Experimental syntax and syntax experiment.

This article surveys judgments about the grammaticality or acceptability of sentences that are the most widely used data source in the syntactic literature, with a particular focus on the relevance of the evidence to the goals of generative grammar. After a background section overviewing the main notions and objectives of that framework, we can trace the fi eld’s history in three major periods that are considered in the three subsequent sections: (i) Formative period, (ii) Experimental syntax period, and (iii) Old ideas revisited period. Typically, syntacticians rely on their own judgments, or those of a small number of colleagues; sometimes they rely on the Experimental syntax paradigm. The perspective adopted here is considered in the two last sections.