ABSTRACT
This chapter examines two aspects of the peripheral construal in Chinese. The first aspect of the problem is closely related to the original spirit of the cartography project. The second aspect of the problem is located at the syntax-discourse interface, which addresses the WHY question. The hierarchy of these projections is identified on the basis of two types of tests: the syntactic test and semantic test. The Subjectivity Scale Constraint reveals that the degree of difficulty for embedding a functional element is correlated with the relevant height of the functional projection that hosts such an element. When the projections are both head-final, the syntactic test is used, and word order reflects the relevant hierarchy. Conversely, when one of the two projections is head-final and the other is head-initial, the semantic test is used by examining the scope interaction between the two projections.
