Don't shoot the messenger: How subjectivity affects distributional properties

The present paper discusses the differences in distributional properties between schijnen and lijken: two Dutch raising-verbs that are often translated to English 'seem'. According to the cartographic approach, for instance Haegeman, L. (2006a. Clitic Climbing and the Dual Status of Sembrare. Linguistic Inquiry 37, 484-501), the differences in distributional properties follow from a difference in their position in the syntactic structure. Lijken is proposed to be a lexical verb inserted in a low position. Schijnen on the other hand is a functional head encoding speaker-related evidential mood, inserted in a high position. This paper shows that postulating different syntactic positions is unnecessary. The distributional differences follow from restrictions on scope as a result of the subjectivity directly (or speaker-related mood). The subjectivity of schijnen results in positive polarity behavior and as such schijnen is ruled out in nonveridical contexts (cf. Ernst, T., 2009. Speaker-oriented adverbs. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 27, 497-544). A benefit of the present approach is that it is able to fit in cases in which schijnen is used non-subjectively and can appear under modals and aspect. In addition, it is able to accommodate the impossibility to embed subjective lijkt-me under modals and aspect.