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On the Argument Structure of Causatives Alex Alsina On the Argument Structure of Causatives Morphologicallyderived causatives are composed of a causative morphemeand a base verb. It is generally accepted that the causative morpheme is a two-place predicate expressing a relation between a causer and a caused event. This has suggested to some researchersthat morphologicalcausatives have essentially the same syntactic represen- tation at D-Structure as English periphrasticcausatives involving verbs like make or cause, which are also semanticallytwo-place predicates. This line of research is most clearly representedby theories that derive causatives through syntactic incorporation, particularlythose of Baker (1988) and Li (1990). In this study I will show that in certainlanguages the causative morphemeis a three- place predicate, involving a patient in addition to a causer and a caused event. This assumption will not only provide a simple account of the basic generalizationsabout causatives, but also explain a whole set of facts that are completely mysterious for the Incorporationtheories. I will argue that the three-place causative predicate yields an argumentthat bears a semantic relation to both the causative predicate and the base predicate. This semanticallycomposite argumentcannot be derived throughmovement in the syntax, since it would violate the 0-Criterion(Chomsky (1981; 1982)).It must be formed elsewhere (i.e., in the argument structure)and assigned fully formed to one syntactic position. A consequence of this is that morphologicalcausatives cannot be formed by a syntactic derivation,contrary to the claim made by the Incorporationthe- ories. 1. The Basic Facts In this section we will establish the basic facts about causatives in Chichewa, a language that has figured centrally in previous theories of causatives (e.g., Baker (1988) and Li (1990)). Chichexwais a Bantu language spoken in Malawi and neighboringcountries in I thank JonathanGinzburg, Smita Joshi, Paul Kiparsky, Chris Pifi6n, Ivan Sag, Tom Wasow, Annie Zaenen,and especiallyJoan Bresnanand Peter Sells for commentsand observations.This articlehas benefited from presentationsat StanfordUniversity, NorthwesternUniversity, and UCLA. I am very gratefulto Sam Mchombofor providingthe Chichewadata. The commentsof anonymousreviewers have helped shape this article in many positive ways. This study, which is based on work developedfurther in my dissertation(Alsina (forthcoming)), has been supportedin part by the United States National Science Foundationunder Grant No. BNS-8919880,and in part by the Centerfor the Study of Languageand Information,Stanford University. Linguistic Inquiry, Volume 23, Number 4, Fall 1992 5 17-555 ? 1992 by The Massachusetts Institute of Technology 517 518 ALEX ALSINA South CentralAfrica, and the judgmentsreported here are those of Sam Mchombo. We will first consider the way in which the causee is expressed, and then discuss the status of the oblique causee. The morphosyntacticexpression of the causee in Chichew'aappears to depend on the transitivityof the verb on which the causative verb is formed. When the base verb is transitive, the causee may be expressed as an oblique phrase introduced by kwa (elsewhere used to introducegoals and directionallocatives), as shown in (la), or as an object, as shown in (lb) (examples from Alsina and Mchombo (1990)). (See section 3.1 on the generality of this alternation.)' (1) a. Niungu i-na-phik-its-a maungu kwa ka'dzidzi. 9 porcupine 9 s-Ps-cook-csT-Fv6 pumpkinsto la owl 'The porcupinehad the pumpkinscooked by the owl.' b. Nungu i-na-phik-its-a kadzidzi maungu. 9 porcupine9 s-Ps-cook-csT-Fvla owl 6 pumpkins 'The porcupinemade the owl cook the pumpkins.' Chichew'ais not exceptional in allowing this alternationin the expression of the causee of transitive base verbs. Many other Bantu languages have this variation: for example, Shona (Hawkinsonand Hyman (1974, 155), Bokamba(1981)), Swahili (Scotton (1967, 260)), Kinyarwanda(based on the author's informantwork with Monique Mas- agara),and Tharaka(according to researchby CarolynHarford). In the first three, unlike Chichewa and Tharaka, the oblique causee takes the same preposition as the passive by-phrase. With causatives based on intransitiveverbs, the causee is invariablyexpressed as an object, as shown in (2) (from Alsina and Mchombo (1990)). (2) Chatsaliraa-ku-nam-its-a' (*kwa')mwaina. 1 NAME 1 S-PR-lie-cST-FV to 1 child 'Chatsalirais makingthe child lie (tell lies).' There is no doubt that the object causee in examples (lb) and (2) is an object, since it shows the general syntactic behavior of objects in Chichewa: it must be adjacent to the verb, can be expressed by means of an object marker,and can be the subject in the passive form (see Alsina and Mchombo (1990), Baker (1988, 165)). As for the oblique causee of examples like (la), the available evidence argues for treatingit as an adjunct(of the variety referredto as "argument-adjunct"by Grimshaw (1990), which includes the passive by-phrase).Given the assumptionthat adjuncts are ' Tones and vowel length are markedin the Chichewasentences as follows: long vowels may be low -, high ", rising v, and falling ^, and short vowels are either high ', or low, which is unmarked. Each noun in Bantu belongs to one of eighteen noun classes, denotedin the glosses by Arabicnumerals. Roman numeral I designatesfirst person singular.The followingabbreviations are used: s subject PS past CST causative FV final vowel o object INF infinitive PAS passive FOC focus PR present ERG ergative ACC accusative REL relative ON THE ARGUMENT STRUCTURE OF CAUSATIVES 519 generally optional, it then follows that the oblique causee of (la) can be omitted, as in (3). (3) Nungu i-na-phik-its-a maungu. 9 porcupine 9 s-Ps-cook-csT-Fv6 pumpkins 'The porcupinehad the pumpkinscooked.' A sentence like (3), with an omitted causee, corresponds to a sentence like (la), with an oblique causee, and not to one like (lb), with an object causee. The clearest evidence internalto Chichewxa is the fact that the causee can only be omitted when there is a correspondingform with an oblique causee. Causativesbased on intransitiveverbs, for example, can neither express the causee as an oblique, (2), nor omit it, (4). (4) *Chatsal'raa-ku-naim-its-a. 1 NAME 1 S-PR-lie-CST-FV 'Chatsalirais making someone lie (tell lies).' There is cross-linguisticevidence pointingto the conclusion that the causee can be omitted only when it can be expressed as an oblique. The Bantu languages Shona, Swahili, Kinyarwanda,and Tharaka,which show an object/obliquealternation for the causee of transitiveverbs, allow it to be omitted. On the other hand, the Bantulanguages Sesotho (Machobane(1989; personal communcation))and Kichaga (Alsina and Moshi (1990)),which can only express the causee of transitiveverbs as an object, do not allow it to be omitted. The facts of Marathi(Alsina and Joshi (1991), Joshi (personal com- munication))also support this conclusion. In Marathi,causatives based on most tran- sitive verbs take an optional oblique causee, as in (5), whereas causatives based on transitivesof the "ingestive" type (see Masica(1976)), which can only express the causee as an object, cannot omit it, as in (6). (5) sumaa-ni (raam-kadun)shaam-laa maarawle. Suma-ERGRam-by Sham-Accbeat-csT 'Suma had Sham beaten (by Ram).' (6) sumaa-ni *(raam-laa)paani paadzle. Suma-ERG Ram-Acc water drink-csT 'Suma made Ram drink water.' The evidence providedby Zubizarreta(1985) for the adjunctstatus of the par-phrase causee and for the argument status of the dative causee in French, when applied to Chichew'a,reveals that the kwa'-phrasecausee is the analogue of the former and the object causee the analogue of the latter. As in French, an inalienablepossession con- structioncan be the embeddedstructure of a causative providedthe causee is an object, (7a), and not an oblique, (7b). (7) a. Alimi a-na-kwez-ets-a Chaitsaliradzanja. 2 farmers 2 s-ps-raise-csT-Fv 1 NAME 5 hand 'The farmers made Chatsaliraraise his hand.' 520 ALEX ALSINA b. *Almi a-na-kwez-ets-a' dzanja kwa Chatsalira. 2 farmers 2 s-Ps-raise-cST-Fv5 hand to 1 NAME The two forms of the causee contrast with respect to the ability to antecede a possessive pronoun in the same clause: (8) a. Alimi a-ku-lemb-ets-a mkaingondakatulo yake. 2 farmers 2S-PR-write-cST-Fv3 lion 9 poem 9 his 'The farmers are makingthe lion write his poem.' b. *Almi a-ku-lemb-ets-a ndakatuloyake kwa mkango. 2 farmers 2 S-PR-write-cST-FV 9 poem 9 his to 3 lion Assumingthat the inalienablepossession constructionrequires a coargumentof the possessed object to be interpretedas the possessor, the ungrammaticalityof the kwa- phrase in (7b) follows from the fact that it is an adjunctand not an argument;the object causee, on the other hand, can be interpretedas the possessor of the inalienableobject in (7a) because it is an argumentof the same predicateas the possessed object.2Adopting Zubizarreta'sassumption that an argumentcannot be referentiallydependent on an ad- junct of the same clause, the object causee in (8a), as an argument,can be the antecedent of the possessive pronoun, but the oblique causee in (8b), as an adjunct, cannot.3As in Zubizarreta(1985), "truncated" causatives (those without an overt causee) are equiv- alent in terms of argumentstructure to those with an oblique causee (the par-phrasein French, and the kwa-phrasein Chichewxa). In sum, we have seen that, althoughcausatives based on intransitiveverbs in Chi- chew'ahave the causee invariablyexpressed as an object, (some) causatives based on transitive verbs allow the causee to alternatebetween an object and an oblique expres- sion. A theory of causatives must account for what it is that allows the argumentthat correspondsto the external argumentof the embeddedverb to be expressed as an object in the causative form, what it is that allows it to be optionally expressed as an oblique or omitted, and what it is that allows this optional oblique expression only for some verbs.
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