ON SOME PROBLEMS OF WH-QUESTIONS IN BULGARIAN

Abstract

The research is focused on the different functions of the Bulgarian whwords koy and kakvo, namely cases in which they function as an adjective and cases in which they function as a noun. The theoretical base of the research is The Minimalist program (probe-goal systems), more specifically the cartography of syntactic structures. The main goal is to test whether there is sufficient evidence for the Bulgarian wh-words koy and kakvo to be considered D-bases. While relying on certain generalizations of Boshkovich (Boshkovich 2013), we examined Bulgarian texts and demonstrated the following: a) by analogy with English pronouns, koy and kakvo are D-bases in Bulgarian since they need definitive or at least specific (in the sense of Penchev 1997:515) answers, but also because they can’t be modified (Fukui’s test); b) koy and kakvo do not function as pronouns but as determiners; c) koy and kakvo demonstrate different behavior due to the presence (in the sense of Dimova 2013) of an empty nominal element [N], which is realized only due to contextual requirements.