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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>The idea of frequency, social
preferences/development, and semantic-form combinations developing to account
for the different contraction possibilities sounds quite plausible, Spike.
HPSG in fact treats some of these as separate words. Moreover, the observation
I made that the deontic sense of 'gotta' sounds ungrammatical without
contraction supports the idea that this is a single word now (as Paul Postal
pointed out, it is a 'raising' verb, as in 'There's gotta be a way out of
here' uses). </FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>The failure to contract across a 'trace',
moreover, can follow in RRG either for pragmatic reasons, as I suggested or,
alternatively, because these are different kinds of what RRG calls 'nexus'
relations. In 'Who do you want to see' we have 'cosubordination' and in 'Who
do you want to see Bill' subordination, as Bob VanValin reminded
me.</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Whatever the final answer it seems much more
plausible that it will come from semantics and pragmatics than tree
structure.</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Dan</FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML>