Two Syntactic Positions for English Aspectual Verbs

1.1. The control/raising analysis of English aspectual verbs Since Perlmutter (1968, 1970), the standard assumption has been that English aspectual verbs are ambiguous between control and raising predicates. 1 The arguments for the raising analysis come from the fact that English aspectual verbs can have non-thematic subjects. They allow for expletive subjects (1a-b), exhibit active/passive synonymy (2), and permit idiom chunks to maintain their idiomatic meanings (3). (1) a. There began to be commotion. (Perlmutter 1970: 108, (6)) b. It began to rain. (Perlmutter 1970: 109, (7)) (2) a. The noise began to annoy Joe. b. Joe began to be annoyed by the noise. (Perlmutter 1970: 109, (9)) (3) a. Heed began to be paid to urban problems. (Perlmutter 1970: 110, (12)) b. Headway began to be made toward a solution. (Perlmutter 1970: 110, (13)) The arguments for the control analysis come from the fact that there seem to be cases where th