Editing Determiner phrase (section)

==Arguments for DP over NP==

The DP-hypothesis is held for four main reasons: 1) facilitates viewing phrases and clauses as structurally parallel, 2) accounts for determiners often introducing phrases and their fixed position within phrases, 3) accounts for possessive ''-s'' constructions, and 4) accounts for the behaviour of definite pronouns given their complementary distribution with determiners.

===Parallel structures===

The original motivation for the DP-analysis came in the form of parallelism across phrase and clause. The DP-analysis provides a basis for viewing clauses and phrases as structurally parallel.<ref>Bernstein (2008) develops the point that the DP-analysis increases parallelism across clauses and phrases.</ref> The basic insight runs along the following lines: since clauses have functional categories above lexical categories, noun phrases should do the same. The traditional NP-analysis has the drawback that it positions the determiner, which is often a pure function word, below the lexical noun, which is usually a full content word. The traditional NP-analysis is therefore unlike the analysis of clauses, which positions the functional categories as heads over the lexical categories. The point is illustrated by drawing a parallel to the analysis of auxiliary verbs. Given a combination such as ''will understand'', one views the modal auxiliary verb ''will'', a function word, as head over the main verb ''understand'', a content word. Extending this type of analysis to a phrase like ''the car'', the determiner ''the'', a function word, should be head over ''car'', a content word. In so doing, the NP ''the car'' becomes a DP. The point is illustrated with simple dependency-based hierarchies:

[[File:NP vs. DP 1.1.png|NP vs. DP 1.1|center]]

Only the DP-analysis shown in c establishes the parallelism with the verb chain. It enables one to assume that the architecture of syntactic structure is principled; functional categories (function words) consistently appear above lexical categories (content words) in phrases and clauses. This unity of the architecture of syntactic structure is perhaps the strongest argument in favor of the DP-analysis.

===Position===

The fact that determiners typically introduce the phrases in which they appear is also viewed as support for the DP-analysis. One points to the fact that when more than one attributive adjective appears, their order is somewhat flexible, e.g. ''an old friendly dog'' vs. ''a friendly old dog''. The position of the determiner, in contrast, is fixed; it has to introduce the phrase, e.g. ''*friendly an old dog'', ''*old friendly a dog'', etc. The fact that the determiner's position at the left-most periphery of the phrase is set is taken as an indication that it is the head of the phrase. The reasoning assumes that the architecture of phrases is robust if the position of the head is fixed. The flexibility of order for attributive adjectives is taken as evidence that they are indeed dependents of the noun.

===Possessive ''-s'' in English===

Possessive ''-s'' constructions in English are often produced as evidence in favor of the DP-analysis.<ref>For an example of possessive ''-s'' used as an argument in favor of DPs, see Carnie (2021: 214-217).</ref> The key trait of the possessive ''-s'' construction is that the ''-s'' can attach to the right periphery of a phrase. This fact means that ''-s'' is not a suffix (since suffixes attach to words, not phrases). Further, the possessive ''-s'' construction has the same distribution as determiners, which means that it has determiner status. The assumption is therefore that possessive ''-s'' heads the entire DP, e.g.

# [the guy with a hat]'s dog
# [the girl who was laughing]'s scarf

The phrasal nature of the possessive ''-s'' constructions like these is easy to accommodate on a DP-analysis. The possessive ''-s'' heads the possessive phrase; the phrase that immediately precedes the ''-s'' (in brackets) is in specifier position, and the noun that follows the ''-s'' is the complement. The claim is that the NP-analysis is challenged by this construction because it does not make a syntactic category available for the analysis of ''-s'', that is, the NP-analysis does not have a clear means at its disposal to grant ''-s'' the status of determiner. This claim is debatable, however, since nothing prevents the NP-analysis from also granting ''-s'' the status of determiner. The NP-analysis is however forced to acknowledge that DPs do in fact exist, since possessive ''-s'' constructions have to be acknowledged as phrases headed by the determiner ''-s''. A certain type of DP definitely exists, namely one that has ''-s'' as its head.

===Definite pronouns===

The fact that definite pronouns are in complementary distribution with determiners is taken as evidence in favor of DP.<ref>Hordós et al. produce the behavior of definite pronouns as an argument in favor of the DP-analysis.</ref> The important observation in this area is that definite pronouns cannot appear together with a determiner like ''the'' or ''a'' in one and the same DP, e.g.

# they
# *the they

# him
# *a him

On a DP-analysis, this trait of definite pronouns is relatively easy to account for. If definite pronouns are actually determiners, then it makes sense that they should not be able to appear together with another determiner since the two would be competing for the same syntactic position in the hierarchy of structure. On an NP-analysis in contrast, there is no obvious reason why a combination of the two would not be possible. In other words, the NP-analysis has to reach to additional stipulations to account for the fact that combinations like ''*the them'' are impossible. A difficulty with this reasoning, however, is posed by indefinite pronouns (''one'', ''few'', ''many''), which can easily appear together with a determiner, e.g. ''the old one''. The DP-analysis must therefore draw a distinction between definite and indefinite pronouns, whereby definite pronouns are classified as determiners, but indefinite pronouns as nouns.