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11.3.3.Topicalization

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This section discusses topicalization, the phenomenon that in main clauses virtually any clausal constituent (and sometimes also parts thereof) may precede the finite verb in second position, subsection I starts by showing that, as in the case of question formation, the moved constituent can have a wide range of syntactic functions and can be of any category, subsection II continues by comparing topicalization to question formation (as well as relativization) in order to motivate the claim that it is derived by wh-movement; we will see that, apart from the fact that topicalization is a root phenomenon, there are indeed compelling reasons to assume wh-movement to be involved in the derivation, subsection III repeats some arguments from Section 9.3 for rejecting the traditional view that subject-initial sentences are necessarily derived by topicalization; exclusion of such sentences from the set of topicalization constructions will lead to the conclusion that such constructions have two characteristic properties: they exhibit subject-verb inversion and have a non-neutral reading, subsection IV explores the latter issue, and will show that topicalized phrases often play a special role in discourse; they express a contrastive focus, act as a topic, or perform a special function in the organization of the discourse. Given this, we may expect for contrastively focused phrases and topics at least that wh-movement may pied-pipe a larger phrase if syntactic restrictions prohibits extraction and subsection V shows that this expectation is indeed borne out, subsection VI continues with a discussion of topicalization of clauses and smaller verbal projections: such cases are special because wh-movement of such constituents is not possible in the case of question formation and relativization, subsection VII concludes with a comparison of topicalization in Dutch and English, and will show that there are a number of conspicuous differences, which raises the question as to whether the two should be considered phenomena of the same kind.

I. Syntactic function and categorial status of the topicalized element
II. Topicalization is a subcase of wh-movement
III. Subject-initial clauses versus topicalization constructions
IV. Information structure: focus and topic
V. Pied piping and stranding
VI. Topicalization of verbal projections
VII. Some differences between English and Dutch topicalization

[+] I. Syntactic function and categorial status of the topicalized element

The traditional generative analysis holds that main clauses are derived by placing the finite verb in the second position of the clauses, the so-called C-position in (285), followed by topicalization of some constituent into the so-called clause-initial position, the specifier of CP; see Section 11.1 for details.

285

There seem to be virtually no restrictions on the syntactic function or the categorial status of the topicalized element. The examples in (286) start by showing this for nominal arguments: subjects, direct and indirect objects are all possible in sentence-initial position.

286

a.	Marie/Ze	heeft	haar broer/hem	die baan	aangeboden.	subject
	Marie/she	has	her brother/him	that job	prt.-offered
	'Marie/She has offered her brother/him that job.'

b.	Die baan	heeft	ze	her brother/him	aangeboden.	direct object
	that job	has	she	her brother/him	prt.-offered
	'That job, she has offered [to] her brother/him.'

c.	Haarbroer/Hem	heeft	ze	die baan	aangeboden.	indirect object
	her brother/him	has	she	that job	prt.-offered
	'Her brother/Him, she has offered that job.'

There are, however, two important differences between subject-initial sentences and sentences with an object in first position. First, clause-initial objects can be considered to be semantically marked in that they act as discourse topics or contrastive foci, or have some other special function in the organization of the discourse, while this does not necessarily hold for clause-initial subjects. Second, topicalized objects are often characterized by a special intonation pattern: the objects in (286b&c), but not the clause-initial subjects in (286a), must be accented, as is clear from the fact the latter but not the former can be a reduced pronoun. This suggests that subject-initial sentences may also be syntactically different from constructions with topicalized objects; we will return to this issue in Subsection III.
Next, the examples in (287) show that it is also possible to topicalize prepositional objects: (287a) illustrates this for a prepositional indirect object and (287b) for the prepositional object of kijken (naar)'to look (at)'.

287

a.	Aan haarbroer/Hem	heeft	ze	die baan	aangeboden.	indirect object
	to her brother/him	has	she	that job	prt.-offered
	'His her brother/him, she has offered that job to.'

b.	Naar dat huis	staat	Jan al	een uur te kijken.	prepositional object
	at that house	stands	Jan already	an hour to look
	'That house, Jan has been staring at for an hour.'

Complementives can also be topicalized: we illustrate this in (288) by means of three examples with complementives of a different categorial status; they show that noun phrases, APs and PPs can all be topicalized.

288

a.	Een liefhebber van Jazz	ben	ik	niet	echt.	nominal
	a devotee of jazz	am	I	not	really
	'A devotee of jazz, I am not really.'

b.	Aardig	is de nieuwe directeur	beslist.	adjectival
	nice	is the new director	definitely
	'Nice, the new director definitely is.'

c.	In de la	heb	ik	de schaar	gelegd.	adpositional
	into the drawer	have	I	the scissors	put
	'In the drawer, I have put the scissors.'

Adjuncts can also be topicalized. Example (289a) shows this for supplementives and examples (289b&c) for adverbial phrases. Observe that we did not mark the adverbial phrases for accent; assigning accent is possible but does not seem to be necessary. We will return to this issue in Subsection IV.

289

a.	Kwaad	liep	hij	weg.	supplementive
	angry	walked	he	away
	'Angry, he walked away.'

b.	Op zolder	slapen	de kinderen.	place adverbial
	on attic	sleep	the children
	'In the attic, the children sleep/are sleeping.'

c.	Na de vergadering	vertrekken	we.	time adverbial
	after the meeting	leave	we
	'After the meeting, we will leave.'

The discussion above has shown that topicalization is like wh-question formation in that constituents with various syntactic functions (argument, complementive and adjunct) and of various different forms (noun phrase, AP and PP) can be moved into sentential-initial position. Topicalization differs from wh-movement, however, in that it also allows preposing of clauses; this is illustrated in (290) for a finite clause. We return to topicalization of clauses in Subsection VI. Accent can be assigned at various places within the preposed clause.

290

a.	Ik	verwacht	niet	[dat	hij	dat boek	wil	hebben].
	I	expect	not	that	he	that book	wants	have
	'I don't expect that he wants to have that book.'

[Dat hij dat boek wil hebben] verwacht ik niet.

The examples in (291) show that it is also possible to topicalize the complement of perfect and passive auxiliaries, a phenomenon known as VP-topicalization. The (a)-examples show that topicalization of the participle is possible both with and without the direct object; the (b)-examples show that subjects are normally not affected. VP-topicalization will also be discussed in Subsection VI. Accent will normally be assigned to the object if it is pied piped by VP-topicalization.

291

a.	Ze	hebben	mijn huis	nog	niet	geschilderd.	perfect
	they	have	my house	yet	not	painted
	'They haven't painted my house yet.'

a'.

[<Mijn huis> geschilderd] hebben ze <mijn huis> nog niet.

b.	Mijn huis	wordt	volgend jaar	geschilderd.	passive
	my house	be	next year	painted
	'My house will be painted next year.'

b'.

Geschilderd wordt mijn huis volgend jaar.

[+] II. Topicalization is a subcase of wh-movement

Topicalization involves movement of some constituent into the initial position of the main clause. It resembles the formation of wh-questions in that the movement targets the position immediately preceding the finite verb; this is illustrated again in the (b)-examples in (292). This observation is not trivial; this does not hold for a language like English. We return to this in Subsection VII.

292

a.	Jan	heeft	gisteren	dat boek	gelezen.
	Jan	has	yesterday	that book	read
	'Jan read that book yesterday.'

b.	Welk boeki	heeft	Jan gisteren ti	gelezen?	wh-question
	which book	has	Jan yesterday	read
	'Which book did Jan read yesterday?'

b'.	Dat boeki	heeft	Jan gisteren ti	gelezen.	topicalization
	that book	has	Jan yesterday	read
	'That book, Jan read yesterday.'

The (b)-examples in (293) show that topicalization differs from question formation (and relativization) in that it is a root phenomenon. It cannot apply in embedded clauses.

293

a.	Marie zei	[dat	Jan	dat boek	gelezen	heeft].
	Marie said	that	Jan	that book	read	has
	'Marie said that Jan has read that book.'

b.	Marie vroeg	[welk boeki	Jan ti	gelezen	heeft].	wh-question
	Marie asked	which book	Jan	read	has
	'Marie asked which book Jan has read.'

b'.	*	Marie zei	[dat boeki	Jan ti	gelezen	heeft].	topicalization
		Marie said	that book	Jan	read	has

There is no way in which embedded topicalization in examples such as (293b') can be improved. The examples in (294), for instance, show that Dutch does not have the option found in German to have topicalization in embedded clauses with verb-second, as embedded verb-second is categorically prohibited in Dutch. We refer the reader to Haider (1985/2010) and Barbiers (2005: Section 1.3.1.8) for a discussion of embedded verb-second in, respectively, German and a number of non-standard varieties of Dutch; the German example in (294a) is taken from Müller (1998:42) in a slightly adapted from.

294

a.	Marie	sagte	[dieses Buchi	habeconjunctive	sie ti	bereits	gelesen].	German
	Marie	said	this book	has	she	already	read
	'Marie said that this book, she had already read.'

b.	*	Marie	zei	[dit boeki	had	ze ti	al	gelezen].	Dutch
		Marie	said	this book	had	she	already	read

The examples in (294) also show that embedded topicalization cannot occur with a phonetically expressed complementizer, unlike what is the case in English examples such as (295a); cf., e.g., Chomsky (1977), Baltin (1982) and Lasnik & Saito (1992). Since there is no a priori reason to think that Dutch topicalization targets a different position than English topicalization, we have added example (295b'), in which the complementizer dat'that' precedes the topicalized phrase.

295

Marie thinks [that this booki you should read ti ].

English

b.	*	Marie denkt	[dit boeki	dat	je	zou ti	moeten	lezen].	Dutch
		Marie thinks	this book	that	you	would	must	read

b'.	*	Marie denkt	[dat	dit boeki	je ti	zou	moeten	lezen].	Dutch
		Marie thinks	that	this book	you	would	must	read

Examples (296a&b) show that topicalization is like question formation in that it allows long wh-movement if a bridge verb such as denken'to think' is present. It should be noted, however, that long topicalization is like relativization in that it is possible with a wider range of verbs than question formation; cf. Schippers (2012:105). For instance, the factive verb weten'to know' permits long topicalization (and long relativization), but not long wh-movement. It should further be noted that some speakers prefer the resumptive prolepsis construction in (296c) to the somewhat marked long topicalization construction in (296b).

296

a.	Welk boeki	denk/*weet	je	[dat	Jan ti	gekocht	heeft]?	wh-question
	which book	think/know	you	that	Jan	bought	has
	'Which book do you think that Jan has bought?'

b.	(?)	Dit boeki	denk/weet	ik	[dat	Jan ti	gekocht	heeft].	topicalization
		this book	think.know	I	that	Jan	bought	has
		'This book I think/know that Jan has bought.'

c.	Van dit boeki	denk/weet	ik	[dat	Jan heti	gekocht	heeft].	prolepsis
	of this book	think/know	I	that	Jan it	bought	has
	'As for this book, I think/know that Jan has bought it.'

That topicalization involves wh-movement is also suggested by the fact that it is island-sensitive, just like question formation and relativization. We illustrate this in (297b) by means of an embedded polar question. For completeness' sake, we have added (297b') to show that the intended meaning can be expressed by means of a resumptive prolepsis construction.

297

a.	Ik	vraag	me	af	[of	Jan dat boek	gekocht	heeft]?
	I	wonder	refl	prt.	if	Jan that book	bought	has
	'I wonder whether Jan has bought that book.'

b.	*	Dat boeki	vraag	ik	me	af	[of	Jan ti	gekocht	heeft]?
		that book	wonder	I	refl	prt.	if	Jan	bought	has

b'.	Van dat boeki	vraag	ik	me	af	[of	Jan heti	gekocht	heeft]?
	of that book	wonder	I	refl	prt.	if	Jan it	bought	has
	'As for this book, I am wondering whether Jan has bought it.'

Example (298b) illustrates the island-sensitivity of topicalization by means of an adjunct island. In this case, the resumptive prolepsis construction is not available as an alternative because the verb huilen'to cry' does not license a resumptive van-PP.

298

a.	Jan huilt	[omdat	Marie dat boek	gestolen	heeft].
	Jan cries	because	Marie that book	stolen	has
	'Jan is crying because Marie has stolen that book.'

b.	*	Dat boeki	huilt Jan [omdat	Marie ti	gestolen	heeft].
		that book	cries Jan because	Marie	stolen	has

This subsection has shown that topicalization exhibits various hallmarks of wh-movement: it targets the clause-initial position, it can be extracted from clauses selected by bridge verbs and it is island-sensitive. What sets it apart from wh-movement and relativization is that it is a root phenomenon; it cannot target the initial position of embedded clauses. We refer to Hoekstra & Zwart (1994), Sturm (1996) and Zwart & Hoekstra (1997) for a discussion of the question as to whether this shows that topicalization targets a different position than wh-movement, as in fact would be claimed in the cartographic approach initiated by Rizzi (1997).

[+] III. Subject-initial clauses versus topicalization constructions

The standard view in generative grammar is that topicalization is responsible for verb second in declarative main clauses in Dutch. The verb is first moved into the C-position immediately preceding the canonical subject position, after which the specifier position of CP is filled by some topicalized phrase. This implies that subject-initial main clauses such as (299a) must be derived by topicalization, as indicated in the representation in (299b).

299

a.	Mijn zuster/Zij/Ze	heeft	dit boek	gelezen.	subject
	my sister/she/she	has	this book	read
	'My sister/she has read this book.'

If the derivation in (299) is correct, we would expect the placement of subjects to be subject to similar restrictions as other cases of topicalization, like in the examples in (300). We seen in Subsection I, however, that subjects crucially differ from objects in that they need not be accented. The effect is even more conspicuous with weak (phonetically reduced) pronouns; while (299a) shows that the weak subject pronoun ze'she' is fully acceptable in sentence-initial position, weak object pronouns like 'r'her' in (300a&b) are not because they cannot be accented; see, e.g., Bouma (2008:34) for more discussion. Adverbial PPs with a weak pronominal complement can be topicalized if the preposition can be assigned accent; see Salverda (2000).

300

a.	Mijn zuster/Haar/*'r	heb	ik	nog niet	gezien.	direct object
	my sister/her/her	have	I	yet not	seen
	'My sister/her I haven't seen yet.'

b.	Op mijn zuster/haar/*'r	wil ik niet wachten.	PP-object
	for my sister/her/her	want I not wait
	'My sister/Her I don't want to wait for.'

c.	Naast 'r	zat	een aardige heer.
	next.to her	sat	a kind gentleman
	'Next to her sat a kind gentleman.'

The same contrast is found with the weak R-word er: the examples in (301) show that expletive er, which is normally assumed to occupy the regular subject position, can easily occur in sentence-initial position, but that this is excluded for er functioning as a locative pro-form or the pronominal part of a PP; topicalization is only possible with strong forms like daar'there' and hier'here'; see, e.g., Bouma (2008:29-30). We will ignore here that things are slightly complicated by the fact that (sentence-initial) er may sometimes have more than one function; we refer the reader to Section P5.5.3 for discussion and examples.

301

a.	Er	spelen	veel kinderen	op straat.	expletive er
	there	play	many children	on street
	'There are many children playing in the street.'

b.	Daar/*Er	spelen	de kinderen	graag.	locative er
	there/there	play	the children	gladly
	'The children like to play there.'

c.	Daari/*Eri	wacht	ik	niet [ ti	op].	pronominal part of PP
	there/there	wait	I	not	for
	'That I won't wait for.'

That this contrast should have an impact on our syntactic analysis is clear from the fact illustrated in (302) that subject pronouns do exhibit a similar behavior as object pronouns if they are extracted from an embedded clause: whereas noun phrases like mijn zuster'my sister' and strong (phonetically non-reduced) subject pronouns such as zij give rise to a reasonably acceptable result, topicalization is excluded if the subject pronoun is weak.

302

a.	(?)	Mijn zusteri/Ziji	zei	Jan	[dat ti	dit boek	gelezen	had].
		my sister/she	said	Jan	comp	this book	read	had
		'My sister/she, Jan said had read the book.'

b.	*	Zei	zei	Jan [dat ti	dit boek	gelezen	had].
		she	said	Jan comp	this book	read	had

Section 9.3 concluded from this that regular subject-initial constructions do not involve topicalization but are derived by simply placing the subject in the regular subject position, the specifier of the T(ense) head. This resulted in the following derivations of subject-initial clauses and topicalization constructions; cf. Travis (1984) and Zwart (1992/1997). Note that these analyses suggest that subject-verb inversion is a hallmark of topicalization constructions; cf. Salverda (1982/2000).

303

a.		Subject-initial sentences

b.		Topicalization constructions

Observe that we are not claiming here that subjects cannot be topicalized, but only that they are not topicalized if they occur in a neutrally pronounced sentence. Examples like (304a) with contrastive accent on the subject may involve topicalization. That they do so is strongly suggested by expletive constructions like (304b); since it is normally assumed that the expletive er'there' occupies the regular subject position, the subject niemand can only occur in sentence-initial position as a result of topicalization. We added the locational adverbial phrase op de vergadering to example (304b) to block a locative interpretation of er'there' in order to ensure that er indeed functions as an expletive.

304

a.	Mijn zuster	heeft	dit boek	gelezen.
	my sister	has	this book	read
	'My sister/she has read this book.'

b.	Niemand	was er	op de vergadering.
	nobody	was there	at the meeting
	'Nobody was there at the meeting.'

The analyses suggested in (303) are interesting in view of the fact that subject-initial clauses are the most neutral form of an utterance from a semantic view point: while topicalized phrases are special in that they play a specific role in structuring the discourse, sentence-initial subjects are often neutral in this respect. The representations in (303) thus enable us to express formally this by postulating that like question formation and relativization, topicalization is semantically motivated; see Dik (1978: Section 8.3.3), Haegeman (1995), Rizzi (1997), and many others. This will be the main topic of Subsection IV.

[+] IV. Information structure: focus and topic

The information structure of a clause is closely related to its intonation pattern. In utterances like the (b)-examples in (305), which present new information only if intended as an answer to the question in (305a), the main accent is located at the end of the clause, normally on the constituent preceding the clause-final verbs; see Section 13.1, sub III, for more detailed discussion. We will refer to utterances with this intonation pattern as neutral clauses (in order to not complicate things we will discuss main clauses only).

305

a.	Wat	is er	gebeurd?
	what	is there	happened
	'What has happened?'

b.	Jan heeft	Marie	een brief	gestuurd.
	Jan has	Marie	a letter	sent
	'Jan has sent Marie a letter.'

b'.	Jan heeft	een brief	naar Marie	gestuurd.
	Jan has	a letter	to Marie	sent
	'Jan has sent a letter to Marie.'

The intonation pattern of utterances can be affected by the information structure of the clause. In the primed examples in (306), which contain both presupposed and new information if used as answers to the questions in the primeless examples, the main accent must be located in the new information of the clause (henceforth: the new-information focus); in the cases at hand, this results in the placement of the main accent in a more leftward position. For more information about assignment of main accent in clauses we refer the reader to Booij (1995).

306

a.	Wie heeft	Jan	een brief	gestuurd?	question
	who has	Jan	a letter	sent
	'Who has Jan sent a letter?'

a'.	Hij heeft	Marie	een brief	gestuurd.	answer
	Jan has	Marie	a letter	sent
	'He has sent Marie a letter.'

b.	Wat	heeft	Jan	naar Marie	gestuurd?	question
	what	has	Jan	to Marie	sent
	'What has Jan sent to Marie?'

b'.	Hij heeft	een brief	naar Marie	gestuurd.	answer
	Jan has	a letter	to Marie	sent
	'Jan has sent a letter to Marie.'

The following subsections will show that topicalization may also affect the intonation pattern of utterances; we will see that the way in which the intonation pattern is affected depends on the impact topicalization has on the information structure of the clause. There are also a number of cases in which topicalization does not seem to have such a great impact on the intonation of the clause; we will discuss some of the prototypical cases. Before we start, we want to note that the literature exhibits a great deal of variation when it comes to information-structural notions like focus and topic; cf. Erteschik-Shir (2007) for an extensive review. We aim at staying close to the use of these notions in É. Kiss' (2002:ch.1-6) description of the Hungarian clause, in which these notions play a prominent role.

[+] A. Contrastive/restrictive focus

The new-information focus can also be placed in sentence-initial position as a result of topicalization. So, next to the answers in the primed examples in (306), we also find utterances like (307a&b). The parentheses indicate that the presuppositional part of such answers is normally omitted.

307

a.	Marie	(heeft	hij	een brief	gestuurd).	answer to (306a)
	Marie	has	he	a letter	sent
	'Marie, he has sent a letter.'

b.	Een brief	(heeft	hij	naar Marie	gestuurd).	answer to (306b)
	a letter	has	he	to Marie	sent
	'A letter, he has sent to Marie.'

Jansen (1981: Section 4.2.1) claims that focus topicalization of the type in (307) is not very frequent (in non-interrogative contexts), which raises the question as to whether we are simply dealing with new-information focus or whether utterances such as (307) have some additional property. We tend to think that the accents in these topicalization constructions are stronger than those in the primed examples in (306), which may suggest that topicalization constructions express contrastive or restrictive focus in the sense that the proposition holds for the focussed phrases, to the exclusion of any other referent; see Section 13.3.2 for more discussion.
This would be in line with the fact that utterance (307a) expresses that in the relevant domain of discourse only Marie was sent a book by Jan: if it were to turn out that Jan also sent a letter to Peter and that the speaker uttering (307a) was aware of that, he could be accused of not being fully informative by withholding information. The same would hold for utterance (