Estructura de constituyentes y 'sino'

Abstract

This article shows that, despite appearances, the structures associated to No vi a Juan sino a Maria (I didn't see Juan, but Maria) and Vi no a Juan sino a Maria (I saw not Juan but Maria) are different. While it is possible to accept a standard analysis in the first case, the second structure displays properties which are surprising if one assumes that a Juan ‘to Juan’ is an argument of the predicate. This work argues that in the second structure the negated element and the corrective coda form one single constituent where sino acts as a relational head.