Order and Optionality: Minimalist Grammars with Adjunction

Adjuncts are characteristically optional, but many, such as adverbs and adjectives, are strictly ordered. In Minimalist Grammars (MGs), it is straightforward to account for optionality or ordering, but not both. I present an extension of MGs, MGs with Adjunction, which accounts for optionality and ordering simply by keeping track of two pieces of information at once: the original category of the adjoined-to phrase, and the category of the adjunct most recently adjoined. By imposing a partial order on the categories, the Adjoin operation can require that higher adjuncts precede lower adjuncts, but not vice versa, deriving order.