Adverb shift in English VP-ellipsis: A new paradigm

This talk investigates the unusual and rarely discussed phenomenon in English, where a VP-adverb surfaces in a higher clausal position in VP-ellipsis contexts than is otherwise possible in non-ellipsis contexts—which I term adverb shift. In this talk, I present the novel adverb shift paradigm and show that adverb shift involves movement out of the VP-ellipsis target. Further, I show that this movement must occur late in the derivation in PF. I then discuss the broader theoretical implications of the adverb shift phenomenon. In particular, what it can tell us about the nature of PF movement, i.e. when it may occur and how it differs from other movement types, e.g. syntactic movement.