Resumen de On dissolving the A/A-bar distinction and the status of preverbal DPs in NSLs: a reply to Alahdal
In this paper, we first argue against Alahdal's (2018) account of feature inheritance of the Edge Feature (EF) from C0 to T0 in null subject languages (NSLs), including (Modern Standard) Arabic. Alahdal proposes that Spec,TP becomes a position that exhibits A/A-bar properties in Arabic when T0 inherits EF from C0. We explore the defects of this argument, highlighting its conceptual and empirical inconsistencies. We also show that this argument suffers from internal problems which speak against its theoretical validity. Second, we present an alternative approach to the relevant data. We propose that a preverbal element in Modern Standard Arabic (and other NSLs with a prominent VSO word order) is either a topic or a focus, depending on its informational content. The preverbal element is located in a dedicated A-bar position in the CP domain of the clause. All A-properties of preverbal elements are assumed to be indirect effects of their clause-initial position.
