Despite the fact that wh-movement can cross clause boundaries as illustrated in Chapter 3.2 above, Ross (1967) first observed that it is not generally unbounded. Instead, it appears to be constrained as there are several types of constituents and clauses that do not allow for the extraction of wh-elements from inside of them depending on their different functions and positions. Some of these restrictions appear to be language specific and it is one objective of the present study to determine if and to which extent they are in effect for LC.
In his seminal work, Ross (1967) identifies several types of constituents out of which a wh-element cannot be extracted. He terms those constituents ISLANDS,which are governed by ISLAND CONSTRAINTS. Among them are NP complement islands, as illustrated by the contrast between (28) and (29), relative islands as in (30) and (31) and sentential subject islands as in (32) and (33).
(28) Whoi did Paul claim he kissed ti?
(29) *Who did Paul make the claim that he kissed?
The empirical observation is that fronting of a wh-element from inside a complex NP is prohibited. This is known as the COMPLEX NP CONSTRAINT (CNPC). Ross (1967) includes relative clauses such as (30) and (31) under this constraint though later analyses tend to separate them out based on a distinction made between complements and adjuncts. It remains equally ungrammatical to extract a wh-constituent from inside a relative clause.
(30) Paul knows the man who kissed Mary.
(31) *Which girli does Paul know the man who kissed ti?
Additionally, he identifies the SENTENTIAL SUBJECT CONSTRAINT, which forbids wh- movement from within a clause in subject position.
(32) That he kissed Mary surprised nobody but Paul. (33) *Whoi did that he kissed ti surprise nobody but Paul?
Though not included in Ross (1967), it also proves ungrammatical to front wh- elements from within an adjunct clause of various kinds as observed by Huang (1982a).
(34) Paul is/ was/ would be jealous because/ when/ if Peter kissed Mary. (35) *Whoi is Paul jealous because Peter kissed ti?
(36) *Whoi was Paul jealous when Peter kissed ti?
(37) *Whoi would Paul be jealous if Peter kissed ti?
Chomsky (1973) recognized WH-ISLANDS as an additional type of island phenomenon, which later became influential in the formulation of general principles and locality requirements on movement operations, such as the minimal link condition or the attract closest principle.
(38) Howi does Paul think Peter won over Mary ti.
(39) Paul wonders whoj Peter won over tj that way.
(40) *How does Paul wonder which girlj Peter won over tj ti?
(41) ??Which girlj does Paul wonder howi Peter won over tj ti?
Generally, an asymmetry is perceived between (40) and (41) for example by Huang (1982a), Lasnik (2001). Neither is well-formed, but clauses in which the adjunct, how in the above examples, is fronted over the argument, which girl in the above examples, seem to be completely unacceptable while the reverse order, as in (41), is less severely degraded.
In Government and Binding Theory island effects were generally accounted for by SUBJACENCY (Chomsky 1973), which is an early formulation of what was later stated as BARRIERS and most recently as PHASES, ultimately constituting a form of locality and/or cyclic movements. Islands were accounted for in terms of BOUNDING NODES, typically taken to be NP and TP. Movements that crossed more than one bounding node were considered ungrammatical which accounted for most of the island effects outlined above. Rizzi (1982) showed that the identity of bounding nodes is language specific, identifying CPs rather than TPs as the relevant category for Italian. Subjacency did not suffice to account for the asymmetry between (40) and (41) as it is violated in both cases and hence cannot provide an explanation for their difference in acceptability. With Chomsky (1981) and Huang (1982a) the Empty Category Principle served as an additional constraint, which required traces of A-bar movements, including wh-movement, to be locally governed (i.e. roughly, c-commanded by a lexical head or antecedent). (40) violates the ECP in addition to violating the Subjacency constraint, which makes it even less acceptable than (41) which only violates Subjacency (Lasnik 2001).
According to (featural) relativized minimality as developed by Rizzi (1990 and subsequent works) island effects are in fact intervention effects caused by movement over a constituent with a similar characteristics which in current theories means a
similar featural configuration. By his assessment it is not the nature of some boundary they pass as such that results in grammatical violation but the interplay between the moved constituent and a constituent crossed in the movement. He claims that a constituent which is similar to the moved item can intervene in the formation of the movement chain preventing the system from co-indexing the lower and higher copies. The larger the similarities, the graver the violation which is how markedness asymmetries are explained in this model. Originally, this was expressed in terms of Relativized Minimality, Government and the Empty Category Principle with the result that “antecedent governing cannot take place inside the domain of a potential antecedent governor” (Rizzi 1990, 5). This is formally expressed in RELATIVIZED MINIMALITY (Rizzi 1990,7),
(42) X -governs Y only if there is no Z such that i) Z is a typical potential -governor for Y, ii) Z c-commands Y and does not c-command X.
Minimalist approaches have since restated notions of government in a feature valuation framework and the adapted form of relativized minimality refers to the intervention of items with the same features, i.e. [wh]-features which prevent the A’- chain from forming properly in the case of wh-islands.