Glossarypresent approach, however, it has been argued that the head position of the
IP contains only the modal auxiliaries and the (in English) invisible
agreement morpheme, information about Tense can be found in an
independent vP hosting infinitival to, and the bound morphemes -ed and -s
also appear here. The specifier position of an IP is occupied by the
subject (see canonical subject position), the complement of an I is usually
a VP or vP (but see small clauses for an exception). IPs are
complements of CPs or ECM verbs.
intermediate projection: the X-bar level projection connecting the zero-level (or
word-level) projection X and the maximal (or phrase-level) projection
XP.
interrogative clause: a structure mainly used to ask for information, either in the form
of a yes–no question or a wh-question.
intransitive verb: a verb without a nominal complement (the object), e.g. ski. Its
subject is either an agent or an experiencer, i.e. one of the theta-roles
assigned to the specifier of a vP. Occasionally intransitive verbs appear
with a cognate object.
IP: see Inflectional Phrase.
irregular: cannot be described with the help of a rule, exceptional.
isomorphism: a one-to-one correspondence between the members of two sets.
I-to-C movement: the generative equivalent of the descriptive notion of subject–
auxiliary inversion attested in questions like ‘Can you swim?’, where the
auxiliary is assumed to move from the head position of IP to the head
position of CP.
landing site: the position elements move to.
language: a system that enables people who speak it to produce and understand
linguistic expressions.
lexical ambiguity: the source of ambiguity is a lexical constituent which is
associated with more than one meaning in the lexicon, e.g. bank, hot.
lexical aspect or aktionsart: aspect internal to the meaning of the verb, e.g. some
verbs describe events with an endpoint (eat), as opposed to others without a
natural endpoint (sit).
lexical entry: a collection of the idiosyncratic properties of lexical items.
lexical verb: a verb with lexical content as opposed to one having grammatical
function in the structure.
lexicon: a mental dictionary where we store information about all the words we use
focusing on the idiosyncratic properties such as pronunciation, meaning,
etc.
light verb: a verb occupying the head of a vP used in combination with another
element, typically a noun or verb, where the light verb’s contribution to the
meaning of the whole construction is less than that of a fully thematic main
verb, e.g. to take a shower=to shower. Certain verbs expressing aspectual
(be, have) or modal (let) meaning also belong here. According to the
proposals in the present book the following constituents can appear within
the vP in a visible or abstract form (see also vP-shells):