Paper Title

LF-Incorporation and Light Verb Constructions in Japanese

Author's Name, Institution and E-mail Address

Masaaki Kamiya, Hamilton College, mkamiya@hamilton.edu

Abstract

This paper argues that there is no LF-incorporation of Verbal Nouns (VNs) into light verb su 'do' in Light Verb Constructions (LVCs) in Japanese. In the literature, Japanese light verbs do not have argument structures or thematic roles. To provide argument structures and thematic roles with the light verb, Saito and Hoshi (2000) claim that VNs are incorporated into a light verb in LF to form a complex predicate and assign theta-roles to the relevant arguments. At the time of incorporation, the accusative case on the VN is also licensed. As a piece of evidence for forming a complex predicate in LF, Saito and Hoshi show that VNs cannot be separated from a light verb in a cleft construction due to a general ban on lowering. However, this is possible when VNs appear in [noun + genitive + VN] in LVCs. Thus, unlike Saito and Hoshi, I claim that VNs are verbs that are nominalized, and that a light verb does have an argument structure and theta-role. That is, a VN and a light verb do not form a complex predicate in LF, and each VN and light verb assigns theta-roles to their own arguments. Interestingly, this conclusion supports Poser (2002), in which he claims that the accusative case of Japanese is assigned to a single theta-assigning predicate. In addition, I claim that the accusative case is not licensed at LF, but at PF. A piece of evidence is provided from fragmentary utterances (e.g, benkyoo, but *benkyoo-o). If case is licensed at LF, *benkyoo-o in a fragmentary utterance will be acceptable. However, this is not the case. This implies that case is not assigned at LF, but rather at PF in the line of Kuroda (1978), Harada (2002), Fukui and Sakai (to appear), and Nakamura (2004).
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