Edited by Anita Auer and Björn Köhnlein
[Linguistics in the Netherlands 31] 2014
► pp. 13–25
This paper is concerned with the correct characterization of the licensing condition on clausal ellipsis and how it relates to the distribution of ellipsis. I argue, essentially following López (2000), that ellipsis is licensed when the ellipsis clause bears a relation to an antecedent in the discourse component. A relation between two discourse units can be established in two ways: (1) Either there holds a direct relation between the two discourse units or (2) there holds an anaphoric relation mediated by a discourse anaphor. In this paper, I show how this two-way distinction in setting up discourse relations accounts for the two-way split we find in the distribution of ellipsis.
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