How to Reconcile a Multidominant Theory of Movement with Late Merge, with a view from Polish

Abstract

This paper presents a way to reconcile so-called Principle C anti-reconstruction effects with a Multidominant Theory of Movement. One of the most popular accounts of this phenomenon involves Late Merge (typically assumed to be possible with adjuncts but not arguments) and has been used as an argument against Multidominant theories of movement, and in favor of the Copy Theory of Movement (Larson 2016, Witkoś 2021). The paper provides a multidominant account of Principle C effects that does not rely on the argument/adjunct distinction, given the fact that the contrast between adjuncts and argument clauses is absent in Polish (Witkoś 2000, 2004), and has been questioned for English as well.