Unaccusative Adjectives and the structure of VP [Syntax, Argument Structure, Tagalog]
Overview. The goal of this talk is to motivate an unaccusative analysis of adjectival passives
(APs) in Tagalog (Western Austronesian). Cross-linguistically, APs have been shown to have an
unergative syntax (Beletti and Rizzi 1981; Pesetsky 1982; Levine and Rappaport Hovav 1986;
Borer and Grodzinksy 1986). In recent work, this fact has been used to argue that the internal
theme-argument (along with the external argument (following Kratzer 1996)) should be severed
(in the sense of Kratzer 1996) from the lexical representation of both verbs and adjectives (Borer
1998, 2005; Baker 2003). This claim has been used, furthermore, to support an articulated view
of VP-structure, in which additional (functional) structure is required in order to project an
internal argument (Hale and Keyser 2002; Baker 2003; Borer 2005). I argue that this articulated
VP-structure is incompatible with Tagalog, given the existence of unaccusative APs.
Evidence. Evidence for the unaccusative analysis of APs in Tagalog is based on an observation
that APs systematically contrast with other adjectives in the language in their ability to function
as the main predicate of two types of clauses. The adjectives in (1), for instance, can be
intensified using the prefix napaka-, while the APs in (2) cannot (see (3)-(4) below). Crucially,
Tagalog has another means of intensifying an adjective that involving full reduplication, and both
types of adjectives can be intensified in this way (see (5)-(6) below). This fact is significant
because it establishes that the contrast between (3) and (4) is not semantic.
The adjectives in (1) can also occur in Comparative Constructions of equality, but the APs in
(2) cannot ((7)-(8)). Both types of adjectives can, however, appear in Comparative Constructions
of inequality ((9)-(10)), as well as a variety of other constructions involving degree modification.
This fact argues that the contrast between (7) and (8) is not likely to be due to a semantic
incompatibility between degree modification of the APs.
Analysis. An important fact about constructions like (3) and (7), compared to the examples in
(5)-(6) and (9)-(10) is that the adjective's single argument (italicized in the examples) appears in
a non-subject (NS) case form. Subject-case (S) on an argument reflects Agreement between
T(ense)0 and an argument, which I assume is one of the means by which an argument can be
syntactically licensed. An argument that does not agree with T0 must be Case licensed. Following
Guilfoyle, Hung, and Travis (1992), nominative Case is assigned by T0 to an external argument.
Internal arguments, however, can only be licensed if they agree with T0, or if they receive
accusative Case from a verb. Given these assumptions, the predication is that if an adjective has
an internal argument--i.e., if it is unaccusative--then its argument will fail to be licensed in the
absence of an available agreement relation with T0, since there is no verb to assign accusative
Case, and because it is not in a local enough configuration with T0 to be assigned nominative
Case. The ungrammaticality of (4) and (8) follow, therefore, from the hypothesis that APs are
unaccusative.
Implications. The existence of unaccusative APs provides an argument for not adopting a VP-
structure like that shown in (11), in which the theme argument is projected as the specifier of a
light-verb predicate that selects an adjectival (secondary predicate) complement (Hale and Keyser
2002; Baker 2003). In particular, since adjectives are able to license internal theme arguments on
their own, in the absence of any additional verb specific functional structure, this additional
structure is both unmotivated and uneccessary for Tagalog. I conclude this talk by pointing out
that the absence of this VP-structure for Tagalog may follow from Snyder's (2001) Complex
Predicate Constraint ((12)). In particular, Tagalog does not allow endocentric compounds (there
are no N-N compounds in the language) making it impossible to form a single word consisting of
V-A from the structure in (11). Given this, I maintain the possibility that some languages
countenance the VP-structure in (11), even if it is not appropriate for Tagalog. A larger
conclusion that can be drawn here is that the syntactic representation of predicate-argument
relation may differ from one language to another, but in a way that is predictable based on other
independent properties of particular grammars.
(1) (Unergative) Adjectives: (ma-)mahal `expensive'; ma-ganda `beautiful'; (ma-)init `hot';
ma-sarap `delicious'; ma-bilis `fast'; ma-sama `bad'
(2) Adjectival Passives: baság `broken'; sirá' `damaged'; galít `angry'; pagód `tired'
sunóg `burnt'; punó' `full'; daíg `surpassed'
Napaka- intensification: [Unerg.-Adj. [(3)]; *Adj.-Passive [(4)]]
(3) Napaka-mahal ng presyo.
napaka- expensive NS price
`The price is very expensive.'
(4) *Napaka-basag ng salamin.
napaka- broke NS mirror
(`The mirror is very broken.')
Reduplicative-intensification: [Unerg.-Adj. [(5)]; Adj.-Passive [(6)]]
(5) Mahal na mahal ang presyo.
expensive L expensive S price
`The price is very expensive.'
(6) Basag na basag ang salamin.
broke L broke S mirror
`The mirror is very broken.'
Comparison of Equality: [Unerg.-Adj. [(7)]; *Adj.-Passive [(8)]]
(7) Hindi pa kasing-ganda ng Maynila ang Mandaluyong.
Neg still equal -beauty NS Manila T Mandaluyong
`Mandaluyong is still not as beautiful as Manila.'
(8) *Kasing-sirá' ng kotse niya ang kotse ni Maria.
equal- damaged NS car his T car NS Maria
`Mari's car is as damaged as his car.'
Comparison of Inequality: [Unerg.-Adj. [(9)]; Adj.-Passive [(10)]]
(9) Mas init ang Boston kaysa San Francisco noong Lunes.
More hot S Boston than San Francisco last Monday
`Boston was more hot than San Francisco last Monday.'
(10) Mas sirá ang kotse ni Maria kaysa kotse niya.
More damaged S car NS Maria than car his(NS)
`Maria's car is more damaged than his car.'
Decompositional VP-structure: (Hale and Keyser 2002; Baker 2003).
(11) ...[VP DPtheme [V' V-be [AP A (XP)]]]
Complex Predicate Constraint: (Snyder 2001)
(12) Two syntactically independent expressions can jointly characterize the event-
type of a single event-argument, only if they constitute a single word (endocentric
compound) at the point of semantic interpretation.