PREDICATE-FRONTING IN BURMESE

Abstract

This thesis describes and seeks a structural account for the phenomenon of predicate-fronting in Burmese in terms of restrictions on its availability. One of these restrictions is that predicate-fronting is possible stranding an indirect object but not possible stranding a direct object. The second restriction described is that predicate-fronting across subjects is available across animate subjects but not across inanimate subjects. I propose that the facts can be accounted for by a difference in the structural positions of animate and inanimate subjects. I also make the claim that predicate-fronting always involves the movement of the vP constituent and not any of its sub-constituents. Finally, I posit that indirect objects can be scrambled out of the vP before vP-fronting but this is not possible with the direct object.