Intervention Effects on Reconstruction: with Focus on NPI and –man ‘only’

Abstract

This paper investigates the intervention effects on the reconstruction of scrambled elements in Korean. It has been often noted in the literature that in certain contexts, a scrambled element induces an intervention effect in conjunction with LF wh-movement in Korean (Beck & Kim 1997). Crucially, what is assumed here is that the scrambled element does not reconstruct, contrary to the standard assumption that scrambled elements can (optionally) reconstruct (Saito 1992). The paper aims to resolve this paradoxical situation. We show that the anti-reconstruction effect is detected only with certain focus elements (e.g. NPI, –man ‘only’ and wh-phrase). Specifically, it is shown that these focus elements may not reconstruct across another intervening focus. We also present data that exhibit a more direct intervention effect such that the relevant construction becomes unacceptable due to the inevitable conflict between reconstruction and the constraint.