Basic English Grammar with Exercises

Exercise 9

f [PRO] To err is human.

arbitrary control

g Mary tried [PRO] to feed the elephants.

subject control

h The teacher plans [PRO] to write another study on causatives.

subject control

Exercise 9

(1) a John was believed to have stolen the book from the library.

b Jane was assumed to be taken to the cinema by taxi.

c The students wanted to pass the exam.

d Which girl do you think John would like to dance with?

Believe is a two-place predicate selecting for an experiencer and a theme or

propositional argument. Here the v head is occupied by the passive morpheme -en,

which does not require an experiencer argument. So there will be only one argument,

which is a clausal argument occupying the specifier position of the VP. The head of

the upper vP is the base position for the passive auxiliary be. This moves to the I head

in the S-structure. The verb believe adjoins to the passive morpheme in v. In the

embedded clause, the main verbs takes two arguments: a theme DP in the specifier of

the VP and an agent DP in the specifier position of the light verb. The main verb steal

adjoins to the light verb, and this complex head moves on the aspectual morpheme -en,

being also a bound morpheme. The perfect auxiliary have occupies the head of the

upper vP projection. The PP from the library is an adjunct, since the verb steal requires

only two arguments: an agent and a theme. The DP the book can be assigned Case by

the light verb in v in its base position. The other argument, however, has to move in

order to receive Case. The first position where it has a chance to receive Case is the

first subject position in the specifier of the lower IP. If the verb in the upper clause is

not passive, then the light verb can assign accusative Case to the DP in the specifier of

the lower IP, as can be seen in (2).

(2) Jane believed John to have stolen the book from the library.

In this sentence, however, the v head is occupied by the passive morpheme -en,

which cannot assign Case. So the DP has to move on to the next position where it can

get Case. This position is the subject position in the specifier of the higher IP. Here the

finite I head assigns nominative Case to the DP.