In syntax, sluicing is a type of ellipsis that occurs in both direct and indirect interrogative clauses.
(The intended interpretations of the question-denoting elliptical clause are given in parentheses; parts of these are anaphoric to the boldface material in the antecedent.)
"[4]The final type of sluicing construction occurs when the elided material correspondent contrasts that of what is in the antecedent.
[5] This analysis has been expanded in greater detail by Jason Merchant, the most comprehensive treatise on sluicing to date.
[3] A second kind of analysis presents nonstructural analyses of ellipsis and does not posit unpronounced elliptical material.
The movement approach states that sluicing is a product of the syntactic derivation in which an embedded clause is built in the syntax and then the wh-phrase within the embedded clause moves outside of the constituent to the position of SpecCP (specifier to the complementizer phrase).
'[8]Jason Merchant demonstrates that binding supports the movement approach using the following sentence: In order for the second “his work” to refer to “every linguist” in the above example, it must be c-commanded by its antecedent within its local domain.
This provides evidence that “his work” originally started off in the elided constituent where it could be c-commanded and in the local domain of that “every linguist” before it moved out of the clause.
PF deletion as proposed by Howard Lasnik states that the TP within the embedded clause is null and has syntactic structure within it that is elided following a wh-movement operation.
After this structure is derived, it is sent off for semantic interpretation, to logical form, in which the implied material in the tense phrase is then present for our full understanding of the sentence.
The nonstructural analysis must add phrase-structure rules to allow an interrogative clause to consist of multiple wh-phrases and be able to account for connectivity effects.
"The following example displays sluicing in Danish:[9] PeterPeterharhassnakkettalkedmedwithenoneelleroranden,anothermenbutjegIvedknowikkenothvem.who.Peter har snakket med en eller anden, men jeg ved ikke hvem.Peter has talked with one or another but I know not who.
"The following example displays sluicing in German:[12] HansHanswillwantsjemandemsomeonehelfen,helpaberbutichIweißknownichtnotwem.whom.Hans will jemandem helfen, aber ich weiß nicht wem.Hans wants someone help but I know not whom.
[9] Abby-gaAbby-NOMdareka-osomeone-ACCmi-tasee-PASTga,butwatashi-waI-TOPdarewhokaQwakaranai.know.notAbby-ga dareka-o mi-ta ga, watashi-wa dare ka wakaranai.Abby-NOM someone-ACC see-PAST but I-TOP who Q know.not"Abby saw someone, but I don’t know who.