borsley et al., 2007, pp. 139–140)
a. Low ddim negator (colloquial) ) non-agreeing copula:
Pwy syddim yn gwybod am y gaǧn adnabyddus hon?
who be.��� ��� ���� know.��� about the song well.known this‘Who doesn’t know about this well-known song?’b. High na(d) negator (literary) ) agreeing copula:Pwy nad yw’n gwybod am y gaǧn adnabyddus hon?
who ��� be.����.3�� ���� know.��� about the song well.known this‘Who doesn’t know about this well-known song?’c. Copula after high na(d) showing 3�� agreement:Pa
rai nad ydynt
yn addas?
which ones ��� be.����.3�� ���� suitable‘Which ones are not suitable?’+ Ouhalla’s Generalization (11) is predicted by the anti-locality approach to antiagreement (8), assuming the presence of negation reflects an additional projection.
X[

CP subject C [ ��� [TP•—• T ... [vP ...

...

As noted by Ouhalla (1993) and Baier (2017), this approach may not extend to all
languages with anti-agreement obviated by negation. In particular, Berber exhibits
agreement with postverbal subjects in their Spec,vP base position.
�I thank Miriam Nussbaum (p.c.) for discussion of Welsh.
�The yw form is also special in that it cooccurs with fronting of some constituent, as opposed to thedefault ����.3�� copula, mae. Example (13c) below shows that yw is 3�� and has a 3�� variant.
42.2 Absolutive anti-agreement B
In the languages above, I assume T agrees with transitive subjects and intransitive
subjects in Spec,TP, following Brandi and Cordin (1989) and discussion in Ouhalla (1993).
But the logic of anti-agreement (8) similarly applies to other sets of arguments in Spec,TP.
The verb in Karitiâna (Tupian; Brazil) agrees with intransitive subjects and transitive
objects (absolutive arguments). There is no agreement with transitive subjects.
(14)

Absolutive agreement alignment in Karitiâna (Storto, 2012):�
d. Y-pyr-ahoj-on
yn õwã.
a. Y-pyr-ahy-dnyn.
1��-A-laugh.at-���� 1sg child1��-A-drink-���� 1sg‘The child laughed at me.’‘I drank.’
e. A-pyr-ahoj-on
an õwã.
b. A-pyr-ahy-dnan.
2��-A-laugh.at-���� 2sg child2��-A-drink-���� 2sg‘The child laughed at you.’‘You drank.’
f. ; -Pyr-ahoj-on
i õwã.
c. ; -Pyr-ahy-dn i.
3-A-laugh.at-���� 3sg child
3-A-drink-���� 3sg‘The child laughed at him/her.’‘He/she drank.’

Storto (1997, 1998) proposes that absolutive arguments move to Spec,TP in Karitiâna,
i.e. that Karitiâna is a “raising ergative” language (Bittner and Hale, 1996a,b).
+ Karitiâna shows absolutive anti-agreement: Agreement does not change in transitive subject extraction (15). Intransitive subject extraction shows an invariant
marker i- (16) whereas object extraction shows an invariant marker ti- together withexceptional subject agreement (17).
(Examples from Storto, 1999)
(15)

(16)

Transitive subject extraction:(17)
Morã y-sokõ’i?
who 1��-tie.up‘Who tied me up?’
Intransitive subject extraction:
Mora-mon i-hyryp?
who-��� �-cry‘Who cried?’Object extraction:
a. ’Ep aj-ti-pasagngã-t ajxa.
trees 2��-��-count-���� 2pl‘TREES, you all are counting.’b. Mora-mon y-’it; -ti-oky-t?
what-��� my-father 3-��-kill-����
‘What did my father kill?’+ This too is explained if movement from Spec,TP to Spec,CP is too close, and absolutive extraction involves skipping Spec,TP. In (17), T cannot agree with the object
and instead cross-references the subject.
The anti-locality approach in (8) oﬀers a viable approach to (some) anti-agreementeﬀects and their obviation.
�A is an “assertion” marker, which appears to have a discourse function. See Storto (2012).
5

3Complementizer-trace eﬀects�

In many languages with optional complementizers, the null complementizer form must
be used when the local subject is extracted.� See Pesetsky (to appear) for a recent review.
(18)

The English that-trace eﬀect (Perlmutter, 1968):
a. What did he say [CP (that) Laura hid ]?
b. Who did he say [CP (*that)
hid the rutabaga]?

(19)

Levantine Arabic (Kenstowicz, 1983, 1989):
a. ’ayy fustaan Fariid kaal [CP (innu) l-bint ištarat]?
which dress Fariid said
that the-girl bought‘Which dress did Fariid say that the girl bought?’
b. ’ayy bint Fariid kaal [CP (*innu)
ištarat l-fustaan]
which girl Fariid said
thatbought the-dress‘Which girl did Fariid say bought the dress?’(20)

Swedish:(Boef and Franco, 2012)
a. mannen [RC (som) du hoppas [CP (att) Maria ska träﬀaimorgon]]man.the��� you hopethat Mary will meet
tomorrow‘the man that you hope Mary will meet tomorrow’b. mannen [RC (som) du hoppas [CP (*att)
kommer hit]].
man.the��� you hopethatcomes here
‘the man that you hope will come here’

What’s special about the null complementizer? Bošković (1997) and Ishii (2004) proposethat embedded clauses without overt complementizers are TPs. Here I similarly proposethat complementizer-less full clauses lack a distinct C layer, but are instead CTPs, headedby CT, which is a phase head.� (See also Erlewine (2017b) for a half-diﬀerent analysis.)(21)

Complementizer-trace eﬀects due to anti-locality:a. * ... [CPthat/innu/att [TP...
⇥b. X ... [CTP...

�The material in this section follows Erlewine (2017b), which in turn benefited from detailed comments
by Jamie Douglas and Yusuke Imanishi.
�There are also languages where a diﬀerent form of complementizer is used for local subject extraction,e.g. French que/qui (Perlmutter, 1968) or Nupe gànán/’án (Kandybowicz, 2006, 2009)—the latter exhibiting
obviation by high adverbs A . I do not discuss such cases here.
See e.g. Taraldsen (2002) for an analysis of French qui which is very close to Rizzi’s (1982) analysis for
Italian in (22/23) below, and is compatible with the overall approach here.
�I am hesitant to simply adopt the analysis that complementizer-less clauses are TPs with no phasehead. See Erlewine (2017b) for one argument against this. On CT vs separated C and T, see e.g. Martinović(2015); Erlewine (2017a); Aldridge (to appear). Alternatively, we could say that TP itself acts as the phaseboundary when it is not extended by a CP as in Bošković (2014).
6

3.1 Comp-trace eﬀects and inversion
As proposed by Rizzi (1982), null subject languages—which may have a weak EPP
requirement or where the EPP may be satisfied by an empty element (see e.g. Roberts,
2010, for discussion)—allow for subject extraction directly from a base position, without
moving through Spec,TP, and therefore do not exhibit comp-trace eﬀects.
(22)

No complementizer-trace eﬀect in Italian (Rizzi, 1982, p. 117):
Chi credi[CP che verrà
who believe.2��that will.come]?

‘Who do you believe will come?’(23)

No complementizer-trace eﬀects in null subject languages:
X ... [
che/... [TP ; ...
CP

If there is another way of satisfying the EPP, the subject can be extracted from its
predicate-internal position across an overt complementizer:(24)

Avoiding the comp-trace eﬀect by skipping Spec,TP (Rizzi and Shlonsky, 2007):a. * What do you think [CPthat [TPis [Predin the box]]]?
Xb.
What do you think [CPthat [TP there is [Predin the box]]]?

Note that Gilligan (1987) shows, with a 100-language sample, that the general availabilityof postverbal subjects (“inversion”) entails the lack of comp-trace eﬀects, but not the otherway around. Inversion base order as in Italian allows for the “skipping” derivation in(23), but this may not be the only way that a language avoids comp-trace violations.
3.2 Obviation by high adverbs A
Complementizer-trace eﬀects are famously obviated by the addition of certain adjuncts:(25)

Obviation by adjuncts:((a–b): Bresnan, 1977; (c): Culicover, 1993)
a. Who did she say [CP that *(tomorrow)would regret his words]?
b. Which doctor did you tell me[CP that *(during an operation)
had had a heart attack]?
c. Robin met the man [RC {that/who} Leslie said
[CP that *(for all intents and purposes)
was the mayor of the city]].

As noted by Rizzi (1997, p. 311), who attributes the observation to Kinsuke Hasegawa,
it is only high adjuncts that obviate the complementizer-trace eﬀect:(26)

Obviation only by higher adverbs:(Brillman and Hirsch, to appear)a.
Who did John say [CPthat [AdvP fortunately [TPran to the store]]]?
b. * Who did John say [CPthat [TP[AdvP quickly [vP ran to the store]]]]?
7

+ The anti-locality approach predicts obviation by high adverbs but not low adverbs,
assuming additional functional projections to host adverbs as in Cinque (1999).
X ... [CPthat [AdvP adverb [TP...

3.3 Locative inversion B + C
Bresnan (1977) observes that locative PPs in locative inversion (LI) (27) are also subject tocomplementizer-trace eﬀects when fronted (28a). (See Salzmann (2011) and Diercks (toappear) for recent overviews of LI.)(27)

[PP In these villages] can be found the best examples of this cuisine.

(28)

a. It’s [PP in these villages] that we all believe(Bresnan, 1994, p. 97)[CP (*that)can be found the best examples of this cuisine].
b. It’s [PP in these villages] that we all believe[CP (that) the best examples of this cuisine can be found ].

One approach to this data is to take the locative PP to truly function as the subject here,
in Spec,TP; see e.g. Pesetsky and Torrego (2001) note 20 for such an approach.
+ But there are reasons to believe the PP in LI is in a distinct (perhaps topic) position:(29)

No LI in clauses that disallow topicalization (Stowell, 1981, p. 272):
a. i. * [That this book, you should read ] is obvious.
ii. * I don’t believe John’s claim [that this book, you should read ].
iii. * It shocked me [that this book, Bill liked ].
b. i. * [That [PP in the chair] was sitting my older brother] is obvious.
ii. * ...John’s claim [that [PP in the chair] was sitting my older brother].
iii. * It shocked me [that [PP in the chair] was sitting my older brother].

(30)

No LI in certain nonfinite clauses:
a. * I expect [nonfinite for [PP on this wall] to be hung a picture of Leonard Pabbs].�
b. * I anticipated [nonfinite [PP on this wall] being a picture].
c. * I believe [nonfinite [PP down the hill] to have rolled a ball].
((a–b): Bresnan, 1994 citing Aissen, 1975; (c): Stowell, 1981, p. 271)

+ The anti-locality approach predicts PPs in LI to be subject to comp-trace eﬀects—
even if they are not in Spec,TP—by virtue of being high, e.g. in a topic position:* ... [CPthat [TopicP⇥...

�Bresnan (1994) follows Aissen (1975) in reporting a for-less version of (30a) to also be ungrammatical,
and Stowell (1981) reports a similar for-less example (*I expect in the room to be sitting my older brother) as
ungrammatical, but I find such for-less clauses with LI under expect to be grammatical...
8

3.4 Yiddish B + C
Yiddish allows for embedded V2 clauses with an overt az complementizer (31). All
examples here are from Diesing (1990). Following Diesing, I assume the V2 verb is in T.
(31)

Yiddish embedded V2:
Ir zolt
visn zayn... [CP az [TP vayn ken men makhn fun troybn oykh].
you should know bethatwine can one make from grapes also
‘You should know that one can make wine from grapes also.’

At first glance, it seems that Yiddish exhibits a complementizer-trace eﬀect whereby
non-subjects but not subjects can be extracted from embedded clauses with az (32):(32)

A complementizer-trace eﬀect in Yiddish:a.
Vos hot er nit gevolt [CPaz [TP mir zoln leyenen
what has he not wanted
that
we should read
‘What did he not want us to read?’b. * Ver hot er moyre [CPaz [TPvet kumen]]?
who has he fear
thatwill comeIntended: ‘Who is he afraid will come?’]]?

+ What is ungrammatical is not subject extraction across az, but rather extraction fromthe prefield (Spec,TP) across az. We can see this in two ways:(33)

Ungrammatical object extraction from prefield:* Vos hot er nit gevolt [CPwhat has he not wanted

az [TPthatzoln mir leyenen
should we read]]?

Intended: ‘What did he not want us to read?’ (cf 32a)
Prediction: an adverb in that pre-verbal position should fix the problem. Is that
so?
(34)

Grammatical subject extraction with prefield object:
Ver hot er nit gevolt [CP
who has he not wanted

az [TP [ot di bikher] zolthat��� the books should

leyenen]]?
read‘Who did he not want to read the books?’
As noted in Branigan (2005), the complementizer-trace eﬀect in Yiddish cannot be about
subject properties such as nominative case, contra Pesetsky and Torrego (2001). Instead, it
is specifically about movement from the closest, embedded prefield position, to Spec,CP.
The anti-locality approach in (21) can account for complementizer-trace eﬀects,
including their adverb obviation eﬀects and their relevance for high non-subjects.
94Highest Subject Restriction��

In some A-constructions in some languages, a resumptive pronoun can take the place ofthe trace (gap):(35)

Hebrew object relative (Borer, 1984, p. 220):
Ra’iti ’et ha-yeled [RC še= Rina ’ohevet (’oto)].
saw.1�� ��� the-boy
that Rina loves.3��� ���.3���
‘I saw the boy that Rina loves (him).’

Here I limit attention to resumptive pronouns in non-island contexts.��
Resumptive pronouns in many languages are subject to a Highest Subject Restriction (HSR),
where resumption is disallowed for subjects of the highest clause of the A-construction:(36)

Highest Subject Restriction in Hebrew (Borer, 1984):
a. Highest subject relative:(p. 244)
Ha-’arie [RC še= (*hu) taraf’et ha-yeled] barax.
the-lionthat 3sgm devoured.3��� ��� the-boy escaped
literally ‘The lion that (*he) devoured the boy escaped.’b. Embedded subject relative:(p. 247)
ha-’iš
[RC še= Xana’amra
[CP še= (hu) ’ohev’arayot]
the-manthat Hannah said.3���
that 3sgm loves.3��� lions
literally ‘the man that Hannah said (he) loves lions’

Resumption in Irish (VSO) famously correlates with a change in complementizer morphology (McCloskey, 1990, 2002): (roughly) aL heads clauses with gapped dependencies;
aN heads clauses with resumptive dependencies.
(37)

Resumption and Highest Subject Restriction in Irish (McCloskey, 2002):
a. Object relative:(p. 189)i. an ghirseach [RC a ghoid na síogaí ]the girlaL stole the fairies
ii. an ghirseach [RC a-r
ghoid na síogaí í]
the girlaN-���� stole the fairies her‘the girl that the fairies stole away (her)’��I thank Hadas Kotek (p.c.) for discussion of Hebrew.
��As opposed to pronouns which appear to form A-dependencies across islands, as in (i). Sells (1984)
calls such pronouns “intrusive” pronouns, in contrast to resumptives.
(i) Which picture of John were you wondering [island whether *(it) was going to win a prize at the
exposition]?
(Pesetsky, 1998, p. 28)
Perlmutter (1972) and Pesetsky (1998) propose to think of such pronouns as spelling-out the tail ofisland-violating chains, but resumption data suggest that they behave diﬀerently than movement chains;see e.g. Aoun, Choueiri, and Hornstein (2001). I will therefore leave the derivation of resumptives inislands open here.
10b. Highest subject relative:
i. an fear [RC a bhí
breoite]the manaL wasill‘the man that (he) was ill’(p. 201; Ó Baoill and Maki, 2012 p. 361)
ii.* an fear [RC a raibh sé breoite]
the manaN was he illc. Embedded subject relative:(p. 201)

an fear [RC a-r
shíl
muid [CP go raibh sé breoite]]the manaN-���� thought we
C was he ill
literally ‘the man that we thought he was ill’+ I consider a derivational approach to resumptives as the spell-out of lower copies
of movement. See Perlmutter (1972); Pesetsky (1998); Boeckx (2003) for previous
approaches to resumption as pronounced trace positions.
(38)

Resumptive pronouns as lower copies with optional restrictor deletion:
a. Movement as copying: (Chomsky, 1993)[DP D NP] ... [DP D NP]
b. Optionally delete the lower NP:[DP D NP] ... [DP D NP]
c. Chain resolution at LF: Trace Conversion (Sauerland, 1998; Fox, 2002)[DP D NP] x ... [DP D x]
The DP cannot be “reconstructed” as the lower copy does not have the restrictor material. This accounts for the unavailability of reconstruction for optional
resumptive pronouns in non-island contexts (Bianchi, 2004; Sichel, 2014).
d. Chain resolution at PF:
Nunes (2004): If ↵ c-commands and ↵ ⇤ , mark one for deletion.
But there is no such identity in (b)! So the higher DP is pronounced, as is thelower restrictor-less D, as a pronoun.

The HSR then results from anti-locality:(39)

Highest subject restriction due to anti-locality:a. Subjects are generally high, e.g. in Spec,TP:��
[TP subject ...
b. Moving from Spec,TP to Spec,CP is too short:* ... [CP subject [TP...
⇥c. Subjects skip Spec,TP instead:
X ... [CP subject [TP ; ...
) a lower copy then cannot be pronounced (as a resumptive pronoun) in the
canonical subject position ) Highest Subject Restriction
11

4.1 Irish A+ The addition of certain adjuncts makes highest subject resumptives grammatical(Ó Baoill and Maki, 2012).
(40)

Conditional clause added in the RC (Ó Baoill and Maki, 2012, p. 363): (cf 37bii)
X Tá [anfear [RC a raibh sé breoite [más fíor]] anseo anois.
is the manaN was he ill
if+��� true here now‘The man who was ill supposedly is here now.’(41)

Adding epistemic, temporal, commitative adjuncts (p. 363):a.
HSR baseline:* Cé ar imigh sé?
who aN left heb.

Intended: ‘Who left?’ar imigh sé {go hádhúil, is léir,
is dócha, inné,
trílá
who aN left he fortunately evidently probably yesterday three days
ó shin, in am, leMáire}?
ago
in time with Mary
‘Who {fortunately, evidently, probably} left {yesterday, three days ago, intime, with Mary}?’

X Cé

All of the adjuncts shown to obviate the HSR by Ó Baoill and Maki (2012) are high in theclause, plausibly between TP and CP (except possibly the commitative). This obviationis straightforwardly explained by the increase in distance between the canonical subject
position and the clause edge.
4.2 Hebrew A + C
According to Borer (1984), Doron (1982) observes that fronting some constituent toincrease the distance between the preverbal subject and the relative clause edge allows
for a grammatical highest subject resumptive A :(42)

Separating the highest subject from the clause edge:
a. ha-iš[RC še= [rak ’al
kesef] (hu) xošev]
the-manthat only about money he thinks‘the man that thinks only about money’(Borer, 1984, p. 247)

��The adoption of this analysis for Irish is complicated by the fact that, famously, Irish’s VSO word
order has been analyzed with the subject not moving to Spec,TP. But see McCloskey (2001) for detailed
discussion suggesting that subjects in Irish regularly do move out of their Spec,vP base position, to somehigher position.
12

b. ha-iš[RC še= {’etmol, ha-šavu’a še=avar}(hu) pagaš’et Dina]
the-manthat yesterday the-week that=passed he met.3��� ��� Dina‘the man that {yesterday, last week} met Dina’(Hadas Kotek, p.c.)Highest subject resumptives also become grammatical when they are postverbal. Thisis possible with a (high register) V2-like inversion structure, where another constituent
is fronted to a preverbal position:(43)

Grammatical postverbal highest subject resumptives:a. ha-iš[RC še= ’et matana natan
hu le-Dina]
the-manthat ��� present gave.3��� he ���-Dinab. ha-iš[RC še= le-Dina natan
hu ’et matana]
the-manthat ���-Dina gave.3��� he ��� present‘the man that gave the present to Dina’(Hadas Kotek, p.c.)In the basic HSR cases, we might have imagined that the HSR reflects a particular
relationship between the RC complementizer and its local T head (e.g. some issue withfeature inheritance, etc.).
+ But instead, the Highest Subject Restriction is a restriction on “being highest” and“being a subject” at the same time, not about “highest subjects.”
First, note that resumptives can be fronted within the relative, even long-distance (44b):(44)Long-distance resumptive fronting (based on Borer, 1984, pp. 250–251):ha-iš[RC še= {’oto}Xana’amra [CP še= {’oto}
Dalya ma’amina
the-manthat ���.3��� Hannah said
that ���.3��� Dalya believes[CP še= {’oto}
Kobi pagaš {’oto}]]]that ���.3��� Kobi met ���.3���
‘the man that Hannah said that Dalya believes that Kobi met’

If an embedded subject resumptive as in (36) is fronted to the edge of the RC, it becomes
ungrammatical:(45)

Fronted embedded subjects become subject to the HSR (ibid p. 250): (cf 36b)
* ha-iš[RC še= hu Xana
’amra [CP še=
the-manthat he Hannah saidthat’ohev ’arayot]]
loves lions

Intended: ‘the man that Hannah said loves lions’13

So the HSR is not about a relationship between the local T and C; it’s about being close
to the edge of the RC C . But why is it limited to subjects?
+ Subjects are the only nominals that are exclusively bare (preposition-less).
– Assume that relative clause heads/operators in direct object position must bebase-generated with the DOM ��� ’et. Suppose ’et is ambiguous between a
preposition and a case-marker.
– As Borer (1984) and others show for prepositions such as ��� l(a) and ��� b(a),relativization over a prepositional object must always use the prepositional
resumptive. The availability of a prepositional parse for ’et allows for high,fronted direct object resumptives as in (44).
A movement theory for resumption allows for an anti-locality approach to the HSR(39), which explains the strict locality sensitivity of the HSR in Irish and Hebrew.
There remaining questions for this account of resumption and the HSR:
– what governs the optional deletion in (38b), especially in diﬀerent A-constructions;– “intrusive” pronouns (footnote 11);– the precise position of subjects in Irish (footnote 12) and in Hebrew inversion;– obligatory non-subject resumptives (Palestinian Arabic in Shlonsky 1992)...

5

Conclusion+ Many classic quirks of subject extraction exhibit the anti-locality signature:A

obviation of Q when additional material is added above the subject,Bapplicability of Q to non-subjects that are exceptionally high, andC

no correlation of Q with other subjecthood properties such as case.

• Approaches to such subject extraction quirks based specifically on some “subjecthood” property such as a relationship with T/Subj (Pesetsky and Torrego, 2001;
Rizzi, 2006), morphological case (Deal, 2017, yesterday), or the C-T relationship(feature inheritance), do not (immediately) predict such behavior.
• At the same time, the existence of subject extraction quirks with this signaturesuggests that (some variety of) an anti-locality constraint is possible and necessary
in diverse languages of the world.

14

These properties in A , B , and/or C do not guarantee that a subject extraction
quirk is an anti-locality-driven eﬀect.
In Erlewine (2016), I argued for an anti-locality analysis of the Agent Focus (AF) construction in Kaqchikel (Mayan) based on apparent A properties.
(46)

AF is required for transitive subject extraction:��
a. Iwir
x-;-u-tĳri wäy ri a Xwan.
yesterday ���-���.3�-���.3�-eat the tortilla the �� Juan
‘Yesterday Juan ate the tortilla.’b. Achike {Xx-;-tĳ-o,*x-;-u-tĳ}
ri wäy?
who
���-���.3�-eat-AF ���-���.3�-���.3�-eat the tortilla‘Who ate the tortilla?’(47)

Adverb obviation of Agent Focus:
Xx-;-u-tĳ}
Achike kan qitzĳ {*x-;-tĳ-o,ri wäy?
who truly truth ���-���.3�-eat-AF ���-���.3�-���.3�-eat the tortilla‘Who truly ate the tortilla?’

But Henderson and Coon (to appear) argue that there is no A-movement in examples
such as (47). They show that some “adverbs” such as kan qitzĳ can in fact act as predicates
which embed full clauses (48) and that similar constructions with overt pronouns canalso be elicited (49).
(48)

Kan qitzĳ can embed a clause (H&C ex 39, from Bible):...achike q-ach’alal[RC ri kan qitzĳ [CP chi ki-nima-n
ri kristo]]...
which ���.1��-friend ��� truly truth���� ���.3��-obey-���� the Christ‘...whichever of our friends that it’s true that they have obeyed Christ...’(49)

Overt pronoun in the clause under kan qitzĳ (H&C ex 44, elicited):��
...q-ach’alalii [RC ri kan qitzĳ [CP chi rĳe’i ki-nima-n
ri kristo...]���.1��-friend ��� truly truth���� 3p ���.3��-obey-���� the Christ‘our friends that it’s true that they have obeyed Christ...’“Because the copula, embedded complementizer, and resumptive pronoun
may all be null, this biclausality is not always readily apparent.”
H&C��I follow the spelling and glossing conventions of Henderson and Coon (to appear) here. ��� =completive, ���� = incompletive, ��� = relative clause marker.
��I wonder if it’s important that these examples in (48–49)—especially (49) without the wh free relative—
are definite DPs with potentially non-restrictive relative clauses. See Sells’s (1984) discussion of intrusive
pronouns as E-type pronouns in his dialect of English, which are not possible with quantificational heads:
(i)

a.
b.

that man that I can never tell whether he is going to be friendly or not (Sells, 1984, p. 453)
* no/every man that I can never tell whether he is going to be friendly or not

If such (overt) pronouns are only possible in certain A-structures, it is unclear whether such parses can
extend to all the adverb data. H&C recognize (fn 13) that there are many remaining questions regarding
the distribution of resumptive pronouns in Kaqchikel.
15

As support for this explanation for (47), H&C show that other adverbs which do notembed clauses do not obviate AF:(50)

Jantäq does not take a CP (H&C ex 57):
Jantäqchi x-a-samäj.
sometimes ���� ���-���.2�-work‘It’s sometimes that you worked.’(51)

Jantäq does not obviate AF (H&C ex 60):
Achikejantäq{Xn-;-tĳ-o,*n-;-u-tĳ}
ri äk’.
who/what sometimes ����-���.3�-eat-AF ����-���.3�-���.3�-eat the chicken‘Who sometimes eats the chicken?’

Note that Henderson and Coon (to appear) concentrate on the discussion of this adverb
data, and only briefly discuss the multiple A-extraction examples in Erlewine (2016).
Discussing a multiple focus(/topic) example, H&C say:“there is reason to believe that the left-most nominal has not actually undergone
A’-movement... but is instead a high, base-generated topic.”
But I show in Erlewine (2016, p. 444) that there are at least some clear cases where thehigher A’-operator is not base-generated high, as it is island-sensitive:��
(52)

Baseline: higher A’-extraction from lower clause
X K’o k’o n-;-noji-n[chin yawa’].
99 ���-B3s g -think-AF that sick‘There is someonei that someone thinks theyi are sick.’(53)

Higher A’-extraction sensitive to relative clause island:* K’o k’o x-;-k’ul-ö[ri achin ri x-;-u-tz’ët].
99 ���-B3s g -meet–AF the man �� ���-B3s g -A3s g -seeIntended: ‘There’s somethingi that someone met [the man who saw iti ].’(54)

Movement to non-immediately-preverbal position is sensitive to adjunct islands:* K’o k’o x-;-b’an-ö
jun pastel [rmax-;-loq’-öri jay].
99 ���-B3s g -make-AF a cake because ���-B3s g -buy-AF the house
Int.: ‘There’s s.o.i that someone made a cake [because theyi bought the house].’For such examples, it seems that Henderson and Coon (to appear) would have to appeal
to the Principle of Minimal Compliance (Richards, 1998), as they briefly suggest (fn 16).
A lot of careful work is required to be certain whether an apparent anti-locality-driven
interaction indeed reflects anti-locality or not. Caveat emptor (et venditor).
��My beliefs about this k’o existential construction itself has also subsequently changed, so the structurein (52) would also be compatible with other, less strict forms of anti-locality. K’o is an existential predicate
which takes a headless, transparent free relative. See Kotek and Erlewine (2016).
16

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