The view from the periphery: The English comparative correlative

The English comparative correlative construction (e.g., The more you eat, t he fatter you get) embeds like an ordinary CP, and each of its clauses disp lays an ordinary long-distance dependency. However, the connection between the two clauses is not ordinary: they are connected paratactically in synta x, but the first clause is interpreted as if it were a subordinate clause. The construction's mixture of the general and the idiosyncratic at all leve ls of detail challenges the distinction between "core" and "periphery" in g rammar and the assumption that some level of underlying syntax directly mir rors semantic structure.