This article aims to account for the syntactic structure of a passive sentence within Principles and Parameters(=PP) theory and Minimalist theory of Chomsky. According to PP-theory, as the inflectional ending morpheme -en of passive verb absorbs the θ-role assigned to the subject NP of a passive sentence, the subject position at D-structrue is empty. The object NP of passive verb moves to the non-θ-position of the subject in S- structure because -en absorbs the objective Case assigned to the object NP. In Minimalist theory the syntactic property of a passive sentence is characterized by a single complement hypothesis, or the lexical structure representation of an unergative verb in shell structure and of a de-adjectival verb in inner structure. In the inner structure the complement of a head V is projected by the de-adjectival verb. This de-adjectival verb assigns a θ-role theme to the specifier NP of VP through predication relation. The NP of inner Spec position moves to the Spec position of AGRsP to be checked against tense and Case feature. The tense verb be selected as the head V of the shell structure also moves to the AGRs position of AGRsP to be checked against tense and agreement feature of functional heads. This morphological feature checking is operated through Spec-head or head-head agreement before Spell-out.
In earlier generative grammar, sentences associated with Easy-type adjectives such as easy, hard, simple, difficult, tough, and so on had been derived by transformations, and assumed to be derived from a single underlying structure. And the difference of sentential types resulted from transformations. But this earlier analysis raises constituency problem in that each of `easy to please` and `easy to please John` forms a different constituent regardless of having the same underlying structure. And this NP-Movement results in the violation of the Specified Subject Condition in Chomsky(1977). To solve these problems Chomsky(1977) proposed that in `tough` constructions, the matrix subject NP is related indirectly to the gap in the complement clause by means of two distinct rules.; Wh-Movement and Rule of Predication. But in Chomsky(1977)`s approach, the interpretation of the constructions is not determined by only the pure Wh-Movement and is supplemented by the Rule of Predication and other as hoc conditions. And Chomsky(1981) introduces the Rule of Reanalysis to `tough` constraction to solve Chomsky(1977)`s problems, but the Reanalysis approach damages the fundamental principles, such as the projection principle, the Thematic theory, and the control theory. Recently, in the sentence like `John is easy to please.`, the matrix subject position which is base-generated has known to be non-θ-position. So, D-structure cannot be a pure representation of θ-structure. To solve these two problems, I assume that Easy-type adjectives have two separate lexical structures and the unit of `Easy-type adjective+to+ Verb` forms a single constituent, a complex lexical item which is lexically base-generated in the lexicon. But this approach has problems that produce an uninterpretable trace in D-structure, and that need a new device to provide a suitable interpretation for the trace. To solve these problems, I propose a new model of `tough` constructions based on Chomsky(1992)`s Minimalist approach.
This paper accounts for the Case assignment of ECM verbs within the GB theory and the minimalist theory. The Case assignment of ECM verbs is accounted for on the "exceptional" level: that is, it is different from the other constructions within the GB theory. The Case assignment of believe verbs is consistently accounted for, like the Case assignment of all the constructions within the minimalist theory. Therefore, as a result from this paper, it comes to see that the minimalist theory is more explanatory adequacy than the GB theory in respect of the idea of grammar pursueing the minimum of grammar theory.
The purpose of this study is to discuss and compare two approaches to using linguistic universals in the explanation of second language acquisition. The first approach is "Universal Grammar approach" within which the notions of parametric variation and markedness have been applied to second language acquisition. The second approach is "typological approach" which used the notion of implication to explain universals in second language acquisition. It is suggested that both the UG and the typological approach make many of the same fundamental assumptions about the nature of interlanguage and how such data are to be explained and that two approaches make different claims as to whether the grammars of primary languages and interlanguages are identical with respect to universals. More evidences are needed to decide which approach is better in explaining universals in second language acquisition.