The Feature-based Analysis of Constraints on Coordination in English: A GPSG AccountA GPSG Account

Abstract

Since Chomsky (Aspects,1965) introduced the idea that categories might be composites of syntactic features, this idea has been taken up and further developed in contemporary syntax theories. One of the outstanding advantages of this idea is to be able to give a sytematic account of categorial identity between conjuncts in coordinate structure. The paper is designed to formulating generalized form of well-formedness condition on coordination in English by this feature-based approach in GPSG framework. We will observe that the categorial identity between two conjuncts is a crucial factor in deciding the well-formedness of the coordinate structure. It will be argued that this fact is best captured by the condition that some specific set of features must be shared by two conjunct categories to ensure the acceptability of the given coordinate structure. These features will be called as "defining features" for categorial identity. Along this line, it will be also observed that the HEAD features in GPSG are relatively decided as to whether they are included as "defining features," whereas some FOOT features; namely, the feature [SLASH] and [WH] are always "defining features" for categorial identity but another FOOT feature [REFL] is not.