Sub-Phrasal Syntax in Korean

Abstract

While much recent work in syntax has concentrated on the scrambling possibilities of non-head elements in the Korean clause, in this paper I investigate the syntax of certain non-head elements which cannot scramble, such as negative adverbials like an and mos, adverbials like cal 'well' and cokum ('a little'), and bare verbal nouns (as in tochak ha-ta 'arrive'). I argue that within the productive phrasal syntax of Korean there is a 'subphrasal' component, which accounts for the combination of the restricted elements discussed here. Each such element has the property that it does not project beyond the XO level; nevertheless, all of this is syntax, and falls outside the domain of the lexicon.