German: a grammatical sketch

As we mentioned previously, the grammatical properties of German have been studied within the generative framework for many years. With respect to the structural characteristics of the language, scholars have been confronted with the challenge of accounting for the asymmetry that characterises word order in main and embedded clauses. In the following, we briefly summarise the main characteristics of the language at the levels of word order and morphosyntax before we turn to a structural account of German sentence structure.

Word order

In German, main and embedded clauses differ with regard to the placement of the finite verb: it obligatorily appears in second position in main clauses (examples

• (378) -(380)), but appears sentence-finally in complementiser introduced embedded clauses (examples (383H384)).^{* [1] The restriction regarding the placement of the finite verb in the second position in declarative main clauses, commonly referred to as the V2 constraint, holds of all Germanic languages except English. The preverbal position in main declarative clauses is not restricted to subjects, as is illustrated in examples (378)-(380) in Table 4.1. Subjects (378) and non-subjects as, for example, adverbs (379) or direct objects (380) may appear in the preverbal position. Another major characteristic of German word order is that non-finite elements of the verbal complex, such as separable prefixes (378), participles}
• (379) , and infinitives (380) obligatorily appear in sentence-final position. Hence, in sentences with periphrastic verb constructions or separable verbs, adverbs, negators and verb complements appear inside the so-called verb bracket.

Table 4.1: Verb second (V2) in German main declarative clauses.*

(378)	Die Frau the woman	setzt puts			den the	Hut hat	nicht not	auf. on
(379)	Gestern yesterday	hat has	die the	Frau woman	den the	Hut hat	nicht not	aufgesetzt. on-put
(380)	Den Hut the hat	kann can	die the	Frau woman			nicht not	aufsetzen. on-put

*VE=verb-end, V+fin=finite verb form, V-fin=non-finite verb form.

Note that verbs appear in sentence-initial position in some constructions, such as yes/no questions (381) or imperative constructions (382). The sequences in (381) and (382) illustrate also that the subject appears post-verbally in verb-initial sequences. German, unlike other (so-called pro-drop) languages (these can be

spoken languages, such as Italian or Spanish, or sign languages, like DGS, see section 3.1), does not allow empty subjects.

In complementer introduced embedded clauses finite verbs obligatorily appear in sentence final position (cf. examples (383)-(384) in Table 4.2).

Table 4.2: Verb final in German complementiser embedded clauses.

Notice, however, that verbs do not appear in the final position in unintroduced embedded clauses, compare (385).

• [1] We will disregard here the exceptions to this generalisation concerning verb placement andthe main/embedded clause dichotomy. For a more detailed discussion see Plaza-Pust (2000).