Questions tagged [x-bar-theory]

A syntactic theory that postulates intermediate constituents below the phrase level (XP) but above the word level (X), known as "X-bar" (written "X̅" or "X′").

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Are English modal verbs tensed or non-tensed?

My assumption: English modal verbs are non-tensed (i.e. we don't say shoulds or shoulded). Yet, in X' bar theory, modal verbs appear under the inflection node I', precisely where we find the ...
Puzzled's user avatar
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To what extent was Chomsky influenced by Tesnière?

Kind of a question about the meta-history of linguistics as a discipline. Chomsky released 'Syntactic Structures' in the US in 1957; Tesnière released Éléments de syntaxe structurale posthumously ...
Khove's user avatar
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Case assignment with prepositions

Consider these examples: 'I am happy with my parents' my parents gets assigned Case by 'with'. *'I am proud with my parents' My question is as follows: What is the reasoning for 2 being ...
PolkaDot's user avatar
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In X bar theory, is the first auxiliary the head of an interrogative clause and the remainder the complement?

In X bar theory, the first auxiliary is the head of a declarative clause: (1) She will have finished it by tomorrow. Here, subject she is a specifier, and verb phrase have finished it by tomorrow is ...
JK2's user avatar
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