Homework 3 comments

In class, I promised to post what I meant by the “clefting test” since it did not appear on the handout. The clefting test I had in mind is a constituency test that works like this:

If you want to find out whether X is a constituent in a sentence containing X, you form a cleft sentence like

It is X that [... S except for X ...]

So, if your sentence is Pat gave a book to Tracy, and you want to see if a book to Tracy is a constituent, then X is a book to Tracy and the test sentence for a clefting test is:

*It is a book to Tracy that Pat gave.

…which I do not find grammatical. But note that what comes after that is basically S but with X removed. If you want to see if to Tracy is a constituent, then X is to Tracy and the test sentence is:

It is to Tracy that Pat gave a book.

…which is okish, acceptable enough. Sometimes if you are clefting a person, it sounds better to use who instead of that.

It is Pat who gave a book to Tracy.

It is a book that Pat gave to Tracy.

It is give a book to Tracy that Pat did.