The syntactic representation of understood subjects

Abstract

Every theory of grammar must employ a certain degree of abstraction. Theories have, however, differed with regard to the abstract elements they use and the distance of their grammatical representations from the physical data they are intended to explain. The present article deals with the question of absent verb subjects which must be supplied for full interpretation. Some recent work in syntax has included such subjects as formal elements within syntactic representations. Both the reality and the utility of such constructs are called into question here, and an alternative analysis is presented which obviates the need for this device.