Scrambling in Japanese

[Tibor Kiss]

Hi everybody,

I have a question concerning scrambling in Japanese: Given ditransitive 
constructions in Japanese, is it possible to scramble both objects in front 
of (i.e. to the left of) the subject, as illustrated in (1)?

(1) Daremo-ni     dareka-o          John-ga syookaisita (koto).
     everyone-dat somebody-acc John-nom introduced

Moreover, if (1) is well-formed, is it ambiguous, as e.g. (2) is? I dare 
say it's not.

(2) John-ga    dareka-o          daremo-ni     syookaisita (koto).
     John-nom somebody-acc everyone-dat introduced

It has been claimed by various authors that examples like (2) are 
ambiguous. It would follow from analyses like Hoji (1986) that (1) is 
ambiguous, too. Mysteriously, the analysis put forth in Aoun/Li (1993) 
suggests that (1) is not possible at all, because they assume that 
scrambling in Japanese is NP-movement to SpecIP. Since there is only one 
SpecIP, (1) should not be possible.

Thanx in advance,

Tibor

=======================================================
Prof. Dr. Tibor Kiss
Sprachwissenschaftliches Institut -- Ruhr-Universität Bochum -- D-44780 
Bochum
+49-234-700-5114 // +49-177-7468265
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