AN ARGUMENT FOR NON-AGREE-DRIVEN MOVEMENT

Abstract

This paper argues for the occurrence of movement that is not the by-product of an Agree relation in which a probe searches for a goal. The hypothesis that not all instances of movement might be feature-driven was entertained in early Minimalism, but it has nevertheless become widely assumed that all instances of syntactic movement should be attributed to the operation of Agree. Here, using complex patterns of DP-internal movement in Bangla, we argue that certain instances of syntactic movement may indeed take place without Agree. Taking the Phase Impenetrability Condition/PIC as the signature property of phases, and sensitivity to the PIC to be indicative of Agree-related movement, we show that some occurrences of movement within a single domain are constrained by the PIC, while others are not.