Phi-features and the Modular Architecture of - UMR 7023 - CNRS

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of Icelandic and Finnish, not nonagreeing ones, including their accusatives (section
5.2). In Faroese and Tamil, this may be observed even in unaccusatives, because
their dative-subject psych-verbs use the nonagreeing accusative rather than
the agreeing nominative for S, and it is then immune to the PCC (Rezac 2007:
Appendix). The v of the psych-unaccusatives of these languages is always vACC
(section 5.5). In Finnish, it is ordinarily an inactive v, but becomes activated by ℜ
to vACC to avoid the Case licensing failure of the PCC context.
The same principles are at work in Finnish 'nominative object' constructions,
without counterpart in Icelandic. One is the passive (325). The external argument
is proarb. The nominative goes on the object, save if [+person], which is accusative.
(325) Siellä näh-tiin [proarb v [tV sinä / *sinu-t / vieras / *viaraa-n]]
there see-PASS.PAST you.N *you-A guest.N *guest-A
One saw you/a guest/guests there.
(Finnish)
Here proarb behaves as the dative intervener does in the core cases of the PCC.
D'Alessandro (2004) develops this analysis for a parallel impersonal si construction
in Italian (326). The external argument is proarb (si), and the object is an
agreeeing nominative, but only if 3 rd person. TNOM is the sole Agree/Case licenser,
and proarb is a defective intervener that blocks [person] but not [number] Agree between
TNOM and the object, (327)a. 1 st /2 nd person objects must occur in the similar
but distinct and independently available impersonal si construction of (326)c.
There the external argument is also proarb, but vACC is always activated, and the object
is a nonagreeing accusative whatever its person, (327)b. Finnish differs in activating
vACC as last resort, when TNOM fails to a license [+person] object. 157
(326) a. I Rossi/?loro si inviterebbero volentieri.
the Rossi's/they SE would.invite.3PL willingly
The Rossi's/they would be eagerly invited. (si + nom. object)
b. *Tu si inviter-ai volentieri
you.NOM SE will.invite-2SG willingly (si + acc. object)
c. Ti si inviter-à
you.ACC SE will.invite-3SG
157 On Finnish proarb, cf. Holmberg (forthc), Holmberg et al. (1993: 189f.); on its interaction with
the binding properties of the object, Kiparsky (2001: 353f.), Manninen and Nelson (2004). There
are reasons to think that when the object of the passive is preverbal, it is not in [Spec, TP] but in
an A'-position (cf. Hakulinen and Karlsson 1975: 345, but contrast Manninen and Nelson 2004).
This assumption is not be necessary to exclude a derivation like Icelandic (255)b. Proarb not only
intervenes in [+person] Agree, but also appears to raise or attaches to T, where it is reflected as
the special invariant agreement morphology of the Finnish passive and in the Italian T-clitic si,
and where it is always the closest goal for T (cf. Rezac 2008c: 93f.). Mechanically similar to the
passive is the imperative with the addressee as intervener (Rezac 2007). (D'Alessandro proposes
that Italian si reflects the syntactically projected impersonal agent in both agreeing and nonagreeing
si constructions, but is Merged at different height in two; I simplify.)