Ellipsis Vacuous Movement Hypothesis
Ellipsis with an auxiliary as a remnant is impossible in main clause nonsubject questions in English.
(1)
(1a–b) involve sluicing/IP-ellipsis. The contrast shows that auxiliary in version is excluded in sluicing contexts (see also Boeckx and Stjepanovic´ 2001; Lasnik 2001).
An unexpected asymmetry arises, however, with respect to main clause subject questions.
(2)
(2b) is fine, in contrast to (1b). Notice that both (1a) and (2a) involve sluicing, the auxiliary being deleted along with other material embedded in IP. We run into problems if (2b) is analyzed as a case of sluicing too, since the presence of the auxiliary as a remnant after sluicing is generally prohibited. The problem does not arise if we take (2b) to be a case of VP ellipsis, and—following the VMH —the wh-subject does not move and there is no inversion.
(3)
The VP-ellipsis represented in (3) is licensed under sisterhood with a nonnull functional head (Lobeck 1990, 1995). This is possible only if the auxiliary does not undergo inversion. The availability of VP-ellipsis with main clause subject questions, but not with nonsubject questions, is consistent with the VMH in. If the wh-subject remains in situ, inversion does not apply.
