Ellipsis, contradiction and voice mismatch

Abstract

Previous research has attributed differences in the acceptability of verb phrase ellipsis (VPE) with voice mismatches to processing effects (Arregui et al. 2006, Grant et al. 2012). This paper argues that they can instead be accounted for in terms of a standard, focus-based condition on ellipsis (Rooth 1992a,b), supplemented with the principle that accommodated antecedents cannot contradict an elliptical sentence. This perspective is compatible with voice mismatched VPE being fundamentally grammatical (Merchant 2013, cf. Hardt 1993) rather than ungrammatical (e.g. Kim & Runner 2018). It also encompasses other focus-based factors modulating voice mismatches, which in turn reveal that implicit arguments do not count for contrast in VPE (cf. Overfelt to appear). The account here aligns with a reappraisal of the ‘mismatch asymmetry’ (Arregui et al. 2006) as being driven by a penalty against passive ellipsis in subject focus environments (Poppels & Kehler 2019).