Basic English Grammar with Exercises

Chapter 6 - Inflectional Phrases

As we mentioned previously, the negative element is not so accommodating and it
refuses to give up its place below the finite inflection and above the verb. Thus in this
case the verb cannot support the inflection and the dummy auxiliary has to be inserted:

(55) IP

DP I'

he I vP

• ∆ v'

v vP

v'

v VP

not borrow the book

The final structure of the clause we end up with is as follows:

(56) IP

• I'

I vP

mod/agr v'

v v/VP

tense (negation) (aspect) (light verbs) V

In what follows, we may sometimes for convenience abbreviate this to:

(57) IP

• I'

I VP

However, the more articulated structure in (56) will be assumed to be correct and
indeed will be essential for accounting for certain phenomena which will be introduced
in the next chapter.

do