Cover not available
Article published In:
Register Variation and Syntactic Theory
Edited by Diane Massam and Tim Stowell
[Linguistic Variation 17:2] 2017
► pp. 157–185

Object drop and article drop in reduced written register

| NTNU Norwegian University of Science and Technology

This paper discusses object drop in English ‘reduced written register’ (RWR), such as recipes (Haegeman 1987a, b, Massam & Roberge 1989, Massam 1992) and diaries. Object drop differs from subject drop in RWR (Haegeman 1997, 2007, this issue); dropped subjects can be of any person and can be expletives, while dropped objects can be third person only and cannot be expletives. I propose that object drop in RWR is dependent on article drop. I analyze null articles in RWR as the presence of a phonologically null determiner with the semantics of a choice function. To analyze object drop, I adopt Tomioka (2003)’s analysis for Japanese null pronouns, in which a null determiner, combined with NP ellipsis, allows a constituent with pronominal-like semantics to go wholly unpronounced. I argue that a similar process is at work in English RWR, and argue that this analysis allows us to understand the person and expletive restrictions.

Keywords: pro-drop, written English, telegraphic register, register variation, object drop, article drop
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Object drop: distribution and explananda
  • 3.Previous analyses
    • 3.1Haegeman: topic drop
    • 3.2Massam: null objects and middles
    • 3.3Summary
  • 4.Article drop in RWR
    • 4.1Parallels between article drop and object drop
    • 4.2The scope behavior of article-less DPs
    • 4.3The null article in RWR: a choice-functional analysis
  • 5.Extending article drop to object drop
    • 5.1Tomioka: article drop and pronoun drop
    • 5.2The internal structure of a pronoun
    • 5.3The restriction to third person
    • 5.4The failure to drop expletives
    • 5.5Indefinite object drop
    • 5.6Summary
  • 6.Remaining issues
    • 6.1Subject-object asymmetries
    • 6.2Which objects can drop?
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 26 January 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lv.14016.wei
References
Baltin, Mark & Paul M. Postal
1996 More on reanalysis hypotheses. Linguistic Inquiry 27(1). 127–45.Google Scholar
Beukema, Frits & Peter Coopmans
1989 A Government-Binding perspective on the imperative in English. Journal of Linguistics 25(2). 417–36. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, Noam
1975 Reflections on Language. New York: Pantheon.Google Scholar
Constant, Noah
2012 Witnessable quantifiers license type-e meaning: Evidence from contrastive topic, equatives and supplements. Semantics and Linguistic Theory (SALT) 221. 286–306. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Elbourne, Paul D.
2005 Situations and individuals. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Fodor, Janet & Ivan Sag
1982 Referential and quantificational indefinites. Linguistics and Philosophy 51. 355–98. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Haegeman, Liliane
1987a Complement ellipsis in English: or how to cook without objects. In Anne-Marie Simon-Vandenbergen (ed.), Studies in Honour of René Derolez, 248–261. Ghent: Seminarie voor Engelse en Oud-Germaanse Taalkunde R.U.G.Google Scholar
1987b Register variation in English: some theoretical implications. Journal of English Linguistics 201. 230–48. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Haegeman, Liliane 1990 Understood subjects in English diaries. Multilingua 9(2). 157–199. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1997 Register variation, truncation, and subject omission in English and in French. English Language and Linguistics 1(2). 233–70. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2007 Subject omission in present-day written English: On the theoretical relevance of peripheral data. Rivista di grammatica generativa 321. 91–124.Google Scholar
Haegeman, Liliane & Tabea Ihsane
1999 Subject ellipsis in embedded clauses in English. English Language and Linguistics 3(1). 117–145. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2001 Adult null subjects in the non-pro-drop languages: two diary dialects. Language Acquisition 9(4). 329–346. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Haegeman, Liliane
This issue. Unspeakable sentences: Subject omission in written registers: a cartographic analysis.
Heim, Irene
1982 The semantics of definite and indefinite Noun Phrases. Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts dissertation.Google Scholar
1991 Artikel und Definitheit. In Arnim von Stechow and Dieter Wunderlich (eds.), Semantik: Ein internationales Handbuch des zeitgenossischen Forschung, 487–535. Berlin: de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Hornstein, Norbert & Amy Weinberg
1981 Case theory and preposition stranding. Linguistic Inquiry 12(1). 55–91.Google Scholar
Huang, C.-T. James
1984 On the distribution and reference of empty pronouns. Linguistic Inquiry 15(4). 531–74.Google Scholar
1991 Remarks on the status of the null object. In Robert Freidin (ed.), Principles and parameters in comparative grammar, 56–76. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Ionin, Tania
2006  This is definitely specific: specificity and definiteness in article systems. Natural Language Semantics 14(2). 175–234. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Johnson, Kyle
2012 Pronouns vs. definite descriptions. In Misha Becker, John Grinstead & Jason Rothman (eds.), Generative linguistics and acquisition: Studies in honor of Nina M. Hyams, 157–84. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Kratzer, Angelika
1998 Scope or pseudoscope? Are there wide-scope indefinites? In Susan Rothstein (ed.), Events and grammar, 163–196. Dordrecht: Kluwer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2009 Making a pronoun: Fake indexicals as windows into the properties of pronouns. Linguistic Inquiry 40(2). 187–237. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lewis, David
1975 Adverbs of quantification. In Edward L. Keenan (ed.), Formal semantics of natural language, 3–15. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mårdh, Ingrid
1980 Headlinese: On the grammar of English front page headlines. Malmö: CWK Gleerup.Google Scholar
Massam, Diane
1992 Null objects and non-thematic subjects. Journal of Linguistics 281. 115–37. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Massam, Diane & Yves Roberge
1989 Recipe context null objects in English. Linguistic Inquiry 20(1). 134–9.Google Scholar
Matthewson, Lisa
1999 On the interpretation of wide-scope indefinites. Natural Language Semantics 7(1). 79–134. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Neeleman, Ad & Kriszta Szendrői
2007 Radical pro drop and the morphology of pronouns. Linguistic Inquiry 38(4). 671–714. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Postal, Paul M. 1969 On so-called ‘pronouns’ in English. In David A. Reibel & Sanford A. Schane (eds.), Modern studies in English, 201–44. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
1971 Cross-over phenomena. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.Google Scholar
Postal, Paul M. & Geoffrey K. Pullum
1988 Expletive noun phrases in subcategorized positions. Linguistic Inquiry 19(4). 635–70.Google Scholar
Prince, Ellen
1981 On the interfacing of indefinite-this NPs. In Aravind K. Joshi, Bonnie L. Webber & Ivan A. Sag (eds.), Elements of discourse understanding, 231–50. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Reich, Ingo
This issue. On the omission of articles and copulae in German.
Reinhart, Tanya
1997 Quantifier scope: how labor is divided between QR and choice functions. Linguistics and Philosophy 201. 335–97. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rizzi, Luigi
1994 Early null subjects and root null subjects. In Toen Hoekstra & Bonnie D. Schwartz (eds.), Language acquisition studies in generative grammar, 151–77. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1997 The fine structure of the left periphery. In Liliane Haegeman (ed.), Elements of grammar: handbook of generative syntax, 281–337. Dordrecht: Kluwer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2006 Grammatically-based target-inconsistencies in child language. In Kamil Ud Deen, Jun Nomura, Barbara Schulz & Bonnie D. Schwartz (eds.), Proceedings of the Inaugural Conference on Generative Approaches to Language Acquisition – North America [GALANA] (University of Connecticut Occasional Papers in Linguistics 4). Cambridge, MA: MIT Working Papers in Linguistics.Google Scholar
Ross, John Robert
1982 Pronoun deleting processes in German. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Linguistic Society of America, San Diego, California.
Siewierska, Anna
2004 Person. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stowell, Tim
1991 Empty heads in abbreviated English. GLOW abstract, GLOW Newsletter #26, HAG.Google Scholar
1999 Words lost and syntax found in Headlinese: The hidden structure of abbreviated English in headlines, instructions and diaries. Unpublished manuscript/handout for talk given at York University, Toronto, Nov 24 1999.Google Scholar
2013 The Syntax of Abbreviated English. Lecture given at the International Congress of Linguists, Geneva, July 22 2013.Google Scholar
Straumann, Heinrich
1935 Newspaper headlines: A study in linguistic method. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd.Google Scholar
Tomioka, Satoshi
2003 The semantics of Japanese null pronouns and its cross-linguistic implications. In Kerstin Schwabe & Susanne Winkler (eds.), The interfaces: deriving and interpreting omitted structures, 321–39. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Weir, Andrew
2012 Left-edge deletion in English and subject omission in diaries. English Language and Linguistics 16(1). 105–29. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2013 Article drop in headlines and truncation of CP. Linguistics Society of America Annual Meeting Extended Abstracts. [URL]. DOI logo
Winter, Yoad
1997 Choice functions and the scopal semantics of indefinites. Linguistics and Philosophy 201. 399–467. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zimmerman, Thomas Ede 1993 On the proper treatment of opacity in certain verbs. Natural Language Semantics 11. 149–79. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zwicky, Arnold M.
1988 On the subject of bare imperatives in English. In Caroline Duncan-Rose (ed.), On language: Rhetorica, phonologica, syntactica: A festschrift for Robert P. Stockwell from his friends and colleagues. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 8 other publications

Ferreira de Carvalhaes Pinheiro, Andrei, Vera Paredes Silva & Christina Abreu Gomes
2023. Conhecimento linguístico e gêneros discursivos digitais: correlações possíveis a partir de fenômenos variáveis em interações por chat. Diacrítica 36:2 DOI logo
Halm, Tamás
2021. Radically Truncated Clauses in Hungarian and Beyond: Evidence for the Fine Structure of the Minimal VP. Syntax 24:3 ► pp. 376 ff. DOI logo
Hasan, Mustafa Flaih & Hasan Shaban Ali Al- Thalab
2023. Minor Sentences in Selected Disney Children's Stories. Journal of Tikrit University for Humanities 30:1, 2 ► pp. 28 ff. DOI logo
Lipták, Anikó & Rint Sybesma
2024. Missing and not found. Linguistic Variation 24:1 ► pp. 77 ff. DOI logo
Patil, Umesh, Peter Bosch & Stefan Hinterwimmer
2020. Constraints on German <i>diese</i> demonstratives: language formality and subject-avoidance. Glossa: a journal of general linguistics 5:1 DOI logo
PAUL, ILEANA & DIANE MASSAM
2021. Licensing null arguments in recipes across languages. Journal of Linguistics 57:4 ► pp. 815 ff. DOI logo
Paul, Ileana & Diane Massam
2021. Une recette pour des arguments nuls. Arborescences :10 ► pp. 113 ff. DOI logo
Radford, Andrew
2019. Relative Clauses, DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 5 april 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.