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This comparative syntactic study claims that agreement is the most central
functional category responsible for licensing predication in finite,
non-finite and small clauses alike. Intriguing syntactic phenomena like
Icelandic infinitival predicates taking non-nominative (quirky) subjects;
psych-impersonal and modal predicates in Italian, Hungarian and Russian;
meteorological predicates, existential clauses, post-verbal and null
subjects in the so-called null-subject VSO languages can all be better
analyzed through a concept of predication that is closely related to AGRP,
manifesting subject-verb agreement.
The overt agreement marking in Hungarian and Portuguese infinitival clauses
further strengthens this view. Obviation and control subjunctive clauses in
the Balkan languages, Welsh finite and non-finite infinitival clauses as
well as case-marked secondary predicates in Icelandic, Slovak, Hungarian,
Russian and Finnish also lend support to an analysis where the [+pred]
feature is checked in AGRP.
Table of contents
List of abbreviations vii–ix
List of cases in Hungarian x
Acknowledgements xi
Foreword xii–xv
1. Finiteness and minimalist theory 1–28
2. Two theories of predicstion without AGRP 29–41
3. AGR-based theories of grammar 43–69
4. AGRP in infinitival clauses: Icelandic and Hungarian 71–143
5. AGRP in other forms of non-finite predication 145–198
6. Conclusion 199–201
References 203–218
Index 220–221
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