French and Spanish <i>wh</i>-interrogatives with and without <i>wh</i>

Abstract This article describes the usage of partial interrogatives without wh such as And you went…? in French and Spanish, analyses variation between in-situ -Ø in-situ-wh -interrogatives went where? On basis an analysis -Ø-interrogatives a corpus spoken these are described particularly efficient means realizing information request. Due to fact that their use is bound contexts which request highly expected by hearer, they can be produced using minimal syntactic format simultaneously ensure addressee produces desired response. In comparison, less context-sensitive. The also investigates possibility differences Spanish regards productivity interrogatives. An acceptability study finds no significant difference terms whereas reaches higher than Spanish. I interpret results evidence for description ad-hoc interactional resource whose does not depend on conventionalization processes, information-requesting has become conventional French.