Sigurðsson (2011) addresses issues concerning referential null arguments in a variety of languages, including Icelandic, Finnish, German, and Chinese, by devising a framework in which all referential empty categories have to be connected to a C/Edge linking feature (CLn). This CLn may be a topic feature, a speaker feature, or a hearer feature. Based on the cartographic approach developed by Rizzi (1997) and Cinque (1999), Sigurðsson proposes the following structure:
(23) CP Force Topic ΛA ΛP Fin TP
According to Sigurðsson (2011), all C/Edge linking features have to look for an appropriate goal to value in terms of Agree (Chomsky 2001). In cases of null argument constructions, it is this probe-goal relationship that licenses an empty subject or object. Given this Minimalist framework, Sigurðsson accounts for Italian null subject sentences like (24a) in terms of the configuration shown in (24b):
(24) a. (Tavolta) parlo islandese. (sometimes) speak.1SG Icelandic
‘Sometimes I speak Icelandic.’
b. [CP…..{CLn}….. (X)… [TP ∅-TΦ…. ]]]]
Assuming that the Italian agreement morpheme is a pronoun realized as ∅, Sigurðsson proposes that, regardless of whether or not there is an element occupying the Spec of CP, the composite ∅-T∅ must be interpreted by associating it with a C/edge-linked feature, which can be 1st, 2nd, or 3rd person.
As for Mandarin Chinese, Sigurðsson proposes that a null referential argument is interpretable as
long as it can find an appropriate C/edge-linking feature to associate with.
(25) a. ____ kanjian ta le. see him PERF
‘[He/She] saw him.’
b. Zhangsani shuo [ ____i hen xihuan Lisi].
Zhangsan say very like Lisi ‘Zhangsan said that he liked Lisi.’
(26) [CP …..{CLn}….. [TP ….. [vP …∅…. ]]]
The null subject in (25a) connects with the topic feature through distant Agree, while the null subject in the embedded clause in (25b) is related to a more local constituent, the matrix subject in the higher CP domain.
According to Sigurðsson, associating referential null arguments with a CLn feature accomplishes two goals: first, it eliminates the need to postulate different X-drop parameters cross-linguistically (where X may be pro, topic, discourse); second, it allows us to dispense with unjustified elements such as indices, whose existence is said to violate the Inclusiveness Condition (Chomsky 1995). Such a mechanism seems desirable, since it is less complex and also more powerful in terms of explanatory force. Nevertheless, we still need to evaluate the effectiveness of this mechanism by looking at its predictions. Notice that both Sigurðsson (2011) and Huang (1984) identify the contents of null arguments by linking empty categories to a topic. This kind of analysis makes a prediction: as long as a prominent topic has been established in discourse, either the subject or the object position in subsequent sentences can be left empty. The following section examines this prediction.
2.3
Re-thinking the topic-variable analysis
Since Huang (1984, 1989), Mandarin Chinese is considered a radical pro-drop language, meaning that subjects and objects in this language can be easily dropped in sentences, as long as their content can be recovered from the discourse. Therefore, when we are presented with the following sentences alone, we tend to assume that these sentences contain empty categories in argument position.
(27) (In)transitive sentences: a. ∅ V object b. ∅ V
For instance, if nothing precedes the main verb in a transitive or intransitive sentence, such sentences as (27a) and (27b) are dubbed null subject sentences, which means that these sentences have empty subject positions.
(28) Transitive sentences: Subject V ∅
Likewise, if the main verb in a transitive sentence is not followed by a nominal phrase, such sentences are taken to have an empty object position.
Since understanding sentences without arguments in Mandarin Chinese requires co-operation with discourse, linguists usually directly assume that sentences like (27) and (28) have pre-verbal or post- verbal empty argument position, and analyze these positions as being co-referential with a person or an entity that is prominent in the previous discourse context.
This type of analysis works well in some cases, but it does not in others. Discourse does play an important role in helping speakers of Mandarin Chinese interpret ‘argumentless’ sentences, since Mandarin Chinese does not have rich inflectional morphology. But, this fact does not mean that discourse is so powerful that it can license every ‘argumentless’ sentence in Mandarin Chinese. As we will see shortly, relying too much on discourse often results in a situation in which some sentences that are predicted to be grammatical turn out to be unacceptable in real language-use contexts.
Conceptually, discourse can be divided into two types: contextual discourse and linguistic discourse. The former refers to a non-linguistic discourse setting surrounding speakers of a conversation, which
might consist of speakers’ world knowledge or what they have perceived visually, while the latter is constituted by linguistic utterances from at least one speaker. In the remaining of this chapter, I direct my focus towards sentences without overt topics, and consider whether or not it is always appropriate to use ‘subjectless’ or ‘objectless’ sentences in linguistic discourse contexts. If the answer is positive, we will need to find out if there is any restriction on the use of such sentences, and determine the properties of covert topics that bind empty categories; if the answer is negative, then we have to come up with an alternative analysis to account for how ‘argumentless’ sentences are formed in Mandarin Chinese.