TY - BOOK ID - 67087684 TI - Generative linguistics and acquisition AU - Becker, Misha AU - Grinstead, John AU - Rothman, Jason PY - 2013 VL - 54 SN - 09250123 SN - 9789027253163 9789027272263 9027272263 9781299396432 1299396437 9027253161 PB - Amsterdam/Philadelphia DB - UniCat KW - Generative grammar KW - Language acquisition KW - English language KW - Acquisition KW - Generative grammar. KW - Language acquisition. KW - Grammar, Comparative and general KW - Grammar, Generative KW - Grammar, Transformational KW - Grammar, Transformational generative KW - Transformational generative grammar KW - Transformational grammar KW - Psycholinguistics KW - Acquisition of language KW - Developmental linguistics KW - Developmental psycholinguistics KW - Language and languages KW - Language development in children KW - Psycholinguistics, Developmental KW - Interpersonal communication in children KW - Acquisition. KW - Derivation KW - Germanic languages KW - English language - Acquisition UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:67087684 AB - This paper proposes a new theory of why null-subjects of finite verbs are produced by young children developing a non-null-subject language. We first show that one of the extant theories, Topic-Drop, isn't supported. Modifying ideas proposed in Rizzi (2006), we assume that finite null-subjects arise in the specifier of a root TP, and may be null as the result of phasal computation. But we reject the idea that the selection of a root is an arbitrary, parametric process. Using new work in syntactic theory that relates information structure (namely undistinguished subjects) to root Tense Phrases ER -