A Rizzian analysis of the left periphery in Sewama Mende

Rizzi (1997, 2001) proposes a universal structure for the left periphery. In this paper
I show that data from Mende, a Mande language spoken in Sierra Leone, supports
Rizzi’s analysis. I show that the Mende left periphery is bracketed by Force and
Finite Phrases, with Focus, and Topic constructions between. I further propose that
all the functional heads in the left periphery in Mende are head-initial with surface
variations resulting from movement of focused and topicalized constituents into
the specifier positions of their respective heads.