Exclamative clauses: At the syntax-semantics interface

A central issue in the theory of clause types is whether force is represented in the syntax. Based on data from English, Italian, and Paduan, we examine this question focusing on a less well-studied clause type, exclamatives. We argue that there is no particular element in syntax responsible for introducing force. Rather, there are two fundamental syntactic components which identify a clause as exclamative, a factive and a wh-operator. These are crucial because they are responsible for two fundamental semantic properties characteristic of exclamatives, namely that they are factive and denote a set of alternative propositions. The force of exclamatives, which we characterize as widening, is derived indirectly,…