GENERALIZED TRANSFORMATIONS AND THE THEORY OF GRAMMAR*

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Abstract
The compositional approach to phrase structure proposed in Chomsky's ‘Minimalist Program’ paper (1992) can be implemented in various ways. This paper explores the use of Tree Adjoining Grammar (Kroch & Joshi 1985, 1986; Frank 1992,inter alia) as a formal mechanism for syntactic composition and compares it to the operations proposed in Chomsky (1992). The TAG approach avoids the need for distinguishing two modes of phrase structure composition, ‘GT’ and ‘adjunction’, and allows the elimination of the requirement ‘extension requirement’. Further, it permits a purely local interpretation of transformational movement and a simplification of the conception of derivational economy. It also has important consequences for the proper treatment of the binding and scope effects of successive cyclic movement.

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