[Lingtyp] Partial pro-drop

[Arnold Zwicky]

I'm coming in on this discussion late, because I'm terrby pressed in my private life and also have to try to respond without any library materials, so from memory and files on my computer.

The big thing is to beg that people stop referring to all instances of subject omission as pro-drop. English is not a pro-drop language; Spanish is. But English has a ton of subjectless constructions, some in neutral register (subjectless imperatives), many in various special registers and styles (epistolary "Met Maggie yesterday";  accost tag "Saw the solution, did you?"; exclamatory "Killed himself! OMG!" and on and on. Each of these constructions is a world of its own, so to speak, with its own semantics, syntax, and pragmatics.

Take a look at:

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https://web.stanford.edu/~zwicky/bls05.reading.pdf

AMZ, "Gonna, Auxiliary Reduction, and two modules of syntactic organization", BLS 31 (2005)

with various missing-subject constructions, in particular Informal Subject Omission, quite frequent in English, though iit's not generally a pro-drop language
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On a separate point, the use of some constructions in both rude / challenging ways and affectionate / deferential ways points to a commonality, in highly emotional or affective content.

I'm just putting these thoughts out for your consideration. Much as I want to, I'm not able to engage in the usual back and forth discussion of my ideas and your responses. I am so sorry.

Arnold