An Investigation of Case Connectivity in Korean Sluicing and Why-stripping

Abstract

This study explores the Case connectivity of Korean fragments such as matrix sluicing and why-stripping, which are elliptical variants of full wh-questions. Both fragments are limited by a certain identity condition in ellipsis. We first show that the argument structure of a missing predicate must be identical to that of the corresponding antecedent predicate. We then show that if the remnant of ellipsis is an NP, it must be Case-licensed by a missing head identical to the corresponding antecedent head. Given this, we argue that Case mismatches are possible in Korean sluicing or why-stripping when the antecedent verb may assign more than one Case. The non-structuralist approach (Sag and Nykiel 2011; Jacobson 2016) enforces the Case identity between a sub-sentential remnant and its correlate. Hence, we defend the structuralist approach to the Case connectivity of Korean fragments.