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In:Brazilian Portuguese, Syntax and Semantics: 20 years of Núcleo de Estudos Gramaticais
Edited by Roberta Pires De Oliveira, Ina Emmel and Sandra Quarezemin
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 260] 2020
► pp. 167–190

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Chapter 7
Diagnosing verb raising

The view from cartography

 | Universidade Estadual de Campinas
Published online: 8 May 2020
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.260.07tes
Abstract
Adverbs have been largely taken as diagnostics for movements. The enrichment of structures by the “Cartographic Program” brings about an important question to the theory of verb raising: which AdvPs should be considered reliable diagnostics? The paper brings data from Brazilian Portuguese and Peruvian Spanish to argue that low adverbs are bona fide diagnostics for verb raising. The position of the finite and the infinitive relative to the nine lowest adverbs of Cinque’s hierarchy in four possible orders is tested in these two languages. Data from BP, testing the position of high adverbs relative to the lexical verb, is presented in the sequence. Those data allow one to argue that high adverbs cannot be used as diagnostic tools for movements. Further data on VP-ellipsis confirms the contention that only low adverbs are bona fide diagnostics for V raising.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Cross-linguistic differences on V-to-I and the split-IP
  • 3.Cinque’s (1999) hierarchy of adverbs
  • 4.A pinch of methodology
  • 5.Verb raising across low AdvPs in BP and PS: The finite and infinitive forms
  • 6.High adverbs
  • 7.Conclusions and further issues
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
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2025. Sentence-medial adverb placement in Spanish: acceptability and preference. Glossa: a journal of general linguistics 10:1 DOI logo
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2022. On the Raising of the Finite Main Verb in Angolan Portuguese and in Mozambican Portuguese: Cartographic Hierarchies, Microvariation and the Use of Adverbs as Diagnostics for Movement. Probus 34:1 ► pp. 171 ff. DOI logo
Tescari Neto, Aquiles
2022. “Adverbs and functional heads” twenty years later: cartographic methodology, verb raising and macro/micro-variation. The Linguistic Review 39:2 ► pp. 293 ff. DOI logo

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