Prepositions with CP and their implications for extended projections

Abstract

In some limited cases, English allows a particular preposition to combine with a certain kind of subordinate clause, as exemplified by in that in “I take the proposal seriously, in that I loathe it”. In contrast, Norwegian systematically allows prepositions to combine with subordinate clauses (as in Det resulterte i at vi vant, literally “It resulted in that we won”). I argue that the English case should be handled as the subcategorization for a certain complement class by a particular lexical entry, while the Norwegian case indicates that the extended projection of clauses can continue up to the preposition. This highlights an important difference between lexical selection and extended projection, revealing a hitherto underappreciated source of parametric variation, and sheds light on several properties of extended projections as well as of prepositions. Specifically, the extended projections of N and V may “converge” at P, challenging the notion of extended projection as being confined to a single lexical category.