A Derivational Syntax for Information Structure

“In this volume, Luis Lopez sheds new light on information structure and makes a significant contribution to work on grammatical operations in the Minimalist Program. He presents a detailed model of syntax – information structure interaction and argues that this interaction takes place at the phase level, with a privileged role for the edge of the phase. Through careful analysis of phenomena found in Romance languages, the author shows that notions such as ‘topic’ and ‘focus’, as usually defined, yield no predictions and proposes instead a feature system based on the notions ‘discourse anaphor’ and ‘contrast’.”–BOOK JACKET.