Notes on Clause Structure

The present article will review, and elaborate upon, some of the many recent proposals concerning sentential functional projections, verb incorporation and “checking theory” (see Chomsky 1992) that have been published or circulated in recent years. In particular an effort will be made to identify the various functional projections distinguished under the so-called “Split Inflection Hypothesis” (henceforth SIH) in English and French and develop a theory of what it is that makes them [±strong] or [±opaque], in the terminology of Pollock (1989), Chomsky (1989) and Chomsky (1992).