Auxiliary + Small Clause

In [#!moro90!#] the copula is treated as a special functional category - a lexicalization of tense, which is considered to head its own projection. It takes as a complement the projection of another functional category, Agr (agreement). This projection corresponds roughly to a small clause, and is considered to be the domain within which predication takes place. An NP must then raise out of this projection to become the subject of the sentence: it may be the subject of the AgrP, or, if the predicate of the AgrP is an NP, this may raise instead. In addition to occurring as the complement of be, AgrP is selected by certain verbs such as consider. It follows from this analysis that when the complement to consider is a simple AgrP, it will always consist of a subject followed by a predicate, whereas if the complement contains the verb be, the predicate of the AgrP may raise to the left of be, leaving the subject of the AgrP to the right.

(81)0(81

(82)

John_i is [_AgrP t_i the culprit ] .  (82)0(82

(83)

The culprit_i is [_AgrP John t_i ] .  (83)0(83

(84)

I consider [_AgrP John the culprit] .  (84)0(84

(85)

I consider [John_i to be [_AgrP t_i the culprit ]] .  (85)0(85

(86)

I consider [the culprit_i to be [_AgrP John t_i ]] . 

Moro does not discuss a number of aspects of his analysis, including the nature of Agr and the implied existence of sentences without VP's.