TWO TYPES OF VP-ELLIPSIS

Abstract

Lobeck (1990, 1995) and Saito and Murasugi (1990) argue that the functional categories (C, T, D) permit the ellipsis of their complements only when their Spec positions are filled. I propose that this licensing condition on ellipsis is extended to the functional category v and claim that there are two types of VP-ellipsis: one is vP-deletion, which is licensed in the functional category TP and the other is VP-deletion, which is licensed in the functional category vP. I argue that the proposed analysis of VP-ellipsis is supported by considering inversion constructions, voice mismatch and VP-ellipsis in infinitival clauses.