Inghild Flaate Høyem

This paper examines the control status of German adjunct infinitives headed by (an)statt, ohne and um. Contrary to previous analyses, I argue that most of these adjuncts display the OC properties described by Landau (2013): The controller must be an argument of the adjunct’s matrix clause (usually, but not always, a subject), long-distance and arbitrary control are ruled out, OC PRO only allows a sloppy reading under ellipsis, and they freely allow inanimate PRO. Assuming a modified version of Landau’s OC-as-AGREE-analysis based on Zeijlstra (2012), Wurmbrand (2011, 2014) and Fischer (2016), OC is analyzed as upward multiple AGREE between a functional head F, an explicit or implicit antecedent, and PRO. Drawing on ideas in Sigurðsson (2004, 2014), NOC is analyzed as contextual pragmatic control. The control status of an adjunct is affected both by its semantic type and its syntactic position. Event and process modifying adjuncts in the c-command domain of T always display OC, including split control. In contrast, adjuncts adjoined above T display NOC. In the German adjuncts under investigation, this is only attested in speech act adjuncts, typically with the speaker/writer as antecedent, and in consecutive adjuncts, with a dativus iudicantis (Engl. estimative dative) as antecedent.

The present article is concerned with so-called absolute, i.e. non-selected, small clauses headed by the preposition mit (in one of its homonymous uses). Drawing on observations and data in Businger (2011), but contrary to his analysis, I argue for a unified syntactico-semantic analysis of ‚absolute‘ small clauses headed by the preposition mit (‚with‘) and haben-clauses (‚have‘) in German as double subject-predicate structures. Based on Bowers’ (1993, 2001) PrP-analysis, I analyze absolute mit-SCs as adjunct PrPs (PrPadjunct) headed by mit with PRO in Spec and a PrP complement (PrPcomplement), consisting (minimally) of a dative DP and a predicative XP, cf. (1): (1) [PrP/adjunct PRO mit [PrP/complement DPdat […] XP]]]Regarding the interpretation of PRO in these adjuncts, I argue that PRO displays the obligatory control (OC) properties described by Landau (2013): 1) the controller must be an argument of the adjunct’s matrix clause (usually, but not always, a subject), 2) long-distance and arbitrary control are ruled out, 3) OC PRO only allows a sloppy reading under ellipsis, and 4) PRO’s antecedent is not restricted to [+human], but also can also be [-human]. Finally, these adjuncts are syntactically and semantically underspecified in the sense that they are not inherently temporal, causal or manner, but are interpreted as such in the corresponding adverbial adjunct positions (cf. Frey & Pittner 1998, 1999 and Pittner 1999).