VP-Fronting in Sardinian: a structural paradox

This paper investigates the phenomena of Inversion and VP-fronting in Sardinian in examples like Dormende sunt sos pitzinnos ?sleeping are the children?. It is argued that the postverbal subject in these constructions cannot occupy the same position as the subject in general cases of Inversion, but raises to a higher position within the clause. This raising operation yields sharply ungrammatical sentences if VP fronting does not apply. However, these can be excluded by postulating general conditions (distinct from the Agree operation) on the structural relations which must hold at spell-out between overt heads and the elements which they license. It is argued that these conditions, along with further provisions which are necessary to accommodate the position of heavy subjects in Inversion constructions, may play a role in facilitating processing.