What’s in a Parasitic Gap?

Abstract Prior literature has debated whether multiple gaps in parasitic gap constructions have a shared antecedent or separate antecedents. I adduce novel arguments for a shared antecedent approach from connectivity effects in English: Parasitic gaps obligatorily match the binding-theoretic class, syntactic category, and lexical identity of the filler. I develop an analysis of parasitic gaps that derives these facts by synthesizing two very different previous accounts—Nissenbaum 2000 and Nunes 2004—in a way that preserves key insights from both. Parasitic gaps emerge from the interaction between (a) parallel Merge, (b) a constrained form of internal Merge, and (c) the mapping of Ā-movement structures to meaningful subparts. My analysis also clarifies the source of weakest crossover effects with parasitic gaps, establishes novel tests for identifying null operators, and paves the way for a novel account of the A-/Ā-distinction in parasitic gap licensing.