Complementizer-Alternation in Creole Languages: New Evidence for Spec-Head Agreement

The topic of this paper is the ki/ma alternation in Cape Verdean Creole (henceforth, CVC) with a focus on the behavior of ki within wh-questions. We argue that ki is a morphosyntactic reflex of Q-agreement between [uQ] on C and a wh-phrase, supporting spec-head agreement in Chomsky (1991), contra the probe-goal agreement system in Chomsky (2000). In so doing, we provide evidence for its position in C and show that in the absence of operator movement and Q-agreement on C, an alternative particle, ma/kuma, appears in C. We show that the symmetric patterns of extraction observed in CVC where the complementizer ki can appear when either the subject or object are extracted, may be in part reducible to a contrast in locality constraints on Agree and can be better explained within a spec-head relation framework for CVC.