Projects: Detecting alternative computation and covert pied-piping   Non-interrogative uses of wh-words  

This paper contributes experimental evidence regarding the question of how relative pronouns are interpreted in English non-restrictive relative clauses with relative pronoun pied- piping (RPPP). Kotek and Erlewine (2015) and Erlewine and Kotek (to appear) claim that the wh-relative pronoun is sensitive to intervention effects inside its pied-piping constituent (cf Sauerland and Heck, 2003; Cable, 2010; Kotek and Erlewine, to appear). In this paper we present the results of a web-based grammaticality judgment survey which supports this claim. We discuss the nature of the intervention judgment, which is notoriously subtle, and how it might be modeled in grammar. The sensitivity of RPPP to intervention effects has important implications for the formal analysis of English non-restrictive relative clauses, supporting the view that relative pronouns are interpreted in-situ without covert movement out of its pied-piping.

This paper reports on experimental evidence to support “The structure and interpretation of non-restrictive relatives” in CLS 51.

Keywords: pied-piping English syntax semantics relative clause relative pronoun intervention effects gradience experimental