On Concord and Projection

Abstract

In the spirit of the copy theory of movement, I propose that Merge applies only to satisfy Selection or Modification. This proposal differentiates between Agreement (instantiated by an EPP-feature targeting the upper argument selected by the lexical head, in the usual way) and Concord, occurring between any head and its Specifier with no additional trigger. It also derives head-movement by proposing that the functional skeleton of a lexical head is one and the same bundle of features, projected according to a paradigm associated with the head. As a consequence, parametric variation can be reduced to properties of inflectional paradigms.