Advances in the Syntax of DPs - Structure, agreement, and case

188 Gréte Dalmi

Among these languages only Italian, Polish and Icelandic allow generic inclusive lexi-

cal DPs to have unique reference under certain conditions. In Italian and Polish the

generic vs. unique reference alternation correlates with aspectual changes, while in

Icelandic, the same reference alternation is triggered by non-veridical operators. Finn-

ish and Hungarian do not allow reference alternation at all. Chinese allows generic

inclusive null DPs to alternate with unique reference null DPs (see Holmberg 2010).

The chart in (89) summarizes this:

(89) Generic inclusive vs. unique reference alternation with aspectual

or contextual restrictions

Reference GENERIC UNIQUE

NSLs GNincl 1 pl 1 sg/2sg 3 sg 3 pl

Chinese any aspect – – any aspect –

Italian ipfv perf – – –

Polish ipfv perf – – perf

Icelandic non-verid. – verid. – –

Finnish – –

Hungarian – –

In sum, reference alternation can be conditioned either by an aspectual or a non-verid-

ical operator in languages where such alternation exists at all.

4. Summary

In this paper I investigated the distribution of generic inclusive lexical vs. null DPs in

Hungarian. Hungarian cross-cuts the typological system introduced by Roberts and

Holmberg (2010) insofar as it allows both lexical and null generic inclusive DPs to

appear in any argument position of the verb. In finite clauses the generic inclusive lexi-

cal DP az ember ‘the man’ corresponds to the genericity-inducing occurrence of one,

while the generic inclusive null DP, proGN, instantiates the variable occurrence of one,

diagnosed by Moltmann (2006, 2010 , 2012 ).

A similar duality is found in the case of controlled PRO. While PROarb needs

no antecedent, PROGN must be bound by a generic inclusive lexical or null argument.

This becomes particularly apparent in the case of psych-impersonal predicates taking

a dative experiencer and an infinitival clause complement. When the lexical or null

dative experiencer happens to be a generic inclusive lexical or null DP, it will control

PROGN, just as dative experiencer DPs with unique reference control canonical PROs.