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Non-finite complements and modality in de-na ‘allow’ in Hindi-

Alice Davison

Abstract The meaning ‘to allow’ is expressed in Hindi-Urdu by the de-na ‘give’ with an oblique , which argue is syntactically as well as semantically ambiguous. has a biclausal analysis, meaning ‘allow X to do A’, as well as an Exceptional Case Marking (ECM) complement with the meaning ‘allow A to happen’. The complements are smaller than finite CP and larger than the non-clausal complement, and the ECM complement is smaller than the control complement. I offer syntactic arguments for the syntactic associated with the two meanings; where the control reading is unavailable, the ECM structure and meaning are available, sometimes by by the context. The modal meaning associated with the control structure suggests that modals do not occur only in ECM/ constructions. The arguments are couched in minimalist syntactic terms, opening up a cross- theoretical dialogue with Butt’s (1995) analysis in Lexical-Functional Grammar (LFG) terms of the permissive as a complex in structure.

Keywords Hindi-Urdu - Permission - Modality - Argument structure - Control - ECM/Raising - Coercion - Complex Predicates - Lexical Case - Structural Case -

1 Introduction

This paper discusses the ‘permissive’ construction, the term used by Butt (1995) for the combination of the verb de-na ‘give’ with an infinitive form but without a postposition. The combination has the meaning ‘allow’. Two examples are given below, with a dative indirect (1), one without (2):

(1) mã =ne bɑccõ=ko kıtab-ẽ pɑṛh- ne dĩ mother=ERG child.m.pl=DAT book-F.PL.NOM read-INF. give.PF.F.PL

‘Mother allowed/let (the) children to read (the) books.’1

1 Abbreviations: ABL - Ablative, ACC - accusative, CP - Conjunctive , DAT - dative, ERG - ergative, GEN - genitive, F - feminine, IMPER - imperative, IMPF - imperfective, INF - infinitive, M - masculine, NOM -

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(2) pıta=ne peṛ kɑṭ-ne di-e father=ERG tree.M.PL[NOM] be.cut-INF.OBL give-PF.MPL ‘Father allowed the trees to be cut.’ (Bhatt 2005)

I propose that the permissive is biclausal and actually has two distinct and coexisting structures with non-finite complement of different sizes, namely an object control TP/CP and an Exceptional Case Marking AspP/TP. The arguments for control are based on valence, lexical case marking, constraints on lexical case, and conditions on anaphor . The arguments for ECM are based on valence, structural case marking, the absence of a condition on lexical case and, most strikingly, on a semantic with the control structure. The control version refers to a locus of permission, an individual, while the ECM version refers to an event; this version is preferred under conditions inconsistent with a locus of permission. These differences are correlated with some differences of modality with a circumstantial modal base. The syntactic and meaning properties of the permissive expressed here represent a different view from the monoclausal complex predicate analysis in Butt (1995), which is based on a different set of data from the data offered here. Nevertheless, the monoclausal analysis is consistent with some of the otherwise unexplained properties of the permissive. So one of the issues discussed here is whether a non-finite complement can be a separate clausal domain or not.

2 Is the de-na ‘allow’ construction syntactically ambiguous?

A major question that I will discuss in this paper is whether the permissive is syntactically ambiguous–for example, are (1) and (2) syntactically different? Various possibilities for structure have been discussed, which are summarized in (3) and (4). The crucial differences are in the position of DP2, and the boundaries of the constituent containing the oblique infinitive.

(3) Biclausal structures a. Object control DP1 DP2(i) [PRO(i) DP3 V-inf] DE b. ECM/Raising to Object DP1 [DP2 (DP3) V-inf] DE (Bhatt 2005) (4) Complex predicate (Butt 1995; 1998) a. C-structures: DP1 DP2 DP3 [V-inf + DE] (Butt 1995:87) DP1 DP2 [DP3 V-inf] DE (Miriam Butt, p.c.) b. Argument (a) structure (Miriam Butt, p.c.) | read (matrix GO is identified with embedded AG)

The LFG monoclausal argument structure (4 a and b) is proposed by Butt nominative, OBL - oblique, PF - perfective, PL - .

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(1995); the verb de- and the infinitive form a complex predicate, whose arguments are the , indirect object DP2, and a direct object DP3, as in (1). This ‘flat’ structure is achieved by argument identification at a-structure, whereas the c-structure can be realized as a complex predicate with an embedded verb (Miriam Butt, p.c.; see Butt, this volume, section 4). In minimalist syntactic terms, the structure (3a) is an instance of object control, in which the indirect object DP2 is a matrix constituent, controlling the null PRO subject of an embedded . This structure is similar to other clearly defined object control structures, such as ‘tell DP to do something’, ‘force DP to do something’, ‘compel, demand, require’, etc.2 The structure (3b) is also biclausal, an instance of an ECM structure (or Raising to Object) assumed for the permissive in Bhatt (2005). DP2 represents the subject of the embedded infinitive. The evidence for Butt’s LFG analysis of the permissive (4) includes , control and reflexive versus pronoun interpretations (Butt 1995: 37-43); there are some speaker differences in these interpretations, as a reviewer points out. Butt’s LFG argument structure coindexes the matrix goal or indirect object with the embedded clause subject; see further discussion in section 7. Butt notes some syntactic similarities in c-structure between the complex predicate permissive described above and the instructive ‘tell’, which involves object control (3a). The similarities include , and coordination (Butt 1995: 44-51, Butt 1998. An anonymous reviewer, however, finds some differences in the construal of negation and negative polarity items, suggesting that there are differences of structure. The ECM structure (3b) is proposed in Bhatt (2005). DP2 is the subject of the embedded infinitive rather than the indirect object of the matrix verb. In my discussion of this structure, I will call it ECM rather than Raising to Object, in order to contrast the control/ECM structures in the clearest possible way, and also to avoid the controversy over the representation of control as raising (Hornstein 1999), which is not relevant to the issues of this paper. The proposal I will make in this paper is the following. The permissive is biclausal and has both the control structure (3a) as in (5) below and the ECM

2The permissive differs from other control complements because there is no postposition on the infinitive clause (see the following note). Postpositions are known to block agreement in HU. So the permissive construction also allows optional long distance agreement with the embedded clause nominative argument (cf. Bhatt 2005). Agreement is one of Butt’s (1995) arguments for monoclausality. Bhatt (2005) argues that this kind of agreement is associated with a reduced or restructured embedded clause, so the combination of infinitive and matrix is in effect one clause for the purposes of agreement. But note that the ECM structure (4b) has a projected subject, and is not a reduced clause. So I will represent (4b) ECM clauses as fully biclausal, pace Bhatt (2005), with a subject in the embedded clause, and optional agreement.

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structure (3b) as in (6) below. I propose that the permissive structure is syntactically ambiguous between control and ECM, but the control analysis is the default choice, reflecting the ditransitive argument structure of de-na ‘give’. The ECM analysis requires special factors to be present. In addition, the meaning associated with the control structure implies the meaning associated with the ECM structure, but not the reverse. The control structure has the meaning ‘allow to do’, which implies ‘allow to happen’. The ECM analysis only conveys ‘allow to happen’. The ECM analysis comes to the fore under specific lexical and pragmatic circumstances, to be defined below.

h (5) mã =ne bɑccõi=ko [PROi kıtab-ẽ pɑṛ -ne] dĩ mother=ERG child.m.pl=DAT book-F.PL read-INF.OBL give.PF.F.PL ‘Mother allowed (the) children to read (the) books.’ [Control]

(6) pıta=ne [peṛ kɑṭ-ne ] di-e father=ERG tree.M.PL[NOM] be.cut-iNF.OBL give-PF.MPL Father allowed [the trees to be cut].’ (Bhatt 2005) [Exceptional Case Marking]

The difference is that DP2 is a matrix indirect object coindexed with PRO in (5) (Control), and a structurally cased embedded subject in (6) (ECM). I will first argue for the control structure, then for the ECM structure, and then discuss various facets of the relationship between the two structures. I will return at the end of the paper to discuss some data that support Butt’s monoclausal complex predicate analysis (4) because are not explained by the biclausal control analysis, perhaps because of the specific lexical properties of de-na ‘give’.

3 De-na ‘allow’ as a control construction

In this section, I will make the case that the permissive is an object control construction. I will use three syntactic arguments, one based on the similarity of thematic roles and case to other object control predicates, another based on lexical case in control contexts, and the third argument based on reflexive binding, which is constrained by syntactic factors such as clause structure and grammatical functions (Gurtu 1992). I begin by showing the similarities of the permissive to a clear case of obligatory object control (7), the ‘instructive’ in Butt (1995).

h (7) mã =ne bɑccõi=se [PROi kıtab-ẽ pɑṛ -ne=ko ] kah-a mother=ERG child.m.pl=ABL book-F.PL read-INF=DAT say.PF.M.S ‘Mother told (the) children to read (the) books.’

The ‘allow’ construction syntactically resembles object control sentences in several ways. The matrix clause has an indirect object with lexical postpositional case. The theme is an oblique infinitive, with a null subject PRO, which is coindexed with the matrix indirect object. The differences with the permissive

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are that the indirect object is marked with the postposition =se ‘from, with’, and the infinitive complement has the postposition =ko ‘dative’. Both the indirect object and clausal direct object case marking are selected by the matrix predicate.3 The instructive (7) has certain syntactic similarities to the permissive, noted in detail in Butt (1995:44-54), and summarized here briefly. One is in scrambling possibilities. The infinitive and matrix verb can move as a unit in both the permissive and the instructive (6) (Butt 1995: 44-47). In both the permissive and instructive, negation in the infinitive clause negates the infinitive verb, but also may negate the (Butt 1995:47-49). Both the permissive and the instructive allow coordinated infinitive complements (Butt 1995:49-51). I take these data to show that the permissive has control properties, though this is not what Butt herself concludes. In this section, I will argue that the permissive is an obligatory object control construction. My first argument is based on argument structure, the association of thematic roles with sentence constituents. The matrix indirect object and PRO may have distinct theta roles in (1), (4), (6). The indirect object marked by =ko or =se is the goal of permission or telling. The embedded subject PRO is the of ‘read’. The infinitive itself is the theme of de- ‘allow’. The second argument is based on the nature of the =ko case marker on the indirect object in the permissive. In a control structure, the goal DP in the matrix has lexical, not structural case. The HU postposition =ko has a dual nature: it is a lexical case selected for the goal by the ditransitive de-na ‘give’, and it will be glossed dative in the examples. It can also be the accusative differential object marker on a direct object, and as such it can be suppressed by the passive form of the sentences (Mohanan 1994:92, 94, 123). There are several arguments that the matrix indirect object has lexical case, not structural object case. A transitive sentence such as (8) requires the differential object accusative marker on a pronoun referring to a human. It has the passive counterpart (9), in which the theme may have either dative object case or .

(8) mɛ̃=ne ʊs=ko bula liy-a [Active] I =ERG 3s =ACC call take-PF.M.S ‘I called/ invited him.’

(9) ʊs=ko/ vo bula-ya gɑ-ya [Passive] 3s.=ACC 3.s[NOM] call-PF.M.S go.PF.M.S

3 For example, the complex predicate mazbur kɑr-na ‘force’ selects =ke liye ‘for’ or =pɑr ‘on’ for the infinitive complement, while vivɑsh kɑr-na ‘oblige, force, put the screws on’ selects =ko ‘dative’ on both the indirect object and the complement clause (Bahl 1979:34-35); see also Bahl (1974:210-212) for razi kɑr-na ‘prevail on someone (=ko ‘dative’) to do something (=pɑr/ke liye ‘on/for’)’.

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‘ was invited.’

But in the permissive (10a), the passive counterpart (10b) does not allow the h nominative on what I am calling the indirect object mʊj e ‘I-DAT’; see Mohanan (1994:92, 94, 123).

(10) a. unhõ=ne mʊjhe ja-ne nɑhĩ di-ya [Active] they=ERG I.DAT go-INF.OBl not give-PF.M.S ‘They did not allow me to go.’ h b. mʊj e/*mɛ̃ ja-ne nɑhĩ di-ya gɑ.-ya [Passive] I.DAT/I.NOM go-INF.OBL not give-PF.M.S go-PF.M.S ‘I was not allowed to go.’

In (9) and in many examples below, the =ko postposition is ambiguous between dative and . The contrast of DOM accusative with the goal dative is even clearer in Kashmiri, a related to Hindi-Urdu and similar in case marking. The Kashmiri and Hindi-Urdu permissives are very similar in composition, as in accusative marking. Unlike Hindi-Urdu, however, Kashmiri does not require the accusative case on direct objects which are personal with human (11a). But the dative is required on the goal of the permissive (11b). These two constructions show a distinction which is often absent in Hindi-Urdu between direct object and indirect object case marking. See more detailed discussion in section 4, examples (30)-(32).

(11) with Kashmiri

a. temy suuzu-s ni bi toor [Nominative direct object] he.ERG send-1SG.NOM not I.NOM there 'He didn't send me there.' b. temy dyutu-m ni mye tatyi rooz-ni [Dative indirect object] he.ER gave-1s not 1s.DAT there stay-INF 'He didn't let me stay there.' (Peter Hook, p.c.)

In Kashmiri, the permissive requires a dative indirect object, distinct in form from a direct object. My conclusion is that the permissive requires lexical on the goal of permission, and this lexical case is similar to the lexical -se postpositional case selected by the instructivee verb kɑh-na ‘tell’. So the permissive has a matrix indirect object that has lexical case, like the instructive. It is invariant, compared with the accusative DOM (Aissen 2003); the DOM can be suppressed in the passive form of the sentence. The next argument for obligatory object control is based on a mysterious and ill-understood condition: in Hindi-Urdu, controlled PRO may not have lexically determined dative case (Davison 2004; 2008). This condition is found in a number of with lexical, or ‘quirky’, case on subjects,

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though not in Icelandic.4 Hindi-Urdu has many predicates, both single lexical and complex predicates, that require dative or other lexical case on the subject (Davison 2004). The specific case of the subject is a of the predicate. Some predicates which value dative case on the subject are shown in (12a,b). These predicates are either stative or change of state predicates, and resemble unaccusatives in certain respects.

(12) a. mʊjhe cay =ki ek pyali bhi nɑhĩ mıl-i (Goal) I.DAT tea-=GEN-F one cup.FS emph not get.-PF.F.S ‘I did not get even one cup of tea.’ h b. shyami=ko ɑpne-api/*j/ʊs*i/j=pɑr krod a-ya (Experiencer) Shyam=DAT self’s-self /3s=on anger.M.S come-PF.MS ‘Shyam got angry with himself.’

The constructions in (12) have counterparts without a dative subject. They are close synonyms, but instead have nominative or ergative subjects, valued by T, perfective aspect (and V features).

h (13) a. mɛ̃=ne cay =ki ek pyali b i nɑhĩ pii (Agent) I=ERG tea=GEN.F one cup.FS emph not drink-PF.F.S ‘I did not drink even one cup of tea.’ h h b. ʊsi=ne ɑpnei-b ai=pɑr krod ki-ya (Experiencer) 3s=ERG self’s brother=on anger do-PF ‘He got angry at his (own) brother.’

Verbs of the type in (12) may not be embedded in control contexts (14), though the counterparts in (13) may be embedded in control sentences (15):

(14) a. *voi [PROi pɛsa mıl-na ] cah-ta hɛ 3s.NOM money get-INF want-IMPF.MS is ‘He wants [PRO to get money].’ h h b. *voi [PROi ɑpne-b aii/*j=pɑr krod a-na] nɑhĩ cah-ta hɛ 3s .NOM self’s-brother=on anger come-INF not want-IMPF is ‘He doesn’t want [PRO to get angry at his brother]’. (15) a. voi [PROi pɛsa le-na ] cah-ta hɛ 3.s ,NOM money take-INF want-IMPF.MS is ‘He wants [PRO to take money.’ h b. mɛ̃i [PROi ɑpne-api/*j=pɑr krod kɑr-na] nɑhĩ cah-ti I.NOM self’s-self=on anger do-INF not want-IMPF ‘I don’t want [PRO to get angry at (my)self]’.

The complements of cah-na ‘want’ that have dative subject predicates are

4 Evidence for grammatical dative-marked PRO in Icelandic is found in Sigurðsson (2008), along with some examples which are not fully grammatical. Icelandic may not be a clear exception to the *(PRO-Dat) condition.

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robustly ungrammatical; the predicates include mıl-na ‘get’ and krodh a-na 5 ‘become angry’. Embedded predicates with structurally cased subjects like le- na ‘take’ and krodh kɑr-na ‘feel/show anger’ are perfectly grammatical. This contrast is one of the strongest effects I have encountered in questioning speakers of Hindi and Urdu; speakers consistently reject (14a,b), often spontaneously substituting (15a,b). The restriction *PRO-lexical case has not found a satisfactory explanation. But it can be noted what the restriction is not (Davison 2008). In particular, it is not a clash between the case of PRO and the case of the controller, nor is it a clash of volitionality between the theta/semantic role of PRO and the semantic role of the matrix controller (contra Butt, this volume section 3.2.4). In (16a), the sentence is well formed, but there is a difference of case and semantic role between the nominative PRO and the dative controller in the matrix clause, if ‘knowing how’ is a non-agentive state. In (16b), the case of PRO and the case of the controller are both dative, so that both subjects are non- volitional. The semantic role of the matrix subject is experiencer ‘know how’, while the role of PRO is a non-volitional goal, the subject of mıl-na ‘to get without special effort’, in contrast with le-na ‘to take (deliberately)’, so there is no clash of volitionality between the matrix and embedded predicates. Yet (16b) is ungrammatical; in my terms, it is because the embedded PRO has dative case, violating the lexical case on PRO condition. Compare the ungrammatical verbs in (16a) and (16b) with the grammatical verbs in (16a,b).

(16) a. ʊse [PRO[NOM] saikɑl cala-na ] a-ta hɛ 3s[DAT] bicycle drive-INF come-IMPF is ‘He/ knows how [PRO to ride a bicycle].’

b. *ʊse [PRO[DAT] pɛsa mıl-na ] a-ta hɛ 3.s.m.[DAT] money [NOM] get-INF come-IMPF.M.S is ‘He knows [(how) to get money].’

The restriction *PRO-lexical case applies as well to object-control structures, such as ‘force’ in (17a,b) and the de-na construction in (17c,d). The ungrammatical verbs in (17a,b) require dative case on PRO, while the

5 Butt (this volume, section 3.2.4) interprets cah-na ‘want’ as a volitional kind of wanting, which takes a =ne ‘ergative’ subject in the perfective. There is an important difference between my assumptions about =ne and hers (Butt and King 2004); I agree with Montaut (1991:103) that non-volitional subjects may be marked with =ne, while Butt and King associate the semantic role of agent with =ne.

(i) berɑng zındɑgi=ke ehsas=ne ʊse hıl-a di-ya colorless life =GEN feeling=ERG 3[DAT] shake-CAUS give-PF ‘The feeling of a colorless life shook her.’ (Montaut 1991:103)

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grammatical verbs in (17a,b) require nominative case. The permissive sentence in (17c) violates *PRO[Dat]. In contrast, the non-dative subject verb in (17d) makes the sentence grammatical.6

(17) a. mɛ̃=ne api=ko [PROi ɛsa pɛsa *mıl-ne/le-ne=ke liye I=ERG =DAT such money get-INF/take-INf=for mɑzbur nɑhĩ kiya forced not do-PF ‘I didn’t force youi [PROi to *get/take such money].’ h b. mɛ̃=ne api=se [PROi ʊs=pɑr krod *a-ne I=ERG you=ABL 3s=on anger come-INf /kɑr-ne=ko mɑzbur nɑhĩ ki.ya /do-INF=DAT forced not do-PF ‘I didn’t force youi [PROi to feel angry at 3s.].’ *with a-ne ‘come’ h c. *mãi=ne bɑccõj=ko [PRO[DAT]*i/j mıṭ aiyã mother=ERG children=DAT sweets.F.PL mıl-ne] nɑhĩ dĩ/diya get-INF.OBL not give.PF.FPL/MSG ‘Mother did not allow the children [PRO to get sweets].’ [PRO-Dat] h d. mãi=ne bɑccõj=ko [PRO[NOM]*i/j mıṭ aiyã mother=ERG children=DAT sweets.F.PL le-ne] nɑhĩ dĩ/diya take-INF.OBL not give.PF.FPL/MSG ‘Mother did not allow the children [PRO to take sweets].’

In the default context, the permissive sentence (17c) is ungrammatical because its complement subject has the lexical case required by the verb mıl-na ‘get’, in contrast to the grammatical (17d), with a non-dative subject verb. The lexical case condition has applied in (17c), as it did to subject control sentences. I take this restriction to indicate the presence of controlled PRO, to which the lexical case condition applies in the permissive construction. See section 5 below for the factors which can make (17d) and similar sentences grammatical. These

6Another syntactic environment in which the *PRO-Dat condition is found is participle modifiers. The have a null argument corresponding to the modified . If the dative condition holds, this null category must be PRO. This structure bears on arguments for a clausal complement for the ECM structure in section 3.

h (i) [[PROi g ɑr a-ya hu-a] admii House come-PF be-PF man ‘The mani [whoi came home]’ h (ii) *[[PROi krod a-ya hu-a] admii anger come-PF be-PF man ‘The mani [whoi got angry]’ See Subbarao (2012:292-4 and Appendix 8.3) for examples of South Asian languages which do or do not have participles like (ii).

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judgments are found with a default context. Below, I will note exceptions to the *PRO(Dat) condition. By contrast, in raising to subject sentences such as (18) and ECM sentences with participial complements (19), the dative DP is expressed and grammatical. There is no restriction on lexical case on the embedded subject, which is overtly expressed. The dative -ko is grammatical.

h h (18) ʊs=koi [ ei b ai=pɑr krod a-ne] lɑg-a 3s=DAT brother=on anger.M.S come-INF.OBl begin-PF.M.S ‘He/she began to get angry at his/her brother.’

(19) mã=ne [bɑcce=ko buxar a-te hue ] dekh-a mother=ERG child=DAT fever come-IMPf be-PF see-PF ‘The mother saw [the child getting a fever].’ (Awadhesh Misra, p.c.)

A final argument for an embedded clause with a controlled PRO subject is based on the syntactic conditions for binding reflexives. In Hindi-Urdu, anaphors are subject oriented. As the late Madhu Gurtu noted (1992: 30), the simplex reflexive ɑpna can be long-distance subject bound across a non-finite clause boundary, and also locally bound within the embedded clause. But the complex reflexive ɑpne ap can only be locally bound, within the same simplex clause. It is hard to find a single clause in which there are two possible (animate) antecedents, but (19) is a possible example. The subject is the only antecedent, though in some science fiction or metaphysical context, the direct object could have been another antecedent. But it is not; the only antecedent is the subject, not the direct object (20).7

(20) mãi bɑccej=ko ɑpne api/*j=se kɛse ɑlɑg mother child=ACC self’s self=from how separate kɑr sɑk-e? do be.able-SUBJUNCTIVE ‘How could the motheri separate the childj from herselfi/*himselfj?’ (Davison 2001:53)

The contrast of simplex and complex reflexive is found in the permissive (21a,b).

7 The conditions for anaphoric binding are complicated by several factors. The simplex anaphor may be used logophorically, especially in the first and second person. Also, as Butt points out (this volume, section 3.2.1), there is an emphatic use, but it is without case and thus not to be confused with the anaphor. There are disagreements in speakers’ judgments about whether the causee can bind a possessive reflexive, summarized from several different sources in Davison (1999:415). But the default is that there is a c-commanding subject antecedent.

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(21) a. mãi=ne radhaj=ko [PRO*i/j ɑpnei/j=ko aine=mẽ Mother=ERG Radha=DAT self =ACC mirror=in dekh-ne nɑhĩ di-ya see-INF.OBL not give-PF.M.S ‘Motheri did not allow Radhaj [PRO*i/j to look at selfi/j in the mirror].’

b. mãi=ne radhaj=ko [PRO*i/j ɑpne ap*i/j=ko aine=mẽ Mother=ERG Radha=DAT self self =ACC mirror=in dekh-ne nɑhĩ di-ya see-INF.OBL not give-PF.MS ‘Motheri did not allow Radhaj [PRO*i/j to look at self*i/j in the mirror].’

The simplex reflexive ɑpne has two possible antecedents, local and long distance (21a). The complex reflexive ɑpne ap in (21b) has only one reading (R. Bhatt, p.c.). It cannot be bound by the matrix subject mã, but only by the local subject PRO, which is controlled by the indirect object radha. This fact cannot be explained except by assuming the presence of controlled PRO as the subject antecedent. The dative indirect object is not the subject antecedent required by an anaphor in Hindi-Urdu (in all but a few exceptional cases; see discussion in Davison 1999, 2001), but see Butt (this volume, 3.2.1 for a contrary view). I have offered four arguments that the permissive has the properties of obligatory object control, which are a matrix indirect object, and an oblique theme complement with a null PRO subject identified by the matrix indirect object. The arguments are a) the nature of the DP of permission, which is invariantly dative and has a distinct theta role from the subject of the embedded clause, b) the invariant dative case on the locus of permission, c) the restriction on dative case on PRO, typical of control, and finally d) the local binding of the subject oriented complex reflexive ɑpne ap with local PRO. The presence of PRO argues for a fairly large clause projection, at least TP, with PRO as its specifier due to the EPP of T. The presence of the infinitive suffix –na 'to' indicates the presence of the functional head T, because it contrasts with the presence of aspect suffixes, indicating the presence of AsP. The infinitive forms of may be VP projections, because the infinitive –en combines in German with auxiliary verbs as the required form of the . The case of PRO could be due to C, arguing for a non-finite CP. I have noted the distinct thematic roles, the lexical case of the indirect object, the lexical case condition on the matrix goal of permission, and the local binding by the PRO subject for the complex reflexive. I think this evidence makes a strong case for the permissive as object control with at least TP. But in the next section, I will argue just as vigorously that the permissive has ECM structure.

4 ‘Allow’ as Exceptional Case Marking

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In this section, I will offer arguments that de-na ‘allow’ is also an ECM construction, which differs in structure and other properties from the control version of the permissive.8 For example, some ‘allow’ sentences do not have a dative indirect object, a locus of permission. If there is one, it is in the discourse context (Bhatt 1998), and not syntactically projected. Work is done by unspecified people (22), trees are cut by unspecified gardeners (23) and darkness arrives of its own accord (24). In (25), the specific moment also changes of its own accord, as the subject of an .

(22) yah kam ho-ne dijiye this work[NOM] be-INF.OB give.IMPER. FORMAL ‘Allow this work to be done/let this work be done.’ (Bahri 1992:320)

(23) pıta=ne peṛ kɑṭ-ne di-e father=ERG tree.m.pl[NOM] be.cut-INF.OBL give-PF.MPl ‘Father allowed [the trees to be cut].’ (Bhatt 2005)

h h (24) age b i ei ho-ne de ãd erai ahead also be-INF.OBL give-IMPER.FAMILIAR darkness[NOM] ‘Let there be darkness ahead.’ (song, Majrooh Sultanpuri, translation by Philip Lutgendorf)

h (25) kɑcce lɑmhe=ko zɑra ʃak = pɑk-ne de-te? unripe moment=ACC a.bit branch=on ripen-INF.OBL give-IMPF.PL ‘That tender moment, couldn’t you have at least let it ripen on the bough?’ (song, S.S. Gulzar, translation by Philip Lutgendorf)

Note the minimal pair in (24) and (25) of DOM. In (24), the non-specific inanimate ãdhera ‘darkness’ has unmarked nominative case. In (25), the specific though inanimate kɑcce lɑmhe ‘tender moment’ has the =ko accusative marker. In all these examples the inanimate or non-referential DP embedded subjects do not refer to individuals are given permission to do something. Rather, the matrix subject refers to someone who allows an event to happen. The event may include an agent which is incidental to the permission given, and not syntactically projected (Bhatt 1998). The ECM clausal complement is an infinitive or TP, but T has no case marking properties, as the matrix verb values DOM accusative/nominative. Below I will note a similarity to ECM sentences with perfective and imperfective aspectual participles, suggesting that the embedded clause is an AspP. Both types of ECM constructions are smaller and less rich in features to

8 This structure could have been represented as Raising to Object, without changing my arguments. The differences between the ECM and Raising to Object analyses are not relevant to the issues discussed here.

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check than the control complement CP or TP with a subject case. The control and ECM structures differ in their interpretations, which are contrasted schematically in (26):

(26) a. Control modality: There is a DP which is allowed to VP b. ECM modality: It is allowed to be the case [for DP to VP]; nothing prevents the event [DP VP] from happening.

Note that the (26a) interpretation entails the (26b) interpretation, but not the other way around. The control structure has a syntactically projected DP which is interpreted as the locus of permission, while in the ECM structure, a locus of permission may be part of the context, or it may be absent.9 The modality is circumstantial, involving conditions which are part of the context; it does not involve obligation (deontic) or knowledge (epistemic). See Portner (2009:187- 188) and Hacquard (2011). I discuss the modal properties of the permissive in 6.1 below. Here I outline my syntactic assumptions about ECM/Raising to Object. The construction has been part of the analysis of English and other languages since the earliest era of . It was characterized as a raising transformation in Rosenbaum (1967) and Postal (1974); the embedded subject is raised to the matrix clause, in which it has the syntactic properties of a direct object, including object case; Lasnik and Saito (1991) returned to this analysis. Chomsky (1981) derived the accusative case on the embedded subject without movement; the matrix verb values case across a TP clause boundary, as ECM. I extend this analysis to Hindi-Urdu, which has a small number of verbs that take a propositional complement.10 In ECM subordinate clauses the DP subject gets direct object case, as in (27):

(27) XP [ DP-[Nom]/=ko VP-oblique participial/ oblique infinitive]

Following Bhatt (2005), I am broadening the definition of ECM to include the oblique infinitive in addition to participles, as in (28)-(29). These sentences

9Bhatt (1998) argues on the basis of sentences like (i) that there need not be a projected locus of obligation, which is syntactically the subject of a deontic modal ‘have to’. (i) are expecting 50 guests tonight. There have to be 50 chairs in the living room by 5 p.m. (Bhatt 1998) The caterer in this case is the locus of obligation.

10Subbarao (1984:167), discusses sentences like (28) which have three syntactic analyses, a propositional complement , which I am assuming here, and two participle modifier constructions, controlled by the matrix and embedded subjects. I=ERG Ram =ACC /[NOM] book[NOM] read-IMPF be-PF-OBl

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represent the productive ECM construction associated with dekh-na ‘see’, pa-na ‘find, see’ and sʊn-na ‘hear’.

h (28) mɛ̃=ne [ram=ko/*0 kıtab pɑṛ -te hu-e] dekh-a see-PF.M ‘I saw [Ram read(ing) a book].’ (Event/ as direct object of ‘see’)

h (29) mɛ̃=ne [bariʃ-0 /=ko pɑṛ-ti hu-i] dek -i 11 I=ERG rain. F. [NOM]/ACC fall-IMPF.F be-PF-F. see-PF ‘I saw [rain falling ].’ (Event as direct object of ‘see’)

The embedded subject in (28)-(29) is marked with the DOM accusative case, associated with the verbal projection of the matrix clause. We see that the accusative =ko is obligatory for DPs with specific or human reference, while it is optional for inanimate, non-specific referents, such as bariʃ ‘rain’. Compare the contrasting pair for inanimates in (24)-(25). The same pattern is found in the simple transitive sentences (30) and (31):

h (30) mɛ̃=ne ram[*nom] /=ko dek -a I=ERG Ram [NOM] ACC see-PF ‘I saw Ram.’

h (31) mɛ̃=ne bariʃ[nom] /=ko dek -ii/aa I=erg rain.f. [NOM] =ACC see-PF.F/MS ‘I saw rain.’ (Peter Hook, p.c., Google search)12

The conditions on DOM =ko are summed up in (32), reflecting the standard view in Aissen (2003). See Dayal (2010) for further more fine-grained discussion of Hindi-Urdu in particular. (32c) is revised in the light of (31).

(32) Case of direct objects: a. Animate/human/specific DPs must get accusative case as direct objects. b. Specific, referential DP direct object may have accusative or nominative case. c. Non-specific, non-referential DPs are usually nominative.

I conclude that the subject of the embedded non-finite clause of an ECM complement receives structural nominative or accusative case, because in ECM sentences (25)-(26) the same factors for the choice of accusative over nominative (31) are at work, just as in simplex clauses (30)-(31). By contrast,

11The feminine agreement is required with the nominative option on bariʃ ‘rain’; with =ko, there is default masculine singular agreement. 12The version of ‘rain’ with accusative case has a kind of specific reading, referring perhaps to the monsoon rather than ordinary rain (Rajesh Bhatt, p.c.).

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the matrix locus of permission in the control structure has only lexical, not structural, case by the passive test in (9)-(11). There is, however, a situation in which the embedded ECM subject may have lexical case. As I mentioned above, experiencer dative subjects can appear overtly in ECM contexts, and are grammatical:

(33) bɑcce=ne [dusre bɑcce=ko kek mıl-te hu-e] dekh-a child=ERG other child=DAT cake get-IMPF.OBL be-PF.OBL see-PF ‘A child saw [another child getting cake].’13 (Awadhesh Misra, p.c.)

This sentence is interesting for the main point I am making, that ECM (or Raising to Object) is different from control sentences, which disallow dative case on the embedded subject. Here the embedded subject gets lexical dative case from the embedded predicate. But there is also an argument for the propositional nature of the ECM complement (33), especially if it is a participle. An alternative analysis is (34), in which a controlled participle modifies a direct object.

(34) bɑcce=ne [dusre bɑccei=ko [PRO[DAT]i kek mıl-te child=ERG other child=ACC cake get-IMPF.OBL hu-e]] dekh-a be-PF.OBL see-PF ‘A child saw [another childi [PROi getting cake]].’

If this were the structure, the controlled PRO would get dative case because of the verb mıl- ‘get’, and the *PRO[Dat] condition would be violated. But this sentence is grammatical, and for that reason I conclude that (34) is not the structure, and instead there is a non-finite complement as in (33). In this section, I have argued that some instances of the permissive have ECM structure. There is on the complement infinitive, just as there is in participle ECM complements (28)-(29). There is no locus of permission which is syntactically projected as an indirect object. There is no violation of the condition barring lexical case on null experiencer subjects. The embedded subject has structural case, which follows the same principles as DOM in simplex clauses. Compared with the control structure in section 4, the ECM has a smaller complement functional projection, TP or AspP. It has no independent case feature for the embedded subject, and the ECM modal interpretation is a subset of the control construction’s interpretation. See further discussion in section 6.2.

13This is a curious case of multiple case valuing: the matrix predicate values structural accusative (direct object case), while the embedded predicate requires lexical dative on the experiencer. This could be case overwriting, in which the lexical case of the embedded predicate overwrites the structural case of the matrix verb. I am assuming that this dative persists under passivization.

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5 Exceptions to the lexical case condition

The dual analysis of the permissive raises some questions. If two different structures exist simultaneously, how do the permissive sentences show distinct behavior? For example, how can a sentence such as (17c) be perceived as ungrammatical, as shown earlier in the paper? The explanation was that it has PRO with a lexical dative case. There should be another analysis of the sentence which is grammatical because of the coercing context, on the order of (37). In this section, I will discuss permissive and obligation sentences in which the lexical case condition does not hold.

5.1 Preferences for the ECM analysis

In some situations, there is a preference for the ECM analysis, which lacks a matrix locus of permission. The dative experiencer predicate buxar a-na ‘to get a fever’ (35) can be embedded under the permissive de-na (36a), as well as the ‘must, ought’ modal cahiye (36b). The dative =ko is valued by the embedded verb on its subject, rather than by the matrix vP. Note, however, what the sentences in (36a,b) mean.

(35) mɑriz=ko buxar a ga-ya hɛ =DAT fever.M[NOM] come go-PF.M. is ‘The patient has gotten a fever.’

(36) a. ḍakṭar=ne [mɑriz=ko buxar a-ne] nɑhĩ diya doctor=ERG patient=DAT fever come-INF.OBL not give.PF ‘The doctor did not allow the patient to get a fever.’ [The doctor did everything he could to make sure the patient did not get a fever.] (Event reading) (K.V. Subbarao, p.c.)

b. [mɑriz=ko buxar a-na] nɑhĩ cahiye patient=DAT fever.m come-INF not ought ‘The patient must not get a fever; it must not happen that the patient gets a fever.’ (Event reading)

The sense of (36a,b) is that the patient is not the locus of permission or obligation. These sentences do not say that the patient is forbidden to get a fever; rather they say that it ought not to happen that the patient gets a fever. Grammatical sentences with lexical case on the embedded subject are not unique to the examples above. Compare mıl-ne in the ungrammatical (16b), (17c with mıl-ne in (37) and cahiye in (38):

(37) is=se ciṛh-kɑr mɑhalıngɑm=ne [monika=ko 3s=ABL be.irritated-CP Mahalingam=ERG Monika=DAT ɛmbibies=ki ḍıgri hi nɑhĩ mıl-ne ] di MBBS=GEN degree.F. emph not get-INF.OBL give.PF.F.

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‘Irritated by her, Mahalingam did not allow Monika to receive the MBBS degree.’ (Peter Hook, p.c; Google search)

Speakers judging (37) as grammatical comment that Mahalingam must have done something behind the scenes to prevent Monika from getting the degree; the sentence does not mean that Monika was not given permission to get the degree. I have placed the internal brackets to reflect an ECM analysis. Even the ungrammatical (17a) can be coerced into a grammatical sentence with ECM structure and the ‘allow to happen’ meaning, in the right discourse context. For example, it could be assumed in the context that the mother removed all the candy in the house, forbade the children to go to a shop to buy candy, and so on (Rajesh Bhatt, p.c.). The same kind of meaning is found with the modal in (38):

(38) [bariʃ ho-na] cahiye rain[NOM] be-INF ought ‘There ought/is likely to be rain; it is needed that there be rain.’

In (38), the rain is not required to fall. Rather, the event of raining is necessary or imminent. The choice of dative or nominative seems to obey the same principle (31) for ECM embedded subjects, so that DPs with inanimate or nonspecific reference may have nominative rather than dative case. The sentence would have a control structure and interpretation if there were a locus of obligation with dative case. We can go further with the ECM construction, which seems to favor non-volitional embedded predicates, unaccusatives or passives. The ECM analysis predicts that the embedded animate subject of an unaccusative verb can be given direct object accusative marking by the matrix verb, in the event sense:14

h (39) maalıki=ne [ ɑpne(i) b ai=ko lʊṭ-ne ] nɑhĩ di-ya boss =ERG self’s brother=ACC be.robbed-INF.OBL not give-PF ‘The (gang) boss didn’t allow [his own brother to be robbed/made bankrupt].’

Here the sense is that the boss prevented others from robbing his brother, not that he did not give his brother permission to be robbed. In the positive sentence (40), the event of becoming a millionaire was allowed to happen (40); the meaning is not that the millionaire was given permission to make money.

14Additional evidence that this dative marking is the effect of the ECM verb, and not the complement verb, can be seen in a version of (23) that projects the optional agent with =se ‘ablative’, not =ko ‘dative’. The sentence is ungrammatical: (i) ) *pıta=ne mali=se peṛ kɑṭ-ne di-e father=ERG gardener=ABL tree.M.PL[NOM] be.cut-INF.OBL give-PF.MPL ‘Father allowed [the trees to be cut by the gardener].’

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(40) ap=ne [mʊjhe kɑroṛ-pɑti bɑn-ne] di-ya you=ERG I=ACC millionaire be.made-INF give-PF ‘You allowed [me to become a millionaire]. [you made it possible/??you gave permission]

The accusative DP in (39) and (40) does not represent a locus of obligation: it is the theme of the embedded unaccusative verb. Conversely, there may be sentences like (41), in which the context suggests that the =ko marked DP is actually a locus of control, even though the infinitive verb piT-ne ‘be beaten’ is unaccusative. Here the event is not just allowed to happen, but volitionally sought.

(41) gandhi-ji =ke sɑmay=mẽ, [logõ=ne ɑpne-ap=ko [PRO Gandhi-HON=GEN time=IN people=ERG self’s-self=DAT pulis=se pıṭ-ne] di-ya police=WITH be.beaten-INF give-PF ‘In the era of Gandhi, people allowed themselves to be beaten by the police.’ (as an act of peaceful resistance)

There are sentences which have only the ECM analysis, as I have shown in this section. The two features of the examples of this preference are that the sentences lack a locus of permission and are not constrained by the condition on lexical case. The two permissive structures coexist but there are factors which I will talk about in section 6.2 which favor one structure over the other. It is, however, possible to get a control reading for a sentence with an unaccusative embedded verb, given the right circumstances (41).

6 The two structures for de-na ‘allow’

6.1 The nature of the modal meanings of de-na ‘allow’.

Here I briefly sketch an account of de-na ‘allow’ as a single modal with two senses, ‘allow to do’ and ‘allow to happen’, following Hacquard (2011) and sources cited in Portner 2009). Allow as a modal is often associated with , having to do with laws and obligations. But this not the case with de-na, which has to do with circumstances, which are true in a given world. The modal base consists of a function from propositions to worlds, specifying the propositions which are true in a given world. In the preceding examples, we have seen how the meaning and grammaticality of sentences may vary according to default assumptions or special context specified by certain circumstances. So we may say that the modal base of de-na is circumstantial, based on what circumstances hold, rather than deontic, based on laws, or epistemic, based what is known. ‘Allow’ in general is not normally deontic, in

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that it does not impose an obligation to do something. Rather it seems to mean something like ‘not require that A not happen’, for a given act A. I am proposing that the modal de-na is associated with two structures, a control structure with the modal flavor ‘allow to do’, and an ECM/Raising structure associated with the modal flavor ‘allow to happen’.15 The association of two with a single verb recalls Perlmutter’s (1970) proposal for begin, as both a control verb and a raising to subject verb. It is also consistent with McCawley’s proposal (1993:397-88) that (syntactic) differences of modals and quantifiers represent natural language meanings. Further, the hierarchy of heads in Cinque (1999) places epistemic modals higher than root/deontic modals, which are low. This difference suggests at least that the two modalities are separate entities, not aspects of the same , and that ambiguity would be possible. The prevailing view following Kratzer’s proposals (such as Kratzer 1991 and others summarized in Portner 2009: 48ff) is that modals are not semantically ambiguous, and the various interpretations are relative to different conversational backgrounds. It is proposed by Bhatt (1998; 2006) and others that modals are not syntactically ambiguous either; modals are raising verbs. Bhatt (1998) notes that the deontic sentences may have an expletive subject rather than a subject of a control verb in the sentence (42); the locus of obligation is in the context.

(42) There must be 50 chairs in the living room by 5 p.m.

As Portner (2009:188) remarks, arguments based on sentences like (42) for raising show that the ‘subject’ argument of the modal need not be in subject position, as in a control structure. But he argues against the stronger position (Bhatt 1998; Wurmbrand 1999) that modals cannot sometimes have a control structure. Portner argues (2009:197) that it is possible to add an individual variable, corresponding to the locus of obligation, to the Kratzer statement of worlds and accessibility relations. This variable would be necessary if it was needed to show that two distinct individuals were obliged to do something for different reasons. In the proposal made in this paper, the modal ‘allow’ in Hindi-Urdu is derived from the lexical verb de-na ‘give’, which selects three arguments: an agent, a theme, and a goal. When the theme is an infinitive complement, the goal is the locus of permission, coindexed with the subject of the embedded infinitive (see Butt’s 1995 argument structure in section 7). The ‘allow’ modal therefore does have an argument with a thematic role which represents the locus of permission, providing strong evidence for a control structure.

6.2 How are the two structures related?

15See Rivero et al (2010) for a discussion of two different languages which have different syntactic structures to express circumstantial necessity.

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In the control structure, a locus of permission is present, as a dative DP in the matrix clause. I define the locus of permission as in (43):

(43) Locus of permission: an individual capable of doing A who is not forbidden to do A (Not necessary that x not do A)

In this clausal structure, the case restriction on PRO applies to the PRO subject of the oblique complement infinitive. The structure is associated with the following modal ‘flavor’: There is someone who is allowed to do something. This sense is often associated with deontic modality, and does implicate that an event was allowed to occur. Nevertheless, it crucially includes a locus of obligation. In the ECM structure, there is no locus of permission argument in the matrix clause, and the case restriction on PRO does not apply, and it is usually assumed that the oblique complement is a defective TP or AspP. The modal ‘flavor’ is that there is an event which is allowed to occur. The ECM structure may be compared with the control structure in the following ways. First, de-na has lost an argument, the dative DP with its goal theta role; recall that the principal difference between control and ECM/Raising is the number of theta roles in the matrix clause in the Movement Theory of Control (Hornstein 1999). Second, the size of the clausal complement is reduced in the ECM structure. In examples like (35), the embedded proposition is clearly an AspP. In a sentence like (2), the complement is an infinitive without case-valuing properties for its (subject) specifier. So in some sense it is smaller or at least less specified than the infinitive complement in the control construction. The difference between the structures could be purely lexical, so that there are two c-selection properties for de-na with a clausal complement. The existence of the ECM structure could be the product of a historical change, resulting in two structures lexically represented for the verb ‘give’.16 The ECM structure could be derived by the loss of the matrix locus of permission, which in turn removes the antecedent for PRO; so the embedded subject must be pronounced and cannot be PRO. This change in structure seems to be connected with a smaller size of the complement. It has been claimed that the epistemic sense of modals is derived from the root sense historically and developmentally, even metaphorically (sources summed up in Hacquard 2011, such as Sweetser 1990: 50ff).

6.3 How are ‘modal flavors’ and syntactic structure associated with permission sentences?

Sentences with de-na ‘allow’ seem to sort themselves out very naturally into the

16The Sanskrit verb √dā ‘give’ has the meaning ‘allow’ with an infinitive complement and a dative locus of permission. Unfortunately the example which is cited in Apte (1958, Vol. II: 507) lacks an overt indirect object. It is understood, and would be dative if overt (Frederick Smith, p.c.).

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two associated structures and meanings. Various factors favor one analysis over the other and reflect differences of the circumstantial modal base, both common default assumptions about the world, and special contexts. The factors which favor the ECM analysis involve constituents of the sentence which are inconsistent with the control analysis. These include an embedded verb that is unaccusative or passive, or the lack of a matrix indirect object referring to an individual who is the locus of permission. The embedded subject may refer to a specific individual just so long as that individual is not given permission, but is involved in the event described by the embedded infinitive. Another factor is the presence of a subject of the embedded verb which has abstract or non-individual reference (such as ‘work’, ‘darkness’, weather phenomena, a referent that under normal circumstances can’t be a locus of permission). Even without these factors, it should be possible in principle to take an ungrammatical control sentence like (17c) and coerce it into a well-formed ECM sentence under the right contextual conditions. For example, to make sure that it’s not possible for the children to get any sweets, mother could take all sweets out of the house, so that the event of children getting sweets is not allowed to occur, under these circumstances. The well-formed sentence (37) is an example of this kind of coercion, by defining surrounding circumstances which block the awarding of the degree. One could imagine a deontic or bouletic reading of this same sentence, according to rules or wishes under which Monika is not given permission to study for a degree; but this sentence would violate the condition on lexical case on PRO because there would be a control structure. With the omission of the locus of permission, lexically/inherently cased subjects are well-formed in ECM complements. The lexical case effect (14a,b), (15a,b) (16a,b) is not found in (38)-(40). Unaccusative subjects with structural dative case are possible in ECM complements. Inanimate referents may have dative or nominative (40); there is no locus of permission.17 I sum up this position in (44):

(44) a. Object control: DP1 DP2i [PROi DP3 V-inf] DE = ‘Actor Modality’ b. ECM: DP1 [DP2 (DP3) V-inf] DE (Bhatt 2005) = ‘Event Modality’

17There are differences of what counts as a locus of permission. An animate spider would not (i), while a computer, which is strictly speaking inanimate, might (ii):

(i) jel=mẽ, qaidi=ne makṛi=ko jala bɑna-ne di-ya prison=in prisoner=ERG spider=ACC web make-INF give-PF ‘In his cell, the prisoner allowed the spider to make its web.’ (Allow to happen) (ii) mɛ̃=ne computer=ko virus scan kɑr-ne di -ya I =ERG =DAT do-INF give-PF ‘I allowed the computer to run the virus scan.’ (Turned on virus scan; allowed it to turn on automatically)

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In this account, (44b) is related to (44a) by dropping DP2; PRO in (44a) corresponds to a lexical subject of the complement in (44b). Sentence (1) has the structure in (44a), while sentence (2) has the structure in (44b). The alternative to my position is that there is one (ECM) structure, which has different interpretations in different contexts. This analysis is related to Kratzer’s claim (1991, 1981) that the root and epistemic senses of a modal are the result of having one linguistic form, and different modal bases which order possible worlds (see discussion in Hacquard 2011). I have proposed both control and raising properties of the complement of de-na ‘allow’, based on the syntactic evidence for control versus raising in sections 3 and 4, and the meanings associated with these structures in both default and special contexts.

7 The complex predicate analysis: some additional evidence

The permissive is basically an enigmatic construction, with apparently more than one syntactic analysis. In previous sections, I have proposed that it has both a control structure and an ECM structure, each associated with a different circumstantial modality, ‘allow X to do’ and ‘allow to happen’. We have little to compare it with in Hindi-Urdu.18 Nothing else is exactly like the permissive, though there are a few other verbs which require an oblique infinitive, principally lag-na ‘begin’:

(45) a. sɑmajh-ne lɑg-e 3.PL.M [NOM] understand-INF.OBL BEGIN-PF.M.PL ‘They began to understand.’ b. unhẽ ek upay sujh-ne lɑg-a 3.PL.M.[DAT] one means.M.S perceive-INF.OBl begin-PF.M.S ‘They began to perceive a solution.’ (requires a dative subject for suujh.)

This verb seems to be intransitive, with no case requirements on the matrix argument; it may be an instance of raising to subject. The agreement pattern recalls the long distance agreement found with the permissive. But this is only a superficial similarity, and it is not much help in probing the nature of the permissive, which has to be analyzed in terms of its own syntactic/semantic behavior. Butt (1995) proposes that the permissive is fundamentally a ditransitive complex predicate with the argument structure in (46). It is monoclausal at

18Miriam Butt notes that German lassen ‘let’ has these two interpretations, but both are associated with the accusative-infinitive structure, probably an ECM structure under my assumptions. The ‘allow X to do’ interpretation has an accusative locus of permission, while in the ‘allow to happen’ interpretation the accusative DP is not a locus of permission. Another verb, erlauben ‘give permission to’, seems to have only the ‘allow to do’ meaning; it requires a dative locus of permission and is a control structure.

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argument structure. See also the diagrammatic version in (4b).

(46) Argument structure for the permissive x cause y to go to the of z. (Butt 1995: 155-6)

The theme y argument in a argument structure is a transparent event { } instead of a full event [ ] as found with control verbs. (See Butt (this volume, section 4.1 for a revised analysis). In both complex predicates and control structures, the agent argument of the theme event is coindexed with the goal argument z. If the event y is a transparent event, then the argument structure is mapped into a monoclausal syntactic structure. The infinitive and de- na form a unit, taking a subject NP, an indirect object NP, and a direct object which is semantically part of the theme transparent event. In functional structure, the permissive is monoclausal and the instructive is biclausal; at constituent (c-) structure they are the same (Miriam Butt, p.c.). See section 3.1 in Butt (1998).The difference between the complex predicate permissive and the control instructive (7) is in the argument structure. It is interesting to compare this analysis, insofar as it is possible to overcome the different theoretical assumptions, with the and binding or minimalist views adopted in this paper. Wurmbrand (2007) proposes that restructuring or clause union can form a monoclausal structure with a VP complement. Lexical event fusion is possible but not necessary. My analysis differs from Wurmbrand’s in that Wurmbrand allows verbs to have infinitive form without assuming that this reflects a full TP clausal projection, while I am assuming that are some kind of TP, treating the infinitive –naa as non-finite dependent tense.

7.1 Arguments for a monoclausal structure for the permissive

Butt (1995) offers two kinds of evidence for the permissive as monoclausal, which I will return to shortly. There is another piece of evidence, not previously discussed, that may be an indication that the complement infinitive of the permissive is in some way different from the complement of object control verbs. There is an odd difference between de-na ‘allow’ and, for example, kɑh- na ‘tell’, an object control verb. Normally, control verbs with an infinitive complement (47a) have a counterpart with a finite complement clause marked with the subordinator ki. (47b). The verb of this finite clause is marked subjunctive.

(47) a. mã =ne bɑccõi=se [PROi kıtab-ẽ mother.f.s=ERG child.m.pl=ABL book-F.PL pɑṛh-ne]=ko kɑh-a read-INF.OBL=DAT say-PF.M.S ‘Mother told (the) children to read (the) book.’ b. mã =ne bɑccõi=se kɑh-a mother.f.s=ERG child.m.pl=ABL say-PF

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h [ki vei kıtab-ẽ pɑṛ -ẽ ] that they[NOM] book-F.PL read-3.PL.SUBJUNCTIVE Mother told (the) children [that they should read (the) books].’ (48) a. mã =ne bɑccõ=ko [ kıtab-ẽ pɑṛh-ne ] mother.f.s=ERG child.m.pl=DAT book-F.PL read-INF.OBL di-ya give.PF.MS ‘Mother allowed/let (the) children to read (the) books.’ b. * mã =ne bɑccõ=ko di-ya mother.f.s=ERG child.m.pl=DAT give-PF.M.S [ki ve kıtab-ẽ pɑṛh-ẽ ] that 3PL[NOM] book-F.PL read-3.PL.SUBJUNCTIVE ‘Mother allowed the children [that they should read the books].’

The version of ‘allow’ with a finite complement (48b) is extremely ungrammatical. This suggests that the infinitive complement of de-na ‘give’ does not express an event which can be expressed as a tensed/finite clause. This could be because, in Butt’s terms, the theme is a transparent event. She notes (this volume, below example 15) that the permissive subcategorizes for another event, and “that at a-structure the lowest matrix argument is fused with the highest embedded argument.” This may be a point of agreement between Butt’s LFG analysis and the Minimalist account I am proposing, though phrased in different terms. Note that the verb de-na ‘give’ does not normally select a clausal complement. The exception is the ‘allow’ sense, which does select for an infinitive theme; apparently it has done so from earliest times—see note 17. This infinitive cannot be expanded as a full finite CP with subjunctive, as in (48b). So both Butt and I agree that there is something defective about the infinitive complement of ‘give’. For Butt, the defective event must form a complex predicate, which then must be expressed as a monoclausal f-structure. In my terms, the infinitive complement is just anomalous as a theme semantically selected by ‘give’ as ‘allow’. It is projected as a normal control complement. But this contrast may also be evidence for covert modality in non-finite clauses in Hindi-Urdu, though much different from the English infinitivals discussed in Bhatt (2006). The infinitive complement of kɑh-na ‘say, tell’ (47a) contains a deontic modal paraphrased by the subjunctive in the finite counterpart (47b). The infinitive complement of de-na ‘allow’ does not include this modality, and perhaps no modality at all, as ‘allow’ itself has a modal sense. I now return to two arguments in Butt (1995) for the monoclausal nature of the complex predicate analysis of the permissive.19 First, in a biclausal

19There is a third argument, based on the fact that the permissive allows long distance agreement with the infinitive object, while the instructive does not (Butt 1995:52). This is a purely mechanical consequence of the fact that the instructive selects a postposition on its complement, and the permissive does not. The oblique infinitive in the permissive is an unusual property.

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sentence with an infinitive complement, there are two possible subject antecedents for the possessive reflexive ɑpna: the matrix subject and the embedded subject, which may be PRO; recall that reflexives in Hindi-Urdu are typically subject oriented. If the permissive is monoclausal, there should be only one antecedent, the subject, which represents the agent of permission (Butt 1995:53-54). Miriam Butt and I seem to find different judgments in sentences like the one below.

(49) maltii=ne radhaj=ko [PRO ɑpnii/?j kɑvitaẽ Malti =ERG Radha= DAT self’s poems.F.PL[NOM] sʊna-ne ] nɑhĩ dĩ recite-INF.OBL not give-PF.F.PL ‘Maltii did not allow Radhaj [PRO to read heri/?j poems.’ a. Malti is very modest or possessive and does not allow others to read her poems.’(default) b. Malti is jealous of Radha or dictatorial, and does not allow Radha to read the poems which Radha wrote.

Butt finds mostly the (49a) reading in Lahori Urdu, as expected if the construction is monoclausal (Butt 1995:42). Under the right pragmatic conditions (49b), however, Hindi speakers whom I have consulted (as well as a small number of Urdu speakers) also interpret ɑpna as referring to the agent of the embedded verb, in other PRO in a multiclausal sentence.20 If the judgment for (49b) is reliable, then the evidence is mixed for a biclausal structure. The (49a) interpretation follows from either a monoclausal structure, or from the ability of a simplex reflexive like ɑpna ‘self’s’ to be non-locally bound in a biclausal structure. Butt’s second argument is based on the controller for the PRO null subject of the conjunctive participle, placed in sentence-internal position.

h (50) ɑnjʊm=nei sɑddɑfj=ko [____i/j dɑrwaza k ol-kɑr] sɑman=ko Anjum=ERG Saddaf=DAT door open-CP baggage=ACC kɑmre=mẽ rɑkh-ne=ko kɑh-a room=in place-INF=DAT say-PF ‘Anjum told Saddaf to put the baggage in the room, PROi/j having

20Some additional support for my view comes from Montaut 1991:197ff, who discusses the role of contextual salience in assigning a referent to the reflexive possessive ɑpna. i) ap logi ʊsej [PROj ɑpne j kam= ka nɑtija you people 3S.DAT self’s work=GEN consequence h b ʊgɑt-ne] dẽ suffer-INF.OBL give- SUBJUNCTIVE.3PL ‘You peoplei should let himj suffer the consequence of hisj deed.’ (Montaut 1991:197)

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opened the door.’ (Butt 1995: 52) h (51) ɑnjʊm=nei sɑddɑfj=ko [___i/*j dɑrwaza k ol-kɑr] sɑman=ko Anjum=ERG Saddaf=DAT door open-CP baggage=ACC kamree=mẽ rakh-ne di-ya room=in place-INF give-PF ‘Anjum allowed Saddaf to put the baggage in the room, PROi/*j having opened the door.’ (cf. Butt 1995: 53)

It is well known that the conjunctive participle subject must be controlled by a subject. The biclausal instructive seems to allow both the matrix subject and the embedded PRO as controllers. The permissive allows only the agent subject to be a controller, as the indirect object in a monoclausal structure would be unavailable. Scrambling the conjunctive participle itself does not change the readings (Butt 1995: 52-3). The judgments reported by Butt are confirmed by the speakers I have consulted. But pragmatic factors may influence coreference possibilities. For example, in (52), the PRO conjunctive participle subject is controlled by the subject of the infinitive, which must be the other PRO (in my biclausal analysis). The judgments are mixed, but for some speakers, the biclausal analysis makes the right predictions.

h h h (52) mãi=ne bɑccej=ko [PROi/j cıṭṭ i ɑpne ap/k ud lik -kɑr ] mother=ERG child=DAT letter.F self’s self/self write-CP PRO*i/j ḍak=mẽ -ne di/diya mail=in put-INF give-PF/F/M ‘Mother let the child, having written the letter by himself, put it in the mailbox.’21

In sum, the subject antecedents of reflexives and the conjunctive participle PRO may include the infinitive subject PRO for some speakers, though not all, given a supporting pragmatic context. So a biclausal analysis is plausible at least for these speakers; otherwise they support a monoclausal analysis. I have argued for two biclausal structures associated with different modal meanings, accounting for properties which add to the data on which Butt’s 1995 analysis was based, and which do not seem to follow from that analysis. Butt (p.c) notes that it is possible to construct an argument structure for the ECM structure (6), like the control a-structure (4b).

7.2 Monoclausal causatives with non-causal meanings

We might compare the permissive with causatives, which are syntactically monoclausal (though complex in argument structure and in derivation). See Butt

21Of the three speakers I have consulted, two interpret the conjunctive participle subject PRO as the child (or mother) and one speaker has only the mother as the referent of PRO.

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(this volume, section 3.) Causatives have the smallest complements with a ‘helping’ or ‘permissive interpretation. Reflexives have only one possible antecedent, the causative agent (53a), unlike the control structure (21).

h (53) radhai=ne sitaj=ko ɑpnii/*j/ʊs*i/j/k=ki tɑsvir dik -a-i Radha=ERG Sita=DAT self’s 3.S =GEN picture see-CAUS-PF. ‘Radhai showed Sitaj self’si/*j/3s*i/j/k picture. (Kachru and Bhatia 1975:61)

There are some semantic properties of the causative construction which are close to the permissive (54), though causatives do not usually have modal interpretations. In addition to an ‘instructive’ meaning, ‘to make or have x do A’, the meaning ‘to help’ is found in modern Indo-Aryan languages, though not as much in Hindi-Urdu as in Panjabi and Gujarati (Khokhlova 2003). It is well known that =ko causees can be non-agentive, even with ‘double’ or -va causatives (for recent discussion see Ramchand 2008).

h (54) mɛ̃-=ne ram=ko pan=ki dʊkan k ʊl-va-yi I=ERG Ram=ACC betel=GEN shop be.open.CAUS.PF.F.S ‘I helped Ram to open the betel shop.’ (Khokhlova 2003)

Here the dative-marked causee is not an agent, and the sense is that the causee benefits from an event which the causer brings about, roughly comparable to the sense ‘allow to happen’ associated with the ECM version of de-na. But this sense is not always consistent. In (55), the causee is an agent (planning his escape), not just the individual who is chased away. This sense may be comparable to the interpretation associated with the control version of the permissive. In (56), the dative-marked causee is both a locus of permission and a volitional agent.

(55) mʊjrım=ko bhɑg-a-na criminal=ACC run-CAUS-INF ‘to let/ help a criminal to escape’ (normally ‘to chase away’) (Khokhlova 2003)

Some of the Indo-Aryan languages are much more tolerant of the ‘assistive’ meaning than Hindi-Urdu, which is fairly restrictive (Khokhlova 2003). By contrast, the ‘allow’ construction in Hindi-Urdu is fully productive and consistent in its event and locus of permission interpretations.

8 Summary and conclusions

The permissive de-na ‘give’ combines with an oblique infinitive in two constructions, with the modal meanings ‘allow A to do X’ and ‘allow X to happen’. The primary syntactic difference is whether the matrix clause contains the indirect object subcategorized by the ditransitive ‘give’, or not. This indirect object represents the locus of permission which is syntactically projected as a

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DP with lexical dative case, and it is the controller of the embedded PRO subject in the ‘allow to do’ modal sense. The embedded oblique infinitive must be a non-finite CP or TP with the ability to license case on PRO. I have offered three arguments for the ‘allow’ permissive construction as an instance of obligatory control. First, the matrix indirect object has a theta role independent of the theta role of the embedded clause. Second, the construction has a property which is characteristic of obligatory control constructions in Hindi-Urdu. The PRO subject may not have a lexical case, particularly dative case, which would come into play if the embedded predicate is one which requires a lexically cased subject, an experiencer or goal. This constraint does not hold in non-obligatory control, raising to subject or ECM complements. Third, the permissive allows local coindexing of the subject oriented complex anaphor ɑpne ap. The local antecedent must be embedded PRO, not the matrix indirect object, which is not a subject and therefore not an eligible antecedent. Next, I argue that the permissive is also an instance of ECM/Raising to object. The locus of permission is not projected syntactically, though it may be lexically implied or part of the discourse context. In this construction, the embedded clause subject has direct object case, either the unmarked nominative or the accusative =ko, according to the DOM criteria of specific or animate reference of the DP subject. The embedded clause itself does not have the property of valuing the subject for case, as in the control structure. This suggests that the ECM complement is less specified than the control complement. It is a non-finite TP or AspP lacking an accusative case feature. The choice of control or ECM structure depends on various factors: the nature of the embedded verb, agentive, passive or unaccusative; and the nature of the embedded subject, agentive or nonreferential. It is also possible to coerce a control structure with an ‘allow to do’ meaning into an ‘allow to happen’ meaning, given the right context. In some instances, a violation of the lexical case condition on PRO is coerced into an ECM structure with an ‘allow to happen’ meaning. I suggest that the two structures are now two distinct lexical entries for de-na ‘give’, resulting from the locus of the indirect object locus of permission, to derive the ECM structure from the control structure. An interesting consequence of the arguments for a modal control structure goes against the prevailing views (Bhatt 1998, Portner 2009) that modals never are expressed with control structures. Another interesting consequence is that the analysis in this paper is at variance with Butt’s LFG analysis in 1995 and in subsequent work; see Butt’s commentary in this volume. I have offered an account of the permissive based on data not considered in Butt’s 1995 very elegant account of light verbs in general, and I have focused attention on the ECM event-oriented structure proposed originally in Bhatt (2005), which I think does have justification as a possible analysis of the permissive. But the construction remains something of an enigma. It has some properties which are not typical of biclausal structures like the instructive, but the syntactic evidence on binding is like that of an independent clause, and the lexical case evidence is typical of control complements. So I see evidence

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that non-finite complements do represent syntactic clausal domains. I have found a syntactic ambiguity of a rather rare sort, between control and ECM, in this one construction, which has the properties of a modal. The syntactic properties correspond to modal differences, which seem to reduce to an ‘allow to do’ reading for the control structure, and an ‘allow to happen’ reading for events in the ECM structure, always assuming an appropriately narrowed circumstantial modal base. The evidence for control supports the idea that modal meanings are not associated only with syntactic raising (or ECM) structures. In the control structure, there is a syntactic argument with a theta role of goal, representing the locus of permission.

Acknowledgements Many thanks to two anonymous reviewers, Miriam Butt, Gillian Ramchand, Rajesh Bhatt, Peter Hook, Liudmila Khokhlova and Thomas McFadden. They have all made valuable suggestions which I have tried to incorporate into this version of the paper, but they are not responsible for the results! I am grateful to Philip Lutgendorf for making me aware of the songs which I quoted as examples of the permissive. Thanks also to the participants at the Finiteness in South Asian Languages conference (FiSAL) at University of Tromsø, June 9-10, 2011, especially to the organizers Sandhya Sundaresan and Thomas McFadden, who also played a major role in preparing this volume. Thanks very much to the following for generously contributing their judgments on Hindi and Urdu sentences: Archna Bhatia, Sami Khan, Pranav Prakash, Rajiv Ranjan and Richa Srishti. Thanks also to my colleague Solveig Bosse for German judgments. As usual, thanks to A. Azar, D.J. Berg, S. Cassivi, A. Comellas, Y. Romero, D. Capper and M. Yao. Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the January 2011 SALA meeting at CIIL Mysore, and the FASAL meeting at University of Massachusetts, March 2011. Many thanks to the audiences for their comments.

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