The Ellipsis Movement Generalization and the Notion of Phase∗
Masanori Nakamura · 2009
Abstract The notion of phase plays an integral part in the current version of the minimalist approach. It has been proposed that derivations proceed phase by phase, handing a specified portion of syntactic structure over to the phonological component as soon as a phase is fully constructed (Chomsky 2000, 2001, 2008; see also Fox & Pesetsky 2005 for relevant discussion). The adoption of phase enables us to build a theory of grammar whereby the derivational system of human language attends only to a limited part of structure at one time, severely lessening the computational burden.