Unaccusative verbs have been the object of much study and research, especially regarding the causative alternation. While there have been many studies that analyze the causative alternation or the nature of the aspectual properties of the clitic se in Romance languages (see for example, Alexiadou et al., 2015; Basilico, 2010; De Cuyper, 2006; Kempchinsky, 2004; Nishida, 1994; Schäfer, 2008; Zagona, 1996), there are not many which provide a uniform account for the distribution of the clitics with the different types of unaccusative verbs in Spanish as a whole, whether they participate or not in the causative alternation. This chapter provides a uniform account for all unaccusative verbs in Spanish, and analyzes the distribution of obligatory PPs and clitics. The analysis adopted here is based on Hale & Keyser’s (2002) model, as developed in Zubizarreta & Oh (2007), which is summarized in Section 3.2, and Mayoral Hernández (2008, 2010).

Degree achievement verbs (increase, fall, grow, age) present challenges for theories of argument structure based on aspectual characterizations (Abusch, 1986; Dowty, 1979, 1991; among others). These verbs show variable behavior with respect to telicity, and, furthermore, the (a)telic interpretation is not straightforwardly affected by properties of the verbs’ arguments, unlike the case of incremental theme verbs (eat an apple vs. eat apples) or directed motion verbs (descend vs. descend the stairs).

A subclass of degree achievement verbs is morphologically related to gradable adjectives (widen, cool, dry, lengthen) and they too exhibit the peculiar telicity properties of the wider class of degree achievements. It is now standardly believed that the aspectual properties of deadjectival degree achievements can be attributed to the scalar structure of the base adjective (Deo et al., 2013; Hay et al., 1999; Kennedy & Levin, 2008; Winter, 2006).

The influencing work by María Luisa Zubizarreta on the syntax–prosody–information structure connection has enlightened the study of the language faculty (Zubizarreta, 1994, 1998, 1999). Her observations have led to much debate not only on general abstract properties of language but also on several empirical domains. Of particular relevance to the understanding of the relationship between syntax, sentence-level stress, and informational structure is her contribution to the debate on the mechanisms that generate VOS word order in Spanish. Zubizarreta’s (1998) pioneering work proposes a formal analysis of the connection between VOS word order, stress assignment, and focus interpretation.

According to Zubizarreta (1998), to obtain a narrow focus interpretation on the subject, Romance languages generate VOS configurations. In her proposal, Spanish VOS order is the result of a short VP-movement operation involving the verb and its complement that leaves the subject in sentence-final position.

In her exploration of the left edge of the clause and its interaction with discourse-related functions such as questions, topic, and focus, Zubizarreta closely examined the frontier between TP and CP in Romance languages. One result of her research in this area was the discovery of a dedicated position in this region “whose function is to ‘externalize’ an argument of a verb v with respect to the tense associated with v” (Zubizarreta, 1999, p. 256). Zubizarreta called this projection the CL(itic)-phrase (1999) and, later, the phi-phrase (2007). She proposed that “clitics and strong agr are the morphological manifestation of an abstract Cl[itic] position” (Zubizarreta, 1999, p. 272). That is, if pronominal clitics or strong agreement occur in a language, then CL occurs. Her work sheds light on the syntax of clitic left-dislocated expressions, and other expressions on the left periphery such as preverbal subjects and Wh-operators in languages that have pronominal clitics and/or strong agreement.

Transfer, i.e. the influence of the first language (L1) in the interlanguage (IL), is a characteristic phenomenon of the process of second language (L2) acquisition. In the field of Second Language Acquisition (SLA), different theories have been proposed to predict how and in which stages the grammatical properties for the L1 are manifested in the IL. According to the theory of Full Transfer / Full Access (Schwartz & Sprouse 1994, 1996), the grammar of the L1 in its entirety is the initial state of the IL. Afterwards, depending on the properties of the L1 and L2, the linguistic input to which the learner is exposed acts as a triggering factor in the reconstruction of the IL grammar. This restructuring process is conditioned by Universal Grammar (UG); for the most part, the IL complies with the restrictions imposed by UG during this whole process.

A common observation in the literature is that unmarked or canonical readings of certain syntactic objects have different linearization requirements from marked, or focused, constituents of the same syntactic objects. Using the linear ordering of prenominal adjectives in English as a case study of marked and unmarked constituent orderings, I seek a deeper explanation for the underpinnings of linear ordering based on the hypothesis that the structural complexity of some specifier is the same as that of its sister, leading to a functional hierarchy of projections for adjectives that parallels that of noun phrases (Prinzhorn, 1996, as cited in Vergnaud, 2014a). I propose that dimensional adjectives are syntactically more complex than absolute adjectives along the semantic dimension of intersectivity, which derives the linear ordering observed. Second, once that hierarchy is established, putting narrow focus on an adjective permits multiple linear orderings, typically accounted for by movement of an adjective phrase to the Specifier position of a focus phrase (Laenzlinger, 2005; Scott, 2002; Svenonius, 2008; etc.).

Polarity-sensitive items are a peculiar kind of linguistic object. As Israel (2004, p. 207) notes: they are a class of items “which do not themselves express negation or affirmation, but which are restricted to sentences of one or the other polarity.” Broadly speaking, polarity items are expressions whose distribution is sensitive to contexts that express contradiction, contrariety, or reversal (Israel, 2004).

Idioms are also peculiar kinds of objects that have complex syntactic structure but behave like individual lexical units. It turns out that many polarity-sensitive items are idioms, and that intersection provides an interesting insight about both categories, which I will explore in this chapter.

A well-studied phenomenon in Spanish (and in Romance languages in general) is clitic placement in constructions with so-called restructuring verbs, such as querer “want,” deber “must,” poder “can/may,” soler (habitual aspect), empezar “begin,” estar “be” – which are sometimes dubbed semi-auxiliary verbs, since they express modality and aspect – as well as the true auxiliary haber “have” (see Burzio, 1986; Cardinaletti & Shlonsky, 2004; Cinque, 2004, 2006; Perlmutter, 1983; Strozer, 1976; among many others). What is especially noteworthy about these constructions is that, when pronominal clitics are used, these may be associated either with the main finite verb or the lexical verb in a non-finite form.

Long the focus of intense discussion in linguistics forums, verbal diathesis alternations (or argument re-ordering) have provided important theoretical tools and empirical materials for developing lexicalist, l-syntax, or purely syntactic hypotheses regarding the projection of argument structures (ASs) (Borer, 2005; Hale & Keyser, 2002; Levin & Rappaport Hovav, 1991; Zubizarreta, 1985, 1987; and others). Less attention has been paid to adjectival ASs. After the pioneering work by Wilkinson (1970), two seminal proposals, Cinque (1990) and Stowell (1991), made a start in this direction, opening new lines of analysis and proposing many productive hypotheses. Cinque (1990) set up the distinction between ergative and unergative adjectives, thus initiating a debate on the parallel between the argument projection of verbal and adjectival syntactic categories.

The study of second language (L2) acquisition from the generative perspective has, traditionally, focused primarily on narrow syntactic and morphosyntactic phenomena (for an overview, see, e.g., Ionin, 2012; White, 2003). The last two decades have seen a rise in L2 studies that address phenomena at the syntax–semantics and syntax–pragmatics interfaces, investigating such topics as grammatical tense and aspect, scope ambiguity, article semantics, and the interpretation of overt vs. null pronouns, among others (for an overview, see Slabakova, 2008, 2016). Across both (morpho)syntactic and interface phenomena, studies find evidence of crosslinguistic influence (transfer) from the learners’ first language (L1), but also find that learners are able to acquire novel properties of their L2 that are not present in their L1 and that are often underdetermined in the input (see Schwartz & Sprouse, 2013; Slabakova, 2016).