2. SUBJECTS
2.4. Postverbal Subjects
Preverbal subjects and empty subjects never occupy the same position in Spanish and this is how the contrast in the previous examples (109a) and (109b) is explained: empty subjects rather than preverbal ones are accepted in interrogative clauses.
As has been frequently pointed out, left-dislocation processes may trigger SV inversion, that is, the postponing of the subject. Olarrea (1996) distinguishes three of these processes and groups them into two categories depending on whether a clitic is not present at all or whether it is or may be present. Consider the examples in (112)-(115):
(112) las rosas, me encantan esas flores (LD + NP) [the roses, me love-3rdpp those flowers]
[roses, I love those flowers]
(113) Juan, lo vimos a él en la fiesta (LD + clitic) [Juan, him see-1stpp-past to him in the party]
[Juan, we saw him at the party]
(114) las flores las compré ayer (CLLD) [the flowers them buy-1stps-past yesterday]
[I bought the flowers yesterday]
(115) ESAS FLORES quiere María (focus construction, emphasis) [those flowers want-3rdps María]
[María wants those flowers]
186 See the next section for an approach to the relative position of postverbal subjects with respect to objects (VOS versus VSO orders).
Thus, he opposes left dislocation (LD) and clitic left dislocation (CLLD) to focus constructions.187 On the one hand, LD may or may not be constructed with a clitic, as in (112) versus (113);188 CLLD, though, requires the obligatory presence of a clitic (or, as we have seen, the corresponding empty category) to license the gap, as reflected in (114).On the other hand, focus constructions do not license a clitic, as exemplified in (115).
In the case of focus constructions, the leftmost phrase constitutes the melodic peak of the sentence, represented here by capitalization, as seen in (115).
As the ungrammatical examples in (116) and (117) indicate, there are two characteristics that must be observed: 1) the presence of the dislocated phrase estos anillos must trigger subject-verb inversion (SV inversion), something that does not take place in (116):
(116) *ESTOS ANILLOS María quiere OSV [those rings María want-3rdps]
And 2) the dislocated constituent must prevent the licensing of a resumptive pronoun, so that los in (117) is not possible:
(117) *ESTOS ANILLOS los quiere María [those rings them want-3rdps María]
187 What Olarrea (1996) terms focus constructions parallels what Hernanz and Brucart (1987) refer to as rhematization/dislocation (rematización/dislocación).
If both these characteristics are not observed, the result is, therefore, ungrammatical.
A strict correlation then exists between emphasis and the obligatory inversion of SV, unless of course the element in focus is the subject.
In the previous examples, the focused element was always the object of the sentence. But these are not the only elements that trigger SV inversion. Piera (1987), for example, analyzes similar constructions in which an adverb or an adverbial expression occupies the leftmost position and triggers the inversion of the subject:
(118) TEMPRANO salía Julia de casa POR LA NOCHE
EN ESTA CIUDAD CANSADA
[soon leave-3rdps-past Julia of house]
by the night in this city tired
[Julia used to leave the house soon / at night / in this city / tired]
(119) LIMPIA COMO UNA PATENA tenía Julia la casa [clean as a new pin have-3rdps-past Julia the house]
[Julia’s house was always clean as a new pin]
(120) CANTANDO EN LA DUCHA estaba Julia cuando llegué [singing in the shower was Julia when arrive-1stps-past]
[Julia was singing in the shower when I arrived]
188 As we have said before, in LD either a clitic or an NP must be present in the sentence and these must be co-referent with the left-dislocated element: las rosas/esas flores in (112) and Juan/lo ... a él in (113).
As the examples in (118)-(120) demonstrate, adverbial phrases and even certain types of adjective phrases and non-finite verbal phrases cause the subject to be placed after the verb (salía Julia, tenía Julia, estaba Julia). Furthermore, as examples in (121)-(123) reveal, these preposed adverbs are in complementary distribution with a preposed subject:
(121) *TEMPRANO Julia salía de casa
*POR LA NOCHE
*EN ESTA CIUDAD *CANSADA
(122) *LIMPIA COMO UNA PATENA Julia tenía la casa
(123) *CANTANDO EN LA DUCHA Julia estaba cuando llegué
So that, if the inversion of the subject and the verb is not carried out, the resulting sentences are not grammatical.
Hernanz and Brucart (1987) argue that apart from emphasis there are other factors that contribute to sentences having postverbal subjects. An example would be the presence of certain adverbials in initial position, the lexical nature of the verb and also the length of the NP subject. With regards to the last one, and in normal circumstances, the postposition of the subject is preferred when the NP subject is longer than usual. This sensitivity to the heaviness of the subject is seen in the examples in (124):
(124) a. María ha llamado [María has phoned]
b. ha llamado María
[has phoned Maríasubject]
c. ?la propietaria del coche robado ayer en pleno centro de Barcelona ha llamado [the owner of the car stolen yesterday in downtown Barcelona has phoned]
d. ha llamado la propietaria del coche robado ayer en pleno centro de Barcelona [has phoned the owner of the car stolen yesterday in downtown Barcelona]
The examples in (125) show postverbal subjects and their relative order with direct objects:
(125) a. ¿cuándo compró manzanas el hermano de Luis? VOS
el chico que vino
[when buy-3rdps-past apples the brother of Luis / the boy that came]
[when did Luis’ brother / the boy who came buy apples?]
b. ? ¿cuándo compró el hermano de Luis manzanas? VSO c. *? ¿cuándo compró el chico que vino manzanas? VSO
As the examples in (125) suggest, sentences start to degrade when the subject is made heavier, especially with relative clauses. In these cases, when the subject is too long, the VOS order as in (125a) is preferred to the VSO order in (125b) and (125c). The postverbal subject is maintained but since it is heavier than the object, the subject is placed at the end of the sentence.
As we have seen, focus constructions oppose LD and CLLD constructions in the triggering of SV inversion and also in the presence of a clitic. Table (II) summarizes some of the main differences between the two constructions:
Table II: focus constructions versus LD and CLLD constructions
FOCUS CONSTRUCTIONS LEFT DISLOCATION (LD and CLLD)
obligatory absence of a clitic possible or obligatory presence of a clitic189
inversion of the subject --
only one constituent is fronted (whether it is the subject or any other constituent)
more than one constituent can be left dislocated
the focus element is interpreted as a quantifier190 -- they are the result of syntactic movement to
[Spec FocP] they are base-generated adjuncts
they do not obey either strong or weak islands they obey islands, at least weak ones
2.4.1. Perspectives on VS Order as a Product of Different Processes
Since the earliest analyses of subject inversion in Romance, it has been assumed that either subjects are moved to a postverbal position in which they appear adjoined to the right edge of the VP, or verbs are moved to a position that is higher than the one occupied by the subject. This was the view taken by Kayne (1972) in his analysis of stylistic inversion, Kayne and Pollock (1978), and Rizzi (1982). This perspective was subsequently adopted by Suñer (1994) and Torrego (1984) for Spanish.
Also, as table (II) in the previous section indicates, recent proposals within the MP consider the presence of the FocP projection to capture the cases of VS order.
Therefore, there are at least two different approaches to the nature of subject-verb inversion in declarative sentences: 1) movement of the verb and not of
189 For an analysis that claims that left dislocations are characterized for not being able to license a clitic, thus paralleling focus constructions, see Zubizarreta (1998). According to Olarrea (1996), such an analysis contradicts the data.