Specifier-to-Specifier Antilocality Also Constrains A-movement: Evidence from the Agreement Paradigm of the Distributive/Collective Ambiguity in the Dual Quantifier Phrases kila/kilta in Standard Arabic

• Published in: SKASE journal of theoretical linguistics Vol. 20; no. 3; pp. 56 - 68
• Main Author: Abu Helal, Abdel-Rahman
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: The Slovak Association for the Study of English 01.12.2023
• ISSN: 1336-782X; 1336-782X

This paper provides an argument for the Specifier-to-Specifier antilocality constraint (Erlewine 2016, 2020) on movement from the collective/distributive interpretative ambiguity in the dual Quantifier Phrase (DQP) kila/kilta in Standard Arabic. The paper shows that the antiagreement effect in distributive kila/kilta is due to the fact that the QP, which occupies a high position in the agreement domain of articulation, may not undergo movement into the specifier of an immediately dominating agreeing head: it is too short a movement that is blocked by antilocality. On the other hand, subject-verb agreement in collective kila/kilta surfaces since collective kila/kilta occupies a lower position in the agreement domain, making movement into the specifier of the agreeing head long enough to avoid being blocked by antilocality. The paper shows that the asymmetry observed between the collective and distributive kila/kilta with respect to (anti-)agreement can be straightforwardly accounted for under the Specifier-to-Specifier antilocality approach of Erlewine (2016, 2020). Keywords: Anti-locality, agreement, collective/distributive readings, A-movement, feature checking