In this squib, I present new data from possessive phrases in Chol
(Mayan) and discuss the problem they present for standard analyses
of pied-piping (see Heck 2004 and references cited therein). I argue
that a theory of pied-piping in which features of a wh-word ‘‘percolate’’
up to a higher maximal projection is unable to straightforwardly
account for the ordering facts found in interrogative possessive constructions
in Chol (also described for Tzotzil (Aissen 1996) and San
Dionicio Zapotec (Broadwell 2001)). I will show that in certain derivations,
feature percolation would have to both occur and not occur
from the same wh-word at different stages in a single derivation. A
derivation in which percolation happens consistently at each step
results in ungrammaticality.
National Science Foundation (U.S.)