Grammaticalization of auxiliaries and parametric changes

Abstract

AbstractThis paper looks at constructions with non-clitic auxiliaries in Old Romanian, which precede the generalized option for clitic auxiliaries in the same language. We argue that non-clitic auxiliaries belong to a grammar with genuine SVO, scrambling to Spec, AspP, and subject-auxiliary inversion (SAI as AUX-to Fin). The generalization of the clitic auxiliary entails the loss of these properties, while triggering a parametric shift in word order to VSO, discourse oriented fronting of constituents (to CP only instead of Spec, AspP), and Long Head Movement (LHM through V-to-Focus) instead of SAI. Implicitly, this analysis supports the distinction between A (AUX-to-Fin) and A-bar (V-to-Focus) head movement of verbal elements, and further refines it by showing that these two types of movement do not concern two specific types of heads (i.e., operator for the C domain versus non-operator for the T domain; Roberts 2001, Head movement. In Mark Baltin & Chris Collins (eds.),