Ellipsis and Replacement in Categorial Mismatch

Abstract

This paper investigates VP/NP Ellipsis/Replacement, concentrating on causative-inchoative alternation and categorial conversion contexts in English. In the former context, VP Ellipsis/Replacement can successfully apply to the VP headed by an inchoative in relation with a causative antecedent, and in fact it can only when the internal argument of the causative verb is identical in reference to that of the inchoative verb. It will be shown that the causativizing morpheme CAUSE as part of the decomposed structure of the causative verb blocks a bundling of the extended verbal projections, which invites a violation of identity in ellipsis and replacement. In the latter context, VP Ellipsis/Replacement and NP Ellipsis are allowed, but NP Replacement is not. The anaphoric one/ones is not permitted when it prevents a bundling of the extended nominal projections, thus failing to secure a right category for identity in replacement.