TNTL 116/1

A.M. Duinhoven

 Samentrekking zonder deletie. De structuur van samengetrokken woordgroepen

Abstract - It is generally assumed that in contracted co-ordinations, such as big and small trees, an element is deleted. In this article it is argued that what seems to be ‘co-ordination reduction’ is actually the result of reanalysis. Originally autonomous word classes, like the declined adjective and the finite verb, became dependent on a noun and a subject. In phrases consisting of one head and two specifying elements, or two heads and one specifier, that dependency causes a discontinuous structure: the first element is connected to the last, and one of these is also linked with the second element. This asymmetry suggests a gap, but no word has been omitted.

Contraction of compounds is also the result of reinterpretation. Compounds with two co-ordinated specifiers or heads, indicating two subcategories of one set, can be understood to be two complementary sets: {a + b}c or a{b + c} => a(c) + bc and ab + (a)c. Among the three elements the same complex structure applies as described above

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