The Passive in Japanese

The Passive in Japanese
Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today (LA)

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University of Vienna / Arizona State University
Rijksuniversiteit Groningen
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Josef Bayer Christer Platzack
University of Konstanz University of Lund
Cedric Boeckx Ian Roberts
ICREA/UB Cambridge University
Guglielmo Cinque Lisa deMena Travis
University of Venice McGill University
Liliane Haegeman Sten Vikner
University of Ghent University of Aarhus
Hubert Haider C. Jan-Wouter Zwart
University of Salzburg University of Groningen
Terje Lohndal
Norwegian University of Science
and Technology
Volume 192
The Passive in Japanese. A cartographic minimalist approach
by Tomoko Ishizuka
The Passive in Japanese
A cartographic minimalist approach
Tomoko Ishizuka
Tama University
John Benjamins Publishing Company

Amsterdam / Philadelphia
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Ishizuka, Tomoko, 1968-

The passive in Japanese : a cartographic minimalist approach / by Tomoko Ishizuka.
p. cm. (Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, issn 0166-0829 ; v. 192)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Japanese language--Voice. 2. Japanese language--Passive voice. 3. Japanese language--
Grammar. 4. Japanese language--Syntax. I. Title.
PL589.I84 2012
495.6’56--dc23 2012022408
isbn 978 90 272 5575 4 (Hb ; alk. paper)
isbn 978 90 272 7348 2 (Eb)
© 2012 – John Benjamins B.V.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any
other means, without written permission from the publisher.
John Benjamins Publishing Co. · P.O. Box 36224 · 1020 me Amsterdam · The Netherlands
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JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:05 F: LA192CO.tex / p.1 (53-117)
Table of contents
List of tables ix
Abbreviations xi
Abstract xiii
Acknowledgments xv
chapter 1
Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 1
1.1 The general research program 1
1.2 Modularity of grammar 2
1.3 The passive voice system in Japanese 3
1.3.1 The traditional dichotomy 3
1.4 Coalescing the two types of passives 5
1.4.1 The polysemy of -rare 5
1.4.2 Distributional differences between -rare and -sase 6
1.4.3 Indirect passives are pseudo- and genitive passives 7
1.5 Research questions 10
1.6 Framework and theoretical tools 11
1.6.1 The principles and parameters treatment
of English passives 12
1.6.2 Collins’ (2005) smuggling analysis 14
1.7 The proposed analysis 16
1.7.1 Lexical properties of -rare 16
1.7.2 General properties interacting with -rare 18
1.7.3 What -rare does not do 18
1.8 The data: Grammaticality judgment surveys 21
1.9 Outline of the book 22
chapter 2
The passive morpheme -rare 25
2.1 The distribution of -rare 25
2.2 The passive -rare is always a functional element 28
2.3 -rare as a voice head 29
vi A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives
2.3.1 Establishing a pattern with long passivization 29

2.3.2 -rare instantiates voice 36
2.4 Lexical properties of -rare 38
2.4.1 Complementation properties of -rare 39
2.4.2 The EPP feature of -rare 41
2.4.3 Introducing a dative projection 46
2.5 Subject honorifics 46
2.6 Summary of the chapter 49
chapter 3
The derived subject in the passive 51
3.1 General properties of Japanese 51
3.1.1 The absence of an expletive 51
3.1.2 Movement and case 54
3.2 The accusative passive 59
3.3 Dative and source passives derived from ditransitive verbs 61
3.3.1 Addressee of ‘verbs of speaking’ 63
3.3.2 Theme-raising of the passivized ditransitive verb 64
3.3.3 The source passive 75
3.4 Passivization of causatives 77
3.5 Pseudo-passives: Passives with intransitives 79
3.5.1 English pseudo-passives 79
3.5.2 Japanese passives derived from obliques 81
3.5.3 Postpositional objects incompatible
with pseudo-passives 93
3.6 The genitive passive 94
3.6.1 Genitive passives disguised: Passives requiring context 102
3.7 Extra-thematic nominative DPs 116
chapter 4
Ni-passives, ni-yotte-passives, and short passives 119
4.1 The ni-phrase 123
4.2 The kara-phrase 126
4.3 Short passives and ni-yotte passives 127
4.3.1 Short passives 127
4.3.2 Ni-yotte passives 128
chapter 5
Revisiting the literature 135
5.1 The traditional classification 135
Table of contents vii
5.2 Traditional analyses 138

5.2.1 The standard analysis of indirect passives 139
5.2.2 Standard analyses of direct passives 140
5.2.3 Standard analyses of possessive passives 143
5.3 Are indirect passives special? 145
5.3.1 Numeral Quantifier Floating 146
5.3.2 The distribution of ni-phrases 157
chapter 6
Further support for movement 165
6.1 The gap is a trace 165
6.1.1 Is the gap a pro? 166
6.2 Reconstruction effects 167
6.2.1 Scope interactions 168
6.2.2 Idiom reconstruction 173
6.2.3 The distributive morpheme zutu 174
6.3 A- vs. Ā-movement 182
6.3.1 Reanalyzing long-distance passivization 183
6.4 Does -rare select for an argument? 187
6.4.1 Compatibility with subject-oriented adverbs 188
6.4.2 Incompatibility with inanimate/abstract DPs 190
6.4.3 Adversative connotations 192
chapter 7
The extra-thematic passive 205
7.1 Methodology of the surveys 207
7.1.1 Questionnaire A 208
7.1.2 Questionnaires B and C 209
7.1.3 Results 210
7.2 Adversative context and extra-thematic passives 211
7.2.1 What is the right kind of context? 215
7.2.2 Data from linguistically-trained native speakers 215
7.2.3 Data from the surveys 218
7.3 The proposed analysis of Grammar-L 222
7.3.1 Does Grammar-L contain Grammar-Q? 225
7.4 Issues centering on individual variability 228
viii A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives
chapter 8
Conclusions 231
8.1 A new analysis of Japanese passives 231
8.2 Properties that the proposed analysis accounts for 231
8.3 Implications 232
Bibliography 235
Name index 245
Subject index 247
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List of tables
2.1 Long vs. embedded passives 30

2.2 Japanese functional categories: Based on Cinque (1999, 2004) 37
2.3 Control vs. raising verbs 37
2.4 Transitive verbs comprising of a root and v[+active] 41
2.5 Middle voice verbs containing v[–active] 41
2.6 Transitive-intransitive alternation of hag-u ‘to peel’ 45
3.1 Grammatical judgment results for (123) 113
3.2 The active source of the derived subject in the passive 115
4.1 The distribution of external arguments 120
4.2 The distribution of by-phrases 131
5.1 Traditional classification vs. the core passive 138
6.1 Reconstruction effects of nominative DPs 173
7.1 Grammaticality judgment results for (13) 213
7.7 Context that makes (20) acceptable 219
JB[v.20020404] Prn:23/05/2012; 13:20 F: LA192ABR.tex / p.1 (47-144)
Abbreviations
acc accusative
asp aspect marker
caus causative morpheme
c complementizer
cl classifier
com comitative
cop copula
dat dative marker
dep depictive marker
gen genitive marker
ger gerundive
ins instrumental
loc locative marker
nmlz nominalizer
nom nominative marker
pass passive morpheme
pl plural
prs non-past tense
pst past tense
q question particle
sp sentence particle
top topic marker
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abstract
A modular analysis of the passive in Japanese

A cartographic minimalist approach
Tomoko Ishizuka
This book provides a thorough syntactic analysis of the passive voice system
in Japanese within the current understanding of Generative Grammar – Carto-
graphic Minimalism. Contrary to the standard assumption that Japanese pas-
sives consist of two types – direct and indirect, this book motivates a unified
A-movement analysis that assumes the existence of a single passive morpheme
-(r)are with invariant lexical features. Specifically, it shows that the derived sub-
ject always originates in the complement domain of -(r)are and corresponds to an
accusative, dative, genitive, or oblique source in the active counterpart.
Drawing on the data collected through experimentally controlled methods,
this book also addresses the issues of interspeaker variability, requirement of sup-
portive context, and their implications for differences in individual grammars.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:01 F: LA192ACK.tex / p.1 (47-88)
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Hilda Koopman, Dominique Sportiche, Anoop Mahajan,

Andrew Simpson, Carson Schütze for extensive suggestions and feedback.
I also would like to thank the participants of the questionnaire surveys, and
Kentaro Nakatani, Reiko Okabe, Shinichiro Masuo, Phillip Brown and Minoji
Akimoto for the help with the data collection. This research has been supported in
part by the Lenart Travel Fellowship.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.1 (66-138)
chapter 1
Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives
1.1 The general research program
The passive voice is one of the most well-attested voice alternations in the world’s
languages, and its intricate properties have fascinated many linguists and have
advanced and challenged syntactic theories (cf. Shibatani 1985, 1988, 1998).
This book revisits and provides a thorough examination of the passive voice in
Japanese, one of the most well-studied voice systems, within the current frame-
work of what I call ‘Cartographic Minimalism,’ a combination of the current
framework of Generative Grammar and decompositional approaches to syntax (cf.
Chomsky 1993; Chomsky 1995; Chomsky 2000; Rizzi 2004; Belletti 2004a; Cinque
1999; Cinque 2004; inter alia).1
Specifically, this book motivates a novel unified raising analysis of all Japanese
passives, rejecting the widely-accepted views that the passive morpheme -(r)are
optionally introduces an external argument and that Japanese has two types of
passive constructions: direct and indirect passives.
This book will take it as a point of departure that a uniform analysis for all
Japanese passive constructions is a theoretically desirable hypothesis and pursue
this hypothesis as far as possible. Indeed, the fact that the same -rare is used in the
different passive constructions otherwise appears to be an unexplained accident.
This will lead to a reevaluation of the numerous properties that are alleged to sep-
arate the different passive constructions as well as to a novel analysis of Japanese
passives based on Collins (2005), which should capture all the complex properties
that Japanese passives exhibit. In the course of the discussions, it will be shown
that this project is not only feasible but also independently supported. I summa-
rize below how we will deal with the major properties that have been argued to
distinguish the two types of passives. Ample details, background, and discussion
1. Some researchers might find Minimalism and the cartographic approach incompatible be-
cause of the simplicity that Minimalism pursues and the decomposition that the cartographic
approach assumes. However, the current research, together with Cinque and Rizzi (2008),
does not consider they are. Very rich C and T systems, which are empirically supported, can
be brought about by recursively utilizing simple derivational operations (external and inter-
nal Merge).
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2 A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives
will be provided in the remainder of this introductory chapter as well as in the

subsequent chapters.
First of all, the standard method of distinguishing Japanese passives is by
whether they contain a gap (i.e. direct passives) or not (i.e. indirect or gapless
passives). We will establish that the indirect or gapless passives do in fact have a
gap, which corresponds to an oblique argument (dative, kara-marked source, or
no-marked genitive DPs). The presence of a gap is difficult to diagnose on the sur-
face because relativization and passivization in Japanese force the postposition or
case marker to disappear, leaving no overt clues to the derivation. A great deal of
this book is dedicated to motivating the existence of the gap in all passives, using
standard diagnostics for movement such as locality.
A second standard argument supporting the maintenance of a distinc-
tion between the two types of passives comes from the property that -rare
in indirect passives introduces a supplementary thematic role (i.e. affectee).
I will show that there is in fact no evidence that this role is introduced by
-rare. Affectedness is in fact a derived property, which arises from particular struc-
tures.
A third argument concerns the distributional differences between the two ni-
phrases – the Japanese by-phrases – contained in direct and indirect passives. It
turns out that the well-known generalizations usually cited in reference to this
are based on an incomplete version of the empirical paradigm. Once more data is
examined, we find that the generalization no longer holds. The purported defin-
ing properties are not coextensive with one of the two passive types. Therefore,
I conclude that the direct-indirect dichotomy is not only unnecessary but also
empirically inadequate.
1.2 Modularity of grammar
One of the major discoveries of modern syntax is modularity of grammar. Prop-

erties of particular constructions arise in a modular fashion, from the lexical
properties of the building blocks appearing in the constructions that interact with
independently motivated properties of the language and general principles of Uni-
versal Grammar. In particular, a modular approach has been adopted in order to
analyze English passives since Chomsky (1981) (see also Baker 1988; Jaeggli 1986;
Baker et al. 1989; Collins 2005). This is also the approach adopted here; it allows us
to pinpoint the properties shared across languages, which create a universal char-
acterization of the passive voice system, as well as to provide insight into complex
systems within a given language, here Japanese.
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Chapter 1. Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 3
1.3 The passive voice system in Japanese
Over the past 50 years of modern linguistics, the syntactic properties of Japanese
have been widely studied, resulting in a substantial body of literature. Passives
are a central topic in Japanese syntax, together with causatives, scrambling, rel-
ative constructions, multiple nominative constructions, and nominative/genitive
(ga/no) conversion (Kuno 1973; Kuroda 1979; Hoshi 1994; Murasugi 2000; Saito
& Hoji 1983a; Watanabe 1993; Miyagawa 1989; Shibatani 1990; Ura 1996; among
many others). Japanese syntax exhibits various interesting phenomena, which are
superficially quite different from those of well-studied western languages. Strik-
ing differences between Japanese and western languages have often resulted in a
bifurcated view of languages (Western vs. Asian languages). The passive voice in
Japanese is one such phenomenon, raising questions about the universal character-
ization of the passive voice and the precise locus of syntactic variation (cf. Huang
1999).
1.3.1 The traditional dichotomy
Japanese passive sentences contain a synthetic passive morpheme -(r)are, which

attaches to transitive, ditransitive, and some intransitive predicates. The exter-
nal argument of the predicate is introduced, sometimes optionally, by the dative
ni-phrase. The Japanese passive voice system is extremely rich, and there is no
consensus in terms of the precise number of passive types, let alone their syntactic
structures (see Hoshi 1999 for reviews of controversy). However, all the existing
literature commonly assumes that at least two distinct types of passives (or -(r)are
morphemes) must be postulated to explain the different properties associated with
Japanese passives: (1) the ‘direct passive,’ whose subject is related to an object gap
in the predicate and (2) the ‘indirect passive’ (also known as the adversative or
gapless passive), whose subject is apparently not related to an object position in
the predicate. Examples of the direct passive (coupled with its active counterpart)
and the indirect passive are provided below:2
(1) Direct Passives
a. Keisatu-ga Ken-o tsukamae-ta.
police-nom Ken-acc catch-pst
‘The police caught Ken.’ Active
2. Most of the English translations of Japanese indirect passives tend to be awkward and even
ungrammatical. I will often gloss them literally, but no theoretical status should be attached:
they are used because they seem to me to be the best approximations.
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b. Keni -ga (keisatsu-ni) ti tsukamae-rare-ta.

Ken-nom police-dat catch-pass-pst
‘Ken was caught by {the police/someone}.’ Passive
(2) Indirect Passive
a. Naomi-wa hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta.
Naomi-top mother-dat die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was died by (her) mother.’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni nige-rare-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat escape-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi.’
c. Tokyo-ga ooame-ni hu-rare-ta.
Tokyo-nom heavy.rain-dat descend-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Tokyo was descended upon by the heavy rain.’
d. Ken-wa Naomi-ni nak-are-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-dat cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was cried over by Naomi.’
The traditional dichotomy capitalizes on apparent differences in the availability

of an active source, as well as the presence of adversative connotations associated
with the nominative DP (or the topic DP as in (2a) and (2d)) in the passive (in an
adversative connotation, the nominative DP is adversely affected by the event de-
noted in the rest of the sentence).3 In the standard analysis, their different clusters
of properties are attributed to the lexical properties of two homophonous passive
-(r)are morphemes: the -rare in the direct passive, as in (1b), is alleged to reduce
valency as in English-type passives, while the -rare in the indirect passive, as in
(2), is assumed to lexically encode adversative effect and increase valency by in-
troducing an experiencer or affectee argument, thus functioning more like a
causative/applicative morpheme (Kuno 1973; among many others).
Contrary to the standard view, I will show that it is not only unnecessary but
actually inadequate to posit two types of passives in Japanese: all the passives, in-
cluding those in (2), are direct passives in the sense that they all contain a gap in
the complement domain of -rare that corresponds to its subject. I will then de-
velop a unified raising analysis of Japanese passives, assuming a single lexical entry
of -rare with invariant lexical features.
3. I use the term ‘the nominative DP’ as a cover term for the surface subject of passive sen-
tences, encompassing both nominative and topic DPs in cases like (2a) and (2d) (in order to
distinguish it from the external argument of the predicate embedded under -rare).
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1.4 Coalescing the two types of passives
Despite the common assumption, it is highly questionable whether -rare ever in-
troduces an external argument for the following reasons: (1) -rare behaves like
a prototypical synthetic passive morpheme in terms of its polysemic nature, and
no other uses of -rare, which are reported to be historically related, introduce an
argument (see Shibatani 1985); (2) Japanese has a true argument introducer –
a causative morpheme -sase, and its distribution is quite different from that of
-rare (see Section 6.1 for more information about -sase). If the function of -rare
were to introduce an external argument like -sase, the distributional differences
between the two morphemes, especially with regard to the complementation prop-
erty, could not be explained; and lastly (3) the two purported defining properties
of indirect passives – the lack of an active source and the presence of adversative
connotations – do not necessarily coincide with traditionally recognized indirect
passives, resulting that indirect passives would not constitute a natural class.
1.4.1 The polysemy of -rare
In quite a few languages, the synthetic passive morpheme is known to give rise to
a number of different readings, such as reflexive, reciprocal, middle, and abilitive
(see Shibatani 1985; Kazenin 2001: 902). This is also the case with -(r)are: -rare has
a number of usages, to wit (1) passive, (2) abilitive (or potential), (3) middle (or
spontaneous), and (4) subject honorific.4 The different uses of -rare are known
to arise from a common source (see Shibatani 1985; Oshima 2006). The cross-
linguistic polysemy and historical evidence strongly motivate a unified treatment
of such morphemes (see Section 2.1 for examples and more information). Sig-
nificantly, the only use of -rare that introduces an additional argument into the
structure is in the indirect passive. This makes the argument-introducing analysis
of the (indirect) passive -rare highly suspicious, given that we ultimately want to
achieve a unified analysis of all the different uses of -rare, not only its passive uses.
4. Interestingly, -rar, a subpart of the morpheme -rare, often gives rise to a reflexive reading,
as exemplified below:
a. John-ga moohu-ni kurum.ar-ta.

John-nom blanket-dat warp.(r)ar-pst
‘John wrapped himself in a blanket.’
b. John-ga moohu-ni kodomo-o kurun-da.
John-nom blanket-dat child-acc wrap-pst
‘John wrapped a child in a blanket.’
The reflexive use of -rar strongly suggests a decompositional approach to the passive morpheme
-rare (further research needed).
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1.4.2 Distributional differences between -rare and -sase
Let us now turn to the second reason why we want to unify the two types of pas-
sives. Japanese has a synthetic causative morpheme -(s)ase, which introduces a
causer argument into the structure (see (3b)). Interestingly, -(r)are is much more
selective than the causative -(s)ase in terms of the predicate to which it attaches;
that is, -(r)are cannot combine with certain unergative verbs, such as oyog ‘to
swim,’ hatarak ‘to work,’ and odor ‘to dance,’ whereas the causative morpheme
-(s)ase can.5
(3) a. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni oyog-are-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-dat swim-pass-pst
Int. ‘Ken was affected by Naomi’s swimming.’
b. Ken-wa Naomi-o oyog-ase-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-acc swim-caus-pst
‘Ken {made/let} Naomi swim.’
(4) a. *Ken-wa tuma-ni suupaa-de hatarak-are-ta.
Ken-top wife-dat supermarket-loc work-pass-pst
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that his wife worked at a supermarket.’
b. Ken-wa tsuma-o suupaa-de hatarak-ase-ta.
Ken-top wife-acc supermarket-loc work-caus-pst
‘Ken {made/let} his wife work at a supermarket.’
(5) a. *Ken-wa musume-ni odor-are-ta.
Ken-top daughter-dat dance-pass-pst
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that his daughter danced.’
b. Ken-wa musume-o odor-ase-ta.
Ken-top daughter-acc dance-caus-pst
‘Ken {made/let} his daughter dance.’
The ungrammaticality of (3a), (4a), and (5a) is unexpected and difficult to ex-
plain if -(r)are were to introduce an external argument as -(s)ase does. We cannot
attribute the ungrammaticality of (3a), (4a), and (5a) to a selectional property of
-(r)are since it is not the case that -(r)are is entirely incompatible with unergative
verbs (see (2d)).
The literature notes that some indirect passives (e.g. (3a), (4a), and (5a)) re-
quire rich context that explicates how the surface subject of the passive is adversely
affected by the event denoted in the rest of the sentence (Kubo 1992; inter alia).
5. I conducted a 5-point scale grammaticality judgment survey (1-impossible, 5-acceptable)

with 54 native speakers, and the mean rating of (3a) was 1.39, that of (4a) was 1.67, and that
of (5a) was 1.56. In contrast, the mean rating of (2a) was 4.33, (2b) was 4.93 and (2d) was
4.52. All of these sentences were presented without supportive context (see Section 1.8 for more
information about the survey).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.7 (405-448)
However, these indirect passives exhibit a considerable amount of interspeaker

variability with respect to acceptability (see Shibatani 1994), and passives like (3a),
(4a), and (5a) are all unacceptable to me even when contextualized. (The role of
supportive context and its implications for syntax will be systematically investi-
gated in Section 3.7 and Chapter 7.) Even if they were acceptable with rich context,
the contrast would still need to be accounted for: the passives in (2) (as well as the
causative sentences containing unergative verbs) are always well-formed without
context, while the passives in (3a), (4a), and (5a) are unacceptable without con-
text. What distinguishes the intransitive predicates contained in (2) from the ones
like oyog ‘to swim,’ hatarak ‘to work,’ and odor ‘to dance’? This question will be
answered in the next section.
1.4.3 Indirect passives are pseudo- and genitive passives
Contrary to this view, one of the more radical claims I make here is that not only
direct passives but also indirect passives have an active source (i.e. the nomina-
tive DP is licensed in the complement domain of -rare). Specifically, I argue that
all indirect passives are in fact instances of either English-like pseudo-passives or
genitive passives. The pseudo-passive involves raising of the object in the pre-(or
post-)positional phrase. Examples of Japanese and English pseudo-passives are
given below:
(6) a. John-ga Mary-{ni/*o} hohoen-da.
John-nom Mary-{dat/*acc} smile-pst
‘John smiled at Mary.’ Active
b. Mary-ga John-ni hohoem-are-ta.
Mary-nom John-dat smile-pass-pst
‘Mary was smiled at by John.’ Passive
The above examples illustrate an important difference between English and

Japanese pseudo-passives; unlike in English, the moved element in Japanese nei-
ther retains nor strands Case-markers. This is also true for the genitive passive,
whose derived subject is merged as a genitive DP of the (underlying) internal ar-
gument. Note that the genitive passive is traditionally known as ‘the possessive
passive’ (Kubo 1992; among others).
(7) a. Naomi-ga Ken-no kao-o tatai-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-no face-acc hit-pst
‘Naomi hit Ken’s face.’ Active
b. Keni -(*no-)ga Naomi-ni kaoi/*j -o tatak-are-ta.
Ken-(*no-)nom Naomi-dat face-acc hit-pass-pst
Int. ‘Keni was hit in (his)i/*j face by Naomi.’ Gen-Acc Psv
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.8 (448-508)
The absence of original Case under movement is in fact a general property of

Japanese; it is also operative in relative constructions (see Section 3.1.2.1). This
property obscures the source of the nominative DP in the passive and has often
misled linguists to conclude that the indirect passive is gapless.
With this understanding of the distribution of Case, I revisit in Chapter 3 the
representative examples of indirect passives and propose that in Japanese passives,
various DPs contained in the lower VP layer – not only an underlying accusative
DP, but also a kara-marked source (or ablative), dative, and genitive DP of the
internal argument – can move to the nominative position. Once we adopt this
claim, the contrast in grammaticality between the indirect passives in (2) and the
ones in (3a), (4a), and (5a) can be straightforwardly accounted for. Specifically,
all the intransitive verbs contained in (2) are compatible with one of the potential
sources of the derived subject, providing the passives in (2) – unlike the ones in
(3a), (4a), and (5a) – with an active counterpart. The proposed active counterparts
for the passives in (2) are presented below (see Section 3.5 for more information
about pseudo-passives):
(8) a. Naomi-no hahaoya-ga sin-da.
Naomi-no mother-nom die-pst
‘Naomi’s mother died.’ Genitive
b. Naomi-ga Ken-kara nige-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-from escape-pst
‘Naomi escaped from Ken.’ Source
c. Oo.ame-ga Tokyo-ni hut-ta.
heavy.rain-nom Tokyo-dat descend-pst
Lit. ‘Heavy rain descended upon Tokyo.’ on-Directional Dat
d. Naomi-ga {sono sirase-ni/ # Ken-ni} nai-ta.
Naomi-nom {that news-dat/ Ken-dat} cry-pst
‘Naomi cried over {the news/# Ken}.’ Dative Cause
Crucially, the interpretation of the nominative DP of the passives given in (2) cor-
responds to the bold-faced argument of the proposed active sources given in (8).
For example, (2a) is infelicitous unless the dative DP ‘mother’ is Naomi’s mother,
and so is (2b) unless the nominative DP ‘Ken’ is the source of Naomi’s escaping.
There is some complication with the Dative Cause argument of the verb nak-u
‘to cry,’ which obscures the active source. That is, the Cause argument must be
inanimate in the active sentence, while it must be animate once it appears in the
nominative position in the passive (see Section 3.5 for more information on this
issue). Despite the animacy difference between the active and the passive counter-
parts, I propose that the nominative DP in (2d) is indeed a Dative Cause argument
selected by the verb nak ‘to cry.’ The following pair supports my proposal:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.9 (508-565)
(9) a. Naomi-ga {sono hanasi/ # Ken}-ni nai-ta.

Naomi-nom that story/ Ken-dat cry-pst
‘Naomi cried over {that story/# Ken}.’
b. {Sono hanasi/ # Ken}-ga (Naomi-ni-wa) nak-e-ta.

that story/ Ken-nom Naomi-dat-top cry-(r)e-pst
Lit. ‘{That story/# Ken} is cry-able (to Naomi).’
(Int. ‘That story is able to make Naomi cry.’)
The verb nak-e-ru ‘cry-able’ in (9b) consists of the stem nak ‘to cry’ and a lexical in-
transitivizer (in recent work, understood as a first phase or low passive) -(r)e. The
nominative DP in the low passive derived from nak ‘to cry’ is restricted to an inan-
imate DP, as illustrated in (9b). However, the derivation must involve movement,
since the lexical morpheme -(r)e does not select for an argument. This supports
the idea that the Dative Cause argument is indeed an argument selected by nak ‘to
cry,’ which is able to undergo movement to the nominative position.
In contrast, unergative verbs like oyog ‘to swim,’ hatarak ‘to work,’ and odor
‘to dance’ do not take a lower VP layer and are incompatible with dative, ac-
cusative, and kara-marked source DPs, as illustrated below (see Section 3.5 for
further discussion):
(10) Naomi-ga (*Ken-{ni/kara/o}) oyoi-da.
Naomi-nom Ken-{dat/from/acc} swim-pst
‘Naomi swam (*{at/from/along} Ken).’
Consequently, the passives in (3a), (4a), and (5a) are ungrammatical because their
nominative DPs remain unlicensed. If the proposal made here is correct, avail-
ability of an active source is no longer coextensive with traditionally recognized
indirect passives.
Likewise, the other purported defining property of indirect passives – adver-
sative connotations – is not coextensive with indirect passives either. This is not a
new finding: Alfonso (1971) and Kitagawa & Kuroda (1992) use a number of ex-
amples to demonstrate very convincingly that the adversative connotations carried
by many indirect passives are cancelable and not inherent to the indirect passive
-rare. In addition, Howard & Niyekawa-Howard (1976) provide many examples
of direct passives that carry strong adversative connotations (see Section 6.4.3 for
more information on this issue).
I take the above reasons to be sufficient to reject the argument-introducer
-rare and conclude that the commonly adopted dichotomy – direct vs. indirect
passives – is descriptively inadequate.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.10 (565-627)
1.5 Research questions
Subsuming indirect passives under direct passives allows us to see Japanese passives
as a unitary phenomenon involving only one -rare. We now aim to understand the
Japanese passive voice system by identifying the lexical properties of -rare and by
examining the distribution and interpretation of the other pieces comprising the
construction. Let us first distinguish several important research questions regard-
ing (1) the passive morpheme -(r)are, (2) the derived subject, and (3) the external
argument of the predicate embedded under -rare (i.e. the dative by phrase).
(11) The Passive Morpheme -(r)are
– What is its syntactic category? (Section 2.2)
– Where is it merged in the structure? What complements does it select?
(Section 2.3 )
– Does it select a specifier? (Sections 2.4.2 and 2.4 )
– How does it relate to other uses of -(r)are? (Section 2.5)
(12) The Nominative DP
– Where does it originate (i.e. what is the external merge position)?
(Chapter 3)
– Does it have to be an argument of the predicate with which -(r)are merges?
(Sections 3.5 and 3.6)
– If the source DP of the derived subject has Case in the active, but not in the
passive, what happens to the original Case? (Section 3.1.2)
– How does the derivation proceed? (Chapter 6)
– When does it have adversative connotations and when not? Where do they
come from? (Section 6.4.3.1)
(13) The External Argument of the Predicate that -rare Merges with
– Is it present in the syntactic representation at all? (Section 4.3)
– How is it realized? What are its forms? (Chapter 4)
– Are there different distributional properties depending on the form? If so,
how should these be analyzed? (Chapter 4)
– When can it be silent? When is it obligatorily pronounced and why?
(Section 5.3.2.1)
These research questions guide the investigation of the passive in the subsequent
chapters. The questions given in (11) are answered in Chapter 2, (12) in Chapters
3 and 6, and (13) in Chapters 4 and 5.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.11 (627-670)
1.6 Framework and theoretical tools
The analysis of the Japanese passive voice system proposed in this book is couched
in terms of Cartographic Minimalism (Chomsky 1995; Chomsky 2000; Rizzi 2004;
Belletti 2004a; Cinque 1999; Cinque 2004; and many others). Although Cartogra-
phy and Minimalism might seem inherently incompatible at first sight, I do not
consider they are (see also Cinque and Rizzi 2008). As Cinque and Rizzi (2008)
note, we can take the two approaches to have a different focus. Minimalism focuses
on the elementary mechanisms which are involved in syntactic computations,
while the cartographic approach focuses on describing the details of the syntactic
structure, which turns out to be rich and complex. Indeed, very rich C and T sys-
tems can be brought about by recursively utilizing simple derivational operations
(external and internal Merge).
Given that the current research investigates Japanese passive voice system and
that Japanese is an agglutinative language that allows stacking of multiple ver-
bal morphemes, decompositional approaches, or more generally, cartographic
approaches in which the basic building blocks are tiny (see Cinque 1999, 2004;
Koopman & Szabolcsi 2000; Rizzi 2004; and a host of others) are clearly the most
suitable in understanding the nature of the passive morpheme -rare.
The underlying assumption of the Cartographic approach is that all languages
share the same rigidly-ordered functional categories (or universal hierarchy of
merger), as well as the same principles of phrase and clause composition (Cinque
2004: 4). I also assume some version of the decompositional approach to VP
structure (Hale & Keyser 1993; Hale & Keyser 2002; Marantz 1997; Harley 1995a;
Travis 2005; Pylkkänen 2002; among others). The particular distinctions I adopt
here are vagent that introduces an agent; vcause that introduces a cause (lower
than agent); and an active voice v that combines with a VP layer (process/result).
The v[+active] I assume is not necessarily agentive but more like an Austronesian
active voice that is compatible with pure unaccusatives. Crucially, v is not used as
a category label here.
This book makes a number of choices concerning syntactic representations.
Regarding whether Japanese is underlyingly head-initial or head-final, the syn-
tactic trees drawn in this book are head-final; however, the analysis proposed
here operates independently of the directionality of headedness. Also, the syntac-
tic derivations are often represented in a somewhat simplified manner so as to
illustrate the particular points I would like to highlight as directly as possible. Fur-
thermore, current syntactic theories dispose of certain properties by implementing
them in many different technical ways, with the result that the derivational op-
tions we face are often underdetermined. When confronted with this, I will use
the most general independently available syntactic mechanisms (i.e. overt move-
ment), instead of exploring other options (e.g. specific linearization algorithms,
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.12 (670-722)
PF movement, LF movement, complex definitions about interventions, multiple

agree, and so forth).
In this book I will show that -rare is a raising predicate and never introduces
an argument (see Section 2.2). Once we assume that -rare does not assign a θ-
role and that all unequivocally well-formed passives have a gap in the complement
domain of -rare, whose interpretation corresponds to the nominative DP in the
passive, Japanese passives look very much like English passives. The classic puzzles
with English passives are (1) what happens to the external argument and (2) if the
external argument is present, how the internal argument gets around the external
argument to reach Spec,TP without violating Relativized Minimality (Rizzi 1990)
or the Minimal Link Condition (Chomsky 1981, 1995: 311); these puzzles are also
critical problems with Japanese passives. The analysis of the Japanese passive voice
system I develop in this and subsequent chapters follows the smuggling analysis of
English passivization proposed by Collins (2005), which involves the mechanism
that moves the VP that contains an internal argument around the external argu-
ment, with the result that the internal argument is brought closer to Spec,TP than
the external argument. I show that the smuggling approach in fact accounts for
otherwise puzzling complementation properties of the passive morpheme -rare.
The principles and parameters treatment of English passives (cf. Chomsky
1981) has always been a starting point in understanding the passive voice systems
of other languages. This is also the case with Japanese. Therefore, in this section
we will briefly review the traditional treatment of English passives and then discuss
the benefit of adopting Collins’ (2005) smuggling approach.
1.6.1 The principles and parameters treatment of English passives
The transformational rule-based approach to English passives (see Chomsky 1965)

has been replaced with a modular-type approach by Chomsky (1981), which has
subsequently been adopted as the standard way to analyze English passive sen-
tences like that in (14b).
(14) a. He wrote the book.
b. The book was written (by him).
Chomsky (1981: 124–125) assumes that the unique property of the passive mor-
phology is that it in effect ‘absorbs accusative Case.’ This property of the passive
morphology interacts with the following universal property of languages: if a V
assigns no Case to its object, then it assigns no θ-role to its subject (also the
case with unaccusative verbs). This apporach is also known as Burzio’s (1986: 178)
Generalization:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.13 (722-785)
(15) Burzio’s Generalization

All and only the verbs that can assign a θ-role to the subject can assign
(accusative) Case to an object [subject = external argument]
The internal argument moves to Spec,TP by virtue of the Case filter. Thus, the
passive morphology itself does not directly trigger the movement. Yet this proposal
leaves a number of questions open. For example, why do the two properties, the
absence of a θ-role and the absence of accusative Case, always go together?
In the late 1980s it was proposed that the English passive suffix -en it-
self is the argument that is assigned both Case and the external θ-role (see
Jaeggli 1986; Roberts 1987; Baker 1988; Baker et al. 1989; and many others).
The principal problem with this approach is the status of the external argu-
ment. Jaeggli (1986) points out that the DP in a passive by-phrase bears the
external θ-role of the passivized verb. As shown in the examples below, it is not
the case that the by-phrase is always interpreted as agent; rather, it is inter-
preted as agent only when the external θ-role assigned by the passivized verb
is agent (examples are adopted from Jaeggli 1986: 599; see also Lasnik 1988;
Collins 2005: 83).
(16) a. Bill was killed by Mary. (agent)
b. The package was sent by John. (source)
c. The letter was received by Bill. (goal)
d. That professor is feared by all students. (experiencer)
These examples suggest that the object of the by-phrase is in fact the external
argument selected by the little v.
To account for the pattern illustrated in examples like (16), Jaeggli (1986)
has proposed a well-known mechanism called ‘θ-role transmission,’ wherein the
external θ-role is absorbed by the passive participle -en first and then trans-
mitted to the by-phrase (see also Fox & Grodzinsky 1998; among others). A
shortcoming of this idea is that it is a construction-specific mechanism, which
is difficult to establish independently. If this analysis were correct, the way the
external θ-role is assigned to a by-phrase in the passive would be very com-
plex and entirely different from the way it is done in the active, which violates
UTAH (Baker 1988: 46) and the Principle of Locality of Selection (Sportiche 1998;
inter alia).
Given the data presented in (16), it is plausible that a little v is present in the
structure of the passive, and that the external argument headed by by is selected by
the v, as it is in the active. However, the locality problem still remains: how exactly
can the internal argument move over a c-commanding external argument in the
passive?
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.14 (785-819)
The little v is likewise present in Japanese passives, and is in fact morpholog-

ically transparent (see Chapter 4). Furthermore, similar to the English by-phrase,
the interpretation of the dative by-phrase in Japanese passives always matches
the external θ-role assigned by the predicate embedded under -rare, suggesting
that the DP headed by dative Case is an external argument selected by the lit-
tle v. Consequently, the analysis of Japanese passives faces the same challenge as
that of English passives. Positing a construction-specific complex mechanism like
θ-role transmission cannot be the solution. Instead, I adopt the smuggling analysis
proposed by Collins (2005).
1.6.2 Collins’ (2005) smuggling analysis
Collins’ (2005) analysis assumes that the external argument headed by by in the
English passive is generated the same way as the external argument in the active
sentence is (i.e., Spec,vP) (see also Watanabe 1993: 337; Mahajan 1995: 27; Kural
1996; Goodall 1997 for similar proposals). His proposal is theoretically favorable
since it conforms to UTAH (Baker 1988: 46), the Principle of Argument Realiza-
tion (Larson 1988), and the Principle of Locality of Selection (Sportiche 1998; inter
alia) in terms of θ-role assignment.
Collins’ (2005) analysis involves the following assumptions, structure, and
derivational steps.
(17) Collins’ Assumptions
1. The external argument is selected by the little v and is merged into
Spec,vP.
2. ‘by’ instantiates the head of VoiceP and subcategorizes for vP.
3. The passive suffix ‘-en’ heads a PartP and absorbs neither the external
θ-role nor Case.
4. Part ‘-en’ has uninterpretable features that must be checked by the Voice
head.
5. Voice ‘by’ checks the Accusative Case of the DP in Spec,vP.
6. A-movement takes place through Spec,PartP (evidence is provided from
French agreement patterns; see Collins 2005: 85).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.15 (819-861)
(18) TP
DP
T VP
The book
V VoiceP
be
<PartP> Voice’
DP Part’ Voice vP
by DP v’
VP
V Part
him v <PartP>
V DP
write -en
(19) Derivational Steps

1. PartP, whose head is -en, takes a VP complement.
2. The verb moves to adjoin to Part, yielding a passive participle.
3. v merges with PartP.
4. The external argument is selected for by the little v and is merged into
Spec,vP.
5. ‘by’ is merged as the head of VoiceP and checks the accusative case of the
DP in Spec,vP.
6. PartP moves to the specifier of VoiceP to check features of -en (i.e., PartP
smuggles the internal argument past the external argument).
7. The internal argument DP is promoted to Spec,TP (A-movement)
through Spec,PartP.
Clearly, a direct application of Collins’ analysis of English passives to Japanese

passives is not possible. Unlike English, for instance, Japanese has a pronounced
passive voice head, with the external argument being introduced by -ni. Both Voice
and Dative (i.e. by) cannot be viewed as spellout of the same syntactic head, but
rather reveal a richer cartography. Therefore, the assumptions and derivation given
for English passives will be adjusted for Japanese.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.16 (861-921)
1.7 The proposed analysis
By providing answers to the research questions listed in (11) to (13), I will es-
tablish a unified raising analysis of the voice system in Japanese, assuming simple
and invariant lexical features of the passive morpheme -rare. The approach I take
is a modular one, wherein interactions between the passive morphology -(r)are,
the independently motivated properties of Japanese, and general principles of UG
bring about the different clusters of properties observed in the different kinds of
passive sentences. This section outlines the key ideas of the proposed analysis.
1.7.1 Lexical properties of -rare
In Chapter 2, I first establish that the syntactic category of -rare is Voice head.
This is supported by the fact that -rare can combine with causative and aspec-
tual heads lower than Voice (e.g. naos ‘re-do’), but not with the heads higher than
Voice in Cinque’s (1999, 2004) hierarchy of functional heads (e.g. tagar ‘want’)
(see Section 2.3):6
(20) Hierarchy of Functional Heads – Japanese (cf. Cinque 2004: 76, 93, 176)
PastTense (ta)>Volition (ta-gar)>Continuative (tuzuke)>Perfect
(te-i)>Progressive (te-i)> Prospective (kake)>Inceptive (hazime,
das)>Frustrative/Success (sokone)>Voice (-(r)are)>Causative
(-sase)>Inceptive II (hazime, das)>Continuative II (tuzuke)
>Completive II (oe, age, toge)>Repetitive II (naos)>V
The lexical properties of -rare are then proposed. First, -rare has the following
complementation properties: -rare selects for an active ‘vP,’ and thus can never
take a middle VP, a pure unaccusative VP, or a passivized VP as its complement
(e.g. war.e-ru ‘to breakintr,’ oti-ru ‘fall’).
(21) *Taroo-ga musuko-ni kaidan-kara oti-rare-ta.
Taro-nom son-dat stairs-from fall-pass-pst
Int. ‘Taroi was affected by hisi son’s falling from the stairs.’
Second, -(r)are has the EPP (edge) feature that attracts the VP layer, strand-
ing the vP layer (i.e. smuggling; Collins 2005). This is a true EPP property in the
sense of Chomsky (1981); it is satisfied by an overt specifier. Since no expletive
VPs exist, the distribution of -(r)are is restricted to those verbs that have a VP
containing pronounced material to satisfy the EPP property of -(r)are. Satisfying
the EPP feature results in smuggling the internal argument contained in the VP
6. XP>YP indicates that YP is the complement of the head of XP.

JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.17 (921-980)
across the external one, bringing it closer to the ga-Case (Nom.) position, and
thus overcoming a Minimality violation:
(22) [ [VP DP V ] [[vP PRO VP v ] rare ] ]
The support for this proposal comes from the fact that -rare cannot combine with
pure unergative verbs that lack a lower VP layer (e.g. (3a); see Section 1.4.2). As-
suming that there is a general ban on movement from complement to its specifier
position, as proposed by Abels (2003) and Kayne (2005), the EPP feature of -rare
forces the complement structure of -rare to contain at least two separable VP lay-
ers with the lower layer containing overt lexical materials. Thus, it is predicted that
pure unergative verbs which spell out v cannot be complements of -rare.
Third, -rare (optionally) introduces a dative projection, which usually com-
bines with the element selected by v. The dative phrase must precede the elements
in the moved VP, which shows that the dative selects for Voice as its complement
rather than the other way around. The structure is represented as follows:
(23) Accusative Passive
a. Keni -ga keisatu-ni ti tukama.e-rare-ta.
‘Ken was caught by the police.’
b. TP
DP
Ken-ga T
VoiceP pst
DP/? ni
police
VP
vP rare
DP V
DP
Ken catch VP v
police
Note that this structure raises a Minimality problem when raising the DP from
the VP to the nominative position. To solve this problem, the dative phrase must
not count as intervener, which is often technically achieved by assigning it some
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.18 (980-1031)
feature that makes it a non-intervener, or by making it inert for probing by -ga. I

will propose a slightly different analysis in Section 3.3.2.4.
1.7.2 General properties interacting with -rare
The lexical properties of -rare proposed above interact with general properties of
Japanese, yielding a variety of passive sentences. First, as is well-known, Japanese
lacks an overt/covert expletive (Miyagawa 1989). Consequently, impersonal pas-
sives are not possible in Japanese (see Section 3.1.1). Second, the Japanese matrix
T has EPP features that require its specifier to be filled with a DP (Shibatani 1977).
These two properties – the lack of expletives and EPP of T – trigger an oblig-
atory DP movement to the nominative Case position. A movement derivation
is supported by the availability of reconstruction effects (the situation regarding
reconstruction effects is quite complex; see Section 6.2 for further discussion):
(24) a. Dareka-ga dono-kyoositu-de-mo sensei-ni
someone-nom every-classroom-loc-mo teacher-dat
nagur-are-ta. (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
hit-pass-pst
‘Someone was hit by a teacher in every classroom.’
b. Huta-ri-no seito-ga dono kyoositu-de-mo sensei-ni
two-cl-no student-nom every classroom-loc-mo teacher-dat
nak-are-ta. (2>∀, ∀>2)
cry-pass-pst
‘Two students were cried over by a teacher in every classroom.’
In both (24a) and (24b), the universal quantifier in the locative phrase can have
wide scope over the existential and numeral quantifiers in the subjects, suggesting
that their subjects are derived by movement. Significantly, as briefly mentioned
in Section 1.4.3, the range of DPs that can occupy the nominative position in
the passive is not restricted to underlying accusative DPs but includes underly-
ing kara-marked source DPs, various types of dative DPs (though not all dative
DPs; see Section 3.5), and genitive DPs of the internal argument. Different clusters
of properties observed across various passive sentences stem from differences in
the underlying source of the nominative DP.
1.7.3 What -rare does not do
Contrary to the standard view that -rare in indirect passives selects a malefactive
(Pylkkänen 2002), an experiencer (Hoshi 1991, 1995, 1999; Huang 1999), or an
affectee argument (Kitagawa and Kuroda 1992; Goro 2006), I argue that -rare
never selects for an argument. In addition, I argue that -rare in direct passives
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.19 (1031-1100)
does not absorb accusative Case. Some major reasons for these claims are outlined
below.
1.7.3.1 -rare does not assign a θ-role

The first claim – that -rare never selects for an argument – is supported by the
following facts. First, unequivocally well-formed passives always contain a gap:
without such a gap, the passive is unacceptable (at least without rich supportive
context) (e.g. (3a); see also Section 3.5).
Second, as mentioned in Section 1.4.3, the interpretation of the nominative
DP always matches the θ-role of the gapped DP (see Section 3.5 for more infor-
mation). This is reflected in the translations of some well-cited indirect passives in
the literature. Consider the examples below:
(25) Taroo-ga ame-ni hur-are-ta.
Taro-nom rain-dat descend-pass-pst
‘Taro was rained on.’
(Kuno 1973: 300; Howard & Niyekawa-Howard 1976; Miyagawa 1989: 38)
(26) Kireina ojosan-ni nak-are-ru to chotto ureshii mono-da.
beautiful girl-dat cry-pass-prs and little happy thing-cop
‘It’s kind of nice when a beautiful girl cries because of you.’
(Alfonso cited in Wierzbicka 1988: 259)
It is often assumed in the literature that -rare means ‘be affected by.’ However, ‘be
affected by’ does not specify how the nominative DP is affected: the passive should
be felicitous as long as the nominative DP is affected. However, the translations
of (25) and (26) say that the subject of the passive is affected (if affected at all) in
a certain way. Taro in (25) was affected in that he got wet because of the rain. If
he had an umbrella and so didn’t get wet from the rain, (25) is infelicitous. The
referent of the silent argument you in (26) was affected because you were the cause
of the girl’s crying. If not from the morpheme -rare, where do these interpreta-
tions come from? Even though the active sources of these passives have never been
acknowledged in the literature, the translations suggest that the nominative DP
was indeed interpreted in such a way as to match its underlying θ-role. I take this
semantic dependency to mean that the nominative DPs in these passives bear the
θ-role assigned by the predicate embedded under -rare.
A third piece of evidence comes from the fact that a particular θ-role associated
with ‘every nominative DP’ of passives containing -rare is not identifiable. The
adversative connotations carried by some passives are just an implicature, which is
cancelable and not inherent to the passive morpheme -rare (see Section 6.4.3.1 for
what is responsible for adversative connotations). Furthermore, the possible type
of the nominative DP varies depending on the predicate to which -rare attaches,
as illustrated below:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.20 (1100-1162)
(27) a. Sono gakko-wa yusyuuna gakusei-ni nige-rare-ta.

that school-top smart student-dat escape-pass-pst
‘That school was escaped from by smart students.’
b. *Sono gakko-wa gakusei-ni nak-are-ta.
that school-top student-dat cry-pass-pst
‘That school was cried over by students.’
The passive (27b) is unacceptable even in a situation where the school was un-
dergoing destruction, and the students who had graduated from the school cried.
Setting aside why the cause of nak ‘to cry’ is incompatible with ‘that school,’ the
contrast between (27a) and (27b) is unexpected if ‘that school’ is an experiencer
or affectee argument selected by -rare. This contrast strongly suggests that the
nominative DP is not selected by -rare, but by the predicate embedded under it.
1.7.3.2 -rare does not absorb accusative case

I further propose that -rare does not absorb accusative Case because the DP that
can satisfy the EPP of T is not restricted to an underlying accusative argument
in Japanese. As mentioned earlier, a wide variety of arguments can move to the
nominative position as long as they are merged in the moved VP. For example, the
derived subject is an underlying dative goal in (28a), a possessor of the internal
argument in (28b), a dative causee in (28c), and a source DP in (28d). In addi-
tion, as the following examples show, -rare is able to cooccur with an accusative
o-marked DP:
(28) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni otto-o syookai.s-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat husband-acc introduce.do-pass-pst
‘Ken was introduced heri husband to by Naomii .’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni kao-o nagu-rare-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat face-acc hit-pass-pst
‘Ken had his face hit by Naomi.’
c. Ken-ga Naomi-ni sigoto-o yame-sase-rare-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat job-acc quit-caus-pass-pst
‘Ken was made to quit his job by Naomi.’
d. Ginkoo-ga nanimonoka-ni kokyaku-no meibo-o nusum-are-ta.
bank-nom somebody-dat customer-no name.list-acc steal-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The bank was stolen the customer list from by somebody.’
I assume that o-marking is optional, but available in principle. On the other hand,
passives like (29a) do not contain an o-marked DP. In (29a) the derivation with
accusative Case does not converge because there is no argument satisfying the EPP
feature of T if Ken is attracted to accusative Case (see (29b)). In contrast, when
the internal argument has a possessor, as in (29c), the possessor DP can satisfy the
EPP feature of T, and the structure converges.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.21 (1162-1217)
(29) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni nagu-rare-ta.

Ken-nom Naomi-dat hit-pass-pst
‘Ken was hit by Naomi.’
b. *Naomi-ni Ken-o nagu-rare-ta.
Naomi-dat Ken-acc hit-pass-pst
Lit. ‘(There) was hit Ken by Naomi.’
c. Ken-ga Naomi-ni Ken-no kao-o nagu-rare-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was hit the face by Naomi.’
Importantly, the Case filter is not a driving force for the A-movement in Japanese
passives.
This section summarizes the lexical properties of -rare. In the subsequent
chapters, I will show that the proposed lexical properties of -rare together with
some general properties of Japanese and Universal Grammar account for vari-
ous distributional properties of the Japanese passive in a unified and principled
manner.
1.8 The data: Grammaticality judgment surveys
The properties and analysis established in this book are based largely on intro-
spective data (cf. a native speaker of Japanese, Tokyo dialect). As I mentioned in
Section 1.1, however, the literature reports that there is a considerable amount of
interspeaker variability in acceptance of certain types of passives, which are al-
leged to require supportive context in order to be well-formed (Shibatani 1994).
Following Shibatani (1994), let us call this type of passive the “extra-thematic
passive” for reasons which will be made clear in Section 3.7. I will call the unequiv-
ocally well-formed passives ‘core passives’ (the ones that do not require contextual
support).
One of the goals of this book is to systematically investigate the issues cen-
tering on context requirement and interspeaker variability. I aim to account for
the differences between the grammar of speakers who consistently reject “extra-
thematic passives” versus that of speakers who consistently accept them. For this
purpose, three experimental questionnaire studies, referred to as A, B, and C, were
conducted with 74, 54, and 54 native Japanese speakers respectively. Participants
of the questionnaires were restricted to naïve non-linguist native speakers in order
to gather objective information.
The judgment data were collected using a five-point scale task (1 = impossible,
5 = completely natural). Stimuli sentences are presented as examples throughout
the book, together with their questionnaire version and the mean rating given by
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.22 (1217-1270)
participants. All stimuli examples were presented to participants without support-

ive context unless specified otherwise. Examples are given below:
(30) a. Otto-ga tuma-ni nige-rare-ta.
husband-nom wife-dat escape-pass-pst
‘The husband was escaped from by his wife.’ [A:mean 4.82]
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat run-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was run by Naomi.’ [A:mean 1.09]
c. Densya-de Naomi-ga roozin-ni seki-o s-are-ta.
train-loc Naomi-nom old.man-dat cough-acc do-pass-pst
‘Naomi was coughed on by an old man in the train.’ [A:mean 3.20]
The mean ratings noted above are meant to be interpreted as follows: (30a), which
was presented in questionnaire version A, received a mean rating very close to
five, and is therefore judged to be acceptable to many speakers without context.
(30b)’s mean rating is close to 1, so it is judged to be unacceptable to many speakers
without context. (30c)’s mean rating falls close to the middle of the scale, which
indicates a high degree of speaker variability unless it is stated in the text that most
of the participants rated the sentence as 3. Whenever relevant, the distribution of
ratings is provided in the text. Crucially, I do not intend to correlate the value of
the mean rating to the degree of well-formedness (see den Dikken et al. 2007: for
more information about problems with this approach).
The methodology used in the surveys can be found in Section 7.1, and the
issue of individual variability will be extensively discussed in Chapter 7, especially
in Section 7.4.
1.9 Outline of the book
Chapter 1 has provided an overview of this book, highlighting major proposals

including the lexical properties of -rare. In Chapters 2 to 6, the analysis and prop-
erties of the ‘core passive’ are established. Finally, Chapter 7 provides a preliminary
analysis of the ‘extra-thematic passive.’
Specifically, Chapter 2 examines the properties and distribution of the passive
morpheme -rare and answers the questions provided in Section 1.5. The lexical
properties of -rare introduced in this chapter are motivated in Chapter 2. In ad-
dition, as a first step towards unifying different uses of -rare, the discussion is
extended to subject honorific uses of -rare. I then demonstrate how the proposed
lexical properties of -rare give rise to what looks like highly language-specific uses
of the passive morpheme (see Section 2.5).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.23 (1270-1320)
Chapter 3 introduces two properties of Japanese that interact with the deriva-
tion of passives: the lack of expletives (Section 3.1) and Case disappearance under
movement (Section 3.1.2). Chapter 3 then uncovers properties of the nominative
DP in the passive. In it, I revisit representative examples of indirect passives dis-
cussed in the literature and propose that they are instances of either English-like
pseudo-passives (i.e. raising from an oblique position) or genitive passives. Given
the analysis presented in this book, the nominative DP must be merged as the
highest argument in the moved VP: I show in this chapter that this is exactly the
case. The animacy restriction observed with some passives is also discussed in this
chapter (Section 3.3.2.2).
Chapter 4 focuses on the external argument of the predicate embedded under
-rare and discusses the distributional and interpretational differences among the
three types of by-phrases – the dative ni-phrase, the ni-yotte phrase, and the kara
(from) phrase. As mentioned at the end of Section 1.6.1, I provide evidence show-
ing that v is present in the syntactic representation of the Japanese passive and
that the external argument headed by the dative is selected by the v (Section 4.1).
I also present data showing that short passives also contain an argument, i.e. PRO
(Section 4.3).
Chapter 5 deals with the existing literature. The goal of this chapter is not to
provide a comprehensive survey of the previous analyses on Japanese passives but
to discuss how the previously detected properties fall out from the proposed anal-
ysis. I first show how the traditional classification of the passive can be translated
in the current partitioning of Japanese passives (here we distinguish the type of
passive depending on the position where the nominative DP is originally merged;
see Section 5.1). I reexamine the arguments in favor of distinguishing direct and
indirect passives. In this context, I propose a new generalization concerning Nu-
meral Quantifier Floating in Japanese in order to account for its distribution in the
passive (Section 5.3.1). In addition, the issue of when short passives and ni-yotte
passives are and are not possible is addressed in this chapter (Section 5.3.2.1).
Chapter 6 argues that the nominative DP selected within the moved VP arrives
in the nominative position via movement. The issues centering on scope and idiom
reconstruction are discussed in Section 6.2. Furthermore, I provide new evidence
in favor of movement with respect to the binominal use of the distributive mor-
pheme zutu ‘each’ (Section 6.2.3). I also show that the passive construction behaves
like an A-construction, not an Ā-construction, contrary to Haung (1999) (Sec-
tion 6.3). Lastly, this chapter discusses the affected/adversative connotations that
are carried by many passives in Japanese and investigates where such connotations
come from (Section 6.4.3.1).
Exploiting the data collected through the surveys, Chapter 7 investigates the
‘extra-thematic passive’ and the role of supportive context. First, the methodology
of the surveys is reported (Section 7.1). I then address the following questions:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:11 F: LA19201.tex / p.24 (1320-1324)
Does ‘adversative context’ really improve the acceptability of the ‘extra-thematic

passive’? What are the defining properties of ‘adversative context’? Lastly, I propose
a preliminary analysis of the grammar of speakers who consistently accept extra-
thematic passives and account for the differences between their grammar and that
of speakers who consistently reject those passives (Section 7.3).
Chapter 8 discusses implications of this research program and concludes.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.1 (63-151)
chapter 2
The passive morpheme -rare
We aim to understand the properties of Japanese passives by examining the dis-

tributional properties of the pieces comprising the construction. The focus of this
chapter is on the morpheme -(r)are.
As illustrated in the active-passive alternation below, the passive in Japanese
contains an extra piece of verbal morphology – the passive morpheme -(r)are –
which combines with the main predicate, forming one phonological ‘word.’1
(1) a. Naomi-ga Ken-o aisi-tei-ru.
Naomi-nom Ken-acc love-asp-prs
‘Naomi loves Ken.’ Active
b. Keni -ga (Naomi-ni) ti ais-are-tei-ru.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat love-pass-asp-prs
‘Ken is loved by {Naomi/somebody}.’ Passive
In the subsequent sections, I motivate the lexical entry of -rare by addressing the
questions given in Chapter 1, (11). Section 2.1 introduces the different contexts
(e.g. middles, potentials, subject honorifics) in which the morpheme -rare appears.
Sections 2.2 and 2.3 establish that -rare is a functional element, specifically a pas-
sive Voice head. Section 2.4 motivates the lexical properties of -rare. Section 2.5
extends the discussion to the subject honorific construction and proposes a uni-
fied analysis of the passive and subject honorific uses of -rare, assuming a single
lexical entry of the morpheme -rare with invariant features in Japanese. Lastly, Sec-
tion 2.6 summarizes the distributional properties and the lexical entry of -rare that
are proposed in this chapter.
2.1 The distribution of -rare
In quite a few languages, the passive morpheme occurs in different construc-

tions where it gives rise to reflexive, reciprocal, middle, and abilitive readings
1. The alternation between -rare and -are is phonological. The passive morpheme takes the
form rare if it attaches to a vowel-ending stem (tabe-rare ‘eat-pass’) whereas it takes the form
are if the verb stem ends with a consonant (tatak-are ‘hit-pass’).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.2 (151-208)
(e.g. Russian sja, Romance se/si: Haspelmath 2001; Shibatani 1985: 902; Kazenin
2001). This is also the case with the Japanese -rare: besides passives, -rare oc-
curs in (1) middles (or traditionally known as ‘spontaneous’), (2) lexical pas-
sives/intransitivizers (in recent work, understood as a ‘first phase’ or ‘low’ passive;
e.g. Harley 2005; Ramchand 2008), (3) abilities (or potentials), and (4) subject
honorifics. Many of these uses are shared with the Romance si/se, but the subject
honorific use is quite unique (see Section 2.5 for more information about how the
unique properties of subject honorifics follow under the proposed analysis).
(2) a. Middle (Spontaneous)
Mukasi-no koto-ga sinob-are-ru.
old.time-no thing-nom recall-rare-prs
‘Things that happened a long time ago come to mind.’
(Shibatani 1985: 823)
b. Low/Lexical passive
Ken-no huku-ga yog-ore-ta.2
Ken-no clothes-nom soil-rare-pst
‘Ken’s clothes became soiled.’
c. Abilitive (Potential)
(i) Kodomo-ga yoru ne-rare-nai.
child-nom night sleep-rare-neg
‘(My) child is not able to sleep at night.’ [Agentive]
(ii) (Watasi-ni-wa) kono huku-ga moo ki-rare-nai.
I-dat-top this clothes-nom already wear-rare-neg
‘This dress is no longer wearable (by me).’ [Non-agentive]
d. Subject Honorific
Matuda-sensei-ga waraw-are-ta.
Matuda-prof-nom laugh-rare-pst
‘Professor Matuda (honorably) laughed.’
Setting aside the agentive abilitive example in (2ci) and the subject honorific sen-
tence in (2d) for the moment, it becomes clear how all the other uses of -rare are
2. -(r)are is said to be realized as -(r)ore in yog-ore due to an earlier period of vowel harmony
(Kuroda 1993: 47). The transitive counterpart of yog-ore is yog-os ‘to soil,’ which comprises of
the root yog and a low causative (s)as. In yog-os, (s)as also undergoes vowel harmony and is
realized as (s)os (see (3b)). See Volpe (2005: 126 n. 30). The morpheme -(r)ore in (2b) is called a
lexical/low passive morpheme because the stem with which -rare combines (i.e., yog) – a verbal
root – does not stand alone and cannot be directly merged with a tense morphology (e.g., *yog-
ta). Further, adding a low passive or causative to the root generally derives what in English looks
like single simplex verbs, which in fact we now know are syntactically composed. Following
Harley (2008), I assume that a low causative is some kind of a little v.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.3 (208-254)
Chapter 2. The passive morpheme -rare 27
related when we compare the above sentences in (2) with their following transitive
counterparts.
(3) a. Ken-ga mukasi-no koto-o sinon-da.
Ken-nom old.time-no thing-acc recall-pst
‘Ken recalled things that happened a long time ago.’
b. Ken-ga huku-o yog-osi-ta.
Ken-nom clothes-acc soil-(s)as-pst
‘Ken soiled his clothes.’
c. Watasi-ga kono huku-o ki-ta.
I-nom this clothes-acc wear-pst
‘I put on this dress.’
The commonality is that the nominative DPs of the -rare constructions in (2) are
all realized as the accusative o-marked internal argument in (3). In other words,
the contexts in which -rare appears all resemble the prototypical passive. The ques-
tion arises if all the -rare constructions involve an identical morpheme -rare or
not. At first blush, a unified treatment of -rare seems plausible for (2a), (2b), and
(2cii), but more difficult for (2ci) and (2d), where the external argument – not the
internal argument – of the predicate embedded under -rare appears as the surface
subject of the sentence. Are the latter two -rare morphemes different from the rest?
Given the contention of the current research, I would like to pursue a uniform
account for all the -rare constructions, such that the apparent differences follow
from its interaction between the properties of -rare and that of other elements
comprising the constructions.
Historical facts also strongly support a unified treatment of -rare. Shibatani
(1985) reports that the different uses of -(r)are arose from a common source. Ac-
cording to Oshima (2006: 150), the passive and spontaneous uses of -(r)are (and
its predecessors -(ra)r/-(ra)y) are said to be the oldest among the four uses; this
is why I focus on the passive construction in order to identify the core properties
of -rare. The ambiguity between the passive and spontaneous uses is present in
records dating from the 8th century, and there is no consensus on which use is
prior (Kiginuki 1991; Hashimoto 1969, cited in Oshima 2006). The potential use
of -(ra)y/-(ra)r arose before the 9th century and was limited to negative contexts
until the end of Heian period (A.D. 794–1192). The honorific use emerged in the
Heian period (Oshima 2006, originally in Karashima 1993).
Despite some superficial differences across constructions, the cross-linguistic
polysemy coupled with the historical evidence strongly motivates a single lexical
entry of -rare. What is clear from the observation above is that none of the oc-
currences of -rare must add an extra argument to the structure. I will thus pursue
the hypothesis that -rare never introduces an argument (as opposed to optionally
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.4 (254-306)
introducing an argument as often assumed in the literature). Specifically, the fol-

lowing is the lexical entry of -rare that I propose.
1. -rare is the functional head that instantiates Voice (cf. Cinque 1999, 2004).
2. It merges with ‘active voice’ v as its complement.
3. It has the EPP feature that attracts a VP layer to its Specifier.
VoiceP
VP
vP rare
DP V
DP
VP v
In the remainder of this chapter, I will motivate this proposal.
2.2 The passive -rare is always a functional element
It seems quite uncontroversial that -rare is a functional element: -rare is a bound

morpheme, which needs to attach to some kind of a verbal host. The analytical
questions are: (1) Is this functional element capable of assigning a θ-role?; and (2)
does it have its own semantic value? The passive -rare (especially in the indirect
passive context) is often translated as ‘be affected by’ in English. This is because
direct English translations of Japanese passives are often unavailable, and Japanese
passives tend to carry adversative connotations, such that the nominative DP is
adversely affected by the event denoted in the complement of -rare. However, a
convenient translation does not mean that -rare actually semantically corresponds
to the English passivized verb ‘be affected.’
Returning to the first question, as I mentioned in the previous section, I as-
sume that -rare never assigns a θ-role (see Section 6.4.3 for further discussion). As
for the second question, I argue that -rare does not have any semantic value. It is
difficult to tease apart the meaning of -rare from the predicate it attaches to, and
it cannot be modified by an adverb. Consider the following examples containing a
temporal adverb nando-mo ‘many.times’:
(4) a. Ken-ga nando-mo Naomi-ni nagur-are-ta.
Ken-nom many.times-mo Naomi-dat hit-pass-pst
(i) ‘Ken was hit by Naomi many times.’
(ii) ‘*Ken was affected many times by Naomi’s (single) hitting.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.5 (306-359)
b. Ken-ga nando-mo Naomi-ni nige-rare-ta.

Ken-nom many.times-mo Naomi-dat escape-pass-pst
(i) ‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi many times.’
(ii) ‘*Ken was affected many times by Naomi’s (single) escaping.’
If -rare were a verb meaning ‘be affected,’ the two readings – (i) and (ii) – should be
in principle available depending on the scope of the adverb. Nevertheless, ‘many
times’ can only modify the hitting and escaping events. (4a) and (4b) are incom-
patible with a situation where Naomi’s hitting or escaping happened once, but Ken
was affected by that event many times (e.g. (i) he was late for work; (ii) he had to
see a doctor; (iii) he had to look for Naomi). In contrast, the ambiguity is present
in the following English counterparts: (i) ‘Ken was affected by the fact that Mary
hit him many times’ and (ii) ‘Ken was affected by the fact that Mary escaped (from
him) many times.’3 I take this to mean that -rare neither means ‘be affected’ nor
has any semantic value that can be modified by an adverb. Then a question arises:
Where does the adversative connotations come from? The answer to this question
is provided in Section 6.4.3.1.
2.3 -rare as a voice head
We now turn to the question of what kind of functional category -rare is. Based on
the distribution of -rare with respect to aspectual verbs, I propose that -rare is a
Voice head.4 We adopt Cinque’s (1999, 2006) cartography, which distinguishes the
structural heights among aspectual verbs, and aim to understand the distribution
of -rare and aspectual verbs in terms of their relative merged positions. It will be
shown below that -rare can combine with the aspectual verbs that are merged be-
low Voice but not with those that are merged higher than Voice. This observation
strongly motivates the proposal that -rare instantiates Voice.
2.3.1 Establishing a pattern with long passivization
It has been well-documented that a selective set of aspectual verbs, which par-
ticipate in restructuring (also known as ‘clause reduction’) constructions, can be
a complement of the passive -rare, yielding long passives (in long passives -rare
3. Thanks to Chad Vicenik for sharing his intuitions about these sentences.
4. A plausible hypothesis is that -rare is decompositional: -rar is Voice and (r)e is probably a
verbalizer. This proposal accounts for the complementation property of T: T in Japanese (e.g. ta
‘past’) needs to combine with verbs. The presence of the verbalizer (r)e allows rare to combine
with T. Here, however, I will simply treat -rare as Voice.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.6 (359-417)
Table 2.1 Long vs. embedded passives
I. Long (V-rare) II. Long and embedded III. Embedded (-rare-V)
sase (cause) tuzuke (continue) kake (be about to)

wasure (forget) das (start) sugi (exceed)
toger (succeed) hazime (begin) tei (progressive/perfect)
naos (redo) tagar (want)
oe (finish) sokone (fail)
age (complete)
tukus (exhaust)
attaches to the aspectual verb and the embedded object promotes to the nomina-
tive position) (Shibatani 1973; Shibatani 1978; Nishigauchi 1993; Kageyama 1993;
Kageyama 1999; Koizumi 1994; Koizumi 1995; Koizumi 1998; Matsumoto 1996;
Wurmbrand 2003; Fukuda 2009; among others).
The literature recognizes three patterns with aspectual verbs: compatible with
(1) only long passives (obligatorily restructuring); (2) both long and embed-
ded passives (optionally restructuring); and (3) only embedded passives (non-
restructuring). Table 2.1 reports my judgments about the compatibility of the
commonly discussed aspectual verbs with long passivization (cf. Kageyama 1989,
1999; Nishigauchi 1993 for their own reported judgments). The aspectual verbs in
‘group I’ can be a complement of -rare, allowing long passivization. In contrast,
the aspectual verbs in ‘group III’ cannot be a complement of -rare. Instead, they
can take -rare as a complement (i.e., embedded passives). The aspectual verbs in
‘group II’ allow both long and embedded passives.
I. Only long passives

(5) Causative: [sase-rare] vs. [*?rare-sase]
a. Ken-ga (Naomi-ni) John-o tazune-sase-rare-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat John-acc visit-caus-pass-pst
‘Ken was caused (by Naomi) to visit John .’
b. *?Ken-ga Naomi-o (John-ni) tazune-rare-sase-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-acc John-dat visit-pass-caus-pst
‘Ken caused Naomi to be visited (by John).’5
5. Sase-rare is the canonical order. The inverse order rare-sase is definitely marked but pos-
sible in some cases (e.g., nagur-are-sase-ta ‘punch-pass-cause-pst’ (cause to be punched) is
acceptable to me).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.7 (417-484)
(6) Forget: [wasure-rare] vs. [*rare-wasure]

a. Sono kanzya-wa isya-ni {tiryoo.si-wasure-rare/
that patient-top doctor-dat {treatment.do-forget-pass/
*tiryoo.s-are-wasure}-ta. [Animate subject]
treatment.do-pass-forget}-pst
Lit. ‘That patient was forgotten to be treated by the doctor.’
b. Ken-e-no tegami-ga {dasi-wasure-rare/
Ken-to-no letter-nom {mail-forget-pass/
*das-are-wasure}-ta. [Inanimate subject]
*mail-pass-forget}-pst
Lit. ‘The letter to Ken was forgotten to be mailed.’
(7) Succeed/Manage to: [toge-rare] vs. [*rare-toge]
Nantoka sono sigoto-ga {yari-toge-rare/ *yar-are-toge}-ta.
somehow that job-nom {do-accomplish-pass/ do-pass-accomplish}-pst
‘Somehow that job was accomplished.’
(8) Redo: [naos-rare] vs. [*rare-naos]
Sono-syorui-wa nandomo {kaki-naos-are/ *kak-are-naosi}-ta.
that-document-top many.times {write-redo-pass/ write-pass-redo}-pst
‘That document was rewritten many times.’
(9) Finish/complete: [owe/age-rare] vs. [*rare-owe/age]6
Ronbun-ga {kaki-{owe/age}-rare/ *kak-are-{owe/age}}-ta.
paper-nom {write-finish-pass/ write-pass-finish}-pst
‘The paper finished being written.’
(10) Exhaust: [tukus-are] vs. [*rare-tukus]
Keeki-ga tabe-{tukus-are/*rare-tukusi}-ta.
cake-nom eat-{exhaust-pass/pass-exhaust}-pst
‘The cake was eaten up.’
II. Long and embedded passives
(11) Continue: [tuzuke-rare] vs. [rare-tuzuke]
Sono hon-wa ooku-no hito-ni {yomi-tuzuke-rare/
that book-top many-no person-dat {read-contiue-pass/
yom-are-tuzuke}-ru daroo.
read-pass-continue}-prs perhaps
‘Perhaps that book will continue to be read by many people.’
6. There are disagreements in judgements with respect to owe ‘finish.’ While Shibatani (1973b,
1978), Nishigauchi (1993), and Matsumoto (1996) claim that owe ‘finish’ only allows for long
passives, Kageyama (1993) reports that some speakers also allow embedded passives. Fukuda
(2009a) conducted a survey and reports that the ratings for long passives were significantly better
than that for embedded passives with owe ‘finish.’ Likewise, I only allow for long passives with
owe ‘finish.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.8 (484-562)
(12) Begin/start: [das/hazime-rare] vs. [rare-das/hazime]7

a. Sinsyoohin-ga uri-{hazime-rare/das-are}-ta.
new.product-nom sell-{begin-pass/start-pass}-pst
‘The new product started to be sold.’
b. Sinsyoohin-ga tukaw-are-{hazime/dasi}-ta.
new.product-nom use-pass-{begin/start}-pst
‘The new product started to be used.’
III. Only embedded passives
(13) Be.about.to: [*kake-rare] vs. [rare-kake]
Ken-no zitensya-ga {*kowasi-kake-rare/ kowas-are-kake}-ta.
Ken-no bike-nom {break-be.about.to-pass/ break-pass-be.about.to}-pst
‘Ken’s bike was about to be broken.’
(14) Exceed: [*sugi-rare] vs. [rare-sugi]
Yosan-ga {*tukai-sugi-rare/ tukaw-are-sugi}-ta.
budget-nom {use-exceed-pass/ use-pass-exceed}-pst
‘The budget was over-used.’
Turning to the aspectual marker tei, it is known to have either a progressive or

perfective interpretation depending on the inherent telicity of the verb to which
it attaches (Kindaichi 1976; Jacobson 1992; Ogihara 1998; among others). With
verbs that encode telic events (e.g. achievement verbs), tei gives rise to a perfective
interpretation, whereas with verbs that encode atelic events (e.g. activity verbs),
it gives rise to a progressive interpretation (examples are adapted from Ogihara
1998).
(15) a. Ken-ga ima doa-o sim.e-tei-ru.
Ken-nom now door-acc close.(s)e-asp-prs
‘Ken is closing the door now.’ [Progressive]
b. Doa-ga ima simat-tei-ru.
door-nom now close.(r)ar-asp-prs
‘The door is closed now.’ [Resultative]
The aspect -tei may take the passive -rare as a complement. The inverse order
is not compatible with a passive interpretation; it only gives rise to an abilitive
interpretation, as illustrated in (16b).
7. Drawing on Mamoru Saito’s grammaticality judgment, Cinque (2004) notes that das is only
compatible with long passivization. Conversely, Nishigauchi (1993) and Sugioka (1984) claim
that das is only compatible with embedded passives. The choice of the verb stem seems to play
some role in their judgments (Cinque uses the verb stem tate-ru ‘to build,’ and Nishigauchi
uses the verb nikum-u ‘to hate’). In my opinion, with the verb stems given in (12), das is en-
tirely compatible with both long and embedded passives (see Yashima 2009: n. 16 for the same
judgment).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.9 (562-603)
(16) Aspect (progressive/perfect): [*tei-rare] vs. [rare-tei]

(cf. [tei-rare] only gives rise to an ‘able’ reading.)
a. Sono hon-wa ooku-no hito-ni {*yon-dei-rare/
that book-top many-no person-dat {read-asp-pass/
yom-are-tei}-ru.
read-pass-perf}-prs
‘That book has been read by many people.’
b. Sono hon-wa nagaikoto yon-dei-rare-ru.
that book-top long.thing read-asp-pass-prs
‘That book is readable (*is being read) for a long time.’
As for the desirative ta.gar ‘want.verbalizer (want, hereafter),’ it is generally

incompatible with long passives, as illustrated in (17a), (17b) and (17c). The
following examples are adapted from Miyagawa (1989: 159):
(17) Want: [*tagar-rare] vs. [rare-tagar]
a. Kodomo-ga titioya-ni {*donari-tagar-are/ donar-are-tagar}-ta.
child-nom father-dat {shout-want-pass/ shout-pass-want}-pst
‘The child wanted his father to shout at him.’
b. Kanozyo-ga Taroo-ni {*erabi-tagar-are/ erab-are-tagar}-ta.
she-nom Taro-dat {choose-want-pass/ choose-pass-want}-pst
‘She wanted to be chosen by Taro.’
c. *?Karaa.terebi-ga minna-ni kai-tagar-are-ta.
color.TV-nom everyone-dat buy-want-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Color TVs were wanted by everyone to buy.’
However, there is a complication: tagar is a control predicate, which restricts its

subject to sentient beings. This point is illustrated with examples in (18).
(18) a. {Ken/Densya}-ga hasit-ta.
{Ken/train}-nom run-pst
‘{The train/Ken} ran.’
b. {Ken/*Densya}-ga hasiri-tagar-ta.
{Ken/train}-nom run-want-pst
‘{Ken/*The train} wanted to run.’
c. *Ame-ga huri-tagar-ta.
rain-nom descend-want-pst
Int. ‘Rain wanted to descend.’
This restriction is also at work with embedded passives (which are accpetable if the
subject is a sentential being (see (17a) and (17b)), resulting in the ill-formedness
of (19)).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.10 (603-666)
(19)**Karaa.terebi-ga minna-ni kaw-are-tagar-ta.

color.TV-nom everyone-by buy-pass-want-pst
Lit. ‘Color TVs were wanted by everyone (to buy).’
What is important is that the reasons for ill-formedness differ between (17c) and
(19). (17c) is ill-formed because of the illicit ordering of elements, while (19) is
ill-formed because of a non-sentient subject. Interestingly, there is a contrast in
degree of ill-formedness: (19) is much worse than (17c), but (17c) is still ill-formed
to me (and to Miyagawa 1989).8
The same pattern is observed with sokone ‘to miss.’ Although sokone can be a
complement of -rare, it restricts its subject to sentient beings. Consequently, it is
incompatible with inanimate subjects, as shown in (21).
(20) Fail: [*sokone-rare] vs. [rare-sokone]
a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni {*suisen.si-sokone-rare/
Ken-nom Naomi-dat {recommend-fail-pass/
suisen.s-are-sokone}-ta.
recommend-pass-fail}-pst
‘Ken failed to be recommended by Naomi.’
8. Linguists disagree about whether passives with non-sentient subjects like (17c) are compat-
ible with long passives or not. Although Miyagawa (1989) and I reject passives like (17c), Zushi
(2008) and Nishigauchi (1993) report that long passives of tagar with non-sentient subjects are
well-formed. Consider the following examples adapted from Nishigauchi (1993):
(i) a. Mizu-ga (minna-ni) nomi-tagar-are-tei-ru.

water-nom everyone-dat drink-want-pass-asp-prs
Lit. ‘Water is wanted by everyone to drink.’ (* to me)
b. Kono kuruma-ga wakamono-ni nori-tagar-are-tei-ru.
this car-nom youths-dat drive-want-pass-asp-prs
Lit. ‘This car is wanted by young people to drive.’ (*?to me)
c. Sono hon-wa minna-ni yomi-tagar-are-tei-ru.
that book-top everyone-dat read-want-pass-asp-prs.
Lit. ‘That book is wanted to be read by everyone.’ (*?to me)
I only allow the verb -tagar with non-sentient subjects: (i-a) is absolutely unacceptable, and (i-b)
and (i-c) are better than (i-a) but still much degraded than passives with sentient subjects like
(17a) and (17b). The reason (i-b) and (i-c) are better than (i-a) is because, in general, regardless
of the presence of tagar ‘want’, a passive with a non-sentient subject is better if it is a definite
DP and the dative by-phrase is a non-specific DP. Presumably this has to do with the animacy
hierarchy interacting with movement properties, but the exact reason for this contrast awaits
future research.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.11 (666-711)
b. Sono eiga-wa ookuno hito-ni mi-

that movie-top many person-dat watch-
{*sokone-rare/*rare-sokone}-ta.
{fail-pass/pass-fail}-pst
‘That movie failed to be watched by many people.’
(21) Selectional Properties of sokone
{*Densya/Ken}-wa hasiri-sokone-ta.
{train/Ken}-top run-fail-pst
‘{*The train/Ken} failed to run.’
Note that Table 2.1 did not include ow.ar ‘come to an end,’ which is one of the most
commonly discussed aspectual verbs in Japanese. This is because I accept neither
long nor embedded passives with ow.ar.9 This is illustrated below:
(22) Finish: [*owar-are] vs. [*?rare-owar]
a. Kaizyoo-no isu-ga katazuke-{*owar-are/ *?rare-owar}-ta.
hall-no chair-nom remove-{finish-pass/ pass-finish}-pst
Lit. ‘The chairs in the hall were finished being putting away.’
b. Syorui-ga syokuin-ni {*kubari-owar-are/
document-nom employee-dat {distribute-finish-pass/
*? kubar-are-owar}-ta.
distribute-pass-finish}-pst
Lit. ‘The papers were finished being distributed by an employee.’
Given that the transitive counterpart of ow.ar – ow.e ‘to finish’ – allows for long
passives, the incompatibility of ow.ar might be surprising. However, this is be-
cause of the complementation property of -rare. As we will see in Section 2.4,
-rare subcategorizes for Active Voice verbs (i.e. verbs that contain the little vagent
or vcause , which license an external argument), and ow.ar does not qualify. The
intransitive verb ow.ar ‘to come to an end’ consists of the verbal root ow and lexi-
cal/low passive (or intransitivizer) -(r)ar, which is not an Active Voice projection,
thus it cannot be a complement of -(r)are (see Section 2.4.1 for more information
about complementation properties of -rare).
We now turn to the question of how we can make sense of the distribution of
-rare with aspectual verbs.
9. Linguists disagree about whether ow.ar allows for long or embedded passives. For exam-
ple, Matsumoto (1996) claims that ow.ar is compatible with embedded passives, while Fukuda
(2009) conducted two grammaticality judgment surveys and found that the native speaker par-
ticipants tend to accept neither long nor embedded passives with owar. Likewise, I can accept
neither. The reason for the variability awaits future research.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.12 (711-880)
2.3.2 -rare instantiates voice
In this section, I would like to demonstrate how the ‘cartography approach’ ad-
vanced by Cinque (1999, 2004) sheds new light on the complementation prop-
erties of the passive -rare and affords a deeper understanding of the distribution
of aspectual verbs with -rare (see also Fukuda 2009b; Nishiyama & Ogawa 2009;
Yashima 2009).
Cinque (2006) examines the typology of the order of functional heads includ-
ing aspectual verbs and proposes that there is a universal hierarchy and a rigid
order among the merged positions of elements. The following is a subset of the hi-
erarchy developed by Cinque (1999: see Cinque 2006 for a finer-grained structural
hierarchy):
(23) TP(Past) > ModVolition > AspContinuative > AspPerfect > AspProgressive
> AspProspective > AspInceptive > AspFrustrative/Success > AspCompletive(I)
> Voice > Causative > AspInceptive(II) > AspContinuative(II) >
AspCompletive(II) > AspRepetitive(II) > V10
Under this approach, the null hypothesis is that -rare instantiates Voice head. If
this hypothesis is correct, the predication is that only the aspectual verbs that are
merged lower than Voice can undergo long passivization since they can be embed-
ded under -rare (see Cinque 2006: 69). The data established in the previous section
conforms with this prediction.
Table 2.2 summarizes the distribution of Japanese functional heads with re-
spect to -rare (the table was construed mainly based on the data discussed in
Nishiyama & Ogawa 2009 and Yashima 2009).11
Assuming that hazime, das ‘to begin’ and tuzuke ‘to continue’ each occupy
two distinct positions in the hierarchy (with slightly different semantics or func-
tions, which I do not investigate further here), the distribution given in Table 2.2 is
straightforwardly accounted for by the relative merged positions among elements
proposed in Cinque (1999, 2006) if -rare is indeed specified as passive Voice head.
10. The list is taken from Cinque (2004: 76, 93). Lower repetitive projection appears in two lists
in Cinque (2006: 93 and 176).
11. The structural positions of sugi ‘exceed’ and tukus ‘exhaust’ are not evident from their
meanings. The former must occupy a position higher than -rare, and the latter lower than -rare.
The goal of this section is to establish that -rare instantiates Voice within Cinque’s (1999, 2006)
cartography project. The relative ordering among other aspectual heads in Table 2.2 needs to be
established independently. Furthermore, I do not intend to propose a new analysis for the struc-
ture of V-V compounds here. Readers are referred to Nishiyama & Ogawa (2009) and Fukuda
(2009b) for reviews of analyses.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.13 (880-880)
Table 2.2 Japanese functional categories: Based on Cinque (1999, 2004)
English Japanese v-rare rare-v
15 T(Past) -ed ta * ok
14 Mod-Volition want ta-gar * ok
13 Asp-Continuative continue tuzuke * ok
12 Asp-Perfect have -en te-i * ok

11 Asp-Progressive be -ing
10 Asp-Prospective be about to kake * ok
9 Asp-Inceptive begin hazime * ok
das
8 Asp-Frustrative not manage to sokone * ok
7 Voice by (Collins 2005) -rare – –

6 Causative make/let/cause -sase ok ?*
5 Asp-Inceptive (II) begin hazime ok *
das
4 Asp-Continuative (II) continue tuzuke ok *
Asp-Completive (II) finish oe, age ok *

3 complete toge
not complete wasure ok *
2 Asp-Repetitive (II) (do) again naos ok *
1 V
Table 2.3 Control vs. raising verbs
Control Control & raising Raising
oe ‘finish’, age ‘finish’ hazime ‘begin’ sugi ‘exceed’

naos ‘redo’, wasur ‘forget’ das ‘start’ owar ‘come to an end’
tagar ‘want’, sokone ‘fail’ tuzuke ‘continue’ kake ‘be about to’
This proposal is superior to the traditional proposals in many ways. Tradi-

tionally, the distributional differences are attributed to whether a verb is a control
predicate or a raising predicate, as in Table 2.3, with long passives only possible
with control predicates (Shibatani 1978; Kuno 1983; Nishigauchi 1993; Kageyama
1993; Koizumi 1995; Koizumi 1998; Matsumoto 1996; Hasegawa 1999; Yashima
2009; among others). This is due to the traditional assumption that -rare absorbs
an external θ-role of a lexical verb presyntactically. Consequently, raising verbs
cannot combine with -rare, because they lexically do not have the external θ-role
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.14 (880-911)
that satisfies the property of -rare. Control predicates, on the other hand, assign
an external θ-role, thus it is predicted that they can be embedded under -rare,
allowing long passivization.12 The verbs that are compatible with both long and
embedded passives are alleged to be ambiguous between raising and control. How-
ever, this account does not explain the distribution of -tagar ‘want’ and -sokone
‘fail,’ which are traditionally considered as control verbs, but cannot be a comple-
ment of -rare. Furthermore, it does not account for why embedded passives are
incompatible with control predicates, such as owe/age ‘to finish,’ naos ‘to redo,’
wasure ‘to forget,’ even when the subject is a sentient being.
Contrary to the traditional approach, I assume, along with many others, that
the argument structure of the verb is fully represented in the syntax and that there
is no lexical absorption of an external θ-role (cf. Collins 2005). With the current
approach, the status of the external argument, i.e. whether the external argument
of the aspectual verb embedded under -rare is a base-generated lexical argument or
a derived argument, does not determine the availability of the long passivization.
The availability entirely depends on the structural merged position of the aspectual
head relative to the Voice head -rare.
2.4 Lexical properties of -rare
This section will establish further lexical properties of the passive Voice -rare: i.e.
what it takes as complement (or merges with) and what EPP properties it has.
First, -rare has the following complementation properties: it selects for an active
‘vP,’ thus it cannot take a middle, a pure unaccusative, or a passivized verb as its
complement. Second, -rare has EPP (edge) features that attract the VP, stranding
vP (i.e. smuggling: Collins 2005). Third, -rare (optionally) licenses a dative projec-
tion, which usually attracts the external argument of the predicate to which -rare
attaches. The three properties are illustrated in turn below.
12. As pointed out by Kageyama (1993) and Yashima (2009), among others, the control ac-
count has another problem, which is the traditional problem of long passivization with restruc-
turing predicates. That is, in long passivization, the internal argument of the verb embedded
under the control predicate should not be able to move to the matrix ga-position since PRO,
which locates in the specifier of the embedded verb, intervenes, thus the derivation violates
Relativized Minimality (cf. Rizzi 1990). The minimality might appear to be a problem for the
present analysis: that is, in order to get to the matrix ga-position, the internal argument needs to
cross either PRO or a trace in addition to the external argument of the aspectual verb. However,
the smuggling analysis I pursue here can get around this problem by smuggling the VP of the
embedded clause, stranding the higher layer containing an external argument and PRO/trace.
It might be the case that the availability of smuggling a VP layer is in fact responsible for the
cross-linguistic distribution of long passivization.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.15 (911-983)
2.4.1 Complementation properties of -rare
In Section 2.3.1, we have seen one complementation property of -rare. Namely,

it cannot take aspectual verbs that are merged higher than the passive Voice head
-rare. Now we turn to another important complementation property.
Japanese passives are extremely productive; the passive morpheme -(r)are
combines with transitive (e.g. nagur-u ‘hit,’ aisu-ru ‘love,’ and hihansu-ru ‘crit-
icize’), ditransitive (e.g. watas-u ‘hand/give,’ syookaisu-ru ‘introduce,’ and okur-
u ‘send’), and some intransitive predicates comprising both unaccusative and
unergative predicates (e.g. sin-u ‘die,’ nak-u ‘cry,’ and nige-ru ‘escape’). Neverthe-
less, -rare is not compatible with all intransitive and transitive predicates. Quite
a few verbs – generally intransitives – resist -rare (e.g. *ak-are-ru ‘openintr.-pass,’
*itam-are-ru ‘hurtintr. -pass,’ *war.e-rare-ru ‘breakintr. -pass’). Others are compati-
ble but yield interpretations other than passives (e.g. Subject honorifics – sube-
rare-ru ‘honorifically slide,’ oti-rare-ru ‘honorifically fall’; Middles/Abilitives –
hag-are-ru ‘{spontaneously/be able to} come off/*peel-pass’). In the next section,
I consider what kind of verbs can be embedded under -rare.
2.4.1.1 -rare selects for active voice vP

My proposed generalization is that the passive -rare selects for an active voice
verb. This proposal is consistent with the observations made by Washio (1989)
and Shibatani & Pardeshi (2002), who point out that the passive -rare is incom-
patible with middle voice intransitive verbs like war.e-ru ‘breakintr. (spontaneously
break)’ and mituk.ar.-u ‘be.found.’13 Combining -rare with a middle voice verb
yields an illicit string regardless of the choice of arguments, the type of the ex-
ternal argument (either a dative by-phrase or a ni-yotte phrase), and tense (e.g.
*war.e-rare-ta, *mituk.ar-rare-ru), as exemplified below. Examples from (24b) to
(24f) are adapted from Washio (1989):
(24) a. *Naomi-ga raburetaa-ni mituk.ar-are-ta.
Naomi-nom love.letter-dat find.(r)ar-pass-pst
Int. ‘It happened to Naomi that her love letter was found.’
13. Drawing on the classification proposed by Motoori Haruniwa (1763–1828), Shibatani &
Pardeshi (2002) have classified intransitive verbs into two kinds: ‘active’ intransitives, mizukara
sikasuru (to do so volitionally) and ‘inactive’ intransitives, onozukara sikaru (to happen thus
spontaneously). The dichotomy between Active Voice and non-Active Voice verbs (i.e. Middles
and Passives) proposed here roughly matches their Active-Inactive verb distinction. However,
they define active intransitives as verbs that select for a subject with volition, which seems not to
be the defining property of the verbs that can be a complement of -rare. Some verbs that do not
require volition (but they are Active Voice verbs) are still compatible with it (e.g. hur-u ‘(rain)
descend’, nak-u ‘cry (doesn’t require volition)’).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.16 (983-1037)
b. *Ken-wa itumo megane-ni kumor-are-ru.

Ken-top always glasses-dat collect.moisture-pass-prs
Int. ‘It always happens to Ken that his eyeglasses collect moisture.’
c. *Naomi-wa hon-no peezi-ni yabur.e-rare-ta.
Naomi-top book-no page-dat tear.(r)e-pass-pst
Int. ‘It happened to Naomi that the book-page tore.’
d. *Ken-ga totuzen mado-ni war.e-rare-ta.
Ken-nom suddenly window-dat break.(r)e-pass-pst
Int. ‘Ken experienced the window’s sudden breaking.’
e. *Ken-wa kutu-no himo-ni hodok.e-rare-ta.
Ken-top shoe-no lace-dat untie.(r)e-pass-pst
Int. ‘It happened to Ken that his shoelace untied.’
f. *Ken-wa zubon-ni nug.e-rare-ta.
Ken-top pants-dat undress.(r)e-pass-pst
Int. ‘It happened to Ken that his pants fell off.’
Additionally, Washio (1989) points out that -rare cannot combine with a pas-
sivized verb, as illustrated below (adapted from Washio 1989: 232):
(25) *Watasi-wa musuko-ga (dareka-ni) nagur-are-rare-ta.
I-top son-nom (someone-dat) hit-pass-pass-pst
Int. ‘I was affected by the fact that my son was hit (by someone).’
How can we understand the incompatibility of non-active voice verbs, i.e., middle
and passive voice verbs, with -rare in light of the complementation property of
-rare? I will implement this in terms of selection: -rare selects for an active voice
v complement (i.e. little v[+active] ), which I take to be v with a DP occupying
its Spec. The compatibility of -rare with raising predicates indicates that the DP
occupying the specifier of an active Voice vP can be a derived argument, i.e. a
product of raising as in the case of long passives.
We can further substantiate the notion of active voice vP by adopting the idea
advanced by Harley (1996), Marantz (1997), among others that v comes in three
varieties: vdo or vcause (i.e. v[+active] ) and vbecome (i.e. v[–active] ). Japanese
verbs are often morphologically complex, and the function of each morpheme
is quite transparent. Many verbs exhibit a transitive-intransitive alternation and
consist of a verbal root and either a low/lexical causative (e.g. ‘-(s)as’, ‘-(s)e’) or a
low/lexical passive (e.g. ‘-(r)are’, ‘-(r)ar’, ‘-(r)e’) (Shibatani 1990; Miyagawa 1999;
Harley 1996; Jacobsen 1992; Volpe 2005; among others). Following Harley (2005:
28) and many others, I assume that the low causative morphemes instantiate
vagent (or vdo ) or vcause and the low passive morphemes instantiate vbecome.
Table 2.4 provides some transitive verb examples consisting of a verbal root (i.e.
√
V) and v[+active] . The verbs in row (i) take a null v[+active] and those in (ii)
take -(s)as. All the verbs in Table 2.4 can be embedded under -rare. They have an
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.17 (1037-1105)
Table 2.4 Transitive verbs comprising of a root and v[+active]
Composition -rare Transitive verb examples

√
(i) V-Ø ok war-u, or-u (break), tigir-u (tear off),
ni-ru (boil), tok-ru (melt), sak-ru (tear)
√
(ii) V-(s)as kog-as-u (scorch), hiy-as-u (make cool),
kar-as-u (wither), bar-as-u (expose),
iy-as-ru (heal)
Table 2.5 Middle voice verbs containing v[–active]
Composition -rare Intransitive examples

√
V-(r)e * war-e-ru, or-e-ru (break),
tigir-e-ru (become torn off), ni-e-ru (boil),
tok-e-ru (melt), sak-e-ru (tear)
kog-e-ru (become scorched),
hi-e-ru (become cool), kar-e-ru (wither),
bar-e-ru (come to light), i-e-ru (heal)
intransitive counterpart containing v[–active] spelled out as -(r)e, as shown in Ta-

ble 2.5. All of the verbs in Table 2.5 are incompatible with the passive -rare. The
property established in this section, i.e. -rare takes active voice v as its complement,
is very important in order to explain the intricate distribution of the passive con-
struction. We will come back to this property in Section 2.4.2.1 and show that this
property indeed accounts for otherwise puzzling distribution of the passive.
2.4.2 The EPP feature of -rare
In this section, I motivate another lexical property of -rare; that is, it has EPP
(edge) features that attract the VP layer, stranding vP (i.e. smuggling; Collins
2005). The VP is attracted to the edge of the phrase, smuggling the internal argu-
ment over the external argument. As far as the derivation is concerned, the highest
DP within the VP will be attracted to the nominative case position.
(26) VoiceP
VP
vP rare
DP V
DP
VP v
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.18 (1105-1166)
The support for this proposal comes from the fact that -rare cannot merge with
pure unergative verbs that lack a VP layer, such as oyog ‘to swim,’ hatarak ‘to work,’
and odor ‘to dance.’
(27) a. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni oyog-are-ta. [C:mean 1.39]
Lit. ‘Ken was swum by Naomi.’
Int. ‘Ken was affected by Naomi’s swimming.’
b. *Ken-wa tuma-ni suupaa-de hatrak-are-ta. [B:mean 1.67]
Lit. ‘Ken was worked at the supermarket by his wife.’
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that his wife worked at a supermarket.’
c. *Ken-wa musume-ni odor-are-ta. [C:mean 1.56]
Lit. ‘Ken was danced by his daughter.’
The ungrammaticality of these sentences cannot be explained by the incompati-

bility of -rare with unergative verbs, since -rare can take nak-u ‘to cry,’ (analyzed
as a pseudo-passive in Section 3.5):
(28) Ken-wa Naomi-ni nak-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was cried over by Naomi.’
We can understand the ungrammaticality of sentences like (27a), (27b), and (27c)
if we assume the general ban on movement from complement to its specifier posi-
tion, as proposed by Pesetsky & Torrego (2001), Abels (2003), and Kayne (2005).
Namely, when an unergative verb spells out v, the general ban on movement pro-
hibits vP itself to satisfy the EPP feature of -rare, and there is no VP layer that can
do so.
(29) VoiceP
vP rare
DP v
Naomi swim
On the other hand, as briefly discussed in Section 1.7.3.1, the unergative verb
nak-u ‘to cry’ is compatible with a VP that contains a cause argument that is
promotable to the nominative DP in the passive. The verb nak-u has a transitive-
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.19 (1166-1236)
like structure in this use, and the structure is basically the same as the one given in
(26) (see Section 3.5.2.4 for more information).
Moving a VP containing no overt material will not satisfy the EPP of -rare. In
short, the EPP property of -rare and the general ban on movement in effect force
the complement structure of -rare to contain at least two separable VP layers. The
higher layer must be v[+active] , and the VP must contain some DP material. More
support for the proposal of EPP features of -rare will be given in Section 3.6.
2.4.2.1 Interim summary and consequences

In the previous two sections, I have established the following lexical properties of
-rare:
(30) 1. It selects for an active v.
2. It has the EPP feature that attracts the complement of v[+active] to its
specifier, stranding the vP.
These two properties determine what predicate can be embedded under -rare. The
first property rules out predicates that contain v[–active] , such as ot.i-ru ‘to fall’
(cf. Harley (2008) proposes that the morpheme ‘i’ corresponds to vbecome ):
(31) *Taroo-ga musuko-ni kaidan-kara ot.i-rare-ta.
Taro-nom son-dat stairs-from fall-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Taro was fallen by his son from the stairs.’ [A:mean 1.09]
Significantly, the presence of the active voice vP does not coincide with unac-
cusativity. For example, unaccusative verbs, such as sin-u ‘to die’ or nige-ru ‘to
escape’ can be a complement of the passive -rare, as illustrated below:
(32) a. Naomi-wa hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Naomi was died by (her) mother.’ [A:mean 4.68]
b. Otto-ga tuma-ni nige-rare-ta.
Lit. ‘The husband was escaped from by his wife.’ [A:mean 4.82]
This suggests that unlike oti-ru ‘to fall,’ unaccusatives like sin-u and nige-ru can
optionally introduce an active vP layer, which combines with -rare. The support
for this structure comes from the fact that these unaccusative verbs are compatible
with volitional adverbs, as exemplified below:
(33) a. Ken-wa waza.to minna-no mae-de sin-da.
Ken-top intentionally all-no front-loc die-pst
‘Ken intentionally died in front of everyone.’
b. Kanzya-ga waza.to isya-kara nige-ta.
patient-nom intentionally doctor-from escape-pst
‘The patient intentionally escaped from the doctor.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.20 (1236-1287)
The compatibility of volitional adverbs with some unaccusative verbs, especially

with inherently directed motion verbs, such as iku ‘go,’ kur-u ‘come,’ hair-u ‘enter,’
and tuk-u ‘arrive,’ is well-documented in both Japanese and English (e.g., Levin
& Hovav 1995; Tsujimura & Aikawa 1999). Therefore, the assumption here is that
there are at least two types of unaccusative verbs in Japanese.
Let us now turn to the second lexical property of -rare. I have already shown
in the previous section that the EPP feature disallows -rare to combine with pure
unergative verbs that lack a VP layer (e.g. oyog ‘to swim,’ hatarak ‘to work,’ and odor
‘to dance’; see (27a), (27b), and (27c)). Furthermore, the EPP feature of -rare ac-
counts for the incompatibility of -rare with verbs taking a small clause complement
instead of a VP (e.g. tuk-u ‘to arrive’), as exemplified below:
(34) *Tarooi -ga tomodati-ni zibuni -no ie-ni tuk-are-ta.
Taro-nom friend-dat self-no home-dat arrive-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Taroi was arrived at self ’si house by his friend.’ [A:mean 1.07]
The problem with the verb tuk-u ‘to arrive’ is that it does not have the right type
of complement: the EPP feature of -rare needs to be satisfied with a VP, not by a
PP or small clause complement. The verb tuk-u takes a small clause complement,
which cannot satisfy the EPP feature of -rare:
(35) VoiceP
*SC
vP rare
DP PP
DP
SC v
friend at.home
Lastly, -rare cannot directly merge with a verbal root, which is in fact ruled out
by both of the properties just discussed. It lacks an active voice vP that -rare selects
for, and it also lacks a complement VP that is needed to satisfy the EPP of -rare.
Directly combining -rare with a verbal root or a structure that does not have two
VP layers results in an illicit string or yields a non-passive interpretation, to wit
middle, abilitive, subject honorific interpretations. For example, in (36a) -rare is
directly merged with a verbal root and yields a middle voice interpretation. (36b),
on the other hand, yields an illicit string bar-are-ru.
(36) a. Ken-no huku-ga yog-ore-ta.
Ken-no clothes-nom soil-rare-pst
‘Ken’s clothes became soiled.’ (cf. yog.os.u ‘make soiled’)
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.21 (1287-1356)
Table 2.6 Transitive-intransitive alternation of hag-u ‘to peel’
Root Intransitive Transitive
hag-u (peel) hag.e-ru (go bald, hag.as-u (peel,

come off) remove from the surface)
b. *Himitu-ga bar-are-ru.
secret-nom expose-rare-prs
Int. ‘The secret will be exposed.’ (cf. bar.e-ru ‘come to light,’ bar.as-u
‘expose’)
Similarly, some transitive verbs cannot be a complement of the passive -rare if the
size of the verb is too small (i.e. not consisting of two VP layers). The verb hag-u ‘to
peel’ is one such example. The transitive verb hag-u seems to be structurally very
small, since it can combine with the low causative and low passive morphemes
and yield a lexical intransitive and a lexical transitive predicate respectively.14 See
Table 2.6 for the transitive-intransitive alternation with hag-u ‘to peel’.
As shown in (37b), combining -rare with hag-u ‘to peel’ does not yield a
passive interpretation but only a middle (spontaneous) or abilitive reading.15
(37) a. Ryoosi-ga kemono-no kawa-o hag-u.
hunter-nom beast-no skin-acc peel-prs
‘The hunter skins a beast (lit: peels a beast’s skin).’ [Active]
b. Kemono-no kawa-ga (*ryoosi-ni(-yotte)) hag-are-ru.
beast-no skin-nom hunter-dat-yotte peel-(r)are-prs
‘The beast’s skin {comes off/is able to come off} (*by the hunter).’
[Middle/Abilitive]
The morpheme -rare needs to merge with hag-as-u, which contains vdo , in order
to be interpreted as the passive voice, as shown in (38b).
(38) a. Siiru-ga (*Ken-{ni/ni-yotte}) hag-are-ta.
sticker-nom Ken-dat/dat-yotte come.off-mid-pst
‘The sticker {(spontaneously) came off/was able to come off}.’
‘*The sticker was peeled off by Ken.’
14. Adding the vbecome -(r)e to the root hag-u yields a middle voice reading, whereas adding
the vdo -(s)as yields another transitive verb ‘to peel.’ The two transitive verbs slightly differ in
usage. The canonical use of hag-u is ‘to skin’, while hag-as-u is used more generally to mean ‘to
peel (a sticker, a wallpaper, etc).’ hag-e-ru is used in situations where one goes bald or paintings
come off/fade, and so forth. hag-are-ru is a middle counterpart of the transitive verb hag-as-u,
meaning ‘(a sticker, a wallpaper, etc) (spontaneously) to come off ’ (see (38a)).
15. Presumably the verb hag-u ‘to peel’ is compatible with a silent low causative head, which
allows it to function as a transitive verb in (37a), but restricts its meaning to ‘to skin.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.22 (1356-1420)
b. {Kemono-no kawa/siiru}-ga Ken-ni-yotte hag-as-are-ta.

Beast-no skin/sticker-nom Ken-dat-yotte peel-tr-pass-pst
‘The {beast’s skin/sticker} was peeled off by Ken.’
Assuming that -(s)as in hag-as-u ‘peel’ is vdo , the verb hag-u must lack an active
voice vP layer. The contrast shown in (38) supports the proposal that the passive
morpheme -rare needs to merge with a minimum structure that consists of two
VP layers, one of which is active voice v.
2.4.3 Introducing a dative projection

This section introduces the last lexical property of -rare. Namely, -rare (optionally)
introduces dative Case for the DP in vP, as the following active-passive pair shows:
(39) a. John-ga Mary-no imooto-o tasuke-ta. Active
John-nom Mary-no sister-acc help-pst
‘John helped Mary’s sister.’
b. Mary-ga John-ni imooto-o tasuke-rare-ta. Passive
Mary-nom John-dat sister-acc help-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Mary was helped her sister by John.’
The dative by-phrase (i.e. the dative phrase that corresponds to the external argu-
ment of the predicate embedded under -rare) and the so-called ni-yotte phrase will
be discussed in Chapter 4.
Note that while Collins (2005) proposes that English ‘by’ is an instance of
Voice (which alternates with a silent voice), this option is unavailable in Japanese,
where -rare seems to lexicalize Voice. If dative is a separate projection that comes
with passive voice, there are two options available: either (1) Voice selects for da-
tive, which selects for active voice vP, yielding the order of merger [v[+active] >
Dat > rare] or (2) dative selects for Voice, which selects for active voice vP, yielding
the order of merger [Dat > v[+active] > rare]. These questions are addressed in
Section 3.3.2.3.
2.5 Subject honorifics
The previous sections have established the lexical properties of -rare. Although the
focus of this book is on the passive uses of -rare, my research program assumes that
the lexical properties of -rare itself is invariant across all the -rare constructions.
Therefore, we should be able to propose a unified analysis (see Section 2.1).
In this section, as a first step toward a unified treatment of -rare, I extend
the analysis of passive uses of -rare to the subject honorific use. In subject hon-
orific sentences, -rare is used to express the speaker’s sense of respect toward the
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.23 (1420-1500)
referent of the subject. Unlike the passive, subject honorific constructions are
incomptible with an overt dative by-phrase. Examples of subject honorifics are
presented below:
(40) a. Sensei-ga hasi-rare-ta.
teacher-nom run-pass-pst
‘The teacher (honorably) ran.’
b. Sensei-ga moohu-ni kurum.ar-are-ta.
teacher-nom blanket-dat wrap.(r)ar-pass-pst
‘The teacher (honorably) wrapped himself in the blanket.’
c. Kato-san-ga kaidan-kara oti-rare-ta.
Kato-Mr.-nom stairs-from fall-pass-pst
‘Mr. Kato (honorably) fell from the stairs.’
What is striking with above examples is the fact that honorific -rare can combine
with predicates incompatible with the passive -rare. Generally, -rare is ambiguous
between the passive and subject honorific uses:
(41) a. Sensei-ga kodomo-o sikar-are-ta.
teacher-nom child-acc scold-pass-pst
[Poss-Acc. PSV] ‘The teacher had his child scolded.’
[Sub. Honorific] ‘The teacher honorably scolded a child.’
b. {Sensei/Ken}-ga waraw-are-ta.
teacher/Ken-nom laugh-pass-pst
[Acc. Passive] ‘{The teacher/Ken} was laughed at.’
[Sub. Honorific] ‘{The teacher/Ken} honorably laughed.’
There have been attempts to relate subject honorific -rare to (direct) passive -rare:
Hasegawa (1988), Kubo (1992), and Toyoshima (2008) propose that subject hon-
orifics are the direct passive of the underlying subject (i.e. they are the raising
construction), as illustrated below:
(42) Sensei-ga [vP sensei ot.i]-rare-ta.
teacher-nom fall-pass-pst
‘The teacher honorably fell.’
This analysis seems highly unsatisfactory. There are remaining questions: Where
does the honorific interpretation come from? Why does the subject honorific
construction involve the passive morpheme? Toyoshima (2008) argues that the
honorific meaning is pragmatic, dependent on the lexical choice of the main verb
and the referent of the surface subject. However, the availability of an honorific
interpretation is independent of the referent of the surface subject (see (40c)).
Therefore, it is not sufficient to attribute the honorific interpretation to pragmatic
reasons.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.24 (1500-1537)
Under a unified analysis of -rare, the -rare in subject honorifics must be the
same -rare as the one in the passive construction. Thus, it takes an active vP com-
plement and attracts a VP layer to its specifier. The nominative DP must be raised
from the moved constituent, i.e. ‘teacher’ in (42) must have been contained in
the complement of little v[+active] . This means that the subject honorific con-
struction must contain a silent active vP, which itself takes a wide variety of com-
plements. Given the meaning of this construction, we can understand this silent
predicate as having the semantics of ‘to honor,’ which introduces a silent sub-
ject, say speaker (cf. Kayne 2005 for proposals about silent elements).16 Thus,
minimally, the subject honorific passive has the structure sketched below:
(43) VoiceP [[VP teacher fall ]i [[SPEAKER [VP teacher fall] i HONOR ] rare ]]
The predicate is embedded under this silent predicate honor, followed by the
merger of -rare, yielding the order of merge [rare>v[+active] HONOR>fall]. The
VP layer ‘to fall’ moves to Spec of -rare, and the highest argument of the predicate,
‘teacher’, is subsequently attracted to the nominative position to satisfy the EPP of
T in a regular fashion, yielding a string-vacuous movement.
This derivation accounts for an important distributional property of sub-
ject honorifics. In the subject honorific construction, -rare merges with a wider
range of predicates than it does in the passive construction. We have seen in Sec-
tion 2.4 that the passive use of -rare cannot combine with v[–active] (e.g. otir-u
‘to fall’) or pure unergative verbs that lack the VP layer (e.g. hasir-u ‘to run’
or odor-u ‘to dance’). In contrast, the subject honorific use of -rare is compat-
ible with such predicates (see (42)). The distribution straightforwardly follows
from the proposed derivation: the presence of the silent projection [HONOR]
results in introducing an active voice vP, which satisfies the complementation
property and the shell-structure requirement of -rare, thus allowing the derivation
to converge.
16. Thanks to Hilda Koopman (person. comm.) for suggesting this idea. The external argu-
ment could be PROarb instead of SPEAKER: what exactly the silent external argument is does
not play a critical role for the proposal here. Alternatively it is also plausible that the structure in-
volves object control and a subject PRO in the embedded clause. ([teacheri [SPEAKER ti [PROi
fall] HONOR] rare T]). However, what is important for the proposal here is that the silent pred-
icate HONOR introduces an active vP layer, which allows -rare to combine with a wider range
of predicates than the one appearing in the passive context.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 15:38 F: LA19202.tex / p.25 (1537-1598)
2.6 Summary of the chapter

In this chapter, various properties of the passive -rare have been discussed.17 First,
in Section 2.3 I discuss the distribution of long passives and show that -rare can-
not combine with the aspectual verbs whose merged positions in Cinque’s (1999,
2006) hierarchy are higher than that of the passive -rare. Based on this property,
I propose that the passive morpheme -rare instantiates the Voice projection. In
Section 2.4, I establish the following lexical properties of -rare:
(44) Lexical Properties of -rare
1. It instantiates Passive Voice.
2. It merges with ‘active voice’ v as its complement.
3. It has the EPP feature that attracts a VP layer to its specifier.
4. It comes with an optional dative projection.
Lastly, in Section 2.5 I propose an analysis of subject honorifics, assuming that

-rare contained in subject honorifics is the same one appearing in the passive.
Specifically I argue that in subject honorific constructions, -rare merges with a
silent active voice predicate HONOR, which combines with the vP or VP and
show how this structure accounts for the distributional properties of the subject
honorific construction.
17. Although I did not discuss in this chapter, -rare also has aspectual effects on the predicate
with which it merges.
(i) a. John-ga tabe-tei-ru.

John-nom eat-asp-prs
‘John is eating.’ (Progressive reading)
b. Gohan-ga tabe-rare-tei-ru.
rice-nom eat-pass-asp-prs
‘The rice has been eaten.’ (Perfective/Resultative reading)
(ii) a. John-ga Ken-o nagut-tei-ru.
John-nom Ken-acc hit-asp-prs
‘John is hitting Ken.’ (Progressive)
b. Ken-ga John-ni nagur-are-tei-ru.
Ken-nom John-dat hit-pass-asp-prs
‘Ken is being hit by John.’ (Progressive)
As shown in (i-b), the attachment of -rare to an accomplishment verb yields a resultative in-
terpretation. In contrast, the attachment to an activity verb preserves the activity reading, as
shown in (ii-b). I do not discuss this property of -rare in the chapter, but further structural dis-
tinctions among transitive predicates seem to be necessary in order to account for the different
interpretations associated with the attachment of the passive -rare.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.1 (63-133)
chapter 3
The derived subject in the passive
This chapter is concerned with the behavior of the nominative DP – the derived
subject. I start the discussion by introducing some general properties of Japanese.
Then I address the following questions: What is the external merge position of the
derived subject? How is the nominative DP interpreted? What is the nominative
DP selected by? Given my thesis that passivization is achieved by smuggling and
the general theory outlined in Chapter 2, it must be the case that the nominative
DP is merged as the highest argument within a smuggled VP. This sets boundary
conditions on the analytical options that can be entertained.
3.1 General properties of Japanese
This section introduces two properties of Japanese that are relevant to the dis-
cussion of the passive voice system – the lack of expletives and the behavior of
adpositional Case markers under movement.
3.1.1 The absence of an expletive
As is well known, many languages including Dutch, German, Latin, Classical

Greek, North Russian dialects, Shona (Bantu), Turkish, and Taramahua (Uto-
Aztecan) allow ‘the impersonal passive,’ which is the passive derived from an
intransitive predicate (see Keenan & Dryer 2007: 17). Some impersonal passives
have an expletive in the subject position, and others are subjectless (or having
an expletive pro). The examples given below are taken from Keenan & Dryer
(2007: 17):
(1) a. Er wordt (door de jongens) gefloten.
there became (by the young.men) whistled
Lit. ‘There was whistled by the boys.’ [Dutch]
b. Gestern wurde getanzt.
yesterday became danced
‘Yesterday there was dancing.’ [German]
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.2 (133-194)
c. Ankara-ya gid-il-di.
Ankara-to go-pass-pst
‘It was gone to Ankara / There was a trip to Ankara.’ [Turkish]
d. Tashi goci-ru.
not sleep-pass
‘One doesn’t sleep.’ [Taramahua]
Japanese, on the other hand, allows neither subjectless nor expletive impersonal
passives (Miyagawa 1989: 170), as demonstrated below:
(2) a. *Kinoo (syoonen-{ni/ni-yotte}) odo-rare-ta.
yesterday boy-{dat/ni-yotte} dance-pass-pst
Int. ‘Yesterday there was danced by {the boy/somebody}.’
(cf. Miyagawa 1989:170)
b. *Pari-ni ik-are-ta.
Paris-dat go-pass-pst
Int. ‘It was gone to Paris.’
c. *Ooku-no hito-ni sin-are-ta.
many-no people-dat die-pass-pst
Int. ‘There was died by many people.’
The EPP feature of -rare discussed in Section 2.4.2.1 straightforwardly rules out
(2a) (the lower VP layer does not contain overt material) and (2b) (the lower layer
is not the right kind; it is not a VP but a PP small clause). In contrast, the lexi-
cal properties of -rare given in 2.4.2.1 cannot explain the unacceptability of (2c),
as sin ‘to die’ by itself can be passivized. Following Heycock (1993: 195), Fukui
(1986), Miyagawa (1989: 170), Terada (1990: 216), among others, I assume that
(2c) is unacceptable because Japanese lacks null (or overt) expletives. Without an
expletive, moving a DP to Spec,TP is the only way to satisfy the EPP feature of T
in Japanese passives.
Independent support for this claim is provided by Terada (1990: 216). Predi-
cates such as omo-u ‘think,’ sinzi-ru ‘believe,’ and iw-u ‘say’ optionally participate in
the ECM construction in Japanese, where the subject of the embedded clause can
alternate between ga- and o-markings as long as the embedded clause contains an
individual-level predicate (see Section 6.3 for more information about the ECM
construction in Japanese). Consider the following paradigm:
(3) a. Hitobito-ga [CP John-ga teki-da-to] omot-tei-ru.
people-nom John-nom enemy-cop-c think-asp-prs
‘People think that John is an enemy.’ [Active]
b. Hitobito-ga Johni -o [CP ti teki-da-to] omot-tei-ru.
people-nom John-acc enemy-cop-c think-asp-prs
‘People think that John is an enemy.’ [Raising to Object]
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.3 (194-243)
Chapter 3. The derived subject in the passive 53
c. *?Hitobito-ni [CP John-ga teki-da-to] omow-are-tei-ru.

people-dat John-nom enemy-cop-c think-pass-asp-prs
‘It is thought by people that John is an enemy.’ [No ‘it CP’ expletive]
d. John-ga hitobito-ni ti teki-da-to omow-are-tei-ru.
John-nom people-dat enemy-cop-c think-pass-asp-prs
‘John is thought by people to be an enemy.’ [Passive]
In basic agreement with Terada (1990: 217), I find (3c) very awkward, whereas
(3d), which is the passive corresponding to the -o variant, is completely natural.
Terada (1990) claims that (3d) is an instance of ‘obligatory’ raising from inside the
lower clause to fill the matrix subject position. Significantly, raising to the matrix
clause is no longer optional, which strongly suggests that there is no expletive in
Japanese that can satisfy the EPP feature of T.
In contrast, linguists such as Kuroda (1978), Takahashi (2000), and Hiraiwa
(2005), argue that Japanese has a null expletive, drawing on examples like the
following:
(4) a. Sigure-te-ki-ta.
shower-ger-start-pst
‘It started to shower.’ (Kuroda 1978)
b. Kaigi-de(-wa) depaatomento-no samazamana
meeting-loc-(top) department-no various
mondai-ni-tuite hanasiaw-are-ta.
problems-dat-about discuss-pass-pst
Lit. ‘It was discussed about various problems of the department at the
meeting.’
The sentence given in (4a) containing the verb sigurer-u, which is a verb derived
from a noun sigure, indeed seems to be acceptable without a subject. Nevertheless,
even if (4a) contained an expletive, it would be a weather expletive, which is a
pronoun selected by a restricted set of weather predicates and is different from a
true ‘there’ expletive. (4b), on the other hand, can be analyzed as containing an
overt subject with a dropped -ga (and possibly the silent -ga is headed by a silent
nominal head thing; cf. Kayne 2005), as illustrated below:
(5) Kaigi-de(-wa) [depaatomento-no samazamana
meeting-loc(-top) department-no various
mondai-ni-tuite]-ga hanasiaw-are-ta.
problems-dat-about-nom talk-pass-pst
‘(About) various problems of the department were discussed at the meeting.’
Since the evidence in favor of expletives in Japanese is inconclusive, I assume, in

accordance with Shibatani (1977), Kishimoto (2001: 603), Miyagawa (2001), and
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.4 (243-307)
many others, that Japanese does not have expletives and that the matrix nomina-
tive ga-position must be filled by a non-expletive item by PF in Japanese.
It is these two independent properties of Japanese – the EPP feature of T and
the lack of expletive – that trigger obligatory raising of the DP in the Japanese pas-
sive, but crucially not the Case filter, as in my proposal -rare does not absorb Case
(see 1.7.3.2). Since the ga-position is a non-thematic position, the next question
to address is what can be the external merge position of the ga-marked DP. This
is not always transparent because of the properties of Japanese Case that will be
discussed in the next section.
3.1.2 Movement and case
Generally, it is very difficult to identify whether a derivation involves movement or

base-generation in Japanese. There are two reasons for this. One is that Japanese
makes frequent uses of silent arguments, involving topic drop and null pronouns.
Thus, whether a gap is a trace or a null pronoun is always a matter of debate.
Examples are given below:
(6) a. Kinoo Ken-ga kat-ta.
yesterday Ken-nom buy-pst
‘Yesterday Ken bought it.’ [Topic Drop]
b. Keni -ga [kinoo proi/j hon-o nakusi-ta-to] Naomi-ni
Ken-nom yesterday book-acc lose-pst-c Naomi-dat
tuge-ta.
tell-pst
‘Ken told Naomi that (he) lost a book yesterday.’ [Null Pronoun]
The other reason is that Japanese in general allows neither double-Case marking
(e.g. *hon-ni-ga ‘book-dat-nom’) nor Case stranding in any movement configu-
ration, not restricted to passives. Let me first illustrate this point with examples
from relativization (see also Kameshima 1989: 13, who discusses disappearance of
Case under relativization).
3.1.2.1 Relativization in Japanese

Relative clauses in Japanese are prenominal. They lack relative pronouns, and they
are finite (i.e. they contain the nominative ga and a tense marker (e.g. -ta ‘pst’, -ru
‘non-pst’)), which is said to be crosslinguistically rare (see Keenan 1985b).1
1. The relative clause construction in Japanese has been extensively studied (e.g. Kuno 1973;
Kameshima 1989; Murasugi 2000; among many others), but I do not intend to provide a
comprehensive review of Japanese relative clauses in this section (see Ishizuka 2009: for more
information).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.5 (307-353)
The relativized head marks only the Case in the matrix clause. The following
examples illustrate relativization from different sources:
(7) a. ga-marked agent
Hisyo-ga [[repoota-ga seizika-o koogekisi-ta]
secretary-nom statesman-acc attack-pst
repootai ]-o oikake-ta.
reporter-acc chase-pst
‘The secretary chased the reporter who attacked the statesman.’
b. o-marked theme
[[Seizika-ga repoota-o koogekisi-ta] repootai ]-ga hisyo-o
statesman-nom attack-pst reporter-nom secretary-acc
home-ta.
praise-pst
‘The reporter who the statesman attacked praised the secretary.’
(8) a. ni-marked goal
[[Seizika-ga repootaa-ni tomodati-o syookaisi-ta] repootaa]-ga
statesman-nom friend-acc introduce-pst reporter-nom
hisyo-o home-ta.
secretary-acc praise-pst
‘The reporter who the statesman introduced his friend to praised the
secretary.’
b. kara-marked source
[[Doroboo-ga ginkoo-kara Naomi-no yokin-o nusun-da]
thief-nom Naomi-no savings-acc steal-pst
ginkoo]-wa hyooban-ga yoku-nai.
bank-top reputation-nom good-neg
‘The bank from which a thief stole Naomi’s savings has a bad reputation.’
c. no-marked possessor
[[Syoozyo-no kaban-ga nakunat-ta] syoozyo]-ga nai-ta.
bag-nom disappear-pst girl-nom cry-pst
‘The girl whose bag disappeared cried.’
d. de-marked instrumental
[[Naomi-ga naihu-de niku-o kit-ta] naihu-wa togat-tei-ta.
Naomi-nom meat-acc cut-pst] knife-top sharp-asp-pst
‘The knife which Naomi cut meat with was sharp.’
e. de-marked locative
[[Ken-ga mise-de hon-o kat-ta] mise]-ga atarasii.
Ken-nom book-acc buy-pst shop-nom be.new
‘The shop where Ken bought the book is new.’
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f. de-marked manner
[[Ken-ga hoohoo-de mondai-o toi-ta] hoohoo]-ga
Ken-nom problem-acc solve-pst way-nom
siri-ta-i.
know-want-prs
‘(I) want to know the way Ken solved the problem.’
g. de-marked reason
[[Ken-ga riyuu-de kaet-ta] riyuu]-ga wakat-ta.
Ken-nom go.home-pst reason-nom figure.out-pst
‘(I) figured out the reason Ken went home.’
h. ni-marked temporal
[[Ken-ga hi-ni hon-o kat-ta] hi]-o omoidasi-ta.
Ken-nom book-acc buy-pst day-acc recall-pst
‘(I) recalled the day Ken bought the book.’
As illustrated above, the original ga-, o-, ni-, kara-, no-, and de-markings are oblig-
atory absent.2 It is not very surprising that the ga- and o-markings disappear
under relativization (see (7)), since this is also the case with English relativization.
What is unexpected is the disappearance of ni-, kara-, no-, and de-markings (see
the corresponding English translations involving P-stranding in (8)). Because of
the absence of the original Case-markings or postpositions, it is often difficult to
identify a gap corresponding to the relativized head. In fact, many relative clauses
are alleged to be gapless because of this reason, and many linguists have analyzed
Japanese relative clauses as derived by base-generation (Perlmutter 1972; Murasugi
2000; Fukui & Takano 2000; among others). However, as shown below, Japanese
relative clauses exhibit reconstruction effects in terms of pronominal/anaphor
binding, effects that are considered to be a reliable diagnostic for movement (see
also Ishii 1991; Hoshi 2004; Ishizuka 2008):3
2. Note that this does not mean that all the DPs with ni-, de-, kara-, and no-markings can
undergo relativization.
3. There are well-known cases that appear to violate subjacency (Kuno 1973; among many
others). However, I show in Ishizuka (2009) that they are cases of local relativization with a pro
inside the relative island (see Han & Kim 2004; Ishizuka 2009, for further discussion). Addition-
ally, I argue that the following well-known gapless example is a relative clause corresponding to
the English ‘when’ relative:
(i) [sakana-ga yakeru] nioi

fish-nom is.grilled smell
‘the smell when a fish is grilled’
The Japanese phrase means exactly what the English translation means. Even in English, there is
no obvious gap that corresponds to the head noun ‘smell.’ The actual meaning of this phrase is
‘the smell (that comes about) when a fish is grilled.’ Presumably, the Japanese phrase (i) contains
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(9) a. [Keni -ga tj mituke-ta] [kare-zisini -no syasin]j

Ken-nom find-pst him-self-no picture
‘the picture of himselfi which Keni found’
b. [[dare-moi (-ga) mada t j sira-nai] [zibuni -no kekkonaite]j ]-no
indet-mo(-nom) yet know-neg self-no spouse-no
e
picture
‘the picture of self ’si spouse whom no onei knows yet’
The availability of reconstruction effects proves that the derivation of relative

clauses in Japanese involves movement despite the fact that the moved DP does
not retain its original Case-marking. We will see below that the situation with
Case under passivization in Japanese is very similar to relativization and very dif-
ferent from languages like Icelandic, where (inherent) Case is preserved under
passivization (cf. Zaenen et al. 1985; Maling & Sigurjónsdóttir 2002).
3.1.2.2 Disappearance of case under passivization

We have already seen examples in which accusative Case of the DP in the ac-
tive voice disappears in the passive counterpart, which I refer to as the accusative
passive. This is a core property of passive constructions crosslinguistically.
(10) a. Naomi-ga Ken-o tatai-ta. Active
Naomi-nom Ken-acc hit-pst
‘Naomi hit Ken.’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni tatak-are–ta. Passive
‘Ken was hit by Naomi.’ [A:mean 4.88]
What is surprising is that the same pattern holds with the Dative ni- and Genitive
no-markings.4 (11b) and (12b) are instances of ni-deletion, while (13b) is an in-
stance of no-deletion triggered by passivization. The θ-role of the nominative DP
in (11b) and (12b) corresponds to goal in (11a) and directional in (12a) re-
spectively. The θ-role of the nominative DP in (13b) corresponds to possessor in
its active counterpart.
(11) a. Ken-ga Mary-ni hon-o watasi-ta. Active
Ken-nom Mary-dat book-acc hand-pst
‘Ken handed Mary a book.’
the same silent materials as its English counterpart does in addition to a silent head ‘time’ (cf.
Kayne 2005).
4. Unlike relativization, the locative de-marked DP cannot be raised to the nominative position
in the passive.
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b. Mary-(*ni)-ga Ken-ni hon-o watas-are-ta. Passive

Mary-(*dat)-nom Ken-dat book-acc hand-pass-pst
‘Mary was handed a book by Ken.’
(12) a. Mary-ga John-ni hohoen-da. Active
Mary-nom John-dat smile-pst
‘Mary smiled at John.’ [A:mean 4.93]
b. John-(*ni)-ga Mary-ni hohoem-are-ta. Passive
John-(*dat)-nom Mary-dat smile-pass-pst
‘John was smiled at by Mary.’ [A:mean 3.38]
(13) a. Naomi-ga Ken-no kao-o tatai-ta. Active
Naomi-nom Ken-no face-acc hit-pst
‘Naomi hit Ken’s face.’
b. Keni -(*no)-ga Naomi-ni kaoi/*j -o tatak-are-ta. Passive
Ken-(*no)-nom Naomi-dat face-acc hit-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was hit (his) face by Naomi.’ [A:mean 4.82]
If we compare the Japanese sentence (12b) with its English translation, the differ-
ence between the two languages is evident: in English it is easy to identify where
the derived subject originates because of the stranded overt preposition ‘at.’
Comparing the Japanese pattern with languages like Icelandic further high-
lights the uniqueness of this phenomenon in Japanese. In Icelandic, where the Case
marking shows up DP internally and not DP externally as in Japanese, dative Case
is preserved under (verbal) passivization, as illustrated below (Zaenen et al. 1985):
(14) a. Skipstjórinn sökkti skipinu (Zaenen and Maling 1990: 143)
the.captan.nom sank the.ship.dat
‘The captain sank the ship.’ Active
b. Skipinu var sökkt af skipstjóranum
the.ship.dat was sunk by the.captain.dat
‘The ship was sunk by the captain.’ Passive
In contrast to Icelandic, the derived subject in Japanese always carries the Case of
the derived position, i.e. nominative, or if it further undergoes topicalization, the
topic marker -wa.
As with relativization, many Japanese passives are alleged to be gapless due to
the apparent lack of a gap corresponding to the nominative DP. The literature has
accounted for the different properties observed among passives by distinguishing
many different kinds of Japanese passives, including direct passives, indirect pas-
sives, possessor passives, ni-passives, and ni-yotte passives. In cases like accusative
passives, identifying an active source of the nominative DP is straightforward.
The question is whether all Japanese passives can be analyzed as having an active
source. If ‘yes,’ then a unified analysis is within reach. This is exactly the direction
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.9 (521-576)
I pursue in this book. One of the goals of this chapter is to show that many pur-
ported indirect gapless passives are passives involving movement of the DP out of
an oblique position to the ga-position with an absence of the original postposi-
tion. The remainder of this chapter focuses on identifying the active source of the
derived subject in the passive, by examining its interpretation. One of the major
findings is that the potential active source for the derived subject in the passive is
not restricted to theme but in fact corresponds to a wider variety of arguments.
Section 3.2 examines the accusative passive that is derived from a transitive
predicate. Section 3.3 discusses passives that contain ditransitive predicates. Sec-
tion 3.4 investigates passivization of causatives. Section 3.5 deals with the psuedo-
passive that contains intransitive predicates. Section 3.6 discusses the possessor
passive, whose nominative DP corresponds to the possessor of the (underlying)
internal argument of the embedded predicate. Lastly, Section 3.7 deals with the
extra-thematic passive, whose nominative DP indeed lacks an active source.
3.2 The accusative passive
The accusative passives that are given in (15a) and (16a) are proto-typical passives,
where a theme argument bearing accusative Case in the active voice occupies the
nominative position in the passive:5
(15) a. Ken-ga keisatu-ni tukamae-rare-ta.
‘Ken was caught by the police.’ [Acc. passive]
b. Keisatu-ga Ken-o tukamae-ta.
‘The police caught Ken.’ [Active]
(16) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni ais-are-tei-ru.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat love-pass-asp-pst
‘Ken is loved by Naomi.’ [Acc. passive]
b. Naomi-ga Ken-o aisi-tei-ru.
Naomi-nom Ken-acc love-asp-prs
‘Naomi loves Ken.’ [Active]
Animate DPs (e.g. (15a) and (16a)) are not the only type of DP that can occupy the
nominative position. Inanimate DPs, abstract DPs, and sentential DPs may also
5. Many examples in this section contain an overt dative by-phrase without parentheses, but
this does not mean that the by-phrase cannot be omitted in all of these cases. See Section 5.3.2.1,
which discusses the omittability of the dative by-phrase in Japanese passives.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.10 (576-623)
occupy this position. Note that all the passive examples below include an overt
dative by-phrase:
(17) Inanimate DP
a. Ken-no omotya-ga Naomi-ni kowas-are-ta.
Ken-no toy-nom Naomi-dat break-pass-pst
‘Ken’s toy was broken by Naomi.’ Passive
b. Naomi-ga Ken-no omotya-o kowasi-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-no toy-acc break-pst
‘Naomi broke Ken’s toy.’ Active
(18) Abstract DP
a. Naomi-no doryoku-ga ryoosin-ni yatto mitome-rare-ta.
Naomi-no effort-nom parents-dat at.last acknowledge-pass-pst
‘Naomi’s efforts were finally acknowledged by her parents.’ Passive
b. Ryoosin-ga yatto Naomi-no doryoku-o mitome-ta.
parents-nom at.last Naomi-no efforts-acc acknowledge-pst
‘Naomi’s parents finally acknowledged her efforts.’ Active
(19) Sentential DP
a. [Ken-ga heya-o deteitta-no]-{ga/wa} Naomi-ni
Ken-nom room-acc went.out-no-{nom/top} Naomi-dat
mokugeki.s-are-ta.
witness.do-pass-pst
‘That Ken went out of the room was witnessed by Naomi.’ Passive
b. Naomi-ga [Ken-ga heya-o deteitta-no]-o mokugeki-si-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-nom room-acc went.out-no-acc witness-do-pst
‘Naomi witnessed that Ken went out of the room.’ Active
All the above passives are completely natural to me (see Section 6.4.2 for more
examples with a non-animate derived subjects). These examples show that -rare
does not select for an animate argument. Some linguists, such as Kuroda (1979),
Kitagawa & Kuroda (1992), Hoshi (1994), Huang (1999), argue that -rare always
assigns an experiencer or affectee θ-role and propose a control analysis (see
Section 6.4.3.1 for more discussion), but if so, the above examples are unexpected.6
The nominative DPs in (17a), (18a), and (19a) are uniquely selected by the verb
6. Although there are many cases where the nominative DP can be an inanimate or abstract
DP or proposition, as exemplified in (19a), there are also cases where an inanimate/abstract DP
is awkward with an overt dative by-phrase. Nevertheless, this is not because -rare subcategorizes
for animate or sentient DPs but is due to the structure of the complement of -rare. The cases
where the derived subject appears to be incompatible with inanimate or abstract DPs will be
extensively discussed in Section 3.3.2.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.11 (623-679)
embedded under -rare. The derivation, therefore, must involve movement (more
evidence for movement is given in Chapter 6). The lexical properties of -rare es-
tablished in Chapter 2 and the properties of accusative passives discussed above
yield the following derivation.
a. Keni -ga keisatu-ni ti tukama.e-rare-ta.
‘Ken was caught by the police.’
b. TP
DP
Ken-ga VoiceP T
pst
VP
vP -rare
DP V
DP
Ken catch VP v
police
This derivation does not show how the external argument receives the dative
marking – a matter that I will defer until Section 3.3.2.4.
3.3 Dative and source passives derived from ditransitive verbs
As is well-documented, the Japanese passive allows raising of the goal argument

of ditransitive predicates, such as atae-ru ‘to give/provide,’ okur-u ‘to send/present,’
suisen.su-ru ‘to recommend,’ syookai.su-ru ‘to introduce,’ and watas-u ‘to give (by
hand)’ (e.g. Inoue 1976: 77; Shibatani 1978: 141; Kubo 1992; Kazenin 2001: 902).
Examples coupled with their active counterparts are given below:
(21) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni labuletaa-o watas-are-ta. [A:mean 3.89]
Ken-nom Naomi-dat love.letter-acc hand-pass-pst
‘Ken was handed a love letter by Naomi.’ Goal Passive
b. Naomi-ga Ken-ni labuletaa-o watasi-ta. [A:mean 4.96]
Naomi-nom Ken-dat love.letter-acc hand-pst
‘Naomi handed Ken a love letter.’ Active
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(22) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni koibito-o syookai.s-are-ta.

Ken-nom Naomi-dat boyfriend-acc introduce.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was introduced her boyfriend to by Naomi.’ Goal Passive
b. Naomi-ga Ken-ni koibito-o syookai.si-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-dat boyfriend-acc introduce.do-pst
‘Naomi introduced her boyfriend to Ken.’ Active
Raising of the goal of the ditransitive predicate is always possible in Japanese pas-
sives. This suggests that the goal must have been the highest DP in a moved VP;
therefore, the derivation must have the following minimal properties:
(23) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni hon-o watas-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat book-acc hand-pass-pst
‘Ken was handed a book by Naomi.’
b. TP
DP
VoiceP T
Ken-ga
pst
VP
vP -rare
SC V Naomi
VP v
DP hand
have DP
Ken
book-acc
1. The theme DP receives o-marking as it always does in the active voice ditran-
sitive construction.
2. -rare merges with active voice v, satisfying the complementation property of
-rare.
3. -rare attracts the VP containing the accusative DP to its specifier, stranding the
vP layer (this step satisfies the EPP feature of -rare).
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4. The goal, Ken, moves out of the small clause as it always does in the derivation
of the active voice ditransitive construction, and it moves to Spec,TP satisfying
the EPP feature of T.7
3.3.1 Addressee of ‘verbs of speaking’
In addition to the goal of regular ditransitive verbs, the dative object of ‘verbs
of speaking’ can be a source of the nominative DP in the passive. The dative
object of ‘verbs of speaking’ is an addressee (or recepient of information);
speech is always directed to an addressee. Even in cases where a speaker is talk-
ing to himself, this speaker has a second role as an addressee. This class of verb
includes ziman.su-ru ‘to boast,’ kokuhaku.su-ru ‘to confess,’ sasayak-u ‘to whis-
per,’ sengen.su-ru ‘to announce,’ sir.ase-ru ‘to inform,’ happyoo.su-ru ‘to announce,’
hookoku.su-ru ‘to report,’ and so forth, and these verbs often contain a light verb
su-ru ‘to do.’ Some examples are given below ((25a) is adapted from Kuno 1973):
(24) a. Bokusi-ga Ken-ni tumi-o kokuhaku.s-are-ta. Passive
priest-nom Ken-dat sin-acc confession.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The priest was confessed Ken’s sin to by Ken.’ [A:mean 3.82]
b. Ken-ga bokusi-ni tumi-o kokuhaku.si-ta. Active
Ken-nom priest-dat sin-acc confession.do-pst
‘Ken confessed his sin to a priest.’ [A:mean 4.99]
(25) a. John-ga Maryi -ni zibuni -no koto-o ziman.s-are-ta. Passive
John-nom Mary-dat self-no matter-acc boast.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘John was bragged to by Mary about self ’s (=Mary’s) matter.’
[A:mean 3.19]
b. Maryi -ga John-ni zibuni -no koto-o ziman.si-ta. Active
Mary-nom John-dat self-no matter-acc boast.do-pst
‘Mary bragged about self ’s matter (=Mary’s) to John.’ [A:mean 4.55]
Many instances of passives containing a ‘verb of speaking’ are said to be gapless.

The addressee of ‘verbs of speaking’ is considered neither a core argument of the
verb nor a potential source of the derived subject. Without an active source, it is
commonly treated as an experiencer or affectee selected by the passive mor-
pheme -(r)are. Kuno’s (1973) well-cited Example (25a) is a representative case.
Kuno (1973) refers to (25a) as an example of the indirect passive, whose nomi-
native DP does not have a corresponding active source bearing the same θ-role.
7. The minimality problem of moving ‘book’ over the intervening ‘Ken’ to the accusative pro-
jection is probably solved by predicate inversion (den Dikken & Næss 1993), which is not shown
in the tree. We will come back to this issue in Section 3.3.2.3.
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However, since the nominative DPs in (24a) and (25a) must be interpreted as ad-
dressees for the passives to be felicitous, I conclude that they are licensed as the
addressee argument of the ‘verb of speaking.’
3.3.2 Theme-raising of the passivized ditransitive verb
What has not been discussed in the literature is what happens if one tries to raise
the theme of the ditransitive predicate in the Japanese passive that contains an
overt dative goal phrase. Interestingly, the theme of the passivized ditransitive
verb cannot move to the nominative position if the goal and agent are both overt.
(26) a. *Hanataba-ga Ken-ni (kinoo) Naomi-ni watas-are-ta.
bouquet-nom Ken-dat yesterday Naomi-dat hand-pass-pst
Int. ‘The flower bouquet was given to Naomi by Ken (yesterday).’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni (kinoo) hanataba-o watasi-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat yesterday flower.bouquet-acc hand-pst
‘Ken gave Naomi a flower bouquet (yesterday).’
(27) a. *Naomi-ga tomodati-ni (kinoo) Ken-ni syookais-are-ta.
Naomi-nom friend-dat yesterday Ken-dat introduce-pass-pst
Int. ‘Naomi was introduced to Ken by (her) friend (yesterday).’
b. Tomodati-ga Ken-ni (kinoo) Naomi-o syookaisi-ta.
friend-nom Ken-dat yesterday Naomi-acc introduce-pst
‘The friend introduced Naomi to Ken (yesterday).’
Inserting kinoo ‘yesterday’ between the two dative phrases does not improve the
grammaticality of the sentence, which indicates that the two accusative passives are
not degraded because of the linear adjacency of dative phrases. Furthermore, (27a)
shows that regardless of the animacy of the derived subject, accusative passives
with overt goal and agent DPs are not acceptable. I will simply characterize this
phenomenon as a ban against double datives in the Japanese passive:
(28) Double-ni Constraint on Japanese Passives
Two datives cannot surface in a passive sentence in Japanese.
As expected, the same pattern holds with the passive derived from a ‘verb of
speaking,’ which I refer to as the pseudo-ditransitive verb.
(29) a. *Ken-no himitu-ga otooto-ni tomodati-ni baras-are-ta.
Ken-no secret-nom brother-dat friend-dat reveal-pass-pst
Int. ‘Ken’s secret was revealed to his friend by his brother.’
[A:mean 2.22 (s.d. 1.36)]
b. Otooto-ga tomodati-ni Ken-no himitu-o barasi-ta.
brother-nom friend-dat Ken-no secret-acc reveal-pst
‘The brother revealed Ken’s secret to his friend.’ Active
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(30) a. *Syuusen-ga daitooryoo-ni kokumin-ni sengens-are-ta.

end.of.war-nom president-dat people-dat announce-pass-pst
Int. ‘The end of the war was announced to the people by the president.’
b. Daitooryoo-ga kokumin-ni syuusen-o sengensi-ta. Active
president-nom people-dat end.of.war-acc announce-pst
‘The president announced the end of the war to the people.’
[C:mean 4.89 (s.d. 0.46)]
Both (29a) and (30a) are entirely unacceptable to me.8 Then what happens if one
of the two dative phrases is suppressed? The next section addresses this question.
3.3.2.1 When one of the two dative phrases is suppressed

When one of the two dative DPs is suppressed in the passive derived from a
(pseudo)-ditransitive verb, the passive becomes well-formed, but the dative DP
can only be interpreted as the indirect object (or internal argument), to wit the
goal or addressee. The dative by-phrase (external argument) reading is unavail-
able (or at least very difficult to obtain in pragmatically neutral context).
(31) The Accusative Passive Containing a Ditransitive
a. Hanataba-ga Naomi-ni watas-are-ta.
bouquet-nom Naomi-dat hand-pass-pst
‘The flower bouquet was given {to/*by} Naomi (by someone) yesterday.’
b. Naomi-ga Ken-ni syookais-are-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-dat introduce-pass-pst
Int. ‘Naomi was introduced {to/*by} Ken (by someone) yesterday.’
(32) The Accusative Passive Containing a ‘Verb of Speaking’
a. Ken-no himitu-ga Naomi-ni baras-are-ta.
Ken-no secret-nom Naomi-dat reveal-pass-pst
‘Ken’s secret was revealed {to/*by} Naomi.’ [A:mean 4.50 (s.d. .89)]
b. Syuusen-ga kokumin-ni sengens-are-ta.
end.of.war-nom people-dat announce-pass-pst
‘The end of the war was announced to the people.’
[C:mean 4.44 (s.d. 1.06)]
c. Syuusen-ga daitooryoo-ni sengens-are-ta.
end.of.war-nom president-dat announce-pass-pst
‘The end of the war was announced {to/*by} the President.’
[B:mean 3.19 (s.d. 1.43)]
8. The high standard deviation from the questionnaire results reveals a considerable amount
of speaker variability with respect to the acceptability of (29a), but the majority rejected the
sentence: 49 out of 74 participants rated (29a) as 1 or 2. 11 participants rated it as 3, and 14
participants rated it as 4 or 5.
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The dative DPs in the above passives are compatible with the goal or addressee
readings, but not with the dative by-phrase reading. Although the mean ratings
from the questionnaire do not reveal how the participants interpreted the da-
tive phrase, the contrast between (32b) and (32c) is insightful. The two passives
were designed to manipulate real-world plausibility by choosing different dative
phrases. The dative phrase ‘people’ in (32b) is a plausible addressee but an im-
plausible agent. Whereas the dative phrase ‘president’ in (32c) is ambiguous: the
agentive reading is the more plausible, but the addressee interpretation is also
available. A somewhat lower mean rating and the larger variability in (32c) can
be understood as the conflict between real-world plausibility and the available
reading that the syntax allows. Namely, some participants found the President as
a plausible agent, but the agent reading of the dative P was not available, thus
resulting in larger variability and lower mean rating.
The observation made above is a very important property of Japanese passives,
which is summarized below:
(33) The Dative DP in the Ditransitive Passive Must Be a Goal
In Japanese passives, whenever the complement of -rare is a (pseudo-)ditrans-
itive verb, the dative phrase in the passive is interpreted as the internal dative
argument and not as the external argument.
3.3.2.2 Traditional characterization of the property: Sensitivity to animacy

The distribution of the accusative passive derived from a ditransitive predicate has
been characterized somewhat differently from (33) in the literature. It has been
taken to show that an inanimate or abstract DP cannot be the nominative DP in
the passive when it contains an overt dative by-phrase (traditionally, referred to
as the ni-passive). This generalization seems to be based on two facts underly-
ing the phenomenon given in (33). First, the theme of the ditransitive predicate
is usually an inanimate or abstract DP (e.g. (31a), (32a), and (32b)). Second,
the dative phrase in the accusative passive derived from a (pseudo-)ditransitive
predicate is incompatible with an agentive by-phrase reading (i.e. (33)). Conse-
quently, the generalization holds only when the accusative passive is derived from
a (pseudo-)ditransitive predicate, which we already know from counter-examples
like (17a), (18a), and (19a).
The purported generalization that the passive is sensitive to animacy has led
linguists, such as Kuroda (1979), Kitagawa & Kuroda (1992), and Hoshi (1994),
to treat ni-passives as a natural class and distinguish them from those that do not
contain a dative by-phrase (which is not a distinction I adopt here) (see Chapter 4).
Moreover, it has been used to argue in favor of a ‘control’ analysis of Japanese
passives. However, neither the generalization nor the control analysis accounts for
when the animacy restriction holds and when it does not.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.17 (967-1024)
The following is a well-cited example, which is used as illustrating the sensi-

tivity to animacy (originally from Inoue 1976: 83; also cited in Kuroda 1979; Hoshi
1994; Goro 2006: 187; Park & Whitman 2003; among others):
(34) *Kaikai-ga gityoo-ni sengen.s-are-ta.
opening-nom chairman-dat announce.do-pass-pst
Int. ‘The opening of the meeting was announced by the chairman.’
(but the reading ‘to the chairman’ is ok)
In agreement with the literature, I find (34) unacceptable with the intended by-
phrase reading of the dative DP. However, note that the complement of -rare is
sengensu-ru ‘to announce’ – a ‘verb of speaking’ – the same predicate as the one
contained in (32b) and (32c). The reason (34) is awkward is basically the same
explanation given in the context of (32c). The only available reading of the dative
phrase is addressee, but our real-world knowledge tells us that gityoo ‘chairman’
should be the agent. The conflict between the available reading of the dative phrase
and real-world plausibility gives us the impression that (34) is ungrammatical.
As predicted, once we change the dative phrase to a plausible addressee, the pas-
sive becomes acceptable with the addressee interpretation of the dative phrase, as
shown below:
(35) Kaikai-ga sensyu-ni sengen.s-are-ta.
opening-nom players-dat announce.do-pass-pst
Int. ‘The opening of the meeting was announced {to/*by} the players.’
The bias to interpret the dative DP as the internal argument of the embedded pred-
icate is a pervasive and very important property of Japanese passives, since it has
yielded a false impression that -rare in ni-passives is incompatible with inanimate
or abstract DPs (however, recall the counter-examples, (17), (18a), and (19)).
The following two examples are also well-cited in the literature to illustrate the
animacy effect in the passive:
(36) a. Fermat-no teiri-ga John-ni shoomei.s-are-ta.
Fermat-no theorem-nom John-dat prove.do-pass-pst
‘Fermat’s theorem was proved {to/*by} John.’ (Kuroda 1992: 206)
b. Siroi booru-ga Oo-ni takadakato utiage-rare-ta.
white ball-nom Oh-dat high hit.up-pass-pst
Int. ‘A white ball was hit high in the air {to/*by} Oh.’ (Kuroda 1979: 309)
Although it is not immediately obvious, both of the predicates embedded under

-rare are pseudo-ditransitives, which are compatible with an internal dative DP.
The predicate contained in the first example assigns theme and (optionally) goal,
as the following examples show:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.18 (1024-1075)
(37) a. Ken-ga John-ni Fermat-no teiri-o syoomei.si-ta.

Ken-nom John-dat Fermat-no theorem-acc prove.do-pst
‘Ken proved Fermat’s theorem to John.’
b. Bengosi-ga kenzi-ni syoonen-no muzitu-o
attroney-nom prosecutor-dat boy-no innocence-acc
syoomei.si-ta.
prove-pst
‘The attroney proved the boy’s innocence to the prosecutor.’
The dative goal in the active can move and occupy the nominative position in the
passive:
(38) a. John-ga Ken-ni Fermat-no teiri-o syoomei.s-are-ta.
John-nom Ken-dat Fermat-no theorem-acc prove.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘John was proved the Fermat’s theorem to by Ken.’ Dat. PSV
b. Kenzi-ga bengosi-ni syoonen-no muzitu-o
prosecutor-nom lawyer-dat boy-no innocence-acc
syoomei.s-are-ta. Dat. PSV
prove.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The prosecutor was proved the boy’s innocence to by the lawyer.’
Similarly, the predicate utiage-ru ‘to hit up’ in (36b) involves directed motion,
and verbs of directed motion are in general compatible with a directional dative
phrase. The following examples illustrate this point:
(39) a. Oo-ga siroi booru-o gaiyaseki-ni utiage-ta.
Oh-nom white ball-acc outfield.bleacher-dat hit.up-pst
Lit. ‘Oh (the player) hit the white ball to the outfield bleachers.’ Active
b. Siroi booru-ga (Oo-ni-yotte) gaiyaseki-ni utiage-rare-ta.
white ball-nom Oh-ni-yotte outfield.bleacher-dat hit.up-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The white ball was hit to the outerfield bleachers (by means of Oh).’
Passive
The sentence (39a) shows that the verb utiage-ru ‘to hit.up’ is compatible with
a directional dative phrase. (39b) shows that the dative phrase in the passive is
indeed interpreted as a directional phrase.9 The problem with (36a) and (36b) is
that a by-phrase reading of the dative phrases John-ni and Oo-ni is blocked because
9. ni-yotte is another way to introduce the agent of the embedded predicate. The different
forms used to introduce the external argument of the complement of -rare and their distribu-
tions will be discussed in Section 4. Although the indirect object that expresses the endpoint
of directed motion blocks the by-phrase reading of the dative DP in the passive, it cannot be
promoted to the nominative DP in the passive. The reason for this contrast will be left to future
research.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.19 (1075-1131)
of the presence of the indirect object dative DP. This is also the case with creation
verbs, such as tate-ru ‘to build,’ kak-u ‘to write,’ tukur-u ‘to make/prepare,’ and
ryoorisu-ru ‘to cook.’
(40) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni ie-o tate-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat house-acc build-pst
‘Ken built a house for Naomi.’
b. Ie-ga Naomi-ni tate-rare-ta.
house-nom Naomi-dat build-pass-pst
‘The house was built {for/*by} Naomi.’
The analytical question is why dative Case must map onto the internal argument
and not onto the external argument in this configuration. The current research
program pursues a minimalist answer and tries to reduce it to necessary properties
of the derivation.
3.3.2.3 The accusative passive derived from ditransitive verbs

In the previous sections I have established the following two properties of the di-
transitive passive: (1) two datives cannot surface in a passive sentence in Japanese
(cf. (28)); and (2) dative Case must map onto the internal argument, and not onto
the external argument. We will address these properties below and implement
them into the structure.
As for the first property – why Japanese passives disallow two dative Cases (i.e.
one from the embedded predicate and one from -rare), my proposal is that the
indirect object dative Case introduced by the ditransitive predicate is a dependent
Case (i.e. its availability is contingent on the presence of accusative Case). There-
fore, the dative Case is unavailable in accusative passives, since they do not contain
an accusative DP.
This is also the case with the dative in the causative construction. In the tra-
ditional causative literature, this effect is characterized as the manifestation of a
well-known ‘Double-o Constraint’ – more than one occurrence of o in a simplex
clause is prohibited (Harada 1973).10
(41) a. Ken-ga Naomi-{?*ni/o} odor-ase-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-{?*dat/acc} dance-caus-pst
‘Ken made Naomi dance.’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-{ni/*o} dansu-o odor-ase-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-{dat/*acc} dance-acc dance-caus-pst
‘Ken made Naomi dance a dance.’
10. There is interspeaker variability with respect to accepting ni causee in intransitive

causatives (see Homer & Ishizuka 2009 for more information): the judgments provided here
are mine.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.20 (1131-1183)
If the indirect object dative Case in Japanese is also a dependent Case, it will be
no longer available in the accusative passive, since this passive does not contain
an accusative DP. Consequently, only one dative Case, which is dependent on the
presence of -rare, is available in the accusative passive.
Unavailability of a by-phrase reading of the dative DP shows that the da-
tive Case provided by -rare is “used up” by the goal DP in this configura-
tion, leaving PRO as the only option for the external argument.11 How can
this derivation be achieved, conforming to the analysis developed thus far in
this book? This property can be accounted for if the dative projection is higher
than -rare (i.e. the dative selects for Voice). In this structure, the goal argu-
ment, not the external argument, must move to the dative projection provided
by -rare, because the goal DP contained in the moved VP is closer to the da-
tive projection than the external argument within the vP. Namely, the goal is
attracted to Spec,DatP by virtue of the principle of attract closest. This structure is
sketched below:
(42) a. Hon-ga Naomi-ni watas-are-ta.
book-nom Naomi-dat hand-pass-pst
‘The book was handed to Naomi.’
b. [Naomi-dat [ [VP [SC Naomi book] V ]j [[vP PRO VP v ] rare ] ]
Although this derivation successfully accounts for the obligatory goal reading of
the dative phrase, it creates a new problem for minimality: in this derivation, the
theme must move out of the smuggled VP and map onto the ga-Case position
crossing Naomi-ni.
One option is to assume, as is often the case in the literature, that both
merger orders – [goal theme] and [theme goal] – are available in Japanese
(e.g. Miyagawa 1997; Miyagawa & Tsujioka 2004), and that the accusative pas-
sive derived from a ditransitive predicate has the latter configuration. How-
ever, based on the data on non-idiomatic ditransitive nominals, Kishimoto
(2008) convincingly shows that with ordinary ditransitive verbs, only the dative-
accusative order is available as base-generated order. In nominalization, the
ordering of no-marked arguments reflects their base-generated order. Now con-
sider the following examples of sa-nominalization adapted from Kishimoto
(2008: 167):
11. Ni-yot-te is a clausal adjunct (see Section 4.3.2), and the DP in the ni-yot-te is selected by
the verb yor ‘to cause.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.21 (1183-1264)
(43) a. Himawari-ni mizu-o atae-ru.

sunflower-dat water-acc give-prs
‘(I) give water to sunflowers.’
b. himawari-no mizu-no atae-niku-sa [Possessor Goal]
sunflower-no water-no give-difficult-nmlz
‘the difficulty of giving water to sunflowers’
c. ?*mizu-no himawari-no atae-niku-sa
water-no sunflower-no give-difficult-nmlz
Int. ‘the difficulty of giving water to sunflowers’
(44) a. Beranda-ni sentakumono-o da-su.
veranda-dat laundry-acc let.out-prs
‘(I) put the laundry on the veranda.’
b. beranda-no sentakumono-no dasi-niku-sa [Locative Goal]
veranda-no laundry-no let.out-difficulty-nmlz
‘the difficulty to put the laundry on the veranda’
c. ?*sentakumono-no beranda-no dasi-niku-sa
laundry-no veranda-no let.out-difficulty-nmlz
Int. ‘the difficulty to put the laundry on the veranda’
In both examples, the nominalization with [Goal-Theme] order is well-formed,

while that with [Theme-Goal] order is not. Hence, these examples show that both
types of goals – Possessor and Locative – can be only base-generated to the left of
theme.12
In addition, there are at least two pieces of evidence that support Kishimoto’s
claim that only [Dat-Acc] is the base-generated order. First, the theme DP can al-
ways reconstruct under the goal DP in Japanese ditransitive passives (which will
be discussed extensively in Section 6.2). The availability of reconstruction effects
shows that the theme must be lower than the goal at one point in the deriva-
tion. Second, the Case alignment in Japanese idioms is almost always [Goal-dat
Theme-(acc)].13 Given the premise that rigid idioms are interpretable only when
reflecting the base ordering of arguments (see Larson 1988; Harley 2002; among
12. What is important for the discussion here is that both types of dative arguments are gen-
erated higher than the accusative argument. Whether all the ni-marked arguments, possessor or
locative, occupy the same syntactic position or not is irrelevant for the minimality problem.
13. I would like to thank Yukiko Asano for sharing her Japanese idiom data. One idiom that
appears in [DP-o DP-ni] order is the following:
(i) kitune-o uma-ni nose-ta yoo

fox-acc horse-dat put.on-past as.if
Lit. ‘as if (you) put a fox on a horse’ (meaning: restless, untrustworthy)
However, according to the dictionary, you can also say ‘uma-ni kitune-o nose-ta yoo.’ Hence, it
is very likely that this idiom is originally generated by scrambling the [Dat-Acc] order. Unlike
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.22 (1264-1300)
others), this is unexpected if both [goal-theme] and [theme-goal] orders are

equally available as a base-generated order in regular ditransitive constructions.14
(45) a. tateita-ni mizu
standing.board-dat(at) water
‘to speak fluently/eloquently’ [Locative Goal]
b. oni-ni kanaboo
orge-dat(with) iron.stick
‘to make a strong person even stronger’ [Possessive Goal]
These idioms are frozen (or lexical) idioms, and do not allow scrambling or in-
sertion of a particle, such as wa or mo (see Kishimoto 2008 for more information
about idioms).
If we were to posit the [theme-goal] order in order to avoid minimality ef-
fects, we would have to say that this configuration appears only in the accusative
‘passive’ context, since the [DP-acc DP-dat] order never surfaces in the active
voice (except scrambling constructions). Based on the discussion thus far, I assume
that [goal theme] is the only available base-generated order in the ditransi-
tive construction. In this case, however, how can we get around the minimality
problem? Importantly, this is also a problem for the active ditransitive construc-
tion: assuming that the accusative projection is higher than the merged position
of the goal, moving the theme over the goal to the accusativeP also faces this
problem, i.e.
[ -acc [goal theme]].
The standard solution to this problem in the ditransitive construction is Equidis-

tance (Chomsky 1993), which is contingent on V movement. An alternative solu-
tion then would be to force the V to move higher than the dative. Another plausible
option is to assume that the ditransitive construction in Japanese involves predi-
cate inversion (den Dikken & Næss 1993). I will leave this issue for future research.
The following tree represents the structure (how the minimality problem is solved
is not shown):
this idiom, you cannot use other idioms in [theme-o goal-ni] order (e.g. *sinzyu-(o) buta-(ni)
‘pearl-(acc) pig-(dat)’).
14. Kishimoto (2008) claims that datives that appear in frozen idioms are lexical datives lower
than the ordinary dative Case in ditransitive constructions. If the dative in these idioms is indeed
lower than the regular dative Case, what I show in (45) is that the order of merger of low (or
lexical) dative and low (or lexical) accusative is always [Dat>Acc].
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.23 (1300-1354)
(46) Accusative Passive (with ditransitive verbs)

a. Hon-ga Naomi-ni watas-are-ta.
book-nom Naomi-dat hand-pass-pst
‘The book was handed to Naomi.’
b. TP
DP
book T
DP ni VoiceP pst
Naomi
VP
vP -rare
SC V PRO
VP v
hand
DP
(have) DP
Naomi
book
This derivation accounts for the obligatory internal argument interpretation of

the dative phrase. Two important consequences of this derivation are that the da-
tive goal must always be syntactically present in the ditransitive passive and that
this dative goal must map to a Case position. (Alternatively the goal can never
be PRO, thus it needs to be case-marked.) In this configuration, only one dative
Case dependent on the presence of -rare is available, which bleeds the possibility
of Case-marking the external argument. This then leaves PRO as the only possible
option for the external argument.
3.3.2.4 The dative by-phrase in proto-typical passives

In the previous section, I established that the dative projection selects for VoiceP
(i.e. the order of merger is [Dative>rare]). Recall the minimal structure for the
accusative passive proposed in Section 3.2 (the VP-movement smuggles the DP,
which is then raised to the ga-position). Integrating the dative projection into the
structure yields a minimality violation. Namely, if the external argument moves
to the ni-position, the next step of the derivation (moving the theme DP (Ken
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.24 (1354-1394)
below) out of the moved VP and raising it to the ga-position) would cross the
external argument, as sketched below:
(47) a. Ken-ga keisatu-ni tukamae-rare-ta.
‘Ken was caught by the police.’ [Accusative Passive]
b. * [ police-dat [ [VP Ken V ]i [[vP police VPi v ] rare ] ]
In order to avoid the minimality violation, I adopt the generalized smuggling ap-
proach argued for by Koopman (2008). In a series of work by Koopman (2008,
2009, 2010), she generalizes the smuggling analysis in the passive context to the
mechanism that smuggles DPs within shells and uses it in order to get around
minimality violations in the context of Samoan ergatives and accusatives (see
Koopman 2008, 2010 for more information). Adopting the generalized smuggling
approach leads to the proposal that the vP containing the external argument moves
to the dative projection. This step makes the Case-marking on the DP more akin
to the [for DP to VP] structure (i.e. [DP v] ni rare).
(48) TP
DP
Ken-ga T
VoiceP pst
vP ni
police
VP
vP rare
DP V
DP
Ken catch VP v
police
This solution – that the vP rather than the DP ‘police’ moves to Spec,DatP – might
seem like a rather unusual solution. However, this derivation accounts for one
important distributional property of the dative by-phrase: the dative by-phrase in
Japanese passives, unlike other dative DPs, cannot be relativized:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.25 (1394-1460)
(49) Relativization of the dative by-phrase

a. *[[Ken-ga ti tukama.e-rare-ta] keisatu.kani ]-ga yuumei-ni
Ken-nom catch-pass-pst police.man-nom famous-dat
nat-ta.
become-pst
Int. ‘The policeman by whom Ken was caught became famous.’
b. *[[John-ga ti hon-o watas-are-ta] syoozyoi]-wa kawai-i.
John-nom book-acc hand-pass-pst girl-top cute-prs.
‘The girl by whom John was given a book is cute.’
(50) Relativization of the dative goal DP in the Active/Passive
a. [[John-ga ti hon-o watasi-ta] syoozyoi]-ga yorokon-da.
John-nom book-acc hand-pst girl-nom be.pleased-pst
‘The girl to whom John gave a book was pleased.’
b. [[Hanataba-ga ti watas-are-ta] syoozyoi ]-ga kawaikat-ta.
flower.bouquet-nom hand-pass-pst girl-nom cute-pst
‘The girl to whom the flower bouquet was handed was cute.’
The sentences (49a) and (49b) show that the dative by-phrase cannot undergo
relativization, while the sentences (50a) and (50b) show that the dative goal DP
can undergo relativization both in the active and passive sentences (see 3.1.2.1 for
more cases involving relativization of a dative-marked DP). The contrast between
the dative goal phrase and the dative by-phrase in the passive construction is cap-
tured by the trees in (46) and (48): [DP]-ni vs. [vP DP v ]-ni, and only the former
structure can be relativized. We can rule out the relativization of the dative by-
phrase as a that-trace-effect (i.e. the DP is in a that-trace-like configuration). If the
DP cannot be extracted from the vP in the dative by-phrase context, impossibility
of relativization follows: that is, relatives need DP heads, not vP heads.
3.3.3 The source passive
Understanding all the ingredients necessary for the derivation, let us now turn to
another type of ditransitive passives. Not only the goal and addressee (i.e. the
dative DP), but also the source argument of the ditransitive verb (e.g. nusum-u
‘to steal,’ tor-u ‘to take/steal’) can be promoted to the nominative. I refer to these
passives as ‘source passives.’ Although this is not standardly assumed, this proposal
is unsurprising from the perspective here, since source is basically the counterpart
of goal, minimally differing in directionality.
(51) a. Doroboo-ga Ken-kara okane-o nusun-da. Active
thief-nom Ken-from money-acc steal-pst
‘A thief stole money from Ken.’ [A:mean 4.66]
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.26 (1460-1527)
b. Ken-ga doroboo-ni okane-o nusum-are-ta. Passive

Ken-nom thief-dat money-acc steal-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was stolen his money from by a thief.’ [A:mean 4.77]
(52) a. Otto-ga tuma-kara hesokuri-o tor-ta.
husband-nom wife-from secret.savings-acc take-pst
‘The husband took the secret savings from his wife.’ [A:mean 4.76]
b. Tuma-ga otto-ni hesokuri-o tor-are-ta.
wife-nom husband-dat secret.savings-acc take-pass-pst
‘The wife was taken her secret savings from by her husband.’
[A:mean 4.77]
Kubo (1992) analyzes a passive similar to (52b), which contains the verb tor-u, as a
genitive passive, where the derived subject relates to a genitive DP of the accusative
DP. Since the ga-marked DP and the o-marked DP of the source passive generally
stand in a genitive relation, it is not easy to determine whether the active source of
the derived subject is a genitive DP or a source. My proposal that the source is
the underlying active source of the nominative DP in (51b) and (52b) is motivated
by three facts about Japanese passives. First, the source passive allows an overt
genitive DP of the accusative DP that is distinct from the nominative DP without
a need of further contextual support.15
(53) Ginkoo-ga doroboo-ni Ken-no okane-o nusum-are-ta.
bank-nom thief-dat Ken-no money-acc steal-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The bank was stolen Ken’s money from by a thief.’
Second, the passive is degraded if it contains an overt source DP.

(54) ???Ken-ga doroboo-ni ginkoo-kara okane-o nusum-are-ta.
Ken-nom thief-dat bank-from money-acc steal-pass-pst
‘Ken was stolen the money from the bank.’
Third, we observe the same intervention effect as we observed with the goal of the
ditransitive predicate (see 3.3.2) if we try to raise a theme DP to the nominative
position, as shown below:
15. We cannot, of course, rule out the following structure as a potential active source for (53).
(i) Doroboo-ga ginkoo-no Ken-no okane-o nusun-da.

thief-nom bank-no Ken-no money-acc steal-pst
‘The thief stole bank’s Ken’s money (Ken’s money which was at the bank).’
However, what is important here is that (53) does not require any contextual support, which is
usually the case if the external merge position of the derived subject is a stacked possessor. See
Section 3.6.1 for further discussion about stacked possessors.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.27 (1527-1587)
(55) a. *Okane-ga doroboo-ni Ken-kara nusum-are-ta. Acc. PSV

money-nom thief-dat Ken-from steal-pass-pst
Int. ‘The money was stolen from Ken by a thief.’ [A:mean 1.43]
b. *Hesokuri-ga otto-ni tuma-kara tor-are-ta.
secret.savings-nom husband-dat wife-from take-pass-pst
Int. ‘The secret savings were taken from the wife by her husband.’
[A:mean 1.57]
The passives (55a) and (55b) are unacceptable to me and to many native speakers
who participated in the questionnaire A study.16 (Compare the mean ratings of the
accusative passives, (55a) and (55b), and that of the corresponding source passives,
(51b) and (52b).) Thus, I conclude that the derivations of (51b) and (52b) involve
raising of the source, not the possessor.17
3.4 Passivization of causatives
We have established in Section 2.3 that -rare can take -(s)ase as a complement.
The causative morpheme -sase introduces a causer DP and takes an active vP as its
complement (see Shibatani & Pardeshi 2002). Merging -rare with -sase results in
16. Howard & Niyekawa-Howard (1976) also independently report that a direct object with
the verb tor-u ‘to take’ cannot be promoted to the nominative DP in the passive, while only the
source DP can (see p. 218). However, they do not generalize this property to the goal argument
of the ditransitive predicate.
17. This property, i.e. that the theme cannot be a nominative in the passive when source and
agent DPs are both overt, cannot be explained by the ban on double-datives proposed in (28).
Given that the same pattern holds with goal and source, this phenomenon suggests some kind
of intervention effect within the VP domain. The distribution of ditransitive passives involving
the goal differs from the distribution of those involving the source when the dative phrase is
suppressed: unlike the case involving the goal, it is clearly the source that blocks raising of the
theme to the ga-position:
(i) a. Hesokuri-ga otto-ni tor-are-ta. [with a suppressed source]

secret.savings-nom husband-dat take-pass-pst
‘The secret savings were taken {by/*from} my husband.’
b. *Hesokuri-ga tuma-kara tor-are-ta.
secret.savings-nom wife-from take-pass-pst
‘The secret savings were taken from the wife.’ [with a silent agent]
(i-a) is well-formed, while (i-b) is degraded. If the accusative passive of the source ditransitive is
derived the same way as that of the goal ditransitive, then we would expect that the dative phrase
in (i-a) gives rise to the source interpretation. However, this is not the case. I will leave the exact
implementation of this property for future research.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.28 (1587-1664)
the prediction that the vP will be attracted to -rare, stranding the -sase layer con-
taining the causer DP, and that the external argument in the vP will subsequently
move to the ga-position. The prediction is borne out, as the following paradigm
illustrates.
(56) a. Naomi-ga Ken-o tukama.e-ta. [Transitive]
Naomi-nom Ken-acc catch-pst
‘Naomi caught Ken.’ Active
b. John-ga Naomi-ni Ken-o tukama.e-sase-ta. [Causative]
John-nom Naomi-dat Ken-acc catch-caus-pst
‘John made Naomi catch Ken.’ Active
c. Naomi-ga John-ni Ken-o tukama.e-sase-rare-ta.
Naomi-nom John-dat Ken-acc catch-caus-pass-pst
‘Naomi was made to catch Ken by John.’ Dative PSV
In (56c), the causer ‘John’ maps onto dative Case and the external argument
‘Naomi’ (i.e. agent) in the vP promotes to the nominative position. Since
-rare does not assign a θ-role, the interpretation of the nominative DP is con-
tingent on the θ-role of the smuggled argument in the moved VP (assum-
ing the ‘thematic hierarchy’ or its implementations in vP shell structures; i.e.
agent<experiencer<goal/source location<theme (Grimshaw 1990)). The dative
passive in (56c) involves raising of an agent, while the passive in (57c) derived
from a causative involves raising of an experiencer argument:
(57) a. Ken-ga odoroi-ta.
Ken-nom be.surprised-pst
‘Ken was surprised.’
b. Naomi-ga Ken-o odorok-as(e)-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-acc be.surprised-caus-pst
‘Naomi surprised Ken.’
c. Ken-ga Naomi-ni odorok-as(e-r)are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat be.surprised-caus-pass-pst
‘Ken was surprised by Naomi.’
The derivation of the passive derived from a causative predicate basically mirrors
that of the dative goal passive derived from a ditransitive verb (see (23)).18 The
passivization pattern is very systematic: in general, the second highest DP of the
18. The theme DP cannot move to the nominative position in the passive derived from a
causative. Unlike the ditransitive accusative passive examined in Section 3.3.2, suppressing one
dative DP does not make the passive well-formed.
(i) a. Otto-ga tuma-ni shigoto-o yame-sase-ta.

husband-nom wife-dat job-acc quit-caus-pst
‘The husband made his wife quit the job.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.29 (1664-1703)
complement of -rare is realized as the derived subject in the passive. What appears
as the nominative DP depends on the structural configuration, but not on the lex-
ical properties of -rare or the embedded predicate. This property further supports
the movement analysis of the passive.
3.5 Pseudo-passives: Passives with intransitives
As we have seen in Section 2.4.1, -(r)are combines with some intransitive predi-
cates encompassing both unergatives and unaccusatives (e.g. nak-u ‘to cry,’ niger-
u ‘to escape,’ sin-u ‘to die’). These intransitive passives are traditionally known
as indirect or gapless passives, lacking an active counterpart. Under the unified
smuggling analysis of passives, the derived subject must always be merged as an
argument within the moved VP. Now the questions arise: Where is the nominative
DP originally merged? What is the active source? Here I argue that these passives
are like English pseudo-passives – the passive involving movement of a DP from an
oblique position. This is hard to diagnose in Japanese because of the property that
Case-markers disappear under movement (see Section 3.1.2). I will first discuss
Japanese pseudo-passives, drawing on English pseudo-passives.
3.5.1 English pseudo-passives
English is known to allow pseudo-passives (or prepositional passives), where an

object of a prepositional phrase is raised to the subject in the passive, strand-
ing the preposition (Chomsky 1975, 1981; van Riemsdijk & Williams 1986; Baltin
& Postal 1996; Bresnan 1982; Davison 1980; Hornstein & Weinberg 1981; Riddle
& Sheintuch 1983; Postal 1986; Postal 2004; among others). Examples below are
taken from Postal (2004); Baltin & Postal (1996); Davison (1980); Collins (2005):
b. Tuma-ga otto-ni sigoto-o yame-sase-rare-ta.

wife-nom husband-dat job-acc quit-caus-pass-pst
‘The wife was made to quit the job by her husband.’ Dative PSV
c. *Sigoto-ga (otto-ni) tuma-ni yame-sase-rare-ta.
job-nom husband-dat wife-dat quit-caus-pass-pst
Lit. ‘?The job was caused the wife to be quit by the husband.’
Interestingly, when one of the dative Ps is suppressed as in (i-c), the other dativeP gives rise to
the causer reading, and not the embedded agent reading (but the sentence as a whole does not
make sense, and is thus ungrammatical). This is a pattern different from the one observed with
the ditransitive verb (with a goal) in (46). It might be the case that in (i-c) -rare attracts the VP
layer instead of the vP of the predicate embedded under -sase, and the agent DP cannot receive
Case (the dative in the causative is a dependent Case). Thus the derivation does not converge.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.30 (1703-1752)
(58) a. The problem was referred to by Myron.

b. Pauline’s thesis was talked about by the committee.
c. John was spoken to by the teacher.
d. John was spoken to by Mary.
e. Harry was cared for.
f. The crown was laughed at by the children.
g. The bed has been slept in (by the children).
h. This pen has been written with.
i. That house should not be lived in by handicapped people.
These examples show that a wide variety of prepositional objects ranging from
idiomatic/subcategorized Ps to directional locative/instrumental Ps feed into
pseudo-passives in English (cf. Davison 1980: 44–45). However, as is well-known,
the distribution is quite restricted: for example, this construction is more readily
available when the verb-preposition combination is somehow verb-like in its se-
mantic properties. Further, a modifier cannot intervene between the verb and the
P, as shown below (see Chomsky 1981):
(59) a. *John was spoken angrily to (by the teacher)
b. The bed was slept (*right) in.
The traditional treatment of pseudo-passives is the ‘reanalysis approach’: the

preposition is incorporated to yield a complex verb with the complement of P
taking on the status of a direct object of the complex verb (see Chomsky 1981;
Hornstein & Weinberg 1981; van Riemsdijk & Williams 1986; inter alia). However,
Postal (2004) and Baltin & Postal (1996) convincingly show that the reanalysis
approach is untenable (see Baltin & Postal 1996 and Postal 2004 for arguments
against the reanalysis approach).19
It is not my goal here to propose a novel analysis for English pseudo-passives,
but simply to discuss the logic of the smuggling approach. In the smuggling ap-
proach, the DP that moves to Spec,TP is always the highest DP in a moved partici-
ple VP. Therefore, the moved constituent must contain the P and its complement.
19. One of counter-arguments for the reanalysis approach is the presence of pseudo-passives
involving non-linear adjacency between the verb and the preposition (the following examples
are adopted from Postal 2004: 261):
(i) a. The bridge was climbed onto by the gorilla and then, a few minutes later, off of by
the chimp.
b. The bridge was flown over on Sunday by Sheila and under on Saturday by Louise.
In (i-a) ‘off of ’ is not adjacent to the verb ‘climb’ and in (i-b), ‘under’ is not adjacent to ‘flown,’
thus it is unlikely that incorporation involves in these cases (see Baltin & Postal 1996 and Postal
2004 for more arguments against the reanalysis approach).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.31 (1752-1784)
In other words, only the PPs that are present in the moved PartP and which have
no intervening DP can in principle be raised to Spec,TP.
(60) TP
DP
T VP
This pen
V VoiceP
be
<PartP> Voice’
DP Part’ Voice vP
by DP v’
VP
V Part
him v <PartP>
V PP
write -en
P DP
with
Now, what happens if the same mechanism (i.e. VP-movement smuggles PP over
the external argument) is applied in a language where the adpositional Case-
marking systematically disappears under movement? We get a class of passives
that appears to be gapless – the passive that has been called indirect passives or
adversity/gapless passives in Japanese.
3.5.2 Japanese passives derived from obliques
Given the logic of the analysis developed thus far, the derived subject in Japanese
must always be merged as an argument within the moved VP. This necessitates
finding evidence that the intransitive predicates under discussion indeed allow for
such low PPs. A pseudo-passive treatment has been occasionally proposed for par-
ticular passive sentences (e.g. (61); cf. Kuno 1973: 347; Kubo 1992; Iwasaki 2002).
An example of the pseudo-passive coupled with its active counterpart is given
below:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.32 (1784-1833)
(61) a. Mary-ga John-ni hohoen-da. Active

Mary-nom John-dat smile-pst
‘Mary smiled at John’ [A:mean 4.93]
b. John-ga Mary-ni John-ni hohoem-are-ta. Passive
John-nom Mary-dat smile-pass-pst
‘John was smiled at by Mary.’ [A:mean 3.38]
The pseudo-passive approach can be directly extended to many more cases, includ-
ing passives that have been traditionally analyzed as indirect passives. Specifically, I
will show that various ni-marked DPs (i.e. dative theme, at/on-Directional, and
cause) and source arguments, which are the object of Ps subcategorized by the
verb, can move to the nominative position in Japanese passives. We will examine
them in turn below.
3.5.2.1 Dative theme is the active source

In Japanese the direct object of a substantial number of verbs is realized not as
an accusative DP but as a dative DP, and these dative DPs can be raised to the
nominative position in the passive.20 Many (but not all) of these predicates are
complex, consisting of a light verb and an optionally accusative-marked nominal
object: e.g. kisu(-o).su-ru ‘to kiss,’ intabyu(-o).su-ru ‘to interview,’ denwa-o kake-ru
‘to call/phone,’ tori.tuk-u ‘to haunt,’ hure-ru ‘to (lightly) touch or feel’, and butukar-
u ‘to bump.’21
(62) Dative: Dative Theme
a. Naomi-ga Ken-ni kisu(-o) si-ta. Active
‘Naomi-nom Ken-dat kiss-(acc) do-pst
‘Naomi kissed Ken.’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni kisu(-o) s-are-ta. Passive
Ken-nom Naomi-dat kiss-(acc) do-pass-pst
‘Ken was kissed by Naomi.’
20. Some verbs, such as sawar-u ‘to touch,’ tayor-u ‘to rely on,’ and tukisow-u ‘to accompany’
can take either an accusative or a dative direct object. There are some semantic differences be-
tween dative and accusative objects (and possibly syntactic, according to Fukuda 2009). I will
leave the differences between dative and accusative objects for future research.
21. The availability of dative objects might seem inconsistent with the claim that the dative
Case in ditransitive, passive, and causative constructions in Japanese is a dependent Case (i.e. it
is contingent on the presence of accusative Case; see Section 3.3.2.3). However, the decompo-
sition of many of these verbs (i.e. the light verb and the optionally accusative-marked nominal
object) suggests that (silent) accusative Case is involved, e.g. [DP-ni [kiss]-o kiss-do], and thus I
assume that the dative object construction is basically the same as the ditransitive verbs with an
unrealized accusative Case.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.33 (1833-1878)
(63) a. Yopparai-ga Ken-{ni/*o} butuk.ar-ta. Active

drunkard-nom Ken-{dat/acc} bump-pst
‘A drunkard bumped Ken.’ [A:mean 4.93]
b. Ken-ga yopparai-ni butuk.ar-are-ta. Passive
Ken-nom drunkard-dat bump-pass-pst
‘Ken was bumped by a drunkard.’ [A:mean 3.99]
The following is a simplified tree for (63b) (the step raising vP to Spec,DativeP is
omitted; see (48) for a full tree):22
(64) Dative Theme Passive
TP
DP
Ken-ga VoiceP T
pst
VP
vP -rare
PP V
DP
Ken ni bump VP v
drunkard
The dative theme is contained in the moved VP, and then it is raised to the ga-
position. No new mechanism is needed in order to derive the dative theme passive.
3.5.2.2 at-Directional dative DP

As in English pseudo-passives, Japanese allows raising of the directional DP. The
ni-marked DPs in (61a), (65a), and (66a) correspond to an ‘at-Directional PP’ in
English.
22. The verb butuk.ar-u contains the low passive morpheme ‘-(r)ar,’ which functions like a
reflexivizer (i.e. a drunkard bumped himself into Ken). The verbal structure presented in the
tree is simplified.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.34 (1878-1952)
(65) Dative: at-Directional

a. Naomi-ga Ken-ni donat-ta. Active
Naomi-nom Ken-dat yell-pst
‘Naomi yelled at Ken.’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni donar-are-ta. Passive
Ken-nom Naomi-dat yell-pass-pst
‘Ken was yelled at by Naomi.’
(66) a. Inu-ga Naomi-ni hoe-ta. Active
dog-nom Naomi-dat bark-pst
‘The dog barked at Naomi.’ [A:mean 4.89]
b. Naomi-ga inu-ni hoe-rare-ta. Passive
Naomi-nom dog-dat bark-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was barked at by a dog.’ [A:mean 4.68]
The class of Japanese intransitive verbs that takes a ni-marked at-Directional DP

includes verbs such as hohoem-u ‘to smile,’ donar-u ‘to yell,’ uinku.su-ru ‘to (do)
wink,’ and hoer-u ‘to bark.’ Iwasaki (2002: 133) refers to a passive containing hoe-ru
‘to bark’ (cf. (66b)) as a typical example of the indirect passive, where the subject
(Naomi) is selected as an affectee argument by -(r)are. However, both (66b) and
the proposed active counterpart (66a) denote the same event, i.e. a dog’s barking
at Naomi, and Naomi is interpreted as an ‘at-Directional’ argument in both sen-
tences. Therefore, I conclude that Naomi-ga in (66b) is the ‘at-Directional’ dative
argument uniquely selected by the verb hoe-ru. This straightforwardly leads to a
movement analysis with the deletion of the P. Under the current analysis, the ni-
marked ‘at-Directional DP’ is contained in the moved VP before it moves to the
nominative position. This is expected, as ‘directionals’ in general are small clause
complements of V (Hoekstra & Mulder 1990). Smuggling the ‘at-Directional’ DP
contained in the VP and moving it to the nominative position, accompanied by
the deletion of the P yield the following (simplified) structure:
(67) [Naomi-ga [ [VP [SC Naomi-ni V ]j [[vP dog VPj v ] rare ] ]
The derivation I assume for ‘at-Directional’ dative passives is fundamentally the

same as the one I will propose for ‘on-Directional’ dative passives in Section
3.5.2.3, (see (75) for a tree).
Although ni-marked ‘at-Directional’ DPs are optional, it is not the case that
any intransitive verb is compatible with an ‘at-Directional’ DP. It has to be selected
by the verb in some sense. For example, it is not implausible for Naomi to wait for
Ken at the finishing point of his swimming, yet (68a) is not well-formed. This is
because oyog-u ‘to swim’ in Japanese is a manner verb, lacking the directional (i.e.
path) component. In addition, as shown in (68b), oyog-u ‘to swim’ in Japanese
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.35 (1952-2017)
is incompatible with an accusative or source argument.23 Therefore, the passive

derived from this unergative verb is impossible since its lower VP layer is unable
to provide the DP that satisfies the EPP feature of T (see (68c)).
(68) a. *Naomi-wa Ken-ni oyoi-da. Active
Naomi-top Ken-dat swim-pst
Int. ‘Naomi swum at Ken.’ [B:mean 1.19]
b. *Naomi-wa Ken-{o/kara} oyoi-da.
Naomi-top Ken-{acc/from} swim-pst
Int. ‘Naomi swum on/from Ken.’
c. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni oyog-are-ta Passive
Int. ‘Keni had Naomi swim on himi .’ [C:mean 1.39]
The sentence given in (68c) is a clear example of a gapless passive. As shown by the
low mean rating, (68c) is ill-formed to many speakers (51 out of 54 speakers gave
it a 1 or 2; s.d. 0.66). The contrast between (66b) and (68c) strongly supports the
current proposal that the nominative DP in Japanese core passives always needs a
clause-internal active source.
3.5.2.3 on-Directional dative DP
In addition to ni-marked ‘at-Directional’ DPs, I propose that ni-marked ‘on-
Directional’ DPs can be raised to the nominative position in the Japanese pas-
sive. ‘On-Directional’ arguments ususally appear in the frame of [NP-acc do]
with a light verb, as exemplified in seki-o su-ru ‘to do cough,’ kusyami-o su-
ru ‘to do sneeze,’ and onara-o su-ru ‘to do fart.’ The light-verb construction
seems to allow optional ‘on-Directional DP.’ Many of the indirect gapless pas-
sives discussed in the literature as well as the ones used as stimuli in acquisition
studies (e.g. Sugisaki 1999) are, in fact, instances of raising of a ni-marked ‘on-
Directional.’ Some examples of ‘on-Directional’ dative passives are given below:
(69) Dative: on-Directional
a. Densya-de roozin-ga Naomi-ni seki-o si-ta.
train-loc old.man-nom Naomi-dat cough-acc do-pst
‘Naomi was coughed on by an old man in the train.’
[A:mean 2.99 (s.d. 1.33)]
b. Densya-de Naomi-ga roozin-ni seki-o s-are-ta.
[A:mean 3.20 (s.d. 1.38)]
23. Here we do not consider adverbial accusative DPs (e.g. 3-kilo-o, taiheiyoo-o ‘Pacific Ocean-
acc’). The adverbial accusative DP cannot be raised to the nominative position in the passive.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.36 (2017-2073)
(70) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni onara-o si-ta. Active

Ken-nom Naomi-dat fart-acc do-pst
‘Ken farted on Naomi.’ [A:mean 3.05 (s.d. 1.53)]
b. Naomi-ga Ken-ni onara-o s-are-ta. Passive
Naomi-nom Ken-dat fart-acc do-pass-pst
‘Naomi was farted on by Ken.’ [A:mean 3.51 (s.d. 1.34)]
Interestingly, the results of the questionnaire exhibit a considerable amount of

variability in terms of the acceptability of on-Directional constructions, for both
the active and passive counterparts. To me, both active and passive on-Directionals
are slightly degraded, and I would give them a 3 out of 5. The variability itself is
not a problem with the proposed smuggling analysis. What the current analysis
predicts is some correlation between the passive and active counterparts; that is,
the speakers who accept the passive should accept the active counterpart as well.
The correlation of the within-speaker behaviors between the active and the passive
is a fascinating research topic, which needs to be tested independently with more
items in the future.
Significantly, passives involving ‘on-Directional’ DPs commonly carry strong
adversative connotations; this is due to the directionality of a rather unfavorable
event (i.e. the event happens ‘to’ the nominative DP). However, I want to stress the
fact that the adversative connotations are just an implicature. We can follow the
passives (69b) and (70b) with a string, demo kanozyo-wa ne-tei-te kizuka-nakat-ta.
‘but she was sleeping and didn’t notice that,’ and the sentences are still felicitous
(see Section 6.4.3 for further discussion on affectedness).
The well-cited ‘rain’ example. My analysis of ‘on-Directional’ dative passive ex-

tends to the following well-cited ‘rain’ example, which is presented in the literature
as a prototypical case of adversity passive (e.g. Kuno 1973; Miyagawa 1979).
(71) a. (Megumi-no) ame-ga watasi.tati-ni hut-ta. Active
benefit-no rain-nom we-dat descend-pst
‘A beneficial rain descended upon us.’ [A:mean 4.03]
b. Watasi.tati-wa ame-ni hu-rare-ta. Passive
we-top rain-dat descend-pass-pst
Lit. ‘We were descended upon by rain.’ [A:mean 3.79]
c. Ken-wa ame-ni hu-rare-ta. Passive
Ken-top rain-dat descend-pass-pst
‘Ken was rained on.’ [B:mean 4.28]
I propose that the active counterpart of (71b) is (71a) without megumi-no ‘ben-
eficial.’ The high mean rating of (71a) shows that the verb hur-u ‘to descend’ is
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.37 (2073-2129)
compatible with an ‘on-Directional’ dative phrase. Note that the presence of a

modifier megumi-no is irrelevant here.24
This analysis extends directly to an example like (72a). The ni-phrase in (72a)
is never a locative PP but always a ‘on-Directional’ argument, as the reading sug-
gests.
(72) a. Tokyoo-ga ooame-ni hu-rare-ta. Passive
Tokyo-nom heavy.rain-dat descend-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Tokyo was descended upon by heavy rain. (Tokyo was rained on)’
b. Ooame-ga Tokyoo-ni hut-ta. on-Directional
heavy.rain-nom Tokyo-dat descend-pst
Lit. ‘Heavy rain descended upon Tokyo. ’ [A:mean 4.62]
c. Tokyoo-de ooame-ga hut-ta. Locative
Tokyo-loc heavy.rain-nom descend-pst
Lit. ‘Heavy rain descended in Tokyo.’ [A:mean 4.88]
Japanese has two locative postpositions ‘de’ and ‘ni,’ and they are in complemen-
tary distribution: ‘ni’ is used with stative verbs and ‘de’ is used with eventive verbs
(see also Naku 1998, who argues that ‘ni’ is for the location of a ‘thing,’ while ‘de’
is the location of a ‘situation’ including events and states).25 The complement of
neither locative ni nor de can move to the nominative position in the passive.
(73) a. Kyoko-wa ima Osaka-{ni/*de} ir-u.
Kyoko-top now Osaka-loc exist-prs
‘Kyoko is in Osaka now.’ [A:mean with de 1.23; ni 4.89]
b. Kyoko-wa heya-{*ni/de} odot-ta.
Kyoko-top room-loc dance-pst
‘Kyoko danced in her room.’ [A:mean with de 4.95; ni 1.07]
(74) a. *Osaka-ga Kyoko-ni ir-are-ta.
Osaka-nom Kyoko-dat exist-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Osaka was existed in by Kyoko.’ [A:mean 1.04]
b. *Heya-ga Kyoko-ni odo-rare-ta.
room-nom Kyoko-dat dance-pass-pst
Int. ‘The room was danced in by Kyoko.’ [A:mean 1.04]
Significantly, the verb hur-u ‘to descend’ is an eventive predicate and takes
de, not ni, to express the location where the raining takes place (see (72b)).
24. The dative on watasi-tati is not a benefactive ni but on-Directional ni. The benefactive
ni-DP cannot be realized as the nominative DP in the passive (see 3.5.3).
25. As expected, once a stative aspectual verb ‘tei-ru’ is added to an eventive verb, both ni and
de become available.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.38 (2129-2192)
Therefore, we can conclude that the ni-marked DP in the rain examples is the
‘on-Directional’ DP.
I propose the following (simplified) derivation for the rain passive:
(75) Directional Passive
a. Watasi.tati-ga ame-ni hu-rare-ta.
we-nom rain-dat descend-pass-pst
Lit. ‘We were descended upon by rain (We were rained on).’
b. TP
DP
we-ga VoiceP T
pst
VP
vP -rare
PP V
DP VP v
we on descend
rain
The fact that -rare can attach to hur-u ‘to descend’ shows that hur-u must contain
an active voice v, which satisfies the complementation property of -rare (recall
that -rare cannot combine with oti-ru ‘to fall,’ see Chapter 2). The VP-movement
smuggles the directional PP over ‘rain,’ and watasitati ‘us’ subsequently moves to
the nominative position. The dative by-phrase in the rain passive is obligatory.
This is because there is no PRO counterpart for ‘rain’; ame-ga hur-u ’rain descend’
is like an idiom, with ‘rain’ merged in Spec,vP, and ‘rain’ must be marked by ni.
3.5.2.4 ni-marked cause DP

Finally, let us turn to cases in which the external merge position of the derived
subject is the ni-marked cause. As is well-known, object experiencer psych-
predicates, such as odorok-u ‘to be.surprised,’ take a ni-marked cause argument
(see Hasegawa 2001), and raising from the dative cause DP to Spec,TP is possible
in Japanese passives:26
26. It is not the case that all cause arguments of psych-predicates can move to the nominative
position in the passive. Some predicates like kurusim-u ‘to suffer’ contain an inactive voice, and
are thus incompatible with -rare, while other predicates like okor-u ‘to get.angry’ allow both
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.39 (2192-2252)
(76) a. Ken-ga {Naomi/sono nyusu}-{ni/*o} odoroi-ta.

Ken-nom {Naomi/that news}-dat surprise-pst
‘Ken was surprised at {Naomi/that news}.’ Active
b. {Naomi/*sono nyusu}-ga Ken-ni odorok-are-ta.
{Naomi/that news}-nom Ken-dat be.surprised-pass-pst
‘Naomi was surprised at by Ken.’ Passive
Interestingly, the ni-marked cause is compatible with both animate and inanimate
DPs, whereas the derived subject in the passive is incompatible with inanimate
DPs. Despite this animacy restriction, both the dative phrase in the active sentence
and the derived subject in the passive sentence are evidently the cause of Ken’s
surprise. Thus, the ni-marked cause PP is smuggled by VP-movement across vP
and then raised to the nominative position. (We will come back to the issue of
animacy restriction in the following section.)
(77) [Naomi-ga [ [VP [PP Naomi-ni ] V ]j [[vP Ken VPj v ] rare ] ] ]
We can extend this analysis to the well-cited ‘cry’ examples of Japanese passives.
The well-cited ‘cry’ passive. In addition to the ‘rain’ passive discussed in the pre-
vious section, the passive derived from an unergative predicate nak-u ‘to cry’
has been taken in the literature as a representative example of gapless/adversative
passive:
(78) Ken-ga Naomi-ni nak-are-ta. Passive
Ken-nom Naomi-dat cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was cried over by Naomi.’ [C:mean 4.52]
A close inspection reveals that the nominative DP must be interpreted as the ‘cause’
(i.e. Naomi cried because of Ken) for the passive to be felicitous. As shown by
dative and accusative objects with different semantics. The one that promotes to the nominative
in the passive is the accusative DP, as shown by the translation in (i-c):
(i) a. Ken-ga {Naomi/sono nyusu}-ni okot-ta.

Ken-nom {Naomi/that news}-dat be.angry-pst
‘Ken is angry at {Naomi/that news}.’ ni-Active
b. Ken-ga Naomi-o okot-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-acc scold-pst
‘Ken scolded Naomi.’ o-Active
c. {Naomi/*sono nyusu}-ga Ken-ni oko-rare-ta.
{Naomi/*that news}-nom Ken-dat angry-pass-pst
‘Naomi was scolded by Ken.’ Passive
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.40 (2252-2316)
the high mean rating of the following example, the predicate nak-u ‘to cry’ is
compatible with a ni-marked cause DP (IPAL 1987: 281):
(79) Toosyu-wa kyuukaiura-no sittoo-ni nai-ta.
pitcher-top bottom.of.the.ninth-no careless.pitch-dat cry-pst
‘The pitcher cried over the poor pitching at the bottom of the ninth.’
[B:mean 4.74]
Therefore, I propose that the active source of the derived subject in (78) is the ni-
marked cause DP. This active source, however, is very difficult to identify because
similar to the passive derived from odorok-u ‘to surprise,’ there is a complication
with respect to ‘animacy.’ The ni-marked cause in the active sentence must be
inanimate, whereas the derived subject in the passive must be animate:
(80) a. Naomi-ga Ken-*(no uragiri)-ni nai-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-no betrayal-dat cry-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi cried over Ken’s betrayal.’ Active
b. Ken-(*no uragiri)-ga Naomi-ni nak-are-ta.
Ken-no betrayal-nom Naomi-dat cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was cried over by Naomi.’ Passive
Despite the animacy difference between the active and passive counterparts, I ar-
gue that the nominative DP in (78) is indeed a Dative cause argument selected by
the verb nak ‘to cry.’ The following pair supports my claim:
(81) a. Naomi-ga {sono hanasi/ *Ken}-ni nai-ta.
Naomi-nom that story/ Ken-dat cry-pst
‘Naomi cried over {that story/*Ken}.’
b. {Sono hanasi/ *Ken}-ga (Naomi-ni-wa) nak-e-ta.
that story/ Ken-nom Naomi-dat-top cry-re-pst
Lit. ‘{That story/*Ken} is cry-able (to Naomi).’
(Int. ‘That story is able to make Naomi cry.’)
The predicate nak-e-ru ‘cry-able’ in (81b) consists of the stem nak ‘to cry’ and a
low passive morpheme -re. Since -re does not select for an argument, the deriva-
tion of (81b) must involve raising. (81b) shows evidence that displacement from
the ni-marked cause DP is indeed possible and the cause DP does show up in
the nominative position in a passive-like construction (i.e. the potential passive)
in Japanese.
I consider the animacy restriction to be independent of the lexical property of
-rare as well as the derivation of passivization. The structure of psych-predicates,
as in (76a) and (80a), are probably very complex: it must derivationally involve
low passivization that brings the nominative theme over the ni-marked cause,
assuming the thematic hierarchy [cause > theme]. Here, I will simply assume
that the animacy restriction comes about from the interaction between the passive
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.41 (2316-2378)
morpheme -rare and the structure of the complement of -rare that involves low
passivization. What is important for us is that the ‘cry’ passive can be derived solely
by the mechanism developed thus far. The cause nominative DP is licensed within
the moved VP domain and then raised to the nominative position to satisfy the
EPP of T in the passive (see (77) for the derivation).
3.5.2.5 The source DP

The last case of pseudo-passives involves the source DP:
(82) Source: kara-marked DP
a. Naomi-ga Ken-kara nige-ta. Active
Naomi-nom Ken-from escape-pst
‘Naomi escaped from Ken.’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni nige-rare-ta. Passive
‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi.’ [C:mean 4.93]
We have established in Section 3.3.3 that the source DP can be promoted to the
nominative in the passive in the context of ditransitive predicate. I propose that
(82b) is also an instance of displacement from the kara-marked DP, as the English
translation suggests.
Independent support for the fact that the gap corresponding to Ken is indeed
contained in the moved VP comes from the interpretation of a temporal adverb.
Consider the following example:
(83) Ken-ga [Naomi-ni sando nige]-rare-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat three.time escape-pass-pst
(i) ‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi three times.’
(ii) ‘*Ken was affected by the fact that Naomi escaped from different men
three times.’
If this sentence does not contain the trace of the derived subject ‘Ken,’ the tem-
poral adverb sando should be able to modify the event of ‘Naomi’s escaping’ to
the exclusion of ‘Ken.’ This means that (83) should be compatible with a situation
where Naomi escaped from different men three times (but somehow Ken was af-
fected by her three escapes). However, (83) is infelicitous in such a situation. For
the sentence to be felicitous, ‘Ken’ has to be the source of ‘Naomi’s escaping’ all
three times.27 I take this as a piece of evidence that the moved VP contains the
trace of the derived subject.
27. Alternatively, possessor-raising from the source DP is also possible (e.g. ‘(Naomi escaped)
from Ken’s hospital,’ and Ken promotes to the nominative position), but even in this case, Ken
has to relate to the source (the hospital which Ken owns/introduced to her, etc). (See the next
section for more information about genitive passives.)
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.42 (2378-2420)
The source passive (82b) contains an unaccusative predicate niger-u ‘to es-
cape,’ and thus its underlying subject ‘Naomi’ is originally licensed as a theme at
the specifier of V. Furthermore, like the dative by-phrase of the regular accusative
passive, the dative phrase of the escape passive cannot undergo relativization (see
(50)), as exemplified below:
(84) *[[Ken-ga ti nige-rare-ta] onna]-wa totemo kireidat-ta.
Ken-nom escape-pass-pst lady-top very pretty-pst
Int. ‘The lady by whom Ken was escaped from was very pretty.’
This suggests that the derivation of the source passive derived from the verb niger-
u ‘to escape’ mirrors that of the accusative passive derived from a transitive verb.
Namely, the vP, not the DP, maps onto the dative projection. The derivation is not
straightforward given that our definition of active voice v is a filled Spec. Here, I
assume that the theme DP Naomi is raised to Spec,vP, yielding an active vP. The
proposed structure is sketched below:
(85) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni nige-rare-ta.
‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi.’ [C:mean 4.93]
b. TP
DP
Ken-ga T
VoiceP
vP ni pst
Naomi
VP
vP -rare
DP DP
PP V VP v
Naomi Naomi
Ken from escape
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.43 (2420-2495)
The derivation involves the following steps:

1. The V nige takes a theme and a PP complement.
2. The active v merges with VP, and ‘Naomi’ is attracted to Spec,vP, leaving the
copy in the VP domain (this is due to the property of the active voice v: the
specifier needs to be filled).
3. The Voice -rare merges with v and attracts the VP to its specifier.
4. The vP containing Naomi moves to the dative projection.
5. Lastly, Ken moves to the nominative position, accompanied by the deletion of
the P.
So far, I have reviewed various Ps that allow their complements to move to the
nominative position in the passive. Now I briefly discuss the Ps that do not.
3.5.3 Postpositional objects incompatible with pseudo-passives
The types of postpositional objects that can be promoted to the nominative posi-
tion in Japanese passives are much more restricted than English pseudo-passives.
We have seen earlier in (73) and (74) that neither the complement of ni-locative
nor that of de-locative can be a derived subject. In Japanese, dative phrases can
encode a wide variety of meanings (see Sadakane & Koizumi 1995: Appendix for
a complete list). Although many of the ni-marked DPs can undergo movement
to the nominative position in the passive, not all can. The ni-marked benefactive
argument is one such DP.
(86) a. ??Ken-ga Mary-ni keeki-o yak-are-ta.
Ken-nom Mary-dat cake-acc bake-pass-pst
Int. ‘Ken was baked a cake by Mary.’
b. Mary-ga Ken-(no-tame-)ni keeki-o yai-ta.
Mary-nom Ken-(no-benefit)-dat cake-acc bake-pst
‘Mary baked Ken a cake.’
(87) a. ??Naomi-ga hahaoya-ni huku-o kaw-are-ta.
Naomi-nom mother-dat clothes-acc buy-pass-pst
Int. ‘Naomi was bought the dress by her mother.’
b. Hahaoya-ga Naomi-ni huku-o kat-ta.
mother-nom Naomi-dat clothes-acc buy-pst
‘Mother bought Naomi the dress.’
In addition, unlike English pseudo-passives, the de-marked instrumental P cannot

be the derived subject in the passive:
(88) *Kono pen-ga kono pen-de (tegami-o) kak-are-ta.
this pen-nom letter-acc write-pass-pst
Lit. ‘This pen has been written (the letter) with.’ Instrumental
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.44 (2495-2530)
What distinguishes the Ps that feed into passivization from those that do not
(i.e. the locative and benefactive ni and the locative and instrumental de)? This
is not an easy question to answer. One possible approach would be to say that da-
tive Ps come in two different categories – (1) Case and (2) full-fledged Ps – and
only the complement of the former can undergo movement. However, as will be-
come evident later in Section 5.3.1.2, evidence for distinguishing the two types
of dative-markers is inconclusive. A more promising approach is to attribute the
distributional differences to the structural height of the P. Given the analysis de-
veloped so far, the derived subject must be contained in the moved VP. If the P
is merged higher than the VP (say, within the vP domain), it cannot be smug-
gled over the external argument and cannot move to the nominative position.28
Consequently, the structure does not converge.
3.6 The genitive passive
The last potential active source of the derived subject is a genitive DP. Japanese al-
lows possessor-raising (i.e. an operation that moves a possessor to a Case-position
external to the possessive DP in which it is licensed), and possessor-raising feeds
into passivization. Since the seminal work by Kubo (1992), the genitive passive
where the nominative and accusative DPs stand in a genitive relation have been
recognized as a natural class. I will refer to this type of passive as Genitive-
Accusative Passives. Examples are provided below:
(89) Genitive-Accusative Passive
a. Keni -ga Naomi-ni kaoi -o tatak-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was hit (his) face by Naomi.’
Int. ‘Ken had the face hit by Naomi.’ [A:mean 4.82]
b. Keni -ga toorigakari-no hito-ni kamii -o
Ken-nom passing.by-no person-dat hair-acc
ki-rare-ta. [A:mean 4.14]
cut-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was cut (his) hair by a stranger passing by.’
Int. ‘Ken had his hair cut by a stranger passing by.’
28. In Section 6.2 I will present independent evidence in favor of the claim that the locative
P is higher than the external argument. Namely, the theme in the nominative position can
reconstruct as low as the locative P (and the goal P) but not as low as the external argument.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.45 (2530-2606)
c. Naomii -wa (rinzin-ni) inui -o koros-are-ta.

Naomi-top neighbor-dat dog-acc kill-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was killed (her) dog (by a neighbor).’
Int. ‘Naomi had her dog killed (by a neighbor).’ [A:mean 4.85]
The existence of these passives is unsurprising under the current analysis: as long
as the ga-marked DP originates as the highest DP within the moved VP domain,
the derivation should converge. The structure for (89a) is sketched below (the step
where vP moves to DativeP is omitted, and finer details of possessor-raising are
not addressed here):
(90) a. Keni -ga Naomi-ni kaoi -o tatak-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was hit (his) face by Naomi.’
b. TP
DP
VoiceP T
Ken-ga
pst
VP
vP -rare
DP V Naomi VP v
DP hit
no NP
Ken
face-acc
Are there other cases of genitive passives? Again this question is a priori difficult
to answer since the original Case marker disappears under movement. However,
my answer to this question is Yes. The passives derived from an active unaccusative
verb in (91) have traditionally been analyzed as indirect or gapless passives (Kubo
1992; Shibatani 1990; Washio 1993; inter alia).29 In contrast, I propose that they
29. Some of the verbs used in (91) consist of a nominal object and the light verb ‘do’. The nom-
inal object here is incompatible with accusative Case (nyuuin-(*o) sur-u, ‘to hospitalize’) unlike
the unergative light verb construction (e.g., benkyoo-(o) sur-u ‘to study), and the incompatibil-
ity with ‘o’ is one of the well-known diagnostics for unaccusativity in Japanese (see Miyagawa
1979). Further evidence for unaccusativity is given in fn. 30.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.46 (2606-2673)
derivationally involve possessor-raising, and I call this type of passives Genitive-

Dative passives.
(91) Genitive-Dative Passive
a. Naomi-wa Naomi-no hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta.
(Active Source: ‘Naomi’s mother died.’) [A:mean 4.68, C:4.33]
b. Ken-wa Ken-no hahaoya-ni nyuuin.s-are-ta.
Ken-top mother-dat hospitalize.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was hospitalized by (his) mother.’
(Active Source: ‘Ken’s mother was hospitalized.’)
c. Ken-wa Ken-no kaisya-ni toosan.s-are-ta.
Ken-top company-dat bankrupt.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was gone bankrupt by (his) company.’
(Active: ‘Ken’s company went bankrupt.’)
d. Ken-wa Ken-no musume-ni zisatu.s-are-ta.
Ken-top daughter-dat commit.suicide.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was committed suicide by (his) daughter.’
(Active: ‘Ken’s daughter committed suicide.’) [A:mean 3.91]
The motivation for this proposal is that in these passives there must be a geni-
tive relation between the nominative and dative DPs. This point can be shown by
manipulating the relation between the two DPs.
(92) a. *Naomi-wa Lisa-no hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta.
Naomi-top Lisa-no mother-dat die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was died by Lisa’s mother.’ [A:mean 1.69]
b. *Ken-wa Naomi-no kaisya-ni toosan.s-are-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-no company-dat bankrupt.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was gone bankrupt by Naomi’s company.’ [C:mean 1.81]
c. *Ken-wa misiranuhito-ni zisatus-are-ta.
Ken-top stranger-dat commit.suicide-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was committed suicide by a stranger.’
[A:mean 1.55, C:mean 1.59]
The passives in (92) were chosen to eliminate the potential internal source for the
nominative DP by adding an overt no-marked DP of the dative DP in (92a) and
(92b) (compare them with (91a) and (91c)) and by using a dative phrase that is se-
mantically incompatible with a genitive relation (i.e. stranger) in (92c) (compare it
with (91d)). The contrast between the passives in (91) and those in (92) shows that
the grammaticality of the passives in (91) is contingent on the genitive relationship
between the nominative and dative DPs. This property strongly suggests that the
active source of the derived subject in these genitive-dative passives is the genitive
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.47 (2673-2712)
DP, and the derivation involves possessor-raising. This in fact is a reasonable pro-
posal given that the verbs contained in (91) are all active unaccusative verbs. This
means that the possessed NP – the dative by-phrase – of the genitive-dative passive
is merged as an internal argument of V.30
As is well-known, in possessive dative constructions in Hebrew and French,
possessor-raising is only possible from an internal argument of the verb, and
the possessor dative has been served as an unaccusative diagnostic (see Borer &
Grodzinsky 1986; Gùeron 1985; Landau 1999; Baker 1988). Shibatani (1994: 482)
also observes that “many languages seem to restrict the host argument [of a posses-
sor, TI] to absolute positions, e.g., the object of a transitive clause and the subject
of inactive intransitive clause – the positions encoding a patient role” (see also
Landau 1999: 7). We can now say that Japanese is one of these languages, whose
distribution of possessor-raising (at least in the passive voice) conforms to this
general pattern.
The structure of the genitive-dative passive, however, is not that straightfor-
ward: the derivation requires that the genitive DP remains in the moved VP, while
the host NP appears in Spec,vP. The following is a tentative derivation of the
genitive-dative passive:
a. Naomi-ga hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta.
Naomi-nom mother-dat die-pass-pst
‘Naomi was died by (her) mother.’
30. In Japanese, the numeral quantifier can sometimes appear outside the NP that it modifies
(i.e. Numeral Quantifier Floating; NQF) (Miyagawa 1989: 21, 38 and Nakanishi 2008). Stan-
dardly, the compatibility with NQF has been taken as a a piece of evidence for unaccusativity
(see Section 5.3.1 for further discussion on NQF). All the verbs in (92) are compatible with NQF,
as shown below:
(i) a. Seito-ga kyonen huta-ri nyuuin.si-ta.

student-nom last.year 2-cl hospitalize.do-pst
‘Two students hospitalized last year.’
b. Kaisya-ga kyonenn {san-sya/mit-tu} toosan.si-ta.
company-nom last.year 3-cl bankrupt.do-pst
‘Three companies went bankrupt last year.’
c. Kookoosei-ga kyonen go-nin zisatu.si-ta.
high.school.student-nom last.year 5-cl commit.suicide-do-pst
‘Five high school students committed suicide last year.’
Therefore, I conclude that nyuuin.su-ru, ‘to hospitalize,’ toosan.su-ru ‘go bankrupt,’ and zisatusu-
ru ‘to commit suicide’ are all unaccusative verbs. (Note that the classifier for company is ‘-sya’
but in daily conversation, ‘-tu’ (a basic classifier for various objects) is very often used instead.)
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.48 (2712-2758)
b. TP
DP
Naomi-ga DatP T
pst
VoiceP
vP ni
VP vP -rare
DP VP v
DP DP V
have NP
Naomi DP die
mother have NP
Naomi
mother
In this derivation, the DP [Naomi-no mother] starts out as an argument of the

V. There are two options for the first step: either ‘mother’ moves to Spec,vP by
predicate inversion or the entire DP is raised to Spec,vP, leaving a copy in the VP
domain. The first option raises the problem of motivating predicate inversion, and
it predicts that in Multiple Nominative Constructions, the surface order would be:
*Mother-ga Naomi-ga died. However, this is the wrong order; it should be Naomi-
ga mother-ga died. I will therefore pursue the second option and examine what we
expect to happen under the copy and deletion theory of movement, with spell out
of the highest copy under c-command.
In the grammatical active Naomi’s mother died, the copy of Naomi’s mother in
the VP is deleted under c-command (i.e. [Naomi-no mother]-ga [VP [Naomi-no
mother] die]-pst). In the passive, [Naomi-no mother] moves to the specifier of
the active v, leaving the copy in the VP domain, and the VP is attracted to Spec,
VoiceP (see (94a)). Then the vP containing [Naomi-no mother] is attracted to
the dative P (see (94b)). Subsequently, ‘Naomi’ in the moved VP moves to the
ga-position, and this highest copy deletes the other copies of ‘Naomi,’ one in the
vP and one in the VP under c-command (see (94c)). The copy of ‘mother’ in the
moved VP cannot get Case and needs to be deleted under reconstruction (oth-
erwise the structure does not converge). What remains is the ga-marked ‘Naomi’
and ni-marked ‘mother.’ The following summarizes the derivational steps:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.49 (2758-2823)
(94) a. [VP Naomi-no mother V] [Naomi-no mother VP v]
b. [vP Naomi-no mother VP v]-ni [VP Naomi-no mother V] vP
c. Naomi-ga [vP Naomi-no mother VP v]-ni [VP Naomi-no mother V] vP31
d. Naomi-ga [vP Naomi-no mother VP v]-ni [VP N-no mother V] vP
(‘mother’ in VP is deleted under reconstruction)

The current smuggling analysis accounts for an important derivational property
of Japanese passives. Namely, the passive cannot be derived from pure unergative
verbs, as illustrated below:32
(95) a. *Ken-wa musuko-ni oyog-are-ta. [C:mean 1.61]
Ken-top son-dat swim-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was swum by his son.’
Int. ‘Ken was affected by his son’s swimming.’
b. *Ken-wa musume-ni odor-are-ta. [C:mean 1.56]
Lit. ‘Ken was danced by his daughter.’ (Hoshi 1994: 40)
c. *Ken-wa tuma-ni suupaa-de hatrak-are-ta. [C:mean 1.67]
Lit. ‘Ken was worked by his wife at a supermarket.’
d. *?Ken-wa osanai musume-ni hitodoori-no ooi tokoro-de
Ken-top small daughter-dat people-no many place-loc
hasir-are-ta. [C:mean 2.17]
run-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was run by his young daughter in a crowded place.’
All the passives in (95) exhibit a genitive relation (i.e. kinship) between the nom-
inative and dative DPs, but they are entirely ill-formed to me (even in supportive
31. Although Naomi in the vP is closer to the nominative position than the one in the VP, it
cannot move out of the vP since the vP is an island. This looks like a parasitic gap configuration.
32. The verbs contained in (95), such as oyog-u ‘to swim’ and odor-u ‘to dance,’ are incompat-
ible with NQF, as illustrated in (i) below. The incompatibility with NQF confirms that they are
unergative verbs.
(i) a. *Seito-ga kinoo san-nin oyoi-da.
student-nom yesterday 3-cl swim-pst
‘Three students swam yesterday.’
b. *Syoozyo-ga kinoo san-nin odot-ta.
girl-nom yesterday 3-cl dance-pst
‘Three girls danced yesterday.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.50 (2823-2852)
context) and to many of the native speakers who participated in the question-
naire surveys, as shown by the low mean ratings. As discussed in Section 2.4.2
the ungrammaticality of the passives in (95) can be attributed to the fact that
pure unergative verbs lack a VP layer that is needed to satisfy the EPP feature
of -rare:
(96) VoiceP
×
vP rare
DP – v
Furthermore, possessor-raising out of the external argument of the transitive verb

embedded under -rare is impossible.
(97) a. *Ken-ga otooto-ni misiranu-hito-o koros-are-ta.
Ken-nom brother-dat stranger-person-acc kill-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was killed a stranger by (his) brother.’
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that his brother killed a stranger.’
b. *Naomi-ga musuko-ni sensei-o nagu-rare-ta.
Naomi-nom son-dat teacher-acc hit-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was hit the teacher by (her) son.’
Int. ‘Naomi was affected by the fact that his son hit the teacher.’
This is of course expected given the crosslinguistic pattern of possessor-raising

constructions stated earlier, but this property can be derived under the adapted
smuggling analysis. Consider the following structure illustrating (97b):
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.51 (2852-2919)
(98) Possessor-raising from the External Argument

TP
DP
*Naomi-ga VoiceP T
pst
VP
vP -rare
DP V
teacher hit DP VP v
DP
no NP
Naomi
son
In this derivation the EPP feature of -rare is satisfied, but minimality is a problem:
the internal argument teacher is closer to the nominative position than the no-
marked DP of the external argument son.
We can summarize the properties discussed above as the following general
property of genitive passives:
(99) The subject of the genitive passive must be originally merged as a genitive DP
of the (underlying) internal argument (an element of the VP).33
The traditional analysis in which -rare introduces an experiencer (or an af-

fectee) argument cannot explain this generalization.
33. This generalization also holds for the passive derived from a causative predicate, as illus-
trated below:
(i) ?*Ken-ga [sensei-ni [Ken-no musuko-o hasir]-ase]-rare-ta.
Ken-nom teacher-dat son-acc run-caus-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken, his son was made to run by the teacher.’
Int. ‘It happened to Ken that his son was made to run by the teacher.’
In (i), the nominative DP Ken is merged as a genitive DP of the o-marked DP, which is the
external argument of the verb hasir-u embedded under the causative sase. However, (i) is still
ungrammatical. The smuggling analysis itself does not account for the ill-formedness of this
passive. This phenomenon requires further understanding of the causative construction in
Japanese.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.52 (2919-2960)
3.6.1 Genitive passives disguised: Passives requiring context
Genitive-accusative passives have been extensively discussed in the literature

(Kubo 1992; among others). Nevertheless, the genitive relationship discussed in
the literature that underlies this type of passives turns out to be quite restrictive:
only the passive that encodes a prototypical possessive relation, to wit, kinship,
body-part, and ownership, has been classified as the genitive passive. Contrary to
the previous literature, I define the ‘possessive’ relation as a particular syntactic
configuration (i.e. ‘DP-internal subject’). This definition of ‘possession’ encodes
a much broader range of relations and allows many instances of gapless passives
to be subsumed under genitive passives, as we will see in the next section. Natu-
rally, we expect that the no-marked DP in the right configuration is always able to
undergo possessor-raising.
3.6.1.1 no-phrases in Japanese

The particle no appears in a variety of context in Japanese, including core pos-
sessive relations in a ‘DP-no NP’ frame, with a possessor preceding a possessed
NP (e.g. Ken-no hon ‘Ken’s book’). Besides DP, it follows PP, a numeral-classifier
sequence, and a relative clause (without overt tense marking):
(100) a. Osaka-e-no ressya
Osaka-to-no train
‘a train to Osaka’ PP-no
b. san-satu-no hon
3-cl-no book
‘three books’ Num-cl.-no
c. atui-dake-no piza [Adj-only]-no
hot-only-no pizza
‘pizza which is only hot’ (cf. atu-i (*no) piza ‘hot pizza’)
d. hahaoya-ga zyoyuu-no tomodati
mother-nom actress-no friend
‘(my) friend whose mother is an actress’ [DP-nom NP]-no
Various proposals have been made about the nature of -no: genitive Case (no = ’s)
(e.g. Kuno 1973; Saito 1982; Murasugi 1991; Watanabe 2010), a modifying marker
or a contextual Case marker (Kitagawa & Ross 1982; Saito et al. 2008), a linking el-
ement inserted morphologically (Watanabe 2010), the D introducing a (reduced)
relative (e.g. den Dikken & Singhapreecha 2004; Koike 1999; Ishizuka 2008), and
so forth. It is not very clear how many no particles (in the form of ‘XP-no NP’)
Japanese has. Due to the distributional differences with respect to nominal ellip-
sis exemplified in (101), Saito et al. (2008) propose that there are two types of
no (see also Watanabe 2010). The generalization Saito et al. propose is that no
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.53 (2960-3019)
following arguments (and locative and temporal DPs, which also behave like an
argument) instantiates Case and has a structure that licenses the ellipsis of the
following material, while no introducing adjuncts is a contextual marker, which
does not.
(101) a. [Taroo-no taido]-wa yoi ga, [Hanako-no taido]-wa
Taro-no attitude-top good though Hanako-no -top
yoku-nai.
good-not
‘Though Taro’s attitude is good, Hanako’s isn’t.’
b. [Rooma-no hakai]-wa [Kyooto-no hakai] -yorimo
Rome-no destruction-top Kyoto-no -than
hisan-datta.
miserable-was
‘Rome’s destruction was more miserable than Kyoto’s.’
c. *[Hare-no hi]-wa yoi ga, [ame-no hi]-wa otikomu.
clear-no day-top good though rain-no -top feel.depressed
‘Clear days are OK, but I feel depressed on rainy days.’
The DP-no phrase in (101a) is a DP-internal subject and the one in (101b) is a
DP-internal object of the host NP. Setting aside the fact that hare and ame seem
to me are nominal predicates rather than adjuncts (Sono hi-wa ame-da. Lit. ‘That
day is rain.’), what the above examples show is that the structure of [DP-no NP]
in (101a) and (101b) is different from that in (101c). However, this does not nec-
essarily mean that there are two types of no: the dichotomy proposed by Saito et
al. (2008) crucially depends on the licensing mechanism of nominal ellipsis, and
in fact Watanabe (2010) proposes a mechanism different from that in Saito et al.
(2008). What is important for us here is the distribution of no-phrases with respect
to possessor-raising. Does it also conform with the dichotomy proposed by Saito
et al. (2008)? As illustrated below, DP-internal subjects (e.g. ‘Ken have a car’ in
(102a)) in general can satisfy the EPP of T in the passive.
(102) a. Ken-ga kuruma-o kowas-are-ta. Alienable
Ken-nom car-acc break-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was broken (his) car.’ (Ken had his car broken.)
b. Ken-ga ude-o o-rare-ta. Inalienable
Ken-nom arm-acc break-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was broken (his) arm.’ (Ken had the arm broken.)
c. Naomi-ga odori-o home-rare-ta. Agent
Naomi-nom dance-acc praise-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was praised (her) dancing.’ (Naomi had her dance praised.)
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d. Guntai-ga syokei-o mokugeki.s-are-ta. Agent

army-nom execution-acc witness-pass-pst
‘The army, the execution was witnessed.’34
e. Naomi-ga syoosetu-o home-rare-ta. Creator
Naomi-nom novel-acc praise-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was praised (her) novel.’ (Naomi had her novel praised.)
f. Naomi-ga otooto-o sika-rare-ta. Kinship
Naomi-nom younger.brother-acc scold-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was scolded (her) brother.’ (Naomi had her brother scolded.)
In contrast, adjuncts (in Saito’s term) or nominal predicates do not undergo

possessor-raising, as shown in (103b) and (103d).
(103) a. Seizika-no zyosei-ga hinans-are-ta.
politician-no woman-nom criticize-pass-pst
‘The woman, who is a politician, was criticized.’
b. *Seizika-{wa/ga} zyosei-{ga/o} hinans-are-ta.
politician-{top/nom} woman-{nom/acc} criticize-pass-pst
Int. ‘Politician, the woman (the woman, who is a politician) was criti-
cized.’
c. Ame-no hi-ga yosokus-are-ta.
rain-no day-nom predict-pass-pst
‘Rainy days were predicted.’
d. *Ame-{wa/ga} hi-{ga/o} yosokus-are-ta.
rain-{top/nom} day-{nom/acc} predict-pass-pst
‘The rain, the days were predicted.’
Whether a DP-internal object (or theme) feeds into possessor-raising is not very
straightforward. The following examples show that the theme reading of the
derived subject is not available unlike DP-internal subject cases given in (102).
Nevertheless, the theme reading is available in restricted cases and its availability
depends on the verb -rare merges with.
(104) a. Ken-ga syasin-o {kakudai.s/yabuk/nusum}-are-ta.
Ken-nom picture-acc {enlarge/rip/steal}-pass-pst
[Owner/Creator/*Theme]
Lit. ‘Ken was {enlarged/ripped/stolen} (his) picture.’
(Int. ‘Ken had a picture of him {enlarged/ripped/stolen}.’)
34. It is reported that the dative phrase in possessive dative constructions in Spanish and
Hebrew is incompatible with the agent reading of a process nominal (see Kempchinsky 1992;
Landau 1999). However, as this example shows, the agent reading of a process nominal is
available in Japanese.
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b. Guntai-ga sono mura-no bakuha-o zyunbisi-ta. Active

army-nom the village-no blow.up-acc prepare-pst
‘The blow up of the village was prepared by the army.’
c. Sono mura-no bakuha-ga (guntai-ni) zyunbis-are-ta.
that village-no blow.up-nom army-dat prepare-pass-pst
‘The blow up of the village was prepared (by the army).’
d. *?Sono mura-ga (guntai-ni) bakuha-o zyunbis-are-ta.
the village-nom army-dat blow.up-acc prepare-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The village was prepared the blow up.’
(Int. ‘The village had the blow up prepared (by the army).’)
In (104a), the nominative DP Ken can be interpreted either as an owner or a cre-

ator of the picture, but not as a theme of the picture. Similarly, (104d) with the
theme interpretation of ‘the village’ is awkward. The verbs contained in the above
passives are rather neutral, not biasing towards the ‘theme’ interpretation of the
accusative DP. This pattern is consistent with the distribution of possessive dative
constructions in Hebrew reported by Landau (1999: 5). Interestingly, however, by
alternating the verb, the theme interpretation can be easily obtained. In fact, only
the theme interpretation is available in (105b).
(105) a. Kameraman-ga yuumei.zyoyuu-no syasin-o tot-ta.
photographer-nom famous.actress-no picture-acc take-pass-pst
‘A photographer took a picture of a famous actress.’ [A:mean 4.91]
b. Yuumei.zyoyuu-ga kameraman-ni syasin-o tor-are-ta.
famous.actress-nom photographer-dat picture-acc take-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The famous actress was taken the picture of by the photographer.’
[A:mean 4.78]
What is notable about (105b) is that in this passive the owner or creator inter-
pretation of the derived subject is unavailable, unlike other examples. The passive
(105b) seems to be an exception and should be taken as containing an idiomatic
predicate – syasin-o tor-u ‘to be taken a picture of,’ which forces a theme inter-
pretation of the no-phrase – rather than a pure case involving possessor-raising.
Hence, based on the data presented in (104), I conclude that only DP-internal
subjects can undergo possessor-raising in the passive context in Japanese.
Let us now turn to the semantics of ‘DP(subject)-no NP’ configuration. Not
only agent, owner, and creator, but a wide variety of relations can be encoded in
‘DP-no NP,’ especially in appropriate supportive contexts. For example, Tom-no
bus can be used if one is talking about a bus ‘Tom’ regularly takes (i.e. a habitual
relation). In addition, what counts as a possessive relation seems to vary across
speakers: some people have more tolerance than others, allowing very loose re-
lationships between the two arguments (Vergnaud & Zubizarreta 1992; Shibatani
1994; among others). The current syntactic approach to the idea of possession
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.56 (3130-3182)
predicts that the same variability will carry over to the genitive passive. This pre-
diction is borne out (the issue of variability with respect to genitive passives will
be discussed in Section 3.6.1.2).
Although very flexible, the interpretation of no-phrases is not entirely free: of
all the readings crosslinguistically available for genitives, not all seem to be avail-
able. For example, the ‘cause’ interpretation, which is available with a genitive
phrase in Greek (cf. Koptjevskaja-Tamm 2001), is unavailable in Japanese.
(106) a. *(kanozyo-no) uragiri-no ikari
her-no betrayal-no anger
Int. ‘anger due to (her) betrayal’
b. *(kare-no) uso-no wakare
he-no lie-no break.up
Int. ‘a break-up due to (his) lies’
(Instead, this means ‘(his) fake break-up’)
Unavailability of such readings suggests that the interpretation of no-phrases is

not determined meta-linguistically. Instead, I would like to pursue the idea that
the flexible interpretations come from no-phrases being (reduced) relative clauses
containing silent primitive predicates, such as have, do, and make, and that no
is the D that introduces a (reduced) relative clause (cf. Kayne 1994 for French
de, and English postnominal genitives). Note that Saito’s (2008) dichotomy – ar-
guments vs. adjuncts – does not capture the distribution of possessor-raising. As
shown in (104), DP-no phrase denoting theme cannot undergo possessor-raising,
although it is still an argument in Saito’s dichotomy. The reduced relative ap-
proach of no straightforwardly accounts for the following unique properties of
no: (1) no introduces a non-restrictive modifier (e.g. kasyu-no Naomi, ‘Naomi,
who is a singer,’) and (2) it combines with a PP (e.g. John-kara-no tegami ‘a letter
from John’). Further, I have no intention to attribute the distributional differences
in terms of ellipsis or possessor-raising to different nature among homophonous
no particles. Rather they should be attributed to the underlying structure of the
DP combined with no. Understanding the exact structural differences between the
DP-internal subject, object, and adjunct and the mechanism of nominal ellipsis
and possessor-raising still needs further research.
In what follows, I will introduce four properties of Japanese no-phrases that
are relevant for our discussion of genitive passives. The first important property
is its recursivity (cf. Fukui 1986): multiple no-phrases can cooccur in a single DP.
The stacking of no-phrases is much more flexible than English -’s, as shown in
(107) (the meaning of multiple no-phrases becomes clear when they are translated
as relative clauses).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.57 (3182-3257)
(107) a. [John-no otoosan]-no sono kuruma

John-no father-no that car
‘that car of John’s father’s’
b. John-no [kinoo-no sinbun]
John-no yesterday-no newspaper
*John’s yesterday’s newspaper – (English counterpart)
‘the newspaper which was published yesterday which John owns/wrote’
Despite the number of no-phrases, parsing DPs like (108a) and (108b), is effort-
less.
(108) a. [[[[John-no otoosan]-no [migi-no asi]]-no tume]-no iro]
John-no father-no right-no foot-no nail-no color
‘the nail color of John’s father’s right foot’35
b. [[NY-no hakubutukan]-no [John-no [Pikaso-no [uma-no e]]]]
NY-no museum-no John-no Picasso-no horse-no picture
‘the picture of a horse that was painted by Picasso which is in John’s
possession which is in the museum in NY’
The second property is the rigid relative ordering among no-phrases. Naomi-no e
‘Naomi’s picture’ is ambiguous: Naomi can be a legal owner, creator, or theme
argument of the picture. However, once no-phrases are stacked, the ambiguity
disappears (see also (108b)).
(109) Naomi-no Pikaso-no syoozyo-no e
Naomi-no Picasso-no girl-no picture
[owner/*creator] [creator/*owner] [theme/*creator] [NP]
‘a picture of a girl which Picasso painted which Naomi owns’
Native speakers have strong intuition about the order of these no-phrases. The
interpretation of the no-phrases is rigidly ordered regardless of real-world plausi-
bility: owner-creator-theme.
(110) Naomi-no syoozyo-no Pikaso-no e
Naomi-no girl-no Picasso-no picture
[owner/*creator] [creator/*owner] [theme/*creator] [NP]
‘a picture of Picasso which a girl painted which Naomi owns’
Despite the plausibility of ‘Picasso’ being a creator, ‘Picasso’ can only be the theme
of the picture. Similarly, ‘Naomi’ must be the owner, and ‘a girl’ must be the creator
of the picture (see also Kamiya 2007).
35. As the English translation of (108a) shows, some no-phrases are naturally translated into
English as a compound (e.g. tume-no iro ‘nail color’). This shows that what can be realized as a
compound in Japanese is much more restricted than in English.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.58 (3257-3316)
Thirdly, the linear order among the DP-no phrases matches the hierarchical
structure (see Murasugi 1991: 6). The reflexive zibun ‘self ’ in the creator DP can be
bound by the owner as shown in (111), and zibun in the theme can be bound by
both the owner and the creator.
(111) Keni -no [zibuni -no musuko]-no e
Ken-no self-no son-no picture
a. [owner] [creator ] NP
‘a picture which was painted by self ’s son which was owned by Ken’
b. [owner/creator] [theme]
‘a picture of self ’s son which was created/owned by Ken’
If we switch Ken-no and zibun-no ‘self-no,’ the string becomes ungrammatical.

This shows the hierarchical structure [owner>creator>theme], which is consis-
tent with the hierarchical order established for Romance (Cinque 1980; Giorgi &
Longobardi 1991; inter alia).
Given the above properties of no-phrases, the raising analysis makes the pre-
dictions that (1) only the highest possessor can be raised to the nominative posi-
tion, and (2) an embedded possessor cannot be raised to the nominative position
in passives, as expected from the principle of Relativized Minimality. As shown
below, these predictions are borne out.
(112) a. Mary-ga John-no Pikaso-no boto-no e-o
Mary-nom John-no Picasso-no boat-no picture-acc
hihansi-ta.
criticize-pst
[owner] [creator] [theme] NP
‘Mary criticized a picture of a boat that Picasso painted which John owns.’
Active
b. Pikaso-ga Mary-ni John-no boto-no e-o
Picasso-nom Mary-dat John-no boat-no picture-acc
hihans-are-ta.
criticize-pass-pst
[owner/*creator] [creator] [theme] NP
‘Picasso (owner/*painter) was criticized his picture of a boat which John
painted by Mary.’ Genitive PSV
Despite the plausibility, the nominative ‘Picasso’ cannot be taken as the creator in
(112b); rather, it corresponds to the highest argument, the owner. Once one of the
animate DP-phrases is dropped, the creator reading of ‘Picasso’ becomes available,
resulting in ambiguity between the owner and creator readings.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.59 (3316-3368)
(113) a. Mary-ga Pikaso-no boto-no e-o

Mary-nom Picasso-no boat-no picture-acc
hihansi-ta.
criticize-pst
[owner/creator] [theme] NP
‘Mary criticized a picture of a boat that Picasso {painted/ owned}.’
b. Pikaso-ga Mary-ni boto-no e-o
Picasso-nom Mary-dat boat-no picture-acc
hihans-are-ta.
criticize-pass-pst
[owner/creator] [theme] NP
‘Picasso (owner/painter) was criticized his picture of a boat by Mary.’
Lastly, no-phrases can express meanings equivalent to relative clauses. Consider

the following examples and their intended meanings:
(114) a. Naomi-ga [Ken-no [tosyokan-no hon]]-o kari-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-no library-no book-acc check.out-pst
Int. ‘Naomi checked out the book from the library that Ken wanted to
check out.’
b. Koibitoi -ga [Ken-no kami]-o kit-ta.
girl.friend-nom Ken-no hair-acc cut-pst
Int. ‘Ken’s girl friend cut her hair that Ken loves.’
The relations ‘Ken-no’ encodes in these sentences are not straightforward pos-
sessor relations. This relative-clause-like property of the no-phrase will play an
important role when identifying the active counterpart of a given passive, as we
will see below.
3.6.1.2 Genitive passives disguised

In the preceding section, we have seen that no-phrases can encode a wide variety
of relations between two arguments, and multiple no-phrases can occur in a sin-
gle DP. These properties of no-phrases coupled with the obligatory deletion of no
particle under movement (cf. Section 3.1.2) often obscure the no-phrase source
of the derived subject in the passive. This section deals with a number of specific
examples that have been presented in the literature as arguments in favor of the ex-
istence of indirect or gapless passives. The goal of this section is to show not only
that the proposed analysis can handle these cases but also that the analysis makes
the right predictions.
Let us start with Watanabe’s (1996: 116) example of an indirect passive.
(115) Mary-ga John-ni sono tegami-o yom-are-ta.
Mary-nom John-dat that letter-acc read-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Mary was read that letter {of hers/by her} by John.’
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The passive (115) is felicitous only if ‘Mary’ is an owner or creator of ‘that letter.’
Therefore, I propose that (115) is an instance of the genitive-accusative passive
derived from the following active counterpart:
(116) John-ga [Mary-no [sono tegami]]-o yon-da.
John-nom Mary-no that letter-acc read-pst
‘John read that letter {of Mary’s/by Mary/about Mary}.’ Active
The sentence (116) is well-formed, and the relation between ‘Mary’ and ‘that letter’
can be an owner, creator, or theme relation. The readings in (115) are straightfor-
wardly derived under the present account, as ‘Mary-no (that letter)’ is the highest
no-phrase in the DP in each of these readings. Presumably, the reason (116) has
not been analyzed as a genitive passive is the presence of the demonstrative sono.
However, as shown in (107a), demonstratives do not block stacking of no-phrases.
Therefore, nothing special needs to be said for this case (I address the question of
where the adversative connotations come from in Section 6.4.3.1).
Now consider the following passive, which looks like a gapless passive at first
glance.
(117) Sono hito-wa kankyaku-ni inemuri.s-are-ta.
that person-top audience-dat nap.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘That person was napped by his audience.’
Crucially, for this sentence to be acceptable, ‘audience’ has to be the audience of

‘that person’: the subject and the dative by-phrase in (117) have to stand in a no-
phrase relation (i.e. The person have audience). In other words, there is a gap
corresponding to ‘that person’ in the dative DP. Therefore, my proposal is that
(117) is another instance of genitive passives. The no-phrase relation between the
two DPs can be easily overlooked in cases like (117). However, switching ‘that per-
son’ with another DP like ‘the comedian’ will make it easier to see that there is
a no-phrase relation between the derived subject and the dative phrase, and this
indeed is a necessary condition for this passive to be well-formed.
We now turn to an example involving structural ambiguity. The following
passive is unacceptable, but it sounds better in certain contexts.
(118) *Taroo-wa [otooto-no inu]-ni sin-are-ta. [A:mean 1.66]
Taro-top brother-no dog-dat die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Taroi was died by a dog owned by hisi brother.’
The potential active counterpart of this sentence is (119a). Its nominative DP con-
tains two no-phrases and is structurally ambiguous. The two structures are given
in (119b) and (119c):
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(119) a. [Tarooi -no otooto-no inu]-ga sin-da.

Taro-no brother-no dog-nom die-pst
Int. ‘Taro’s brother’s dog died.’ Active
b. Tarooi -no [proi otooto-no inu]
Taro-no (his) brother-no dog
Int. ‘the dog kept by Taro’s brother that is temporary owned by Taro’
c. [Taroo-no otooto]-no inu
Taro-no brother-no dog
‘the dog that Taro’s brother keeps’
Because of Minimality only Taroo in (119b), not the embedded one in (119c),
is predicted to be able to undergo possessor-raising and move to the nominative
position in the passive. Since otooto ‘brother’ is a relational noun, without con-
text, there is a strong bias towards the structure given in (119c). Accessing (119b)
requires additional contextual support. A semantical difference between the two
structures is that in (119c) there is no direct relation between ‘Taro’ and ‘the dog,’
whereas in (119b) ‘Taro’ has some no-phrase relation with ‘his brother’s dog.’ We
can see below that providing a context inducing a no-phrase relation between
‘Taro‘ and ‘his brother’s dog’ primes the structure given in (119b) and significantly
improves the acceptability of (118).
(120) Possessive Context Taro was asked to take care of his brother’s dog for a few
days, but the dog died when Taro was in charge.
a. [Tarooi -no [proi otooto-no inu]]-ga sin-da. Active
Taro-no brother-no dog-nom die-pst
Int. ‘The dog owned by Taro’s brother which was temporary owned by
Taro died.’ [A:mean 4.72]
b. Taroo-ga [Taroo-no [otooto-no inu]]-ni sin-are-ta. Passive
Taro-nom brother-no dog-dat die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Taroi was died by his brother’s dog that he temporary owned.’
[A:mean 3.11]
The following context, which was designed not to induce direct possessive relation
between ‘Taro’ and ‘the dog,’ was also presented with the two sentences.
(121) Non-Possessive Context Taro’s brother’s dog died, and his brother was very
upset. As a brother, Taro had to comfort and support his brother and ended
up missing his favorite baseball game.
a. [[Taroo-no otooto]-no inu]-ga sin-da Active
Taro-no brother-no dog-no die-pst
Int. ‘The dog owned by Taro’s younger brother died.’ [A:mean 4.58]
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b. ?Taroo-ga [[Taroo-no otooto]-no inu]]-ni sin-are-ta. Passive

Taro-nom brother-no dog-dat die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Taro was died by his younger brother’s dog.’ [A:mean 2.73]
To me the contrast between the two contexts is sharp: the passive is compatible
only with situations like (120). Although the mean ratings for (120b) and (121b)
are close, the paired one-tail T-test shows that the score for (121b) is significantly
lower than the score for (120b), t(73) = 2.36, p = 0.01.36 In this case, the rele-
vant active source for the passive is simply difficult to access. However, when a
supporting context that primes the appropriate active source is constructed, the
passive becomes acceptable. Crucially, context helps only if it induces the struc-
ture in which the movement derivation converges, as expected under the current
analysis.
As discussed in Section 3.6, the relations expressed in the [DP-no NP] form are
very flexible (i.e. ‘relative clause’-like), and contexts help establish a no-phrase rela-
tion between arguments when such a relation is difficult to construe. Significantly,
establishing a no-phrase relation has syntactic effects: it provides the nominative
DP with a clause-internal source (as a DP-internal subject) and makes an other-
wise ungrammatical passive grammatical. Traditionally, such passives are said to
require ‘adversative’ context (the nominative DP is adversely affected by the event)
to be well-formed. However, I will show below that it is ‘no-relation-inducing’
contexts but not adversative contexts that make passives well-formed.
Consider (122a), which is well-formed for me only if ‘Ken’ and the ‘library
book’ stand in some kind of a no-phrase relation (e.g. the library book which Ken
intended to check out or the book that Ken has checked out from the library). The
proposed active counterpart is given in (122b).
(122) a. Ken-wa Naomi-ni tosyokan-no hon-o kari-rare-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-dat library-no book-acc check.out-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was checked out the book from the library that he wanted to
check out by Mary.’ [B:mean 2.22 (s.d. 1.34)]
b. Naomi-ga [Ken-no [tosyokan-no hon]]-o kari-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-no library-no book-acc check.out-pst
‘Naomi checked out the library book that Ken wanted to check out.’37
36. For speakers who could accept (121b), the context (121) was probably sufficient to con-
strue a no-phrase relation between ‘Taro’ and the ‘dog.’ There is clearly inter-speaker variability
in terms of licensing no-phrase relations: some speakers are much more tolerant than others.
37. The interpretation for (122b) suggests that there might be some kind of ellipsis in the
reduced relative: [Ken wanted to check out the [book from the library]] no [book from the
library]. What is relevant here is that (122b) has the same meaning as (122a).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.63 (3551-3619)
Table 3.1 Grammatical judgment results for (123)
mean s.d. 1 2 3 4 5 Total
no context 2.22 1.34 25 7 10 9 3 54

% (46.3) (13.0) (18.5) (16.7) (5.6) (100)
(123a) 3.74 1.39 6 5 9 11 23 54
% (11.1) (9.3) (16.7) (20.4) (42.6) (100)
(123b) 1.83 1.22 30 14 3 4 4 54
% (55.6) (25.9) (5.6) (5.6) (7.4) (100)
The grammaticality judgment results for (122a), which was presented in null con-
text, exhibit considerable inter-speaker variability (cf. the standard deviation is
1.34). Out of 54 participants, 15 (22.3%) gave it a 4 or 5, 10 (18.5%) gave a 3, and
32 (59.3%) gave a 1 or 2 (see Table 3.1). This suggests that 15 speakers were able to
construe a no-phrase relation between ‘Ken’ and the ‘library book’ even without
contextual support, whereas 32 speakers were not. If the well-formedness of this
sentence is indeed contingent on the accessibility of a no-phrase relation between
‘Ken’ and the ‘library book,’ we would expect higher acceptability in supportive
context that induces a no-relation interpretation between the two arguments. In
order to test this hypothesis, (122a) was also presented in the questionnaires in
two different contexts in which Ken was affected by the event: (123a) was designed
to induce a no-phrase relation while (123b) was not.
(123) a. Ken went to the library to check out a book, which he needed to write
a report for his college class. However, the book was not available, and
he found that Naomi, who was taking the same class as him, had already
checked it out. [B:mean 3.74 (s.d. 1.39)]
b. Ken had an appointment with Naomi, but she was 30 minutes late. This
was because she went to the library before the appointment and checked
out a book, which took time. Ken was busy and had difficulty making
time for this appointment, so he got angry. [C:mean 1.83 (s.d. 1.22)]
Although there is inter-speaker variability, the prediction is basically borne out.

Table 3.1 summarizes the ratings from the participants.
As Table 3.1 shows, in the possession-inducing context (123a), 34 (63%) out of
54 rated (122a) as 4 or 5. 9 participants (16.7%) gave it a 3. 11 participants (20.4%)
gave it a 1 or 2, and the mean rating was 3.74. In the non-possessive adversative
context (123b), 44 (81.5%) out of 54 rated the same sentence as 1 or 2 and the
mean rating was 1.83. Interestingly, some speakers who accepted (122a) in null
context rejected it in context (123b).38
38. Although context (123a) was sufficient for me to license a possessive no relation, it was
probably not for 11 speakers who gave (122a) a 1 or 2.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.64 (3619-3697)
We now turn to an example that involves even looser no-phrase relations be-
tween the nominative DP and the accusative DP. The passive (124) is compatible
with two readings, which are given in the English translations:
(124) Ken-ga koibito-ni kami-o ki-rare-ta. [A:mean 4.21]
Ken-nom girl.friend-dat hair-acc cut-pass-pst
(a) Lit. ‘Ken was cut his hair by his girlfriend.’
(b) Lit. ‘Ken was cut his [his girlfriend’s hair] by his girlfriend.’
The first reading comes from the structure of a regular genitive-accusative passive.
Here, we are interested in the second reading. It is a much harder reading to get
unless prompted. The (b) reading is compatible with the situation where Ken likes
his girlfriend’s hair very much (i.e. he has a strong attachment to his girlfriend’s
hair), and his girlfriend cut her hair. This context allows me to establish a no-
phrase relation between Ken and kami ‘hair’: the hair belongs to Ken’s girlfriend,
but it is Ken’s hair in the sense that Ken is obsessed about it. The proposed active
counterparts for the two readings are given below:
(125) a. Koibito-ga [Ken-no kami]-o ki-ta.
girl.friend-nom Ken-no hair-acc cut-pst
‘Ken’s girlfriend cut Ken’s hair.’
b. Koibitoi-ga [Ken-no [pro kami]]-o kit-ta.
girl.friend-nom Ken-no (her) hair-acc cut-pst
Int. ‘Ken’s girlfriend cut her hair that Ken loves.’
64 out of 74 participants rated (124) as 3, 4 or 5. 32 out of those 64 reported that

they could find the ambiguity between (a) and (b). Among the 32 people who
did not get the ambiguity, 31 only accepted the (a) reading, whereas one reported
that he could only accept the (b) reading. In the cumulative total, 63 got the (a)
reading, whereas 33 got the (b) reading.
All the passive sentences examined in this section are traditionally considered
indirect passives, whose nominative DPs lack an active source. As shown, however,
they are just instances of raising from a DP-no phrase. Furthermore, I have shown
that it is not adversative contexts but the context that induces a DP-no source
that increases the acceptability of such passives: this is because establishing a no-
relation between a nominative DP and an argument in the moved VP provides a
clause-internal source for the nominative DP as a no-phrase. In addition, the data
presented here show that only the highest no-phrase can map to the nominative
DP in the passive, which I take to be strong evidence for a movement derivation.39
We have also seen that there is a considerable amount of inter-speaker variability
39. One argument against the movement approach to genitive passives comes from availability
of an overt reflexive ‘zibun’ in the possessed DP:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.65 (3697-3734)
Table 3.2 The active source of the derived subject in the passive
Source Thematic role Examples of the verb stem

of nom.
DP-acc Theme/Patient ker-u ‘kick’; tabe-ru ‘eat,’ kowas-u ‘break’
DP-dat Dative Theme butukar-u† ‘bump’; hure-ru ‘touch’
at-Directional hoe-ru ‘bark’; donaru ‘yell’, uinkusu-ru
‘(do) wink’, hohoem-u ‘smile’
on-Directional seki-o su-ru ‘cough’; hur-u ‘(rain) descend’
Cause nak-u ‘cry’; odorok-u ‘be.surprised’
Goal watas-u ‘hand’; syookaisu-ru ‘introduce’
zimansu-ru ‘brag’, kokuhaku.su-ru ‘confess’
DP-abl Source nige-ru ‘escape’
tor-u ‘take’; nusum-u ‘steal’
DP-no Possessor-Theme Transitive verbs
sin-u ‘to die’; nyuuin.su-ru ‘to be.hospitalized’
with respect to what counts as a no-phrase relation. If the analysis here is correct,
the variability in licensing the no-phrase should directly reflect the variability in
accepting the genitive passive.
This chapter thus far has shown that the derived subject in the Japanese passive
has a wide variety of active sources. Table 3.2 summarizes the sort of DPs that can
be promoted to the nominative in the Japanese passive.
(i) a. Ken-ga (zibun-no) titioya-ni sin-are-ta.

Ken-nom self-no father-dat die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was died by (his) himself ’si father.’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni (zibun-no) titioya-o koros-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no father-acc kill-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Keni was killed (his) himself ’si father by Naomi.’
It is possible to preserve the grammaticality as well as the meaning of the genitive passive by
adding zibun-no ‘self-no’ in the position of the trace especially when a possessed NP is a kinship
term. My proposal is that zibun in (i-a) and (i-b) is in fact an emphatic use of zibun ‘self ’, and
their underlying active counterparts are presented below:
(ii) a. [Ken-no [zibun-no titioya]]-ga sin-da.

Ken-no self-no father-nom die-pst
Lit. ‘Ken’s himself ’s father died.’
b. Naomi-ga [Ken-no [zibun-no titioya]]-o korosi-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-no self-no father-acc kill-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi killed Ken’s himself ’s father.’
If this analysis is correct, the availability of zibun in the trace position does not necessarily
provide a counter-argument to the movement derivation of genitive passives.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.66 (3734-3784)
Are there any passives whose nominative DPs do not correspond to any of the
active sources given in Table 3.2? In other words, are there true gapless passives?
There are indeed such passives – i.e. the extra-thematic passive. We will discuss the
extra-thematic passive in the next section.
3.7 Extra-thematic nominative DPs
This final section deals with the extra-thematic passive – the passive whose nom-
inative DP lacks an active source. The proposed smuggling analysis of Japanese
passives does not generate this type of passive, which in fact is a desirable result
given that the extra-thematic passive is ungrammatical to me. Examples of the
extra-thematic passive are given below (note the low mean ratings):
(126) a. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni oyog-are-ta. [C:mean 1.39]
‘Ken was swum by Naomi.’
(Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that Naomi swam.’)
b. *Ken-wa musume-ni odor-are-ta. [C:mean 1.56]
‘Ken was danced by (his) daughter.’
(Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that his daughter danced.’)
(cf. Hoshi 1994: 40)
c. *Ken-ga Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta. [A:mean 1.09]
‘Ken was run by Naomi.’
(Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that Naomi ran.’)
The term ‘extra-thematic’ is adopted from Shibatani (1994), and it means a situ-
ation where an argument exists that is not part of the case frame of the verb with
which it occurs, or that does not bear a θ-role specified by the verb or the possessed
NP (cf. Shibatani 1994: 465; see Chapter 7 for further discussion).
As the low mean ratings show, the extra-thematic passive is not readily ac-
ceptable unlike the core passive we have seen so far. Adversative contexts, which
make it clear how the nominative DP is affected by the event, are said to make
(126)-type extra-thematic passives well-formed (Kubo 1992; Shibatani 1994: 147;
inter alia). However, I have been unable to come up with a context that makes the
extra-themtaic passives in (126) well-formed. In the following examples, how the
nominative DP is affected is entirely transparent, yet they are still ill-formed to
many speakers (see also (95c) discussed in Section 3.6):
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:34 F: LA19203.tex / p.67 (3784-3839)
(127) a. *Naomi-wa musuko-ni kikenna yama-ni nobo-rare-ta.

Naomi-top son-dat dangerous mountain-dat climb-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was climbed on a dangerous mountain by her son.’
[C:mean 1.70]
b. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni sinkoosyuukyoo-o hazim.e-rare-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-dat new.religion-acc begin-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was joined a new cult by Naomi.’ [C:mean 1.69]
Note that the word sinkoosyuukyo ‘cult’ in (127b) has a negative connotation
in Japanese, and it is highly plausible that if someone becomes a member of
sinkoosyuukyo, people close to him/her are severely affected. Kubo (1992) (and
also Pylkkänen 2002) gives (127b) as a representative example of gapless passives,
but she does not state that the passive requires further contextualization.
The low acceptability of these passives raises the questions: Are adversative
contexts a sufficient condition for licensing an extra-thematic passive? And if so,
what are the defining properties of adversative contexts that are needed to make
the extra thematic passive well-formed. I defer the answers to these questions until
Chapter 7. Chapters 4, 5, and 6 concentrate on the analysis of core passives.
This chapter has shown that the nominative DP in the core passive always has
an active source of the derived subject. This was accomplished by extending the
range of potential active source. Specifically, I have proposed that the addressee
of verbs of speaking, the kara-marked source, various types of dative DPs (i.e.
theme, on/at-directional, cause), or the no-phrase of the internal argument
can be raised to the nominative position in the passive, as long as it is the highest
DP in the smuggled VP. I have further shown in Section 3.6.1.2 that many instances
of gapless passives in fact belong to genitive passives. Identifying the position of the
gap in indirect/gapless passives allows us to subsume the indirect passive under the
direct passive and to unify the two types of passives.
The remaining question is how the nominative DP that is licensed within the
moved VP domain ends up in the nominative position in the passive. Assuming
the principle of Locality of Selection (Sportiche 1988), the derivation of Japanese
passives must involve movement. The arguments and evidence for the movement
analysis are given in Chapter 6. The movement analysis raises another question:
Where do the adversative/affected connotations available with many passives come
from? This issue is also addressed in Chapter 6.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.1 (63-190)
chapter 4
Ni-passives, ni-yotte-passives,
and short passives
In the preceding chapters, I have established that -rare takes an active v as its
complement and attracts a VP to its Spec. The dative ni selects for -rare and at-
tracts the vP containing the external argument. In accusative passives derived from
(pseudo)-ditransitives (e.g., verbs of speaking or creation), ni selects for the dative
goal DP (see Section 3.3.2). In this chapter, I will discuss the issue of other ways
the external argument can be marked, and whether it can be left unmarked (i.e.
short passives).
The external DP in Spec,vP can be marked in three ways: ni, kara ‘from,’ or
ni-yotte ‘by means of ’ (e.g. Kubo 1992). The three forms are presented below:
(1) a. Ken-wa tomodati-{ni/*kara/ni-yotte} zitensya-o kowas-are-ta.
Ken-top friend-{dat/from/ni-yotte} bike-acc break-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was broken (his) bike {by/by means of} his friend.’
b. Ken-wa sensei-{ni/kara/*? ni-yotte} kiraw-are-ta.
Ken-top teacher-{dat/from/ni-yotte} hate-pass-pst
‘Ken was disliked {from/by} his teacher.’
c. Sono tosyokan-wa yuumeina kentikuka-{*ni/*kara/ni-yotte}
that library-top famous architect-{dat/from/ni-yotte}
tate-rare-ta.
build-pass-pst
‘That library was built by means of a famous architect.’1
As shown in (1), ni, kara, and ni-yotte are not always interchangeable. Kara gen-
erally introduces a source argument. Ni-yotte is a complex phrase consisting
of ni followed by a gerundive form of a verb yor-u ‘going via.’ According to
Kinsui (1997), ni-yori-(te), the earlier form of ni-yotte, has roughly two meanings –
‘cause/reason’ and ‘means/way.’2 He reports that ni-yotte arose from the necessity
of translating the two meanings of the Dutch passive preposition door ‘through’
1. Recall that the dative DP can be interpreted only as a benefactive phrase and not as an
agentive phrase with creation verbs like tate-ru ‘to build’ (see Section 3.3.2).
2. Ni-yori, the earlier form of ni-yotte, sounds formal but is still used.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.2 (190-220)
Table 4.1 The distribution of external arguments
Verb-type Complement of -rare ni kara ni-yotte –
(i) Achieve-Result koros-u ‘kill,’ war-u ‘split,’ ok * ok ok

tsukamae-ru ‘catch’
kowas-u ‘break’
(ii) Manner of ker-u ‘kick’, tatak-u ‘hit’ ok * * *
Activity sawar-u ‘touch,’ os-u ‘push’
(iii) Transition aisur-u ‘love’, ok ok *? *
of Emotion nikum-u ‘hate’
or Perception kiraw-u ‘dislike,’
mi-ru ‘see,’ kik-u ‘hear’
sonkei.su-ru ‘admire’
(iv) Ditransitives† okur-u ‘send,’ watas-u ‘hand’ ok ok * *?
(Dative PSV) syookai.su-ru ‘introduce’
(v) V of Speaking† senkokusu-ru ‘declare’ ok ok * *?
(Dative PSV) suisen.su-ru ‘recommend’
(vi) Ditransitives† okur-u ‘send,’ watas-u ‘hand’ * ok ok ok
(Acc. PSV) syookai.su-ru ‘introduce’
(vii) V of Speaking† senkoku.su-ru ‘declare’ * ok ok ok
(Acc. PSV) suisen.su-ru ‘recommend’
(viii) Creation tate-ru ‘build’, kak-u ‘write’ * * ok ok
tukur-u ‘make’
† Note that ditransitives and ‘verbs of speaking’ (i.e. pseudo-ditransitives) appear twice, but this is because
the distribution differs depending on whether the nominative is an underlying goal/addressee or theme, as
we have seen in Section 3.3.2.
into Japanese. This is important since even in contemporary Japanese, as we will

see below, both the ‘cause/reason’ and ‘means/way’ readings remain. Furthermore,
the external argument can sometimes be omitted (e.g. in (1a) and (1c) but not in
(1b)), yielding an interpretation comparable to English short passives, which I will
treat as involving some kind of PRO following Collins (2005).
Table 4.1 summarizes the rather complex distribution of the external argu-
ment of the predicate embedded under -(r)are (the data in Table 4.1 are expanded
version of the data presented by Kubo 1992; Kinsui 1997). An important general-
ization drawn from the table is that the ni-yotte phrase and suppressed by-phrase
distribute in the same fashion, which is consistent with the generalization Kubo
(1992) proposes.3
3. Kubo’s judgements, however, differ from mine fundamentally: she claims that the ni-yotte
phrase is always available with direct and possessive passives. However, I found contrast even
among direct (or accusative) passives, and some instances of short passives seem to involve topic
drop rather than PRO. Fukuda (2009b) also reports experimental results that show that many
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.3 (220-277)
Chapter 4. Ni-passives, ni-yotte-passives, and short passives 121
Table 4.1 shows that the ni-phrase has the widest distribution, as expected from the
proposed analysis. The kara-phrase is only compatible with predicates that seem
to license a source external argument (e.g., a source of the transition of emotion,
etc). Ni-yotte passives and short passives seem to pattern in the same way.
While the judgments of ni-passives and kara-passives are fairly clear, the ni-
yotte passives and short passives involve subtle grammaticality judgements. The
results from the survey exhibit a considerable amount of interspeaker variability
with respect to the compatibility with a ni-yotte phrase, as illustrated below:4
(2) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni tatak-are-ta.
‘Ken was hit by Naomi.’ [A:mean 4.88]
b. ?Ken-ga Naomi-ni-yotte tatak-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-ni-yotte hit-pass-pst
‘Ken was hit by means of Naomi.’ [A:mean 2.85]
c. Grammaticality judgment results
(2a) 4.88 0.52 0 2 0 3 69 74
% (0) (3) (0) (4) (93) (100)
(2b) 2.85 1.27 11 23 15 16 9 74
% (15) (31) (20) (22) (12) (100)
The passive (2b) is quite unnatural to me, as are all ni-yotte passives derived from
‘manner of activity’ verbs. The interpretation of the grammaticality judgement
results of short passives is difficult, as Japanese allows ‘topic drop.’ Without contex-
tual support, only the short/ni-yotte passives derived from type (i) and (viii) verbs
given in Table 4.1 are fully well-formed (Note that these verbs denote achievement
that yields a result-state):5
(3) a. John-ga (nanimonoka-ni-yotte) koros-are-ta.
John-nom (someone-ni-yotte) kill-pass-pst
‘John was killed (by means of someone).’
participants did not accept the ni-yotte phrase with experiencer arguments of verbs like kiraw-u
‘to hate.’
4. Kinsui (1997) reports that a ni-yotte phrase with type (i) verbs sounds rather literal and
formal. In addition, he gives * to stative verbs in type (iii), such as aisu-ru ‘to love,’ nikum-u ‘to
hate.’
5. The complication with type (vi)–(viii) verbs is that the ni-phrase in the passive cannot intro-
duce an external argument of the complement of -rare. The only way to introduce the external
argument is by ni-yotte phrase (see Section 3.3.2).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.4 (277-352)
b. Atarasii tosyokan-ga (si-ni-yotte) tate-rare-ta.

new library-nom (city-ni-yotte) build-pass-pst
‘The new library was built (by means of the city).’
In contrast, if the passives derived from type (ii)–(v) predicates are uttered without
context, a follow-up question is necessary to find out who the particular agent is.
I take this to mean that the omission of the by-phrase in these cases involves ‘topic
drop,’ and they are incompatible with short passives.
(4) a. #Kinoo John-ga ke-rare-ta.
yesterday John-nom kick-pass-pst
‘Yesterday John was kicked.’
b. #Kinoo John-ga tatak-are-ta.
yesterday John-nom hit-pass-pst
‘Yesterday John was hit.’
I observe that short and ni-yotte passives are the most natural when they are de-
rived from ‘incremental theme’ verbs (e.g. eat, build, destroy, break, and kill) or
‘change of state’ verbs (e.g., steal, escape) (see Section 5.3.2.1 for more examples).
All of these verbs denote an achievement that yields a result-state. In contrast,
short/ni-yotte passives are not quite compatible with ‘manner of activity’ verbs
(e.g., hit, kick), which do not allow this result-state reading.
The analytical question is what distinguishes the ‘result-state’ predicates from
‘manner of activity’ predicates. We have already established in Chapter 2 that -rare
needs to merge with a structure that at least contains a v or an equivalent, and
hence both types of predicates should have an active v. The difference is that the
result-state predicates are compatible with cause arguments, while the predicates
expressing ‘manner of activity’ assert the existence of an agent.
Another important property of result-state predicates is that they are also
compatible with eventive (or progressive) interpretations, especially when the pas-
sive contains an overt ni-phrase, as demonstrated below:
(5) a. Ken-no konpyuutaa-ga kowas-are-tei-ru.
Ken-no computer-nom break-pass-asp-prs
‘Ken’s computer has been broken.’ Result-State & Progressive
‘Ken’s computer is being broken (by someone).’
b. Ken-no konpyuutaa-ga Naomi-ni kowas-are-tei-ru.
Ken-no computer-nom Naomi-dat break-pass-asp-prs
‘Ken’s computer is being broken by Naomi.’ Progressive
This leads to the natural hypothesis that predicates of result-state have a sub-
stracture of ‘manner of activity’ or eventive predicates. Following Fujita (1996)
and Travis (2005), among others, I assume that external arguments – agent and
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.5 (352-400)
cause – are introduced in two distinct positions: the cause is realized in a posi-
tion that is asymmetrically c-commanded by the agent. Thus, we can distinguish
the two types of predicates by the structure of their v. My idea is that the pred-
icates that denote achievement yielding a result-state always contain vcause , and
can optionally introduce vagent . Whereas, the manner of activity predicates never
come with vcause alone but are always bundled with vagent . In order to license short
or ni-yotte phrases, -rare needs to merge with the predicate with a v introducing
cause.6
The proposal that short and ni-yotte passives need to combine with vcause is
supported by the following fact: once the manner of activity predicate is embedded
under a causative morpheme, short and ni-yotte passives become possible, as (6)
shows.
(6) Ken-ga (Naomi-ni-yotte) kooen-o hasir-ase-rare-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-ni-yotte park-acc run-caus-pass-pst
‘Ken was made to run in the park (by means of Naomi).’
Furthermore, this proposal is consistent with the fact that ni-yotte means ‘cause/
reason.’ Now the question is whether or not the vcause introduces an argument –
PRO – in short and ni-yotte passives. We will address this question in Sections 4.3
and 4.3.2.
In what follows, the four ways to introduce the external argument of the com-
plement of -rare (ni-, kara-, ni-yotte-phrases, and silent cases) will be analyzed in
turn.
4.1 The ni-phrase
As shown in Table 4.1 and expected from the analysis so far, the ni-phrase ex-
hibits the widest distribution among the three phrases, and it is not selective
about the kind of θ-roles of the DP it introduces. It is compatible with agent,
cause, causer (in causative constructions), experiencer, source, and goal, as
exemplified below (see also Kubo 1992: 251 n. 13; Miyagawa 1989: 40):
(7) Agent
a. Keisatu-ga Ken-o tukamae-ta.
‘The police caught Ken.’ Active
6. Another way to implement this idea is to assume that v comes in different varieties, vcause
and vdo , and vmake (Hale & Keyser 1993, 2002), and PRO can be introduced only by vcause .
Resultative predicates are compatible with both vcause and vdo , whereas the manner of activity
predicates are only compatible with vdo .
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.6 (400-457)
b. Ken-ga (keisatu-ni) tukamae-rare-ta.

‘Ken was caught (by the police).’ Acc. PSV
(8) Cause
a. [Kaisya-ga toosan.si-ta to-iu zizitu]-ga Ken-o utinomesi-ta.
company-nom bankrupt-pst c-say fact-nom Ken-acc damage-pst
‘The fact that his company went bankrupt damaged Ken.’ Active
b. Ken-ga [kaisya-ga toosan.si-ta to-iu zizitu]-ni
Ken-nom company-nom bankrupt-pst c-say fact-dat
uchinomes-are-ta. Acc. PSV
damage-pass-pst
‘Ken was damaged by the fact that his company went bankrupt.’
c. Taihuu-ga ie-o hukitobasi-ta.
‘typhoon-nom house-acc blow-pst
‘The typhoon blew the house away.’ Active
d. Ie-ga taihuu-ni hukitobas-are-ta.
house-nom typhoon-dat blow-pass-pst
‘The house was blown away by the typhoon.’ Acc. PSV
(9) Causer
a. John-ga Naomi-ni Ken-o tukama.e-sase-ta.
John-nom Naomi-dat Ken-acc catch-caus-pst
‘John made Naomi catch Ken.’ Active
b. Naomi-ga John-ni Ken-o tukama.e-sase-rare-ta.
Naomi-nom John-dat Ken-acc catch-caus-pass-pst
‘Naomi was made to catch Ken by John’ Dative PSV
(10) Experiencer
a. Gakuseitati-ga sono kyoozyu-o kowagar-ta.
students-nom that professor-acc fear-pst
‘The students feared that professor.’ Active
b. Sono kyoozyu-ga gakuseitati-ni kowagar-are-ta.
that professor-nom students-dat fear-pass-pst
‘That professor was feared by the students.’ Acc. PSV
(11) Source
a. Naomi-ga Ken-ni hanataba-o okur-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-dat flower-acc send-pst
‘Naomi sent Ken a flower bouquet.’ Active
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni hanataba-o okur-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat flower-acc send-pass-pst
‘Ken was sent a flower bouquet by Naomi.’ Dative PSV
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.7 (457-514)
(12) Goal
a. Ken-ga inu-o morat-ta.
Ken-nom dog-acc receive-pst
‘Ken received a dog.’ Active
b. Sono inu-wa Ken-ni moraw-are-ta.
that dog-top Ken-dat receive-pass-pst
‘That dog was received by Ken.’ Acc. PSV
In general, the semantics of the ni-phrase matches that of the external argument
of the verb embedded under -rare. The exceptions are the accusative passives de-
rived from type (vi), (vii), (viii) pseudo-ditransitive verbs given in Table 4.1. As
discussed in Section 3.3.2, in these cases, the goal, addressee, or benefactive ar-
gument in the moved VP maps onto ni, as it is structurally closer than the external
argument in the vP.
One important characteristic of the ni-phrase in Japanese, which was reviewed
in Section 3.3.2.4, is its resistance to relativization. This generalization holds for the
ni-phrase of most transitive, ditransitive, and intransitive passives, as exemplified
below:
(13) Relativization of the Dative by-Phrase of Accusative Passives
a. *[[Ken-ga ti tsukama.e-rare-ta] keisatu.kani ]-ga yuumei-ni
Ken-nom catch-pass-pst police.man-nom famous-dat
nat-ta.
become-pst
Int. ‘The policeman by whom Ken was caught became famous.’
b. *[[John-ga ti hon-o watas-are-ta] syoozyoi]-wa kawai-i.
John-nom book-acc hand-pass-pst girl-top cute-prs
‘The girl by whom John was given a book is cute.’
(14) Relativization of the Dative by-Phrase of Intransitive Passives
a. *[[Ken-ga hu-rare-ta] ame]-wa tumetakat-ta.7
Ken-nom descend-pass-pst rain-top cold-pst
Lit. ‘The rain by which Ken was descended upon was cold.’
[on-Directional Dat PSV]
b. *[[Naomi-ga sin-are-ta] hahoya]-wa yasasikat-ta. [Gen-Dat PSV]
Naomi-nom die-pass-pst mother-top kind-pst
Lit. ‘The mother by whom Naomi was died was kind.’
c. *[[Ken-ga nak-are-ta] kodomo]-wa kawaikat-ta. [Cause Dat PSV]
Ken-nom cry-pass-pst child-top cute-pst
Lit. ‘The child by whom Ken was cried over was cute.’
7. Note that ame ‘rain’ can be relativized in the active voice (e.g. [[Sono mati-ni hut-ta] ame]
‘the rain which descended on that city’).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.8 (514-573)
d. *[[Ken-ga ti nige-rare-ta] onna]-wa totemo kireidat-ta.

Ken-nom escape-pass-pst lady-top very pretty-pst
‘The lady from whom Ken was escaped was very pretty.’ [Source PSV]
The exception is the dative phrase in the passive denoting goal: when the dative P
is a goal argument, it can undergo relativization. Further, the regular ni-marked
goal argument in the active voice can undergo relativization.
(15) Relativization of the Dative Goal DP in the Active/Passive
a. [[John-ga ti hon-o watasi-ta] syoozyoi]-wa yorokon-da.
John-nom book-acc hand-pst girl-nom be.pleased-pst
‘The girl to whom John gave a book was pleased.’
b. [[Hanataba-ga ti watas-are-ta] syoozyoi]-ga kawaikat-ta.
flower.bouquet-nom hand-pass-pst girl-nom cute-pst
‘The girl to whom the flower bouquet was handed was cute.’
I have proposed a derivational account for this contrast; that is, the goal ni-phrase
is a DP, while the dative by-phrase is a DP contained in the vP layer which behaves
like an island (see Section 3.3.2).
4.2 The kara-phrase
As shown in Table 4.1, the use of kara is restricted to predicates whose external
argument is the source of the transition of emotion/perception (i.e. type-(iii)),
entities (i.e. type-(iv)), or verbal information (i.e. type-(v)). That is, the com-
patibility of kara is contingent on the source θ-role of the highest argument of
the complement of -rare. This semantic restriction contrasts with the distribu-
tion of the ni-phrase, which suggests that kara is not a projection dependent on
-rare. Additionally, Table 4.1 shows that unlike ni-yotte-phrases, the external argu-
ment of the predicates that are compatible with kara (i.e. type (iii), (iv), and (v)
verbs) cannot be suppressed. This suggests that the statuses of kara and ni-yotte
differ. Following Emonds (1985: Ch. 7) and Kubo (1992: 278), I tentatively assume
that kara is a realization of the lexical postposition selected as part of the source
argument, and it is dropped when it is merged with a Case marker like ni.8
8. There are cases in which a Case marker like ga appears to directly follow kara, as illustrated
below:
(i) 30 peezi-kara-ga omosiroi.

30 page-from-nom interesting
Int. ‘(The story) from 30 page is interesting.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.9 (573-623)
Before turning to the ni-yotte-phrase, I will first discuss short passives that do
not contain an overt by-phrase.
4.3 Short passives and ni-yotte passives
4.3.1 Short passives
This section deals with the classic puzzle of whether or not the external argument
of the complement of -rare is present (i.e. PRO in Collins’ analysis 2005). In my
analysis, short passives must contain a silent external argument, simply because
-rare must take an active vP, which has a filled Specifier. As will be shown be-
low, this assumption is independently supported by the distribution of volition
(or subject)-oriented adverbials, depictives, and the ability to control into adjunct
clauses.
A silent external argument can license volition-oriented adverbials. (16a)
shows that wazato ‘deliberately’ is incompatible with non-sentient beings. In con-
trast, all the short passives in (16) are well-formed with wazato:
(16) a. #Hune-ga wazato sizun-da. Inchoative
ship-nom deliberately sinkintr -pst
‘The ship sank deliberately.’
b. Hune-ga wazato sizum.e-rare-ta. Acc. PSV
ship-nom deliberately sinktr -pass-pst
‘The ship was sunk deliberately (by somebody).’ [A:mean 3.41]
c. Konpyutaa-ga wazato kowa.s-are-ta. Acc. PSV
computer-nom deliberately breaktr -pass-pst
‘The computer was deliberately broken (by somebody).’
d. Sono hon-wa iyaiya kak-are-ta. Acc. PSV
that book-top unwillingly write-pass-pst
‘That book was written unwillingly (by somebody).’
e. Sono omotya-wa iyaiya sute-rare-ta. Acc. PSV
that toy-top unwillingly throw.away-pass-pst
‘That toy was unwillingly thrown away (by somebody).’
As expected, the following passive derived from the causative predicate is also well-
formed under the reading where wazato modifies the causative morpheme sase (i.e.
intentionally making him do so):
However, this sentence should be analyzed as containing a silent NP equivalent to ‘story’ or ‘con-
tent’ between kara and ga (cf. Kayne 2005). Thus even in this case, kara is not directly followed
by ga.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.10 (623-686)
(17) Ken-ga wazato sippai.s-ase-rare-ta.

Ken-nom deliberately mistake.do-caus-pass-pst
‘Ken was deliberately made to make a mistake (by someone).’
The second piece of evidence that an implicit external argument is present

comes from the compatibility of short passives with depictive phrases (contra
Pylkkänen 2002: (47b)). Depictive phrases describe a state of an argument of the
verb during the event described by the verb, and they are formed with an NP
followed by -de in Japanese. It is said that only argument NPs and not the NP
inside the PP can license a depictive phrase (cf. Koizumi 1994; Yatsushiro 1999;
Pylkkänen 2002; among others). The following short passive is compatible with
a depictive phrase, while (18b), which lacks a volitional licenser of the depictive
phrase, is ungrammatical.
(18) a. Sono e-wa PROi hadaka-dei kak-are-ta.
that picture-top naked-dep paint-pass-pst
‘That picture was painted naked.’ [Acc. PSV]
b. Sono e-wa (*hadaka-de) yabu.re-ta.
that picture-top naked-dep tearintr -pst
‘That picture tore naked.’ [Inchoative]
Lastly, the silent external argument can control the subject in temporal adjunct
while clauses, which shows that there must be a syntactic controller in the struc-
ture, as opposed to sentences like (19b), which contains an inchoative predicate:
(19) a. Sono tegami-wa PRO naki-nagara kak-are-ta.
that letter-top cry-while write-pass-pst
‘That letter was written (by someone) while crying.’ [Acc. PSV]
b. *Sono tegami-wa naki-nagara yabu.re-ta.
that letter-top cry-while tearintr -pst
‘That letter tore while crying.’ [Inchoative]
The properties of short passives discussed above suffice to conclude that the silent
external argument of the complement of -rare is syntactically represented (i.e.
PRO) in the Japanese short passive. Then a question arises: where is PRO? Does
it stay in the external merge position (i.e. Spec,vP), or can it occur in the same
position as the ni-phrase? Before answering these questions, let us examine the
structure of ni-yotte passives first.
4.3.2 Ni-yotte passives
Following many linguists (Park & Whitman 2003; Oshima 2006; Goro 2006;
Fukuda 2009c, b), we treat ni-yotte as an adjunct/modifier: i.e. the DP in the
ni-yotte phrase is not merged as an argument of the predicate embedded under
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.11 (686-753)
-rare, but as an argument of the verb yor ‘to cause’ in ni-yotte, with the gerund
controlling a silent argument, PRO. This accounts for the observation that the ni-
yotte-passives essentially behave like short passives. In addition ‘ni-yotte’ seems to
modify cause vP, suggesting that the gerund is an adjunct to the vP cause. If so,
this accounts for why the ni-yotte phrase is incompatible with agentive predicates
(see Table 4.1). The examples below show that the ni-yotte phrase is not specific to
the passive -rare construction but indeed modifies the vP cause.
(20) a. Kinoo ziko-ni-yotte dai-zyutai-ga okita.
yesterday accident-ni-yotte big-traffic_jam-nom happen-pst
Lit. ‘The heavy traffic jam occurred yesterday by means of an accident.’
[A:mean 4.62]
b. Taroo-no titioya-ga koutuu.ziko-ni-yotte nakunat-ta.
Taro-no father-nom car.accident-ni-yotte die-pst
‘Taro’s father died by means of a car accident.’ [A:mean 4.48]
Furthermore, a ni-phrase and a ni-yotte phrase can cooccur in a single passive, a

fact which, to the best of my knowledge, has not been noted before.9
(21) a. Doroboo-ga keikan-ni konboo-ni-yotte nagur-are-ta.
thief-nom policeman-dat stick-ni-yotte hit-pass-pst
‘A thief was hit by a policeman by means of a stick.’
b. Hikooki-ga terorisuto-ni bakudan-ni-yotte hakais-are-ta.
airplane-nom terrorist-dat bomb-ni-yotte destroy-pass-pst
‘That airplane was destroyed by a terrorist using a bomb.’
[A:mean 3.16]
The following sentences in (22) show that ni-yotte and ni are not interchangeable,
suggesting that they are related to different arguments: ni-yotte modifies a cause
or means argument, but never an agent, whereas ni in (21) attracts the high-
est argument of the complement of -rare regardless of its θ-role. This is a direct
consequence of the fact that -rare combines with active voice verbs (see Section 4.1).
Consequently, ni-yotte ends up being lower than ni in the structure. (Note that
without ‘bomb-ni’ (22a) is well-formed, since the agent is also a cause.):
(22) a. Hikooki-ga terorisuto-ni-yotte (*bakudan-ni) hakais-are-ta.
airplane-nom terrorist-ni-yotte bomb-dat destroy-pass-pst
Int. ‘That airplane was destroyed by a bomb because of a terrorist.’
[A:mean 1.66]
9. Kuroda (1979) argues that the passive with a dative by-phrase and the passive with a
ni-yotte-phrase is derived differently and has introduced a new dichotomy, ni- versus ni-yotte-
passives. However, this dichotomy is no longer tenable because of examples like the passives
give in (21), where the two phrases cooccur in a single passive. Differences between ni- and
ni-yotte-passives with respect to reconstruction are discussed in Section 6.2.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.12 (753-806)
b. *Hikooki-ga bakudan-ni terorisuto-ni-yotte hakais-are-ta.

airplane-nom bomb-dat terrorist-ni-yotte destroy-pass-pst
‘That airplane was destroyed by a bomb because of a terrorist.’
[A:mean 1.47]
The literature reports various differences between the ni-phrase and the ni-yotte
phrase. Here we briefly review three properties discussed in the literature and
discuss how to account for these distributional differences within the line of ar-
gumentation taken here.
First, the ni-yotte phrase is incompatible with volition-oriented adverbials.
The distribution of the ni-yotte phrase contrasts with that of the dative ni-phrase,
as shown below (cf. Park & Whitman 2003):
(23) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni iyaiya hanataba-o
Ken-nom Naomi-dat unwillingly flower.bouquet-acc
oku-rare-ta.
present-pass-pst
‘Ken was sent a flower bouquet by Naomi unwillingly.’
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni-yotte iyaiya hanataba-o
Ken-nom Naomi-ni-yotte unwillingly flower.bouquet-acc
oku-rare-ta.
present-pass-pst
‘Ken was presented a flower bouquet by means of Naomi unwillingly.’
The sentence (23a) is ambiguous: iyaiya ‘unwillingly’ can associate with either
‘Ken’ or ‘Naomi.’ In contrast, (23b) is unambiguous, and iyaiya ‘uniwillingly’ must
associate with the surface subject ‘Ken.’ How can we account for the difference?
The following anaphor-binding fact shows that the linear order (see (21)) matches
the hierarchical structural:
(24) Hikooki-ga terorisutoi -ni karera.zisini -no bakudan-ni-yotte
airplane-nom terrorist-dat themselves-no bomb-ni-yotte
hakais-are-ta.
destroy-pass-pst
‘That airplane was destroyed by the terrorists using themselves’ bomb.’
The ni-yotte-phrase in (24) must be merged lower than the ni-phrase that is se-
lected for as an argument of vP agent under the reading in (23a). This is so
because it modifies vP cause. Then we can understand the distribution of volition-
oriented adverbials to mean that the ni-phrase is high enough in the structure to
associate with the volitional adverb, whereas the ni-yotte-DP which modifies vP
cause is too low in the structure to associate with volition-oriented adverbs like
iyaiya ‘unwillingly.’
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The second piece of evidence that ni- and ni-yotte-passives differ comes from
the behavior with respect to the depictive de-phrase (see also Fukuda 2009b: who
concludes that the ni-marked DP is an argument while the ni-yotte-marked DP is
a PP adjunct). Specifically, the ni-phrase can license depictive phrases, while the
ni-yotte-phrase cannot.
(25) a. Tarooi -ga senseij -ni makkana.kao-dei/j okor-are-ta.
Taro-nom teacher-dat red.face-dep scold-pass-pst
‘Taroi was scolded by the teacherj red-facedi/j .’
b. Tarooi -ga senseij -ni-yotte makkana.kao-dei/*j okor-are-ta.
Taro-nom teacher-ni-yotte red.face-dep scold-pass-pst
‘Taroi was scolded by means of the teacherj red-facedi/*j .’
In addition, the ni-phrase can control a PRO inside an adjunct clause, while the
ni-yotte-phrase cannot (Fukuda 2009b: 43):
(26) a. Keni -ga Naomij -ni Ken-ni [PROi/j warai-nagara] kisu.s-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat laugh-while kiss-pass-pst
‘Ken was kissed by Naomi, while laughing.’ [Dative Passive]
b. Keni -ga Naomij -ni-yotte Ken-ni [PROi/*j warai-nagara]
Ken-nom Naomi-ni-yotte laugh-while
kisu.s-are-ta.
kiss-pass-pst
‘Ken was kissed by means of Naomi, while laughing.’ [Dative Passive]
The distribution of ni-passives, short passives, and ni-yotte passives with respect to
volitional adverbs, depictives, and control is summarized in Table 4.2.
Given that ni-yotte passives contain PRO, which is able to license depictive de-
phrases and control PRO in short passives, the distribution of the ni-yotte-passive
is puzzling. I have shown in Section 3.5.3 that the de-phrase is structurally quite
high. We independently know that temporal adjuncts are also structurally high
(cf. Cinque 1999; Collins 2005). Therefore, one possibility is that depictives are
simply never c-commanded by PRO from its external merge position. Further-
more, the height of ni-yotte restricts the height of PRO in the context of ni-yotte
passives. Namely, PRO remains low and never moves high enough in the struc-
ture to be able to associate with the depictive or to control the subject of the
Table 4.2 The distribution of by-phrases
Volitional adverbs Depictives PRO in adjunct

ni-Passive ok ok ok
Short-Passive ok ok ok
ni-yotte-Passive * * *
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:09 F: LA19204.tex / p.14 (881-900)
temporal adjunct. Given the discussion so far, we are led to the following structure
of ni-yotte-passives:
(27) The ni-yotte-Passive: ‘The computer was broken by means of John.’
TP
DP
VoiceP T
Computer-ga
pst
VP
NiyotteP -rare
DP V
Computer break XP vPcause
John-niyotte DP VP v
PRO
The proposed structure gives us insights in terms of the structure of the short
passive. The fact that short passives license depictives and volitional adverbs and
control the subject of temporal adjuncts suggests that in short passives PRO moves
high in the structure, i.e. PRO moves to the same structural position as where
an overt ni-phrase is, possibly in order to receive a null Case (cf. Chomsky 1995;
Collins 2005).10 The proposed structure of the short passive is given below:
10. Alternatively, the presence of depictives and volitional adverbs and the need to control the
silent subject in temporal adjuncts force PRO to rise. Yet, why PRO remains low in ni-yotte-
passives still needs to be explained. I will leave these questions open here.
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(28) The Short Passive: ‘The computer was broken.’

TP
DP
T
Computer-ga
vP VoiceP pst
PRO
VP
vP -rare
DP V
DP VP v
Computer break
PRO
What is important in my proposal is that -rare never absorbs an external θ-role,

and thus the external argument of the predicate with which -rare merges is always
syntactically represented, if not as a ni-phrase, as a PRO.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.1 (63-141)
chapter 5
Revisiting the literature
This book thus far has shown that a unified analysis of direct and indirect passives
is not only theoretically desirable but also possible. In particular, I have demon-
strated that the most important defining property of indirect passives (i.e., the
lack of an active counterpart) does not reliably exist. In this chapter, evaluating the
arguments presented in the literature in favor of distinguishing indirect passives
from direct passives, I will show that the dichotomy is not only unnecessary but
also empirically inadequate, further motivating a unified treatment of Japanese
passives.
This chapter is organized as follows. I begin with a brief literature review and
demonstrate how the traditional classification of passives can be translated into
the current proposal. Next I reexamine various properties that are alleged to set the
two types of passives apart. Section 5.3.1 deals with the distribution of Numeral
Quantifier Floating, Section 5.3.2.1 deals with the distribution of ni-phrases, and
Section 5.3.2.2 addresses the distribution of self-binding.
It turns out that the properties previously considered to support a direct-
indirect distinction reflect a partial view of the paradigm. Once a complete set
of facts is considered, a different picture arises: namely, the properties are not
coextensive with one of the two passive types, suggesting that the distributional
differences stem from other factors. I will sketch an account for some of these
properties but will be unable to present a full account here. However, I will clearly
demonstrate that there is no need to divide Japanese passives into two types.
5.1 The traditional classification
As is well-known from the early days of generative grammar, Japanese has two
types of passives (Kuno 1973; Inoue 1976; Shibatani 1978; Kubo 1992; among
others; see Hoshi 1999 for a review): (1) the ‘direct’ passive, which is called the
accusative or dative (goal) passive under the new classification; and (2) the ‘in-
direct’ passive, which comes in two varieties – (a) the ‘possessive’ passive, which
I refer to as the genitive-accusative passive, and (b) the ‘gapless’ passive, whose
subject appears not to relate to any positions or arguments of the predicate with
which -rare merges (in my analysis, the gapless passive encompasses dative, source,
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.2 (141-208)
and genitive-dative passives). Examples of each type of passive are provided below
(the name of the type under the current approach is provided below the mean
rating):
Direct Passive [A:mean 4.88]

(1) Ken-ga Naomi-ni tatak-are–ta.
‘Ken was hit by Naomi.’ Acc. PSV
Indirect Passive: Possessive Passive [A:mean 4.82]

(2) Keni -ga Naomi-ni kaoi/*j -o tatak-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was hit the face by Naomi.’ Gen-Acc PSV
Indirect Passive: Gapless Passive

(3) Taroo-no sakubun-ga Hanako-ni waraw-are-ta. Acc. PSV
Taro-no composition-nom Hanako-dat laugh-pass-pst
‘Taro’s composition was laughed at by Hanako.’ (cf. Pylkkänen 2000)1
(4) Naomi-wa hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta. [A:mean 4.68, C:4.33]
Lit. ‘Naomi was died by (her) mother.’ Gen-Dat PSV
(5) Mary-ga John-ni sono tegami-o yom-are-ta. Gen-Acc PSV
Mary-nom John-dat that letter-acc read-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Mary was read that letter of hers by John.’ (Watanabe 1996: 116)
(6) Ken-wa Naomi-ni nige-rare-ta. [C:mean 4.93]
Ken-top Naomi-dat escape-pass-pst
‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi.’ Source PSV
(7) Naomi-ga inu-ni hoe-rare-ta. [A:mean 4.68]
Naomi-nom dog-dat bark-pass-pst
‘Naomi was barked at by a dog.’ at-Directional Dative PSV
1. The verb waraw-u ‘to laugh’ has a transitive use meaning ‘to mock.’ Although Pylkkänen
(2000) regards a passive derived from waraw-u as a gapless passive, it should be treated as an
instance of accusative passives (or ‘direct passives’). The active counterpart of (3) is given below:
(i) Hanako-ga Taroo-no sakubun-o waraw-ta.

Hanako-nom Taro-no composition-acc laugh-pst
‘Hanako {mocked/laughed at} Taro’s composition.’
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Chapter 5. Revisiting the literature 137
(8) Bokura-wa soto-de suzusii kaze-ni huk-are-ta.

we-top outside-loc cool wind-dat blow-pass-pst
Lit. ‘We were blown at by the cold wind outside.’ at-Directional Dative PSV
(from Washio 1993: 63)
(9) Ken-wa ame-ni hu-rare-ta. [B:mean 4.28]
Int. ‘Ken was rained on.’ on-Directional Dative PSV
(10) Ken-wa Naomi-ni nak-are-ta. [C:mean 4.52]
Lit. ‘Ken was cried over by Naomi.’ Cause Dative PSV
(11) *Ken-ga kyuu-ni Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta. [A:mean 1.65]
Ken-nom suddenly Naomi-dat run-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was run suddenly by Naomi.’ (Shibatani 1998)
Int. ‘Ken experienced Naomi’s sudden run.’ Extra-thematic
(12) *Ken-wa Naomi-ni sinkoosyuukyoo-o hazime-rare-ta. [C:mean 1.69]
Ken-top Naomi-dat new_religion-acc begin-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was joined a new cult by Naomi.’ (Kubo 1992)
Int. ‘Ken experienced Naomi’s joining a new cult.’ Extra-thematic
Within the broad classification of direct and indirect passives, linguists argue for
many different subdivisions. Not all linguists agree that the ‘possessive passive’
form a natural class, and many linguists, including Kuroda (1979), Kitagawa &
Kuroda (1992), and Fukuda (2006), subsume the possessive passive under the
(gapless) indirect passive. Among those linguists who consider the possessive
passive a natural class (e.g., Kubo 1992; Shibatani 1990; Pylkkänen 2002), what
counts as the ‘possessive passive’ is restricted to cases involving the possessor of
accusative-marked DPs. In this book, passives with a no-phrase source have a
much wider distribution (cf. Section 3.6). I have shown that the source of the
nominative may correspond to the outermost no-phrase of dative-marked DPs,
provided the DP originates in the moved VP.
Table 5.1 summarizes the correspondence between the traditional classifica-
tion and the proposed classification of the core passive (extra-thematic passives
are excluded).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.4 (266-337)
Table 5.1 Traditional classification vs. the core passive
Standard Embedded predicate Source θ-role

types of nom.
Direct Tr: ker-u ‘kick’; tabe-ru ‘eat’ DP-acc Theme/Patient
Ditr: watas-u ‘hand’ DP-dat Goal/
Gapless V of speaking: zimansu-ru ‘brag’ Addressee
butukaru ‘bump’; kisusuru ‘kiss’ Dative Theme
hoe-ru ‘bark’; hur-u ‘descend’ Directional
nak-u ‘cry’; odorok-u ‘surprise’ Cause
Intr: nige-ru ‘escape’ DP-from Source†
Possess. Ditr: tor-u ‘take’; nusum-u ‘steal’
Tr: yom-u ‘read’ DP-no Possessor
Gapless Need “possessive context” of Theme
unaccusatives: sin-u ‘die’ (no-phrase)
† The verbs that license source include both intransitive and ditransitive verbs. Thepassive with a ditransitive
verb, tor-u ‘steal’ is analyzed as an instance of the possessive passive by Kubo (1992).
5.2 Traditional analyses
Since the 1960s, there have been two competing analyses of Japanese passives: the
‘uniform theory’, which derives both direct and indirect passives from a common
complementation substructure that involves optional Control (Ariji 2006; Kuroda
1965, 1979; Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992; Howard & Niyekawa-Howard 1976; and
many others), and the ‘non-uniform theory,’ which posits that direct and indirect
passives have distinct structures (Kuno 1973; McCawley 1972; Shibatani 1978; and
many others). Both theories basically agree on the structure of the indirect pas-
sive: the passive -rare assigns an external θ-role and takes a clausal complement.
They differ, however, in the structure of the direct passive. The uniform theory
assumes that the direct passive also involves Control, whereas the non-uniform
theory assumes that it involves Movement.
A more recent treatment of the direct passive is what I refer to as a ‘Hybrid
Approach’ proposed by Hoshi (1994) and Huang (1999), which involves both
Movement and Control (see Sections 5.2.2.3 and 5.2.2.4) (the two linguists dis-
agree about the type of movement, A or Ā). I briefly outline the leading analyses of
indirect and direct passives as well as Kubo’s (1992) analysis of possessive passives
below.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.5 (337-392)
5.2.1 The standard analysis of indirect passives
The standard analysis of indirect passives is presented below (translated in modern

terms with a VP shell structure) (Kuroda 1965; Kuroda 1979; Kitagawa & Kuroda
1992; Howard & Niyekawa-Howard 1976; and many others):
(13) [Ken-ga [vP Naomi-ni nak]-are-ta]. Dat. Cause PSV
Ken-nom Naomi-dat cry-pass-pst
‘Ken was cried over by Naomi.’ [C:mean 4.93]
TP
DPi T’
Ken-ga
vP T
pst
DPi v’
Ken
vP v
Naomi-ni cry -rare
The same structure is also assumed for gapless passives (cf. Kubo 1992). How ex-
actly the embedded external argument receives dative Case remains unclear: the
earlier proposals are Kuroda’s (1965: 170) Constituent Subject Extraction, which
extracts an embedded subject from the embedded sentential complement to the
matrix clause, and Kuno’s (1973: 349) Agentive-Ni attachment, which marks the
subject of the complement clause with ni.
There are many reasons to reject this analysis, and I focus on three principal
reasons here. Firstly, this structure over-generates passives, not distinguishing core
passives from extra-thematic passives. As shown in Section 3.7, not all indirect (or
gapless) passives are acceptable to native speakers to the same degree.
Secondly, this analysis does not account for the semantic restriction of the
nominative DP. According to the standard analysis, the nominative DP is selected
as an affectee argument, thus the sentence should be felicitous as long as Ken is
affected by the event denoted by the complement clause regardless of the ‘way’ that
happens. However, the interpretation of the nominative DP must match the inter-
pretation of the gap contained in the VP domain (see Chapter 3). For example,
Ken in (13) must be affected (if affected at all) because he is a cause of Naomi’s
crying: (13) is infelicitous in the event that Ken loves Naomi and he is upset be-
cause he saw her crying. All the analyses in which -rare selects for an affectee
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.6 (392-448)
(or malefactive/experiencer) external argument (e.g., Pylkkänen’s (2000) high

applicative analysis) run into these two problems.
The structure of indirect passives given in (13) resembles that of Japanese
causatives and also English ‘have’ or ‘get’ causatives. For this reason, indirect
passives have often been considered a variant of causative constructions with
the causative morpheme (or -rare) responsible for the dative Case (in essence
Hoshi 1994; Oshima 2006; Shibatani 1973a: 342).2 Nevertheless, as discussed in
Section 2.4.2, the passive does not show the same distribution as the causative
construction. Specifically, -rare cannot merge with pure unergative verbs that lack
a VP layer, such as oyog ‘to swim,’ hatarak ‘to work,’ and odor ‘to dance,’ while the
causative morpheme -sase does not have such a restriction. The uniform analy-
sis of indirect passives cannot capture the difference between unergatives that can
and cannot be passivized (see Section 6.1, for further distributional differences be-
tween the passive and causative sentences). I will discuss the behavior of indirect
passives with respect to movement diagnostics in Chapter 6.
5.2.2 Standard analyses of direct passives
I now turn to some leading existing analyses of the direct passive, beginning with
a review of the two traditional analyses, non-uniform and uniform theories, fol-
lowed by a discussion of the more recent Hybrid Approach to direct passives that
involves both movement and control (Huang 1999 and Hoshi 1994).
5.2.2.1 Non-uniform theory: Movement approach

Under the non-uniform theory, direct passives are derived just like English pas-
sives. Most linguists assume -rare absorbs structural Case and the external θ-
role (cf. Fukuda 2006; Goro 2006; inter alia). In essence, this is an extension of
Chomsky’s LGB (1981), Jaeggli (1986), Baker et al. (1989), or current minimalist
approaches in which the v in the passive does not project an external argument
(also see Section 1.6.1).
5.2.2.2 Uniform theory: Control analysis

The ‘uniform theory’ (Kuroda 1965, 1979; Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992; Goro 2006)
assumes that the -rare morpheme in the direct passive is the same as the one con-
tained in the indirect passive in that it selects for an affectee external argument
and a clausal complement. However, the derivation of the direct passive involves
an additional mechanism compared to that of the indirect passive due to the pres-
2. There are many different recent proposals for Japanese causatives, which I do not address
here (see Harley 1996; Miyagawa 1994; Miyagawa 1999; Harley 2005; Homer & Ishizuka 2009;
inter alia).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.7 (448-485)
ence of a gap. Namely, the nominative DP (i.e., the affectee argument of -rare)
controls for the accusative pro contained in the complement domain of -rare. The
relevant part of the structure is given below:
(14) Keni -ga [Naomi-ni proi ke]-rare-ta.
Keni -nom Naomi-dat himi kick-pass-pst
‘Ken was kicked by Naomi.’
vP
DP v’
Keni
vP v
Naomi proi kick -rare
The problem with the uniform theory is the obligatory deletion of the embedded
accusative object, as pointed out by Huang (1999) and Hoshi (1994). The embed-
ded object is alleged to be an A-bound pro, and whether an A-bound pro is possible
in the embedded object position is controversial (see Huang 1984; Huang 1989;
Huang 1999; Hasegawa 1984; among others). I will revisit this issue in Section 6.1.
Variants of the uniform analyses – Hybrid Analyses – that have been proposed by
Hoshi (1994) and Huang (1999) to deal with this problem will be reviewed in the
next two sections.
5.2.2.3 Hoshi (1991, 1994): Low A-movement and control

Hoshi (1994) proposes that the null object is not a pro but a PRO, which moves
to Spec,vP (the subject of the embedded clause) in order to receive null Case
(Chomsky & Lasnik 1993) where it is then controlled by the affectee argument
of the matrix verb -rare. As in the standard analysis, the passive morpheme -rare
absorbs accusative Case and suppresses the external argument of its complement.
This is why PRO can move into Spec,vP, which is the process Hoshi (1994) calls
VP-internal passivization. The relevant part of the structure is given below.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.8 (485-539)
(15) Ken-ga [PRO Naomi-ni PRO ke]-rare-ta.

Ken-nom Naomi-dat kick-pass-pst
vP
DP v’
Keni
vP v
-rare
v’
PROi
Naomi-ni t i kick
In this analysis, the suppression of the external argument plays a crucial role in
licensing PRO, since it provides a position for PRO to move into. Hence, the direct
passive is restricted to raising of structural Case-marked DPs. In indirect passives,
external argument suppression and Case absorption do not occur. The problem
with this analysis is that in principle an object pro should be able to occur in the
indirect passive context, but a pro reading of the gap in the indirect passive is never
available. An object pro always gives rise to a direct passive interpretation (i.e., the
accusative gap obligatory refers to the nominative DP), as illustrated below:
(16) Keni -ga [Naomij -ni proi/*j/*k ke]-rare-ta.
(Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that Naomi hit him/*her.’)
Although in this analysis the passive -rare morpheme behaves the same in direct
and indirect passives in that it selects an external argument, the differences be-
tween the two types of passives are non-trivial: stipulating optional features of
-rare – which triggers external argument suppression and Case absorption (result-
ing in VP passivization) in the direct passive but not in the indirect passive – is
essentially the same as proposing two distinct -rare morphemes.
5.2.2.4 Huang (1999), Toyoshima (1996): Ā-movement and control

Huang (1999), building on Feng’s (1995) tough construction analysis of Chinese
passives, also proposes an analysis of direct passives which involves movement
(but this time Ā-movement of an operator) and complementation. The analysis
of tough constructions is illustrated below (cf. Chomsky 1981):
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.9 (539-589)
(17) This problemi is easy [CP OPi for you to solve OPi ].
The relevant part of the structure proposed for Japanese direct passive is given
below:
(18) Ken-ga [OP [Naomi-ni OP ke]]-rare-ta.
vP
DP v’
Keni
IP v
-rare
IP
OPi
Naomi-ni t i kick
Huang’s and Hoshi’s analyses are distinct in whether the movement in the com-
plement of -rare is A- or Ā-movement. As will become evident in Section 6.3, data
in favor of Ā-movement are inconclusive (see also Ishizuka 2010).
Both the control (or uniform) analysis and the hybrid approach differ from
the proposed smuggling analysis in a critical way. Namely, -rare selects for an ar-
gument in the former analyses and not in the latter. If -rare indeed selects for an
argument, we would expect some consistent semantic value associated with every
occurrence of the passive -rare. However, it will be shown in Section 6.4.3 that a
consistent semantic value (or θ-role) is not identifiable (affected connotations as-
sociated with some passives are just an implicature). We now turn to the existing
analyses of possessive passives below.
5.2.3 Standard analyses of possessive passives
Treatments of ‘possessive passives’ differ depending on the analysis. Uniform

theory-type analyses subsume the possessive passive under gapless indirect pas-
sives, assuming that it contains no possessor gap corresponding to the nominative
DP (Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992; Kuroda 1979; Fukuda 2006; among others). This
approach, however, falls short of accounting for the obligatory possessive inter-
pretation of the relationship between the nominative DP and the internal argu-
ment of the predicate with which -rare merges. Furthermore, treating possessive
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.10 (589-628)
passives as a subset of indirect passives is problematic from a typological perspec-

tive since possessor passives appear to behave as a natural class in other languages:
Korean and Mandarin are known to have possessive passives but lack the other
type of indirect passives available in Japanese (understood as dative/source pas-
sives and extra-thematic passives under the current approach). Positing the same
complementation structure for possessive and indirect passives would fail to ex-
plain the typological distribution (Shibatani 1990; Washio 1993; Huang 1999;
inter alia).
In the next section, I review Kubo’s (1992) movement approach to the posses-
sive passive.
5.2.3.1 Movement (non-uniform-type) analysis

Kubo (1992: 288) proposes the following lexical entry for the passive morpheme
-rare:
(19) rare, V, +V [Direct & Possessive Passives]
+VP [malefative] [Gapless Passives]
The passive morpheme -rare in the direct and possessive passives subcategorizes
a X0 -level category V and does not have any θ-role to assign, whereas -rare in
the gapless indirect passive subcategorizes a complement phrase VP and has an
external θ-role to assign (basically the same structure as the one proposed in the
Uniform Analysis of indirect passives given in (13)). Under this proposal, the exter-
nal argument of the predicate is realized as a PP adjunct because the lexical verb –
tatae ‘to praise’ in (20) below – is not the head of the VP.3 The representation of
the possessive passive is given below (Kubo 1992: 290):
(20) Ken-ga hitobito-ni yuuki-o tatae-rare-ta.
Ken-nom people-dat courage-acc praise-pass-pst
‘Ken had his courage praised by people.’
3. Kubo (1992: 290) proposes that the external argument is realized as a PP adjunct based on
the following principle:
(i) An external θ-role can be realized in an adjunct as a last resort (i.e., as a less economic
representation than in Spec (VP)).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.11 (628-673)
TP
DP T’
Ken-ga
VP T
V’ pst
PP V’
people-ni
DP V
Ken V V
NP
praise -rare
courage
Kubo (1992) assumes similarly to the current proposal that Japanese lacks exple-
tives and proposes that the promotion takes place because movement is the only
way to satisfy the EPP of T.
Note that the internal argument ‘Ken’s courage’ is merged as an argument of
the complex predicate ‘praise-rare’ and not as the complement of ‘praise.’ This is
a violation of the principle of Locality of Selection (Sportiche 1998). Hence, Kubo’s
structure is not a possible analytical option for us.
5.3 Are indirect passives special?
The previous section has provided a brief summary of some leading proposals
of Japanese direct, indirect, and possessive passives. It is difficult to evaluate the
existing analyses given that the current approach partitions Japanese passives dif-
ferently from the traditional three-way classification. Under the current approach,
indirect passives are no longer considered a natural class but analyzed as passives
containing a gap in an oblique position or a no-phrase position (i.e., they are sim-
ply a subclass of ‘direct passives’). Both direct and indirect (and genitive) passives
contain the same lexical item -rare and involve VP-movement. They minimally
differ in the external merge position of the argument from which it moves to the
nominative position.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.12 (673-711)
The literature thus far has focused on differentiating direct and indirect pas-
sives. Although the line between the two types of passives is not very clear, they
are said to behave differently in the following respects: (1) the availability of an
active source, (2) the presence of strong adversative/affected connotations, (3) the
distribution of Numeral Quantifiers (NQ, hereafter), and (4) the distribution of
the dative by phrase. I have already shown in Section 3.5 that the nominative
DP in indirect passives must have an active source in the moved VP domain,
which determines its interpretation; otherwise the derivation does not converge.
As for the adversative connotations, Howard & Niyekawa-Howard (1976) have
convincingly shown that they are not specific to indirect passives. The source of
adversative connotations carried by many passives will be discussed extensively in
Section 6.4.3.
In what follows, I reexamine the last two properties assumed to differentiate
direct and indirect passives – the distribution of Numeral Quantifier Floating and
the behavior of ni-phrases.
5.3.1 Numeral Quantifier Floating
The phenomenon of Numeral Quantifier Floating (NQF, hereafter) has been ex-
tensively studied and has played an important role in distinguishing between di-
rect and indirect passives (Miyagawa 1989; Miyagawa & Arikawa 2007; Shibatani
1977a; Kuno 1978; Haig 1980; Terada 1990; Fitzpatrick 2006; Watanabe 2006;
Nakanishi 2008; among many others). In the literature, two competing views have
been advanced regarding the distribution of NQ. One view holds that the numeral
and the host NP are adjacent in the underlying structure and that the host NP
moves higher in the structure, stranding the numeral – a stranding view (e.g.,
Miyagawa 1989). The other view holds that the numeral is base-generated as an ad-
junct to a verbal projection, just like adverbs – an adverb view (Ishii 1999; Takami
1998; Takami 2001; Mihara 1998; among others). Since the literature generally as-
sumes the stranding view, the discussion presented in this section also assumes
the stranding view (see Nakanishi 2008 for an extensive review). Before examining
the behavior of NFQ and laying out what its distribution might reveal about the
derivation in the passive context, I present a basic description of NQF in Japanese.
Numeral Quantifiers are numerals followed by a classifier that agrees in type
with the associated NP (i.e., Num-CL).4 They show a variety of surface patterns,
as illustrated below (note that all the forms involve Case-markers):
4. For example, the classifier for people is -nin, for books -hon, for cars -dai, and so forth.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.13 (711-755)
(21) a. [3-cl-no car]-o

Ken-ga [san.dai-no kuruma]-o nusun-da.
Ken-nom 3.cl-no car-acc steal-pst
‘Ken stole three cars.’ [Localno ]
b. [Car 3-cl]-o
Ken-ga [kuruma san.dai]-o nusun-da.
Ken-nom car 3.cl-acc steal-pst
‘Ken stole three cars.’ [Local]
c. [Car]-o [3-cl]
Ken-ga kuruma-o san.dai nusun-da.
Ken-nom car-acc 3.cl steal-pst
‘Ken stole cars, three.’ NQFshort
d. [Car]-o . . . [3-cl]
Kuruma-o Ken-ga kuruma-o san.dai nusun-da.
car-acc Ken-nom 3.cl steal-pst
Lit. ‘Cars, Ken stole three.’ NQFlong
The last two boxed patterns are pertinent to the discussion here. In these forms, the
NQ either immediately follows the Case-marker (NQF-short) or is separated from
the Case-marker by intervening material (NQF-long). Local configurations always
yield a grammatical string, while NQF-short and NQF-long cases do not. Linguists
in general seem to agree that NQF-long involves movement, but the status of NQF-
short is unclear.5
As is well-known, Miyagawa (1989) has proposed that the NQ must be in a
strict sisterhood relation with its associated NP (in traditional terms, a mutual c-
command relation). However, NQF-short, which satisfies this requirement, is not
always acceptable, as exemplified in (23a) (see the mean ratings):
5. Traditionally, (21c) has been analyzed as being derived from (21a) by NQF (Shibatani 1977a;
Kuno 1978; among others). Here, it is not important whether (21a) or (21b) underlies (21c).
Furthermore, not all linguists agree with the movement derivation of NQF-short. For example,
Watanabe (2006) and Fitzpatrick (2006) assume that (21c) is a single constituent. However, I do
not adopt Watanabe’s approach because NQF-short is not always possible.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.14 (755-822)
(22) NQF from a Theme Accusative DP

a. NQFshort
Naomi-wa tomodati-ni [omiyage]i-o huta-tui watasi-ta.
Naomi-top friend-dat souvenir-acc 2-cl hand-pst
‘Naomi handed two souvenirs to her friend.’ [B:mean 4.89]
b. Local
Naomi-wa tomodati-ni [omiyage huta-tu]-o watasi-ta.
Naomi-top friend-dat souvenir 2-cl-acc hand-pst
‘Naomi handed two souvenirs to her friend.’ [B:mean 4.37]
(23) NQF from a Goal Dative DP
a. NQFshort
*Naomi-wa [tomodati]i -ni huta-rii omiyage-o watasi-ta.
Naomi-top friend-dat 2-cl souvenir-acc hand-pst
‘Naomi handed the souvenir to two friends.’ [C:mean 1.61]6
b. Local
Naomi-wa [tomodati huta-ri]-ni omiyage-o watasi-ta.
Naomi-top friend 2-cl-dat souvenir-acc hand-pst
‘Naomi handed the souvenir to two friends.’ [C:mean 4.98]
The low mean rating of (23a) shows that many speakers reject NQF from a dative
goal DP. There is simply no explanation in the literature that accounts for the con-
trast between (22a) and (23a). The well-known generalization is that an NQ can
be associated with an argument, but not with an adjunct (Okutsu 1969; Harada
1976; Shibatani 1977a; Inoue 1978; Kuno 1978; Sadakane & Koizumi 1995; among
others). In other words, NQF-short is possible only if the particle is a Case-marker,
and not a postposition. However, (23a) involves NQF-short from a goal DP, which
is in general taken to be an argument (“quasi-objects” in Inoue’s (1978) term), and
hence the data do not conform to the generalization.
The complication is that the grammaticality of sentences containing NQF of-
ten involves subtle judgments and gradations, and not all linguists agree with the
data critical to the leading proposals, which makes the analysis of NQF very dif-
ficult. For Sadakane & Koizumi (1995) sentences like (23a), where NQF-short is
derived from a dative goal DP, are well-formed. While it is unclear if the variability
implies that there are different Japanese dialects among speakers, at least for many
speakers (including myself) such examples are impossible, and the literature does
not have an account for that fact.
6. Miyagawa (1988, 1996) argues that NQF from a dative phrase is possible only if the da-
tive phrase precedes the accusative phrase. The results from the questionnaire do not confirm
Miyagawa’s judgments. Although the dative phrase precedes the accusative phrase in (23a), the
sentence is not well-formed to many participants.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.15 (822-879)
It is impossible to evaluate the NQF data in the passive without understanding

its distribution in the active sentences. While I am able to present a new general-
ization that captures the distribution of NQF in the active and passive sentences
within the assumptions defended in this research program, I will be unable to go
beyond the description to explain why the generalization holds: we have to leave a
theoretical understanding of why NQF-short is possible from certain context and
not others for future research. In the next section, I propose new generalizations
regarding the distribution of NQF-short in the active and then discuss what is
predicted to happen once the active sentence is fed into passivization.
5.3.1.1 New generalization and prediction

I propose the following two generalizations regarding Numeral Quantifier Floating:
(24) a. NQF-short is possible only from (underlying) theme (it can be either
ga- or o-marked). It is impossible from an (underlying) ‘external,’ dative,
kara-marked source, or no-marked DP (i.e oblique DPs).
b. The behavior of NQF-short in the active determines the behavior of NQF
in the passive counterpart. If NQF-short in the active is impossible, NQF
in the passive counterpart is impossible either.
The first generalization comes from introspective data (see also Terada 1990, who
has an idea similar to (24a)). Note that this generalization has nothing to say about
the possible type and number of phrases that can intervene between the NQ and its
associated NP. I assume that once NQF-short is formed, the NQ and the associated
NP can be further apart, and other independent principles, such as scrambling,
determine the distribution of NQF-long.
This generalization is consistent with most of the data reported in the litera-
ture and Miywagawa’s well-known generalization (1989) regarding NQF. Namely,
NQF is possible from the subject of unaccusatives and direct passives (i.e., ac-
cusative passives), but not from the subject of unergatives. The examples below
are taken from Miyagawa & Arikawa (2007: 646) and Miyagawa (1989):
(25) a. Kurumai -ga doroboo-ni ti ni-daii nusum-are-ta.
car-nom thief-dat 2-cl steal-pass-pst
‘Two cars were stolen by a thief.’ Acc. PSV
b. Doai -ga kono kagi-de huta-tui ai-ta.
door-nom this key-nl 2-cl open-pst
‘Two doors opened with this key.’ Unaccusative
c. Gakuseii -ga ofisu-ni huta-rii kit-ta.
student-nom office-dat 2-cl come-pst
‘Two students came to the office.’ Unaccusative
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.16 (879-950)
d. *Kodomoi-ga geragerato san-nini warat-ta.

childreni -nom mimetics 3-cli laugh-pst
‘Two children laughed (loudly).’ Unergative
The ungrammaticality of (25d) is not contingent on the presence of the interven-

ing ‘low manner’ adverb geragerato. Substituting geragerato with a temporal adverb
kinoo ‘yesterday’ or a locative P kyooshitu-de ‘in the classroom’ does not render the
sentence acceptable (contra Ko 2005). (25d) sounds a little better if there is no in-
tervening material between the NQ and its associated NP, but it is still unacceptable
to me.
NQF-long examples like those above have been taken as evidence for a
movement derivation in the unaccusative and direct passive constructions; the
strict sisterhood requirement is satisfied with the trace of the moved element
(see Miyagawa & Arikawa 2007; Miyagawa 1989).7 The proposed generalization
7. Kitagawa & Kuroda (1992) argue that Miyagawa’s NQF argument does not exclude the pos-
sibility of the gap being a base-generated empty pronominal (pro or PRO) (examples are from
Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992: (16), (17)):
(i) At the library:

Kongetu-no sinkansyo desu-ka? Kinoo Yamada-sensei-ga
this.month-no newly.published.books cop-q yesterday Yamada-teacher-nom
pro ni-satu karidasimasi-ta yo. Discourse-pro
two-cl check.out-pst sp
‘You mean this month’s newly published books? Prof. Yamada came and checked out
two of them yesterday.’
(ii) Syuuzin-ga yuube mata [kono ryuutizyo kara PRO san-nin
prisoner-nom last.night again this prison from three-people
nige-yoo-to] {kuwadate/kokorom}i-ta. Control-PRO
escape-try-c attempt-pst
‘Three prisoners again attempted to escape from this prison last night.’
Kitagawa & Kuroda (1993) argue that, in the discourse example (i) and the control construction
(ii), the licensers of the NQs are the base-generated pro and PRO respectively. Nevertheless, in
the topic construction (i), there is no guarantee that pro is a base-generated DP internal to the
NQ phrase. The DP ‘newly published books’ may be a pro that has been Ā-moved and dropped
at the left-periphery, as illustrated below:
(iii) proi Kinoo Yamada-sensei-ga ti ni-satu karidasimasi-ta yo.

yesterday Yamada-teacher-nom two-cl check.out-pst sp
‘Prof. Yamada came and checked out two of them yesterday.’
In (iii), the gap is a trace; thus (i) does not necessarily show that pro can license NQF.
Turning to the example with PRO, the structure in (ii) does not match the interpretation of
the sentence. The proposed structure in this account should give rise to the following interpreta-
tion: the prisonersi attempted that three of themi escaped last night. This interpretation should
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.17 (950-996)
straightforwardly accounts for the contrast observed in (25). Namely, in (25a),

(25b), and (25c), NQF takes place from the underlying theme arguments, while
in (25d), NQF must take place from the external argument, resulting in unaccept-
ability.
Data involving NQF in Japanese often need subtle judgments and/or are sub-
ject to idiolectal variations, and the situation with transitive predicates is a bit more
complex than the cases reviewed above. The literature agrees on the judgments in
examples like (26a), (26b) and (26c) but differs from my judgment in examples
like (26d).
(26) a. ?*Kodomo-ga kono kagi-de huta-ri doa-o ake-ta. NQFlong
child-nom this key-with two-cl door-acc open-pst
‘Two children opened a door with this key.’ (Miyagawa 1980: 44)
b. [Gakusei san-nin]-ga sake-o non-da.
student 3-cl-nom sake-acc drink-pst
‘Three students drank sake.’ Local
c. *Gakuseii -ga sake-o san-nini non-da.
student-nom sake-acc 3-cl drink-pst
8
Int. ‘Three students drank sake.’ NQFlong
d. *?Gakusei-ga san-nin sake-o non-da.
student-nom 3-cl sake-acc drink-pst
‘Three students drank sake.’ (ok in the literature) NQFshort
Unfortunately, (26d) was not included in the questionnaire, and we do not know
whether my judgment is the general pattern among native speakers. However,
allow the number of prisoners who did the attempting to vary from the number of prisoners
who tried escaping. However, that interpretation is not available: the number of the prisoners
who did the attempting must match the number of prisoners who tried escaping. (ii) can only
mean that ‘Three prisoners again tried to escape from this prison last night.’ Therefore, NQF
must take place from the matrix nominative DP syuuzin-ga ‘prisoner-nom’ and everything else
must have scrambled out, yielding the surface string given in (ii). Consequently, this sentence
does not show that PRO licenses NQF: if the NQ modifies the matrix subject, as I argue, the NQ
in (ii) is licensed by the trace.
8. As is well-known, scrambling of the object over the subject is possible.
(i) Sake-o gakusei san-nin-ga sake-o non-da.

sake-acc student 3-cl-nom drink-pst
‘Three students drank sake.’
(i) shows that the NQ can stay lower than the surface accusative object. In order to account
for the contrast between (26c) and (i), it is proposed that Japanese does not allow scrambling
the subject over the object, i.e., string vacuous movement. However, one benefit of the current
generalization is that it does not need to resort to such scrambling principle.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.18 (996-1061)
NQF from the external argument is always awkward to me, and the contrast
between (26d) and (26b) is sharp.
Turning to the second point in (24), the distribution of NQF in the passive
directly falls out from the proposed movement analysis. I assume the following
simplified structures for local and for NQF-short:
(27) Structure
a. [DP Num.cl] K [DP Num.cl] Local
b. DP K [DP Num.cl]) NQF
As illustrated by the contrast between (22a) and (23a), it is not the case that NQF-
short is always possible. We can understand this contrast as a manifestation of
the extractability from a [DP Num.cl] constituent. Namely, if the DP can move
out of a constituent [DP Num.cl], stranding NQ, then NQF-short is possible. In
contrast, if the DP cannot move out of a constituent, neither NQF-short nor NQF-
long is possible. Crucially, I assume that (21d) is derived from (21c), and therefore
that the well-formedness of NQF-short is a prerequisite for NQF-long to be well-
formed (but not vice versa). (Usually, judgments become sharper if there is overt
intervening material between the NQ and its associated DP.)
This idea can be straightforwardly extended to passivization. Given the move-
ment analysis we pursue, it is predicted that only the structure that allows NQF-
short in the active should allow NQF in the passive (i.e., the possibility of NQF-
short in the active is a prerequisite for NQF in the passive counterpart). This is so
because in order to independently move to the nominative position, the DP must
be a constituent independent of the NQ in the active source.
In order to test the prediction, I systematically compare my classification of
passives with their active counterparts below and show that the distribution of
NQF in the passive is identical to that of NQF-short in the active. I then conclude
that NQF in the passive is possible if and only if the NQ can follow the Case-marker
in the active.
a. Kurumai -ga doroboo-ni ti ni-dai nusum-are-ta.
car-nom thief-dat 2-cl steal-pass-pst
‘Two cars were stolen by a thief.’ Passive
b. Doroboo-ga kuruma-o ni-dai nusun-da.
thief-nom car-acc 2-cl steal-pst
‘The thief stole two cars.’ Active
(29) Dative Goal Passive
a. *Tomodatii-ga Naomi-ni ti huta-ri omiyage-o watas-are-ta.
friend-nom Naomi-dat 2-cl souvenir-acc hand-pass-pst
‘Two friends were given the souvenir by Naomi.’ Passive
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b. *Naomi-wa tomodatii -ni huta-rii omiyage-o watasi-ta.

Naomi-top friend-dat 2-cl souvenir-acc hand-pst
c. Naomi-wa [tomodati huta-ri]-ni omiyage-o watasi-ta. Local
Naomi-top friend 2-cl-dat souvenir-acc hand-pst
(30) Dative Theme Passive
a. *Kodomoi-ga kuruma-ni ti huta-ri butuka-rare-ta. NQFlong
children-nom car-dat 2-cl bump-pass-pst
‘Two children were bumped by a car.’
b. *Kodomo-ga huta-rii kuruma-ni ti butuka-rare-ta. NQFshort
children-nom 2-cl car-dat bump-pass-pst
‘Two children were bumped by a car.’ [B:mean 1.52]
c. *Kuruma-ga kodomo-ni huta-ri butukat-ta. Active
car-nom children-dat 2-cl bump-pst
‘The car bumped two children.’ [C:mean 1.61]
(31) Genitive-Accusative Passive (NQF from the ga-marked DP)
a. *?Kodomoi-ga John-ni ti huta-ri-(no) zitensya-o nusum-are-ta.
children-nom John-dat 2-cl-(no) bike-acc steal-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Two children were stolen (their) bikes by John.’ Passive
b. *John-ga kodomo-no huta-ri-(no) zitensya-o nusun-da. Active
John-nom child-no 2-cl-(no) bike-acc steal-pst
‘John stole two children’s bikes.’
(32) Genitive-Accusative Passive (NQF from the no-marked DP)
a. Keni -ga yakuza-ni [ti yubi]-o san-bon or-are-ta.
Ken-nom Japanese.mafia-dat finger-acc 3-cl break-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was broken three of his fingers by a Japanese mafia.’ Passive
b. Yakuza-ga Ken-no yubi-o san-bon ot-ta. Active
Japanese.mafia-nom Ken-no finger-acc 3-cl break-pst
‘A Japanese mafia broke three of Ken’s fingers.’
a. *?Seitoi -ga [ti san-nin]-(no) inu-ni sin-are-ta. Passive
student-nom 3-cl-no dog-dat die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Three students were died by their dogs.’
b. *Seito-no san-nin-(no) inu-ga sin-da. Active
student-no 3-cl-no dog-nom die-pst
Lit. ‘Three students’ dogs died.’
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(34) Source Passive

a. *Keimusyoi-ga syuuzin-ni ti huta-tu nige-rare-ta. Passive
prison-nom prisoner-dat 2-cl escape-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Two prisons were escaped from by (their) prisoners.’
b. *Syuuzin-ga keimusyo-kara huta-tu nige-ta. Active
prisoner-nom prison-from 2-cl escape-pst
Lit. ‘A prisoner escaped from two prisons.’
(35) Dative Cause Passive9
a. *Seitoi -ga Matuda-sensei-ni ti huta-ri nak-are-ta. Passive
student-nom Matuda-teacher-dat 2-cl cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Two students were cried over by Mr. Matuda.’
b. *Matuda-sensei-ga seito-no usoi -ni huta-tui nai-ta. Active
Matuda-teacher-nom student-no lie-dat 2-cl cry-pst
Lit. ‘Mr. Matuda cried over the students’ two lies.’
(36) Dative on-Directional Passive
a. *Kodomoi-ga ame-ni ti huta-ri hur-are-ta. [C:mean 1.31]
children-nom rain-dat 2-cl descend-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Two children were descended on by the rain.’ Passive
b. *Ame-ga kodomo-ni huta-ri hur-ta. Active
rain-nom children-dat 2-cl descend-pst
Lit. ‘Rain descended upon two children.’
(37) Dative at-Directional Passive
a. *Onnanokoi-ga John-ni ti huta-ri hohoem-are-ta. Passive
girl-nom John-dat two-cl smile-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Two girls were smiled at by John.’
b. *John-ga onnanoko-ni huta-ri hohoen-da. Active
John-nom girl-dat two-cl smile-pst
Lit. ‘John smiled at two girls.’
The data presented above conform to the generalization provided in (24a). NQF is
possible from the nominative DP in the accusative passive and from the accusative
DP in the genitive-accusative passive, since they are (underlyingly) ‘themes.’ There
are gradations in terms of accepting NQF-short. NQF from a kara-marked source,
dative cause, or dative on-Directional DP, is much more degraded than NQF from
a dative goal, which is in a way consistent with the claim made in Sadakane &
Koizumi (1995). Although the gradations are an intriguing phenomenon, which
9. The passive and active counterparts do not match due to the animacy restriction discussed
in Section 3.5.2.4.
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is in need of an explanation, I do not address this issue or the variability further in

this book.
5.3.1.2 Arguments against the unification

Finally, we are ready to evaluate the arguments provided in support of distinguish-
ing indirect passives from direct passives. NQF in the direct passive is reported to
distribute differently from NQF in the indirect passive. First, the direct passive (or
the accusative passive) allows for NQF-long, whereas the indirect passive does not.
(38) Direct/Accusative Passives
a. Yuube, kurumai -ga doroboo-ni ti ni-dai nusum-are-ta.
last.night car-nom thief-dat 2-cl steal-pass-pst
‘Last night, two cars were stolen by a thief.’ NQFlong
b. Kinoo gakuseii -ga ano otoko-ni ti huta-ri koros-are-ta.
Yesterday students-nom that man-dat 2-cl kill-pass-pst
‘Yesterday, two students were killed by that man.’ NQFlong
(39) Indirect/on-Directional Dative Passives
a. *Kodomoi-ga ame-ni ti huta-ri hur-are-ta. [C:mean 1.31]
children-nom rain-dat 2-cl descend-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Two children were descended on by the rain.’ NQFlong
b. [Kodomo huta-ri]i -ga ame-ni ti hur-are-ta. [C:mean 3.67]
children 2-cl-nom rain-dat descend-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Two children were descended upon by the rain.’ Local
Drawing on the above data, Miyagawa (1989) claims that the derivation of di-
rect (or accusative) passives involves movement (he argues that the trace in the
object position that is co-referential with the derived subject satisfies the strict sis-
terhood requirement of NQ), whereas that of indirect passives does not. In fact,
the incompatibility of on-Directional dative passives with NQF-long is exactly
what we expect, since the active counterpart of (39a) does not allow NQF-short,
as illustrated in (40a):
(40) a. *Ame-ga kodomo-ni huta-ri hur-ta.
rain-nom children-dat 2-cl descend-pst
Lit. ‘Rain descended upon two children.’ Active
b. *Ame-ga mura-ni huta-tu hut-ta.
rain-nom village-dat 2-cl descend-pst
Lit. ‘Rain descended upon two villages.’ Active
Example (40b) shows that the animacy of the dative phrase is not responsible for
the ungrammaticality of (40a). Further, given the new generalization provided in
(24), unavailability of NQF in indirect passives like (39a) is expected and does not
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show that the indirect passive (or the on-Directional dative passive in this case)
does not involve movement. Hence the distribution of NQF does not offer a way
to distinguish the two types of passives.10
The second property that has been argued to motivate a distinction between
direct and indirect passives is that only the dative by-phrase of indirect passives
allows for NQF-short (Miyagawa 1989: 21, 38). This property is illustrated below:
(41) a. *Taroo-ga sensei-ni huta-ri sikar-are-ta.
Taro-nom teacher-dat 2-cl scold-pass-pst
‘Taro was scolded by two teachers.’ Acc.-PSV
b. Sono hahaoya-ga kodomo-ni huta-ri sin-are-ta.
that mother-nom children-dat 2-cl die-pass-pst
‘That mother had two children die on her.’ Gen-Dat PSV
The genitive-accusative passive behaves the same way as the accusative passive in
this respect:
(42) Genitive-Accusative Passives
a. Naomi-ga [kodomo huta.ri]-ni inu-o izime-rare-ta. Local
Naomi-nom child 2.cl-dat dog-acc bully-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was bullied (her) dog by two children.’ [A:mean 3.93]
b. *Naomi-ga kodomo-ni huta.ri inu-o izime-rare-ta. NQFshort
Naomi-nom child-dat 2.cl dog-acc bully-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was bullied (her) dog by two children.’ [A:mean 1.24]
As mentioned earlier, the contrast between (41a) and (41b) has been argued to
show that the dative by-phrase in the direct passive is an adjunct, but the one
in the indirect passive is an argument (see Miyagawa 1989: 169). However, this
is not an explanation, since the dative by-phrases in both (41a) and (41b) are ar-
guments (see the distribution of ni-phrases discussed in Chapter 4). Furthermore,
as illustrated by (23a), it is not the case that an argument dative DP allows NQF.
The distribution straightforwardly falls out from the proposed generalization:
the dative by-phrase of direct and genitive-accusative passives is underlyingly an
external argument, whereas that of indirect passives (genitive-dative passives) is
originally merged as the theme argument of the unaccusative verb sin-u ‘to die.’
Thus, only (41b) allows NQF-short in the active counterpart, and thus only (41b)
10. Some researchers treat the passive derived from butukar-u ‘to bump’ as a ‘direct’ passive
involving promotion of the dative object, (e.g. Iwasaki 2002). As illustrated in (30a) and (30b),
however, the nominative DP in the dative theme passive allows NQF neither in the active nor in
the passive. This fact further supports my argument that the distribution of NQF in the passive
alone is not a reliable diagnostic for a movement derivation.
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is predicted to be compatible with NQF-long in the passive. The proposed active

counterpart of (41b) is given below.
(43) Sono hahaoya-no kodomo-ga huta.ri sin-da.
that mother-no child-nom 2.cl die-pst
‘Two of that mother’s children died.’
The contrast between (41a) and (41b) does not show that the two dative by-
phrases differ in nature (they simply differ in their external merge positions).
Therefore, I conclude that there is no need to distinguish the two types of passives
on the basis of the distributional differences in terms of NQF.11
5.3.2 The distribution of ni-phrases
As discussed in the previous section, one of the motivations to differentiate direct

and indirect passives is the distributional differences in terms of the ni-phrase in
the two types of passives. The differences are in general attributed to the differ-
ent status of the two ni-phrases: the ni-phrase in the direct passive is said to be
a postpositional DP, whereas the one ni in the indirect passive is a Case-marked
real argument. However, distinguishing between ni-phrases that are adjuncts and
those that are not is not an available analytical option in my analysis, and probably
in any other modern analysis that does not make a distinction between adjunct
by-phrases and arguments.
Furthermore, we have already seen in Chapter 4 that ni-phrases of direct
passives behave the same as ni-phrases in indirect passives with respect to rela-
tivization, which weakens the conclusion that one ni is a postposition while the
other is a case marker. In this section, I will reexamine two phenomena that have
been taken to show that the two ni-phrases are different – (1) compatibility with
short passives and ni-yotte-phrases and (2) the ability to bind zibun ‘self.’
5.3.2.1 Compatibility with short passives and ni-yotte passives

The compatibility of direct passives with short passives and ni-yot-te phrases has
been one of the principal arguments in favor of distinguishing indirect passives
from direct passives (see Kubo 1992). Kubo (as well as Pylkkänen 2002) uses
this property as a diagnostic to determine whether a given passive is direct or
indirect. I have shown in Chapter 4 that not all direct (or accusative) passives,
especially the ones derived from ‘manner of activity’ predicates, are compatible
11. The pattern of NQF shows some commonality with the condition on possessor-raising in
passive contexts (see Section 5.3.1). This is not very surprising because both NQF and possessor
raising involve displacement of the element originated inside the DP. The reason for this awaits
future research.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.24 (1372-1435)
with a dropped ni-phrase or a ni-yotte phrase, and hence this property is not coex-
tensive with direct passives. Nevertheless, many cases indeed seem to conform to
Kubo’s generalization:
(44) Direct Passives (Accusative & Genitive-Accusative Passives)
a. Ken-ga (dareka-ni-yotte) koros-are-ta.
Ken-nom someone-ni-yotte kill-pass-pst
‘Ken was killed (by someone).’ Acc. PSV
b. Atarasii biru-ga (dareka-ni-yotte) tate-rare-ta.
new building-nom someone-ni-yotte build-pass-pst
‘The new building was built (by someone).’
c. Bentoo-ga (dareka-ni-yotte) tabe-rare-ta.
boxed.lunch-nom someone-ni-yotte eat-pass-pst
‘(My) lunch was eaten (by someone).’
d. Koozyoo-ga (dareka-ni-yotte) hakais-are-ta.
factory-nom someone-ni-yotte destroy-pass-pst
‘The factory was destroyed (by someone).’
e. Kuruma-ga (dareka-ni-yotte) nusum-are-ta.
car-nom someone-ni-yotte steal-pass-pst
‘The car was stolen (by someone).’
f. Ken-ga (dareka-ni-yotte) konpyuutaa-o kowas-are-ta.
Ken-nom someone-ni-yotte computer-acc break-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was broken (his) computer (by someone).’
(Ken had his computer broken (by someone).) Gen-Acc. PSV
(45) Indirect Passives (on-Directional Dative & Genitive-Dative Passive)
a. Ken-ga *(Ken-no kodomo-ni) sin-are-ta.
Ken-nom child-dat die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was died by (his) child.’ Gen-Dat. PSV
b. *Ken-ga Ken-no kodomo-ni-yotte sin-are-ta.
Ken-nom child-ni-yotte die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was died by means of (his) child.’
c. Ken-ga *(ame-ni) hur-are-ta.
Ken-nom rain-dat descend-pass-pst
‘Ken was descended on by rain.’ on-Directional dat
d. *Ken-ga ame-ni-yotte hur-are-ta.
Ken-nom rain-ni-yotte descend-pass-pst
‘Ken was descended on by means of rain.’
Since we do not attribute the contrast to the argument or adjunct status of ni-
phrases, how can we capture these facts?
All the short passives given in (44) contain a predicate that denotes achieve-
ment yielding a result state; hence they contain vcause . Therefore, they are
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predicted to be compatible with short and ni-yotte-passives under the analysis

proposed in Chapter 4. In contrast, the passives presented in (45) are incompatible
with short passives and the ni-yotte-phrase for independent reasons. The ni-phrase
in (45a) – the genitive-dative passive – contains a deleted copy of the possessor,
which I linked to a parasitic gap (see Chapter 3, Section 3.6), and neither PRO
nor pronouns can substitute for the DP that contains a gap (cf. Who did you read
{a book about/*it}?). In (45c), ‘rain’ seems to be selected as part of the idiomatic
expression, and as such it is understandable that it is unable to be pronominalized
(i.e., it can be neither PRO nor pro).
Consequently, I conclude that compatibility with ni-yotte phrases and the
omission of ni-phrases do not suffice to distinguish the two types of passives.
5.3.2.2 Ability to bind zibun

One classic argument in favor of distinguishing between direct and indirect pas-
sives comes from the behavior of the ni-phrase with respect to zibun-binding
(Kuno 1973; McCawley 1972; among others). The anaphor zibun can be bound
either by the local subject Jiroo or by the subject of the matrix clause, but not by
the dative goal Hanako in (46):
(46) Tarooi -ga Hanakoj -ni [Jirook -ga zibuni/*j/k -o seme-ta]-to it-ta.
Taro-nom Hanako-dat Jiro-nom self-acc blame-pst-c say-pst
‘Taroi said to Hanakoj that Jirok blamed selfi/*j/k .’ [A:mean 4.01]
Traditionally, zibun is considered a long distance subject-oriented anaphor. Bind-

ing by zibun therefore has been used as a diagnostic for subjecthood or argument-
hood. Note however that the behavior of zibun in (46) is that of a logophor, i.e.,
zibun is bound by the logophoric center, hence not by Hanako (Kuno 1986, 1987;
Sells 1987). Since zibun is both a logophor and a regular anaphor, the standard
conclusion that binding diagnoses subjecthood should not be taken for granted.
In causative constructions, zibun is ambiguous and can be bound by either a
nominative or dative argument.
(47) [S1 Tarooi -wa [S2 Jirooj -ni zibuni/j -no huku-o ki]-sase-ta].
Taro-top Jiro-dat self-no clothes-acc wear-caus-pst
‘Taroi made Jiroj put on self ’si/j clothes.’
This property has been taken as evidence that the ni-phrase (i.e., Jiroo-ni) is indeed
the subject of the complement clause (see Shibatani 1976: 248).
Turning to the passive, the standard claim is that the ambiguity observed in
causative constructions holds for indirect passives but not for direct and possessive
passives. The standard examples that illustrate this point are as follows:
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(48) a. Direct Passive (Kuno 1973)

Johni -wa Maryj -ni zibuni/*j -no heya-de koros-are-ta.
John-top Mary-dat self-no room-loc kill-pass-pst
‘Johni was killed by Maryj in self ’si/*j room.’
b. Possessive Passive (Kuroda 1979)
Naomii -wa Kenj -ni zibuni/*j -no heya-de atama-o nagu-rare-ta.
Naomi-top Ken-dat self-no room-loc head-acc hit-pass-pst
‘Naomii was hit the head by Ken in self ’si/*j room.’ [A:mean 3.81]
(68 out of 72 participants reported (a multiple choice task) that the re-
flexive zibun in (48b) is unambiguous, and can only refer to Naomi)
c. Indirect Passive (Kuno 1973; McCawley 1972)
Johni -wa Maryj -ni zibuni/j -no koto-o ziman.s-are-ta.
John-top Mary-dat self-no matter-acc brag.do-pass-pst
‘John suffered from Mary’s bragging about self ’si/j matter.’
(Kuno’s translation) [A:mean 3.19]
In the direct and possessive passives above, zibun can be bound only by the nom-
inative DP but not by the dative by-phrase. However, in (48c), zibun is ambiguous
and it can be bound by the nominative DP or the dative by-phrase. This leads
to the standard assumption that the dative by-phrase in direct passives is an ad-
junct PP while that in indirect passives is an external argument of v (Kuno 1973;
McCawley 1972). As this option is unavailable given the line of argumentation
taken in this book, the question arises: How can the different behavior of ni-
phrases be made to fall out from the current analysis? While I do not have a full
account to offer at this point, my analysis does help clarify some of the issues about
zibun-binding.
When we inspect the data on which the standard claim is based, we find that
the situation is fairly complex and that the facts themselves call for reexamina-
tion. I will start by probing the well-known indirect passive (48c), which Kuno
(1973) and McCawley (1972) have used to illustrate ambiguity with respect to
self-binding ((48c) is adopted from Kuno 1973: 304). Notably, (48c) contains a
‘verb of speaking’ (i.e., a pseudo-ditransitive verb) that takes a theme and an ad-
dressee. The ambiguity with respect to the interpretation of zibun ‘self ’ in (44c)
in fact reflects structural ambiguity, which my derivation can capture directly: one
involves raising of the dative addressee, and the other involves possessor-raising
from the accusative DP. The first structure is compatible with the reading in which
John suffered because he was the addressee of Mary’s bragging about herself, and
this is an instance of raising the dative addressee in my analysis (i.e., the dative
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.27 (1563-1610)
addressee passive). The proposed structure coupled with its active counterpart is
given below:12
(49) a. Maryi -ga Johnj -ni zibuni/*j -no koto-o ziman.si-ta.
Mary-nom John-dat self-no matter-acc brag.do-pst
‘Maryi bragged about self ’si/*j matter to Johnj .’ [A:mean 4.55]
(67 out of 72 (93.1%) chose Mary as a possible referent of zibun ‘self.’)
b. Johni -wa Maryj -ni ti zibun*i/j -no koto-o ziman.s-are-ta.
John-top Mary-dat self-no matter-acc brag.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘John was bragged to by Mary about self ’s (=*John’s /Mary’s) matter.’
[A:mean 3.19]
Zibun refers only to Mary in (49a), as well as in its passive counterpart. The rea-
son zibun does not refer to the nominative DP ‘John’ is for independent reasons.
The verb zimansu-ru ‘brag’ is not appropriate in a situation in which ‘Mary’ spoke
highly of ‘John’ to ‘John’: it is then ‘praising’ rather than ‘bragging’. A further com-
plication is that zimansu-ru ‘to brag’ is a verb of speaking and imposes a logophoric
center. In fact, as will become evident later, the reason zibun refers to the dative
by-phrase ‘Mary’ here is because she is the logophoric center of bragging.13
In the second reading, ‘John’ suffered because ‘Mary’ bragged about ‘John’ to
somebody else. In the structure compatible with the second reading, John is not
an addressee but a no-phrase possessor of the ‘theme’ of Mary’s bragging. The
addressee is realized as a silent pro in this structure:
(50) a. Mary-wa pro [Johni -no [(??zibuni -no) koto]]-o ziman.si-ta.
Mary-top John-no self-no matter-acc brag.do-pst
‘Mary bragged of Johni himselfi ’s matter (to someone).’
b. Johni -wa Maryj -ni pro [John-no [zibuni/*j -no koto]]-o
John-top Mary-dat self-no matter-acc
ziman.s-are-ta
brag.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘John got bragged of himself ’s (John’s/*Mary’s) matters by Mary.’
I propose that in this structure, zibun is used emphatically. Although it sounds

redundant in the active counterpart, I consider the underlying DP [John-no zibun-
no koto] to be acceptable. In this derivation, zibun must refer to John because John
12. Recall that raising of goal or addressee is always compatible with a dative by-phrase.
Only when the theme moves over the goal, the by-phrase is unavailable, which is analyzed here
as a consequence of the double ni-constraint (i.e., the competition for a single ni between the
goal/addressee and the by-phrase; see Section 3.3.2).
13. The reason (49b) carries affected connotations is due to the connotations of the verb
zimansu-ru ‘to brag’ (see Section 6.4.3.1 for further discussion about affectedness).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.28 (1610-1668)
can only be construed as the outer no-phrase of the accusative, which we know can
bind zibun (see n. 39). The affected connotation in this reading arises because it
is ‘John’ whom Mary bragged about. What is important here is that neither of the
two structures is an indirect or gapless passive. They are a dative addressee passive
and a genitive-accusative passive. Consequently, the well-cited example (48c) does
not show that indirect passives are ambiguous in terms of zibun-binding.
Now the question is whether all the dative by-phrase in Japanese passives
behave the same way with respect to zibun-binding, as my analysis predicts. Unfor-
tunately this turns out not to be the case. In most of the passives, however, zibun
is indeed unambiguous: it can be bound by the nominative DP and not by the
dative by-phrase. We have seen above instances of the accusative passive (48a) and
the possessive-accusative passive (48b). The same pattern holds for the dative goal
passive, the causative passive, the source passive (derived from both transitive and
intransitive predicates), and the at-Directional dative passive. The paradigm from
the dative goal passive is given below:
(51) Dative Goal Passive
a. Keni -ga Naomij -ni zibuni/*j -no sensei-o syookai.si-ta
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no teacher-acc introduce.do-pst
‘Ken introduced self ’s (=Ken’s) teacher to Naomi.’ Active
b. Naomii -ga Kenj -ni zibuni/*j -no sensei-o syookai.s-are-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-dat self-no teacher-acc introduce.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi was introduced self ’s (=Naomi’s) teacher to by Ken.’
c. Naomii -ga Kenj -ni zibuni/*j -no heya-de sensei-o
Naomi-nom Ken-dat self-no room-loc teacher-acc
syookai.s-are-ta.
introduce.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomii was introduced a teacher to by Ken in self ’si room.’
The anaphor zibun is contained in the accusative DP in (51b) and in the locative
DP in (51c), and in both cases it can be bound only by the nominative DP Naomi.
The pattern here might seem inconsistent with the data given in (48c). However,
the reason zibun contained in the accusative DP in (48c) can refer to the dative DP
is because it is bound by a logophoric center. This point can be elucidated with the
following example:
(52) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni zibun-no hanasi-o s-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no story-acc do-pass-pst
‘Ken was told self ’s (=Ken, Naomi) story by Naomi.’ Ambiguous
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni zibun-no heya-de hanasi-o s-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no room-loc story-acc do-pass-pst
‘Ken was told the story by Naomi in self ’s (=Ken) room.’ Unambiguous
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.29 (1668-1725)
Both (51b) and (52a) involve raising of the dative goal/addressee, and only in
the latter sentence can zibun refer to the dative by-phrase. This must be because
zibun in (52a) is bound by the ‘teller’ of the ‘story,’ i.e., by Naomi. (51b) con-
tains a different predicate that does not introduce an extra logophoric center, and
therefore zibun can be bound only by the surface subject, the nominative DP.
Likewise, zibun is unambiguous in the causative passive, the source passive,
and the at-Directional passive:
(53) Causative Passive
Keni -ga Naomij -ni zibuni/*j -no heya-de benkyoo-o
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no room-loc study-acc
s.ase-rare-ta.
do.caus-pass-pst
‘Ken was made to study in self ’s (=Ken’s) room by Naomi.’
(54) Source Passives
a. Keni -ga Naomi-ni zibuni -no biru-de kuruma-o
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no building-loc car-acc
nusum-are-ta.
steal-pass-pst
‘Ken was stolen (his) car by Naomi in self ’s (=Ken) building.’
b. Keni -ga Naomij -ni zibuni/*j -no daigaku-de nige-rare-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no college-loc escape-pass-pst
‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi at self ’s (=Ken) college.’
(55) Dative at-Directional Passives
Keni -ga Naomij -ni zibuni/*j -no kyoositu-de hohoem-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no classroom-loc smile-pass-pst
‘Ken was smiled at by Naomi in self ’s (=Ken) room.’
These examples show that it is not the case that the dative by-phrase in indirect
passives such as those in (54b) and (55) can always bind zibun. However, there
are indeed cases in which zibun is ambiguous, and it can be bound by either the
nominative DP or the dative by-phrase, as exemplified below:
(56) a. Dative Cause Passives
Keni -ga Naomij -ni zibuni/j -no heya-de nak-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-no room-loc cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was cried over by Naomi in self ’s (=Ken, Naomi) room.’
b. Genitive-Dative Passies
Keni -ga musukoj -ni zibuni/j -no heya-de sin-are-ta.
Ken-nom son-dat self-no room-loc die-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Keni was died by his son in self ’s (=Ken, his son) room.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 16:18 F: LA19205.tex / p.30 (1725-1748)
Unfortunately, I do not have an account for these cases yet. Nevertheless, the stan-
dard claim that the dative by-phrase in indirect passives can bind zibun is based on
a partial view of the empirical paradigm and turns out to be an incorrect general-
ization. The data examined above at least show that zibun-binding is not a reliable
diagnostic to determine the status of the dative by-phrase in direct versus indi-
rect passives. Nor could it be a reason to distinguish the two types of passives. The
question of how to achieve this result in a principled way will have to await future
research. At the very least, however, the basic contention of this research program
stands unaffected.
This chapter has reviewed the traditional classification of Japanese passives (Sec-
tion 5.1) and shown how each traditional passive type corresponds to the new
passive types proposed here (Section 5.2). Except for a few extra-thematic passives,
which are ungrammatical to me, all the indirect passive examples discussed in the
literature are now reanalyzed as accusative, dative, source, and genitive passives.
Then I reexamined some arguments presented in the literature in favor of dis-
tinguishing indirect passives from direct passives. I have shown that the standard
claims are in general based on an incomplete empirical paradigm, and that with
more data, the generalization is either empirically inadequate (Numeral Quanti-
fier Floating) or not coextensive with one of the two passive types (compatibility
with short/ni-yotte-passives and zibun-binding).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.1 (66-137)
chapter 6
Further support for movement
The discussion thus far has focused on the desirability and feasibility of a unified
movement analysis for Japanese passives. This chapter examines further argu-
ments in favor of a movement analysis and discusses the possible failure of some
traditional diagnostics. Three properties of Japanese passives in favor of the move-
ment analysis have already been discussed in the preceding chapters. The first
property is the minimality effects in terms of the theme moving over a higher
internal argument – the source or goal (see Section 3.3.2). The second prop-
erty is the minimality effects in terms of raising an embedded no-phrase. I have
shown that only the outermost no-phrase of the theme argument can undergo
possessor-raising (see Section 3.6). The third property is the availability of NQF
from accusative passives and genitive-dative passives (which in fact fall under
raising from the (underlying) theme in my analysis) (see Section 5.3.1).
This chapter proceeds as follows. Section 6.1 shows that the gap contained in
the moved VP domain behaves like a trace. Section 6.2 deals with various types of
reconstruction effects. Lack of reconstruction in ni-passives has been presented as
one of the strongest arguments in favor of a control analysis of Japanese passives.
If this generalization is correct, it threatens the unified movement analysis. Con-
versely, if we do find reconstruction effects (in both direct and indirect passives),
this means that the proposed analysis is not only feasible but must be correct.
Section 6.3 argues that the movement involved in the passive is A- and not Ā-
movement. Lastly, Section 6.4 establishes that the passive morpheme -rare never
discharges a θ-role. The adversative connotations carried with many passives are
cancelable, thus they are just implicatures.
6.1 The gap is a trace
The gap contained in the accusative passive has been analyzed as: (1) a trace (or
a copy) of the derived subject, (2) pro, whose antecedent is determined contex-
tually, or (3) an object PRO controlled by the subject. This last possibility is not
an available analytical option, because the object position is not a position where
PRO can occur (see Huang 1999; Shibatani 1990: 322; among others). This leaves
us with the first two options. In what follows, I will show that the gap exhibits a
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.2 (137-200)
different distribution from pro, and conclude that it must be a copy of the moved
element, a conclusion which of course is expected under my analysis.
6.1.1 Is the gap a pro?
The pro option can be readily ruled out, as the distribution of pro differs from that
of the gap in the accusative passive. Let us first compare the distribution of a null
object in the passive with that of pro in the causative. If the passive construction
were to have the same syntactic representation as that of the causative construc-
tion, minimally differing in their meanings (i.e., ‘to cause’ vs. ‘to be affected’), as
proposed by Oshima (2006), then the gaps in the two constructions should behave
the same. However, this is not the case:
(1) a. Causative
Keni -ga Naomij -ni pro*i/*j/k nagur-ase-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat hit-caus-pst
‘Keni made Naomij hit pro*i/*j/k .’
b. Passive
Keni -ga Naomij -ni proi/*j/*k nagur-are-ta.
‘Ken was hit by Naomi.’
(Int. ‘Ken was affected by Naomi’s hitting himi/*j/*k .’)
The null object in (1a) can refer to anybody identifiable in the discourse, as indi-
cated by the index k, but neither the nominative nor the dative argument without a
sophisticated context. In contrast, the null object in the passive (1b) can only refer
to the nominative DP Ken, as the index i indicates. This property directly follows
from a movement analysis.
The interpretation of the null object in (1a) exhibits a typical distribution
of the embedded object pro. Subject-object asymmetries regarding an embed-
ded pro have been well-documented in the literature: only the embedded sub-
ject pro is said to be able to be bound by the matrix argument in many lan-
guages including Japanese, Chinese, Korean, and Brazilian Portuguese (see Huang
1984; Hasegawa 1981; Kuroda 1965). The following examples are adopted from
Hasegawa (1981: 290):
(2) a. Johni -ga [proi/j Mary-o nagut-ta-to] it-ta.
John-nom he Mary-acc hit-pst-c say-pst
‘Johni said that hei/j hit Mary.’
b. Johni -ga [Mary-ga pro?*i/j nagut-ta-to] it-ta.
John-nom Mary-nom him hit-pst-c say-pst
‘Johni said that Mary hit him?*i/j .’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.3 (200-257)
Chapter 6. Further support for movement 167
In (2a), the subject pro in the embedded clause can be bound by the matrix subject
John. It can also refer to another person identifiable in the discourse. However, as
(2b) shows, an object pro cannot be bound by the matrix subject: it behaves like an
Ā trace bound by a matrix topic (see Huang 1984). On the other hand, the referent
of the null object (i.e. the person being hit) must be the surface subject Ken in the
passive (1b): it can refer to neither the dative DP Naomi nor other people who are
previously mentioned. Therefore, the behavior of the object gap in the causative
sentence (1a) is the same as that of the embedded object pro given in (2b), whereas
the object gap in the passive (1b) behaves differently.
A final difference between the null objects in the causative and in the passive
concerns their replaceability with an overt anaphor zibun ‘self.’ The null object
in the causative can be replaced with zibun, and then it can refer to the nomina-
tive and dative arguments, but not the discourse referent, as shown in (3a). On
the other hand, the null object in the passive cannot be replaced with zibun ‘self,’
irrespective of its reading (see also Shibatani 1990: 322; Fukuda 2006).
(3) a. Keni -ga [Naomij -ni zibuni/j -o nagur]-ase-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self-o hit-caus-pst
‘Ken caused Naomi to hit self (=Ken, Naomi).’ [Causative]
b. Ken-ga [Naomi-ni (*zibun/*kare(zisin)-o) nagur]-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat self/him(self)-acc hit-pass-pst
‘Ken was hit by Naomi.’ [Passive]
The distributional differences between the null object in the passive and the null
object in the causative cannot be explained if they are both pro. Since the null
object in the passive can neither be PRO nor pro, I conclude that it is a moved
copy. This conclusion is consistent with my analysis, as the null object is expected
to behave like a moved copy.
Having established that the gap contained in the accusative passive is a copy
of a moved element, we want to know where the DP moves to. Does it move to
the surface nominative position? Or does it move to some intermediate position,
such as Spec,vP (cf. Hoshi 1991, 1994) or some adjoined position of IP (cf. Huang
1999)? If it moves to some intermediate position, the structure must involve both
movement and control. We will reexamine reconstruction facts reported in the
literature in order to answer these questions.
6.2 Reconstruction effects
Lack of reconstruction effects for scope and idioms has been presented as an argu-
ment in favor of the control analysis of ni-passives (i.e. passives with an overt ni-
by-phrase) in the existing literature (Ariji 2006; Kuroda 1979; Kitagawa & Kuroda
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.4 (257-303)
1992; Hoji 2006; Fukuda 2006; among others). The behavior of ni-passives is said
to contrast with that of short and ni-yotte-passives: ni-passives are assumed to dis-
allow reconstruction, while ni-yotte-passives and short passives are assumed to
exhibit reconstruction effects. However, we have seen in Chapter 4 that the ni-
phrase and the ni-yotte-phrase can co-occur in a single passive, so the dichotomy
is untenable. I have analyzed ni-yotte passives as the passive with a clausal adjunct
ni-yotte-phrase controlling PRO (see Section 4.3.2). I will show below that the
well-known generalization reflects only a partial view of the empirical paradigm.
Once more data are taken into consideration, we find that the distributions of ni-
passives and ni-yotte-passives do not differ. In what follows, scope interactions and
idioms will be discussed in turn.
6.2.1 Scope interactions
I begin with describing reconstruction facts in active Voice. Sentences with quanti-
fied phrases like (4a) are scopally ambiguous in English, since an indefinite subject
can scope under a universal object. However, this is not the case in Japanese:
Japanese – Tokyo dialect, at least – is considered to be scope-rigid because in sen-
tences with the canonical order [Nominative»Accusative], only the surface scope
interpretation is available, as exemplified in (4b) and (4c) (see Kuroda 1971; Hoji
1985).1
(4) a. Some student read every book. (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
b. Dareka-ga subete-no hon-o yon-da. (Kuroda 1970)
someone-nom all-no book-acc read-pst
‘Someone read all the books.’ (∃>∀, *∀>∃)
c. [John ka Mary]-ga dono hito-(o)-mo syootaisi-ta (rasii)
John or Mary-nom which person-(acc)-mo invite-pst (seem)
‘(It seems that) John or Mary invited everyone.’ (OR>∀, ?*∀>OR)
In contrast, scopal ambiguity arises in [Accusative»Nominative] order, which must

be derived from the Nom-Acc order by scrambling the accusative to the left of
the nominative (i.e. Ā-scrambling), as shown in (5a) and (5b) (see Wurmbrand
2009: and references therein).
(5) a. Subete-no hon-o dareka-ga yon-da.
all-no book-acc someone-nom read-pst
‘Someone read all the books.’ (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
1. The situation seems to be different with speakers of Kansai dialect. The speakers I asked
reported that they found the sentences ambiguous.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.5 (303-380)
b. Dono hito-o-mo [John ka Mary]-ga syootaisi-ta (rasii)

which person-acc-mo [John or Mary]-nom invite-pst (seem)
‘(It seems that) John or Mary invited everyone.’ (OR>∀, ∀>OR)
If we assume some version of the VP-internal subject hypothesis (Fukui 1986;

Kitagawa 1986; Koopman & Sportiche 1991; Kuroda 1988; among others), the
lack of reconstruction effects in (4b) and (4c) is puzzling: Why can the indefinite
subject scope below the accusative object in English but not in Japanese?
(6) [TP Sub-nom Obji -acc [vP t [VP t V]]]
Dominique Sportiche (pers. communication) suggests that this might be due to

the fact that indefinite quantification enters into the derivation higher in Japanese
than it does in English.
(7) a. [TP Sub-nom IndefJap Obji -acc [vP t [VP t V]]]
b. [TP Sub-nom Obji -acc IndefEng [vP t [VP t V]]]
What is important is that according to (7a), an indefinite will never reconstruct

under an accusative object in Japanese.
Although the nominative DP cannot take scope under the accusative DP, it can
reconstruct under a dative phrase and a temporal/locative adverb, as shown below:
(8) a. Dareka-ga dono koziki-ni-mo tabemono-o age-ta.
someone-nom which beggar-dat-mo food-acc give-pst
‘Someone gave every beggar food.’ (∃>∀, ?∀>∃)
b. Dareka-ga dono ie-ni-mo hagaki-o okut-ta.
someone-nom which house-dat-mo letter-acc send-pst
‘Someone sent a postcard to every house.’ (∃>∀, ?∀>∃)
(9) a. Dareka-ga dono kyoositu-de-mo syukudai-o wasure-ta.
someone-nom which classroom-loc-mo homework-acc forget-pst
‘Someone forgot his homework in every classroom.’ (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
b. Dareka-ga dono kyoositu-de-mo sensei-o nagut-ta.
someone-nom which classroom-loc-mo teacher-acc hit-pst
‘Someone hit a teacher in every classroom.’ (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
c. Dareka-ga maikai syukudai-o wasure-ru.
someone-nom every.time homework-acc forget-prs
‘Someone forgets his homework every time.’ (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
Crucially, the data show that the nominative DP cannot be interpreted at the ex-
ternal merge position under the accusative DP, but it can still reconstruct under a
dative goal phrase or a locative/temporal adverb. This must mean that there is an
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.6 (380-446)
intermediate interpretive position, which is lower than temporal/locative adver-

bials but higher than the accusative DP for the nominative DP to reconstruct to.
(10) [TP Sub-nom Temp Loc Objj -dat t Obji -acc [vP Sub [VP tj ti V]]]
Against this background of scope reconstruction in Japanese active sentences,

let us examine how ni-passives and ni-yotte-passives behave.
Ni-passives (direct and indirect passives). The promoted accusative DP (i.e. the
nominative DP) does not reconstruct under the ni-phrase (i.e. the external argu-
ment) in the accusative passive, as shown below:
(11) a. Darekai -ga daremo-ni ti homer-are-ta. Acc. PSV
someone-nom everyone-dat praise-pass-pst
‘Someone was praised by everyone.’ (∃>∀, ?*∀>∃)
(Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992: 20a)
b. Darekai -ga dono seizika-ni-mo ti siens-are-tei-ru.
someone-nom which statesman-dat-mo support-pass-asp-prs
‘Someone was supported by every statesman.’ (∃>∀, *∀>∃)
c. [Taroo-ka Hanako]i -ga dono sinsain-ni-mo ti home-rare-ta.
Taro-or Hanako-nom which judge-dat-mo praise-pass-pst
‘Taro or Hanako was praised by every judge.’ (∃>∀, ?*∀>∃)
(Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992: 20c)
Facts like those above have been taken as evidence for a control analysis of the
accusative passive containing an overt ni-phrase (Ariji 2006; Kitagawa & Kuroda
1992; Hoji 2006). Importantly though, the nominative DP in the ni-passive recon-
structs under the dative goal and locative or temporal adverbs, as shown below:2
(12) a. Nanikai -ga dono koziki-ni-mo ti kuba-rare-ta. Acc. PSV
something-nom which beggar-dat-mo distribute-pass-pst
‘Something was distributed to every beggar.’ (∃>∀, ∀>∃)3
b. Darekai -ga dono kyoositu-de-mo sensei-ni ti
someone-nom which classroom-loc-mo teacher-dat
nagur-are-ta. (Fukuda 2006: n. 5)
hit-pass-pst
‘Someone was hit by a teacher in every classroom.’ (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
2. Although Fukuda (2006) has reported that the narrow scope readings are not available in
(12b) and (12c), both readings are clearly available to me and the native speakers I asked.
3. Due to the ban on double datives in Japanese passives (see Section 3.3.2.3), the external
argument ni-phrase is unavailable in the accusative passive derived from a ditransitive predicate.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.7 (446-508)
c. [Sannin-no gakusei]i -ga maikai Ito-sensei-ni ti sas-are-ta.

three-no students-nom every.time Prof.Ito-dat call-pass-pst
‘Three students were called on by Prof. Ito every time.’
(three>every, every>three)
These reconstruction facts show that the derivation of accusative passives must
involve movement past the locative, and that the landing site of the moved DP
is the surface nominative position. Significantly, the distribution is the same with
genitive-accusative, source, and dative passives (i.e. the class traditionally identi-
fied as indirect passives).
(13) a. Dareka-ga daremo-ni ti kao-o nagu-rare-ta.
someone-nom everyone-dat face-acc hit-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Someone was hit (his) face by everyone.’ (∃>∀, *∀>∃)
b. Darekai -ga daremo-ni ti nige-rare-ta.
someone-nom everyone-dat escape-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Someone was escaped from by everyone.’ (∃>∀, *∀>∃)
c. Darekai -ga daremo-ni ti nak-are-ta.
someone-nom everyone-dat cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Someone was cried over by everyone.’ (∃>∀, *∀>∃)
d. Darekai -ga dono kyoositu-de-mo sensei-ni ti kao-o
someone-nom which classroom-loc-mo teacher-dat face-acc
nagu-rare-ta. (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
hit-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Someone was hit (his) face by a teacher in every classroom.’
e. Kinoo keisatukani -ga dono mati-de-mo hannin-ni ti
yesterday policeman-nom which city-loc-mo criminal-dat
nige-rare-ta. (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
escape-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Yesterday a policeman was escaped from by a criminal in every city.’
f. Seitoi -ga dono kyoositu-de-mo sensei-ni ti
someone-nom which classroom-loc-mo teacher-dat
nak-are-ta. (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘A student was cried over by a teacher in every classroom.’
The examples in (13) show that the derived subject (i.e. the nominative DP) in
indirect passives cannot reconstruct under the dative external argument but do
reconstruct under locative adverbs. The pattern with passives is not very surpris-
ing given that the nominative DP in the active also reconstructs under tempo-
ral/locative adverbials and dative goal DPs but not under the accusative DP (i.e.
the nominative DP cannot be interpreted at its external merge position).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.8 (508-603)
Short passives and ni-yotte passives. Likewise, the derived subject in ni-yotte pas-
sives and short passives can reconstruct under locative/temporal adverbs and da-
tive goal DPs (data like (14) have played an important role in establishing that
short passives allow reconstruction).
(14) a. Nanikai -ga (iinkai-ni-yotte) dono ie-ni-mo ti
something-nom committee-ni-yotte which house-dat-mo
okur-are-ta. (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
send-pass-pst
‘Something was sent to every house (by means of the committee/some-
one).’ (Yatsushiro 1999: 40 cited in Park & Whitman 2003)
b. Darekai -ga (sensei-ni-yotte) dono kyoositu-de-mo ti
someone-nom teacher-ni-yotte which classroom-loc-mo
nagur-are-ta. (∃>∀, ∀>∃)
hit-pass-pst
‘Someone was hit in every classroom (by means of the teacher/ someone).’
(Fukuda 2006: n. 5)
c. San.nin-no gakuseii -ga (Ito-sensei-ni-yotte) maikai ti
three.cl-no students-nom Prof.Ito-ni-yotte every.time
sas-are-ta. (three>∀, ∀>three)
call-pass-pst
‘Three students were called on (by means of Prof. Ito/someone) every
time.’ (Fukuda 2006)
The general claim in the literature that ni-yotte and short passives, but not ni-
passives, exhibit reconstruction effects is in fact based on the comparison between
(11) (reconstruction under dative external arguments) and (14) (reconstruction
under dative goal and locative adverbs). However, when we examine reconstruc-
tion of the promoted accusative DP in ni-yotte-passives, we find that reconstruc-
tion fails, as it does with ni-passives.
(15) a. ??Dareka-ga dare-mo-ni-yotte ais-are-tei-ru.
someone-nom everyone-mo-ni-yotte love-pass-asp-prs
‘Someone is loved by (means of) everyone.’ (∃>∀, *∀>∃)
b. Dareka-ga dono seizika-ni-yotte-mo siens-are-tei-ru.
someone-nom which statesman-ni-yotte-mo support-pass-asp-prs
‘Someone is supported by means of every statesman.’ (∃>∀, *∀>∃)
In neither (15a) nor (15b) can the promoted accusative DP reconstruct un-
der the ni-yotte phrase (see Section 4.3 for the analysis of the ni-yotte adjunct
that co-occurs with PRO). Since the generalization does not reflect the complete
paradigm, the conclusion drawn from this generalization does not follow. The data
presented in this section is summarized in Table 6.1:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.9 (603-632)
Table 6.1 Reconstruction effects of nominative DPs

Under Acc External (ni(yotte)) Dat goal Loc/temp adv
Active * – ok ok
ni-Passives
Direct – * – ok
Indirect – * – ok
ni-yotte PSV – * ok ok
Short PSV – – ok ok
Two conclusions can be drawn from the discussion above: the reconstruction
facts we have reviewed so far do not distinguish ni-passives from ni-yotte-passives
or direct passives from indirect passives. In addition, the availability of recon-
struction effects (i.e. the nominative DP reconstructs under dative goal DPs and
locative/temporal adverbials) shows that the derivation of Japanese passives – both
direct and indirect passives – does involve movement to the surface nominative
position, thus not involving control.
6.2.2 Idiom reconstruction
Another diagnostic that is generally used to test movement properties involves

idioms. It has been said that idioms reconstruct in short and ni-yotte-passives, but
not in ni-passives. The following examples are adapted from Hoshi (1991, 1994: 11,
1999: 198).
(16) a. Mary-ga tyuui-o harat-ta.
Mary-nom heed-acc pay-pst
‘Mary paid attention.’
b. Tyuui-ga Mary-ni haraw-are-ta.
heed-nom Mary-dat pay-pass-pst
‘Attention was paid to (*by) Mary.’
c. Tyuui-ga (Mary-ni-yotte) haraw-are-ta.
heed-nom Mary-ni-yotte pay-pass-pst
‘Attention was paid {by means of Mary/by someone}.’
(17) a. John-ga ketio-o tuke-ta.
John-nom fault-acc attach-pst
‘John found fault.’
b. John-ni keti-ga tuke-rare-ta.
John-dat fault-nom attach-pass-pst
‘Fault with (*by) John was found.’4
4. Somehow I prefer this word order to ‘fault-nom John-dat.’

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c. Keti-ga (John-ni-yotte) tuke-rare-ta.

fault-nom John-ni-yotte attach-pass-pst
‘Fault was found {by means of John/by someone}.’
A close examination reveals that the idioms used to test reconstruction effects in
the literature are usually pseudo-ditransitive verbs, which optionally take a dative
goal in addition to an accusative theme, as shown by the following active voice
uses of the above two idioms:
(18) a. Mary-ga kodomotati-ni tyuui-o harat-ta.
Mary-nom children-dat heed-acc pay-pst
‘Mary paid attention to children.’
b. John-ga atarasii sensei-ni keti-o tuke-ta.
John-nom new teacher-dat fault-acc attach-pst
‘John found fault with the new teacher.’
(Lit. ‘John attached complaint to the new teacher.’)
The problem with these examples is that the ni-phrase is incompatible with the
external argument interpretation (see the English translations). This is a very
general property of accusative passives derived from (pseudo-)ditransitive pred-
icates, which was discussed in Section 3.3.2.1. Japanese passives are incompat-
ible with double ni-phrases. When one of the ni-phrases is suppressed in di-
transitive passives, the remaining ni-phrase gives rise to a goal or benefactive
reading.
Crucially, it is not the case that idiomatic meanings are unavailable in this
context. The only problem is the unavailability of the agentive by-phrase read-
ing. Therefore, the standard conclusion that ni-passives do not exhibit idiom
reconstruction does not follow, since the unavailability of the agentive by-phrase
reading stems from an independent factor, namely the double ni-constraint in the
ditransitive passive.
6.2.3 The distributive morpheme zutu
This section presents a new argument in favor of a movement derivation in

Japanese passives. Let us first discuss English data, which basically carry over to
Japanese. The distributive morpheme – binominal each – in the structure [NP QP
N each] requires a plural antecedent that c-commands it (Burzio 1986: 198–199;
Safir & Stowell 1988; Boeckx & Hornstein 2005).
(19) a. *Two girls eachi met usi .
b. Wei were met by two girls eachi .
c. *I asked one question eachi about the studentsi .
d. I asked the studentsi one question eachi .
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In addition, each and its antecedent must be in the same local domain:
(20) a. *We expected John to read one book each.
b. *We expected that one student each would call.
The element ‘each’ in the [NP QP N each] construction basically behaves like an
anaphor. Consequently, a phrase [NP QP N each] cannot be the subject of a clause
(see (19a)) unless it is c-commanded by a plural antecedent at some point in the
derivation. This happens in the passive construction. Although the ‘each’ phrase
is not c-commanded by the antecedent on the surface, it is c-commanded by the
silent external argument or the by-phrase at some point in the derivation:
(21) a. ?One interpreter eachi was assigned ti to the visitorsi .
b. ?One present eachi was given ti to the kidsi .
c. Three guards eachi were assigned ti to [the members of the loyal family]i .
d. Three criminals eachi were arrested ti by the policemeni .
e. Three students eachi were hired ti by the professorsi .
The binominal ‘each’ reading is available in the raising construction, but not in the
control construction:
(22) a. ?One interpreter eachi was likely [ ti to be assigned ti to those visitorsi ].
b. *One interpreter eachi was trying [PROi to be assigned ti to those visitorsi ].
Although the surface representations are similar in (22a) and (22b), only the struc-
ture that involves movement – (22a) – allows the relevant distributive reading of
each.
6.2.3.1 Japanese zutu

Japanese has a distributive morpheme zutu. Similar to English binominal ‘each,’
the binominal use of zutu in [NP DP NumCl.-zutu]-Case requires a plural an-
tecedent c-commanding it (e.g. Gil 1990; Choe 1987; McKercher & Yookyung
1999; Oh 2006). Note that * indicates that the sentence is unacceptable with the
intended distributive reading of zutu. The sentence itself is not always ill-formed
if zutu distributes over another c-commanding plural DP.
(23) a. Huta-ri-no otokoi-ga [onigiri hito-tu-zutui ]-o tabe-ta.
2-cl-no man-nom rice.ball 1-cl-zutu-acc eat-pst
‘Two meni ate one rice ball eachi .’
b. Sensei-wa watasi.tatii -ni [hon is-satu-zutui ]-o watasi-ta.
teacher-top us-dat book 1-cl-zutu-acc hand-pst
‘The teacher handed usi one book eachi .’
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c. Sensei-ga [gakusei hito-ri-zutui ]-ni sorera-no honi -o

teacher-nom student 1-cl-zutu-dat those-no book-acc
watasi-ta.
give-pst
Int. *‘The teacher gave one student eachi those booksi .’
(For each book, one student received it.)
d. Kodomo-tatii-no oya-ga [hon ni-satu-zutui ]-o kat-ta.
child-pl-no parent-nom book 2-cl-zutu-acc buy-pst
Int. *‘The children’si parent(s) bought two books eachi .’
(For each child, his parent bought two books.)5
e. [Syoozyo huta-ri-zutui ]-ga watasi.tatii -o tazune-ta.
girl 2-cl-zutu-nom us-acc visit-pst
Int. *‘Two girls eachi met usi .’ (For each of us, two girls met him.)
f. [Kodomo hito-ri-zutui ]-ga honi -ga takai-to it-ta.
child 1-cl-zutu-nom book-nom expensive-c say-pst
*‘One child eachi said that the booksi were expensive.’
(For each book, one child said that it was too expensive.)
Similar to English ‘each,’ Japanese binominal zutu is also clause-bounded:

(24) Sensei-tatii -ga [gakusei-tatij -ga [hon is-satu-zutu*i/j ]-o yon-da]-to
teacher-pl-nom student-pl-nom [book 1-cl-zutu]-acc read-pst-c
it-ta.
say-pst
‘The teachersi said that the studentsj read one book each*i/j .’ (cf. Oh 2006)
Unlike English ‘each,’ zutu has another usage, which is characterized as ‘multi-
ple group formation’ by McKercher & Yookyung (1999) or ‘NP-internal distribu-
tivity’ by Gil (1990). Examples are given below, but this use of zutu is not relevant
for our discussion here.
(25) a. John-ga {[hon]i -o is-satu-zutui / [honi is-satu-zutui ]-o} yon-da.
John-nom book-acc 1-cl-zutu/ book 1-cl-zutu-acc read-pst
‘John read each book (at a time).’
b. [Kodomo go-nin-zutu]-ga yatteki-ta.
children 5-cl-zutu-nom come-pst
‘The children came in groups of five.’
5. In Japanese, a plural marking (tati for human) is not obligatory. Thus oya is ambiguous and
can be interpreted as either ‘one parent’ or ‘parents.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.13 (783-852)
Here we will concentrate on the binominal reading of zutu, which requires a plural
c-commanding antecedent.6 The judgments given below are under the intended
binominal reading (the multiple group reading or the NP-internal distributive
reading is generally available, but irrelevant for the discussion here).
6.2.3.2 Japanese passives

Having established that the binominal reading of zutu requires a plural c-
commanding antecedent, we can use this property as a touchstone of movement
in Japanese passives. As shown below, the distribution of zutu is consistent with
that of the scope interaction we examined in Section 6.2.1. The nominative DP
in the passive cannot reconstruct under the dative external argument, but it does
reconstruct under the dative goal and locative phrases:
(26) Reconstruction Under Dative by-phrase
a. [Otoko huta-rii ]-ga suutukeisu hito-tu-zutui-o hakon-da.
man two-cl-nom suitcase 1-cl-zutu-acc carry-pst
‘Two men carried one suitcase each.’ Active
b. [Suutukeisu hito-tu-zutui ]-ga otoko huta-rii -ni hakob-are-ta.
suitcase one-cl-zutu-nom man two-cl-dat carry-pass-pst
*‘One suitcase eachi was carried by two meni .’ Passive
(Int. ‘For each man, one suitcase was carried.’)
(27) a. Kodomotatii-ga [onigiri hito-tu-zutui]-o tabe-ta.
children-nom rice.ball 1-cl-zutu-acc eat-pst
‘The childreni ate one rice ball eachi .’ Active
b. Onigiri hito-tu-zutui-ga kodomotatii -ni tabe-rare-ta.
rice.ball 1-cl-zutu-nom children-dat eat-pass-pst
*‘One rice ball eachi was eaten by the childreni .’ Passive
(Int. ‘For each child, one rice ball was eaten.’)
With a ditransitive predicate, the accusative DP containing zutu can distribute over
the dative DP, but not vice versa (see (28a) and (28b)):
(28) Reconstruction Under Dative Goal
a. Sensei-ga kodomo-tatii -ni [hon issa-tu-zutui ]-o kubat-ta.
teacher-nom child-pl-dat book one-cl-each-acc distribute-pst
‘The teacher distributed the childreni one book eachi .’ Active
6. McKercher & Yookyung (1999) do not acknowledge two instances of zutu and argues that
the distributivity does not come from the semantics of zutu. Here I do not intend to provide a
full review of zutu but distinguish the two uses for convenience.
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b. Sensei-ga [kodomo-tati hito-ri-zutui ]-ni sorera-no honi -o

teacher-nom child-pl 1-cl-zutu-dat those-no book-acc
kubat-ta.
distribute-pst
Int. *‘The teacher distributed one child eachi those booksi .’
(For each book, the teacher distributed it to one child.)
c. [(Hon) is-satu-zutu]-ga kodomo-tati-ni kubar-are-ta.
(book) one-cl-zutu-nom child-pl-dat distribute-pass-pst
‘One (book) eachi was distributed to the childreni .’ Passive
In (28c), the binominal reading of zutu is available. Significantly, in (28c) the nom-
inative DP containing zutu is not c-commanded by the dative DP on the surface,
yet the nominative DP (i.e. the promoted accusative DP) can reconstruct under
the plural antecedent dative DP. This means that the nominative DP comes from
a position where the goal argument c-commands it, and hence the derivation
involves movement.
The nominative DP in the passive can also reconstruct under the locative DP.
(29) Reconstruction Under Locative P
a. Nanimonoka-ga [mit-tu-no mansyoni]-de [kuruma ni-dai-zutui]-o
someone-nom 3-cl-no apartment-loc car 2-cl-zutu-acc
kowasi-ta.
break-pst
‘Someone broke two cars eachi at three apartmentsi .’ Active
b. [Kuruma ni-dai-zutui]-ga [mit-tu-no mansyoni]-de
car 2-cl-zutu-nom 3-cl-no apartment-loc
nanimonoka-ni kowas-are-ta.
someone-dat break-pass-pst
‘Two cars eachi were broken in three apartmentsi by someone.’ Passive
(30) a. Yamada sensei-ga [mit-tu-no kyoositui ]-de [gakusei
Yamada teacher-nom 3-cl-no classroom-loc student
huta-ri-zutui ]-o sikat-ta. Active
2-cl-zutu-acc scold-pst
‘Prof. Yamada scolded two students eachi in three classroomsi .’
b. [Gakusei huta-ri-zutui ]-ga [mit-tu-no kyoositui ]-de Yamada
student 2-cl-zutu-nom 3-cl-no classroom-loc Yamada
sensei-ni sika-rare-ta. Passive
teacher-dat scold-pass-pst
‘Two students eachi were scolded in three classroomsi by Prof. Yamada.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.15 (897-953)
This pattern conforms to the pattern with the scopal interactions discussed in Sec-
tion 6.2.1: the nominative DP in the passive can reconstruct under a dative Goal
and Locative P but not under the external argument ni-phrase in Japanese.
As shown in (22), the English binominal ‘each’ is compatible with the rais-
ing construction but not with the control construction. The same facts hold in
Japanese, as the following paradigm illustrates:
(31) a. Kotyoo-ga [mit-tu-no kurasui ]-ni [kyooiku zissyuusei
principal-nom 3-cl-no class-dat teaching trainee
hito-ri-zutui ]-o syookaisi-ta. Active
one-cl-zutu-acc introduce-pst
‘The principal introduced three classesi one teacher trainee eachi .’
b. [Kyooiku zissyuusei hito-ri-zutui ]-ga [mit-tu-no kurasui ]-ni
teaching trainee one-cl-zutu-nom 3-cl-no class-dat
syookais-are-ta. Passive
introduce-pass-pst
‘One teacher trainee eachi was introduced to three classesi .’
c. [Kyooiku zissyuusei hito-ri-zutui ]-ga [mit-tu-no kurasui ]-ni
syookais-are-soo-da. likely
introduce-pass-likely-pst
‘One teacher trainee eachi is likely ti to be introduced ti to three classes.’
d. [Kyooiku zissyuusei hito-ri-zutui ]-ga [mit-tu-no kurasui ]-ni
syookais-are-tagat-ta. Want
introduce-pass-want-pst
Int. *‘One teacher trainee eachi wanted PROi to be introduced ti to three
classesi .’
e. [Kyooiku zissyuusei hito-ri-zutui ]-ga [mit-tu-no kurasui ]-ni
syookais-are-sokone-ta. Fail
introduce-pass-fail-pst
Int. *‘One teacher trainee eachi failed PROi to be introduced ti to three
classesi .’
The binominal reading is available only in raising constructions like (31c) and not
in control constructions like (31d) and (31e). This provides strong evidence in
favor of a movement derivation for Japanese passives.
Indirect passives. The behavior of binominal zutu in passives containing intransi-

tive predicates, nak-u ‘to cry’ and niger-u ‘to escape,’ is consistent with that of the
accusative passive given in (31a). First, we will look at the passive derived from an
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unergative predicate nak-u ‘to cry.’ Recall that the dative cause argument of nak-u
‘to cry’ cannot be animate in the active voice but must be animate in the passive
voice (see Section 3.5.2.4). For this reason the passive sentences given below do
not correspond to the active examples:
(32) Reconstructing Under Dative by-Phrase
a. [Hutari-no hyooronkai ]-ga [eiga san-bon-zutui]-ni nai-ta.
two-no critic-nom movie 3-cl-zutu-dat cry-pst
?
‘ Two film criticsi cried over 3 movies eachi .’ Active
b. [(Gakusei) san-nin-zutui]-ga [hutari-no onnanokoi]-ni nak-are-ta.
student 3-cl-zutu-nom 2-cl-no girls-dat cry-pass-pst
*‘Three students eachi were cried over by two girlsi .’ Passive
(Int. ‘For each girl, three students were cried over by her.’ )
(33) Reconstructing Under Locative P
a. Eiga-hyooronka-ga [huta-tu-no eiga-kani ]-de [eiga
film-critic-nom 2-cl-no movie.theater-loc movie
mit-tu-zutui ]-ni nai-ta. Active
3-cl-zutu-dat cry-pst
‘The film critic cried over three movies eachi at two movie theatersi .’
b. [Daigakusei san-nin-zutui]-ga [huta-tu-no kooeni ]-de
college.students 3-cl-zutu-nom 2-cl-no park-loc
onnanoko-ni nak-are-ta. Passive
girl-dat cry-pass-pst
?‘Three college students each were cried over by a girl at two parks .’
i i
c. [Ninki.kasyu san-nin-zutui]ga [huta-tu-no konsaato.horui ]-de
popular.singer 3-cl-zutu-nom 2-cl-no concert.hall-loc
fan-ni nak-are-ta. Passive
fan-dat cry-pass-pst
?‘Three popular singers each were cried over by their fans at two concert
i
hallsi .’
The binominal reading of zutu is unavailable in the passive sentence (32b), show-
ing that the nominative DP (the underlying dative cause) does not reconstruct
under the dative by-phrase. As expected, however, the nominative DP in the pas-
sive can reconstruct under the locative P in the passive. This is exactly the same
pattern we observed with accusative passives. Significantly, the availability of re-
construction under the locative P means that the derivation of indirect passives
(or dative Cause passives) involves movement.
Turning to the source passive derived from nige-ru ‘to escape,’ it exhibits a
different pattern from nak-u ‘to cry.’ Specifically, the nominative DP (underlying
theme) can take scope under the source DP in an active sentence, but not vice
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.17 (1009-1105)
versa (see (34a) and (34b)). This is probably due to the unaccusative nature of
nige-ru, suggesting that the nominative DP is c-commanded by the source DP at
some point of the derivation.
(34) a. [Syuuzin hito-ri-zutui ]-ga [mit-tu-no keimusyoi ]-kara nige-ta.
prisoner one-cl-zutu-nom 3-cl-no prison-from escape-pst
‘One prisoner eachi escaped from the three prisonsi .’ Active
b. [Syuuzin-huta-rii ]-ga [keimusyo mit-tu-zutui ]-kara nige-ta.
prison-2-cl-nom prison 3-cl-zutu-from escape-pst
*‘Two prisonersi escaped from three prisons eachi .’ Active
c. [Keimusyo mit-tu-zutui ]-ga [huta-ri-no syuuzini ]-ni
prison 3-cl-zutu-nom 2-cl-no prisoner-dat
nige-rare-ta.
escape-pass-pst
*‘Three prisons eachi were escaped from by two prisonersi .’ Passive
d. [Keimusyo mit-tui ]-ga [syuuzin huta-ri-zutui ]-ni nige-rare-ta.
prison 3-cl-nom prisoner 2-cl-zutu-dat escape-pass-pst
‘Three prisonsi were escaped from by two prisoners eachi .’ Passive
Since the active sentence given in (34a) exhibits reconstruction effects, the results
from passive sentences in (34c) and (34d) are not very informative. However, the
following data at least show that the (underlying) source DP distributes under
the locative P in the passive:
(35) a. Inu-ga [huta-tu-no kooen]i -de [kodomo san-nin-zutui ]-kara
dog-nom 2-cl-no park-loc child 3-cl-zutu-from
nige-ta. Active
escape-pst
‘The dog escaped from three children eachi at two parksi .’
b. [Kodomo san-nin-zutui ]-ga [huta-tu-no kooen]i -de inu-ni
child 3-cl-zutu-nom 2-cl-no park-loc dog-dat
nige-rare-ta. Passive
escape-pass-pst
‘Three children eachi were escaped from by the dog at two parksi .
If the nominative DP is merged as an argument of -rare in (35b), the availabil-

ity of the binominal reading cannot be explained. Therefore, we conclude that
the derivations of accusative and dative cause or source (i.e. indirect) passives
both involve movement to the nominative position. The next section addresses
the question of what the type of movement is: Is it A- or Ā-movement?
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6.3 A- vs. Ā-movement

The traditional view is that the passive is an A-movement phenomenon, i.e. move-
ment from a non-Case position, whereas relativization and topicalization are Ā-
movement phenomena, i.e. movement launched from a Case position. Contrary
to the standard view, Huang (1999) and Toyoshima (1996) argue that Japanese
passives involve Ā-movement (and control). The difficulty in analyzing Japanese
comes from the fact that case markers disappear under relativization and topi-
calization (see Section 3.1.2). Therefore, identifying whether movement launches
from a Case position is not an easy task. In this section, I will establish that the
Japanese passive is an A-movement phenomenon by comparing its distribution to
that of relativization and topicalization.7
First of all, passivization behaves differently from relativization and topical-
ization in that it is subject to Relativized Minimality. For example, the theme of
ditransitive predicate is unable to move to the nominative position in the passive
if the external argument and the goal are both overt (see Section 3.3.2):
(36) a. Ken-ga (kossori) Naomi-ni hon-o watasi-ta.
Ken-nom secretly Naomi-dat book-acc hand-pst
‘Ken handed Naomi a book (secretly).’ Active
b. [[Ken-ga (kossori) Naomi-ni ti watasi-ta] honi ]-ga
Ken-nom secretly Naomi-dat hand-pst book-nom
omosiro-i.
interesting-prs
‘The book which Ken handed Mary (secretly) is interesting.’ Relative
7. One might argue that distributional differences between passives and relative/topic con-
structions do not mean that passives do not involve Ā-movement, because Japanese relativiza-
tion and topicalization involve base-generation and not Ā-movement (cf. Murasugi 2000).
However, I crucially assume that the derivations of Japanese relativization and topicalization
(involving non-contrastive topics) involve movement. This is because both relativization and
topicalization exhibit reconstruction effects in terms of pronominal/anaphor binding (see also
Hoshi 2004; Ishizuka 2008):
(i) a. [[Keni -ga mituke-ta] kare-zisini -no syasin]-wa yoku tore-tei-ru.
Ken-nom find-pst him-self-no picture-top well be_taken-asp-prs
‘The picture of himselfi which Keni found was well taken.’ [Relative]
b. [dare.moi -ga mada ti sira-nai] zibuni -no kekkonaite
indet.mo-nom yet know-neg self-no spouse
‘DP self ’si spouse whom no onei knows yet’
c. [Zibunj -no kekkonaite]i -wa dare.moj -ga ti zibun-de erabi-tai.
self-no spouse-top indet.mo-nom self-by choose-want.
‘As for [self ’sj spouse]i , everyonej wants to choose ti by self.’ [Topic]
The availability of reconstruction cannot be explained unless relativization and topicalization

involve movement (see Ishizuka 2008; Ishizuka 2009; Ishizuka 2010, for further discussion).
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c. Sono hon-wa Ken-ga Naomi-ni (kossori) watasi-ta.

that book-top Ken-nom Naomi-dat secretly hand-pst
‘That book, Ken handed to Mary (secretly).’ Topic
d. *Honi -ga Ken-ni (kossori) Naomi-ni ti watas-are-ta.
book-nom Ken-dat secretly Naomi-dat hand-pass-pst
‘The book was handed to Naomi (secretly) by Ken.’ Passive
Unlike passives, the theme of a ditransitive verb can freely undergo relativization
or topicalization even when the external and goal arguments are both overt. Like-
wise, with causative predicates, the theme argument of the complement of sase
cannot undergo passivization, but it can undergo relativization and topicalization,
as shown below:
(37) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni kaisya-o yame-sase-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat company-acc quit-caus-pst
‘Ken {made/let} Naomi quit the company.’
b. [[Ken-ga Naomi-ni ti yame-sase-ta] kaisyai ]-wa
Ken-nom Naomi-dat quit-caus-pst company-top
toosan.si-ta.
bankrupt.do-pst
‘The company which Ken made Naomi quit went bankrupt.’ Relative
c. ?Kaisya-wa Ken-ga Naomi-ni yame-sase-ta.
company-top Ken-nom Naomi-dat quit-caus-pst
‘As for the company, Ken {made/let} Naomi quit.’ Topic
d. *Kaisya-ga Ken-ni (kyuuni) Naomi-ni yame-sase-rare-ta.
Company-nom Ken-dat suddenly Naomi-dat quit-caus-pass-pst
Int. ‘It happened to the company that Ken {made/let} Naomi quit (sud-
denly).’ Passive
I take the above distributional differences between passivization and relativiza-

tion/topicalization to mean that the former is A-movement while the latter is
Ā-movement.
6.3.1 Reanalyzing long-distance passivization
Huang’s claim (1999) that Japanese accusative passives involve Ā-movement

comes from Toyoshima’s observation (1996) that Japanese appears to allow long-
distance passivization (see Toyoshima 1996; Huang 1999). In what follows, I divide
the apparent long passivization cases into two kinds and then reanalyze them as
local passivization (the derived subject originates in the matrix clause). The two
kinds are: (1) the passives that involve ECM (raising-to-object) and (2) the passives
that involve raising of the goal/addressee.
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6.3.1.1 Raising-to-object (ECM) constructions in Japanese

As is well-known, Japanese has predicates that allow optional ECM across a fi-
nite/tensed CP boundary, as shown in (38a). In fact, the ECM construction can be
fed into passivization, and there is no reason to treat these cases as Ā-movement
(see (38b)).
(38) a. John-ga Mary-{o/ga} tensai-da-to omot-ta. Active
John-nom Mary-{acc/nom} genius-cop-c think-pst
‘John thought Mary to be a genius/John thought that Mary was a genius.’
b. Maryi -ga John-ni ti tensai-da-to omow-are-ta.
Mary-nom John-dat genius-cop-c think-pass-pst
‘Mary was thought by John to be a genius.’ Passive
Kuno (1976), Sakai (1996), and Tanaka (2002) present compelling evidence that
the accusative DP is in the matrix clause and in an A-position, using such diag-
nostics as binding and adverb placement. The following is a well-cited example
from Kuno (1976), which shows that the nominative or topic DP in the embedded
clause cannot precede a matrix adverb, whereas the ECM-ed accusative DP can
(also cited in Sakai 1996; Hiraiwa 2005; and Tanaka 2002).
(39) a. Taroo-wa (orokanimo) Hanako-{ga/wa} (*orokanimo) baka-da-to
Taro-top stupidly Hanako-nom/top stupidly stupid-cop-c
omot-ta.
think-pst
‘(Stupidly,) Taro considered Hanako to be stupid.’
b. Taroo-wa (orokanimo) Hanako-oi (orokanimo) ti baka-da-to
Taro-top stupidly Hanako-acc stupidly stupid-cop-c
omot-ta.
think-pst
‘(Stupidly,) Taro considered Hanako to be stupid.’
The contrast given in (39) leaves no doubt that the ECM-ed accusative DP is
located in the matrix clause.
The following paradigm concerning binding adapted from Sakai (1996) shows
that the ECM-ed accusative is in an A-position.
(40) a. Rie-wa karerai -o [otagaii -no syoogen-ni-yotte]
Rie-top them-acc each.other-no testimony-ni-yotte
sinzi-tei-ru. Transitive
believe-asp-prs
‘Rie believes themi based on each otheri ’s testimony.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.21 (1238-1293)
b. *Rie-wa [karerai -ga muzitu-da-to] [otagaii -no

Rie-top them-nom innocent-cop-c each.other-no
syoogen-ni-yotte] sinzi-tei-ru.
testimony-ni-yotte believe-asp-prs
‘Rie believes that theyi are innocent based on each otheri ’s testimony.’
c. Rie-wa karerai -o [ti muzitu-da-to] [otagaii -no
Rie-top them-acc innocent-cop-c each.other-no
syoogen-ni-yotte] sinzi-tei-ru. ECM
testimony-ni-yotte believe-asp-prs
‘Rie believes themi to be innocent based on each otheri ’s testimony.’
Example (40a) shows that condition A is satisfied, thus the accusative antecedent
c-commands the reciprocal anaphor otagai in an adjunct clause. The nominative
DP in the embedded clause in (40b) cannot license the anaphor, whereas the ECM-
ed accusative in (40c) c-commands and licenses the anaphor in the adjunct clause.
This means that the accusative DP in the matrix clause is in an A-position.8 Sig-
nificantly, long-distance passivization like (38b) is not a problem for the proposed
analysis of the passive, since it is still the second highest argument (or the highest
DP in the moved constituent) that appears as the nominative DP in the passive.
Passivization smuggles Mary across John and the closest DP Mary moves to the
nominative position, which yields the passive.9
8. Given the common wisdom that a finite clause boundary behaves as a barrier for A-
movement, Japanese ECM cases like (38a) seem to be a problem. For this reason, the question
of whether Japanese possesses true ECM constructions has been a matter of debate since Kuno
(1976). Both raising (e.g. Hiraiwa 2002; Tanaka 2002; Yoon 2007) and control approaches (Hoji
1991, 2005) have been proposed, but I will assume a raising analysis, following Kuno (1976),
Sakai (1996), Hiraiwa (2001), Tanaka (2002), and Yoon (2007), among many others.
9. Whether the nominative DP of the embedded clause can overtly bear accusative Case does
not determine the availability of long-distance passives (contra Nagai: 1991; see (i) adapted from
Nagai 1991). The derived subject simply has to be merged as a sentence-initial DP in the ECM
embedded clause. The availability of accusative Case is governed by independent conditions: the
accusative-marking is limited to cases when the predicate in the complement clause is either an
adjective or a nominal (copulative) predicate (Kuno 1976).
(i) a. Hanako-ga Taroo-{*o/ga} kaisya-o yame-ta-to omot-ta.

Hanako-nom Taro-{acc/nom} company-acc quit-pst-c think-pst
‘Hanako thought that Taro quit the job.’
b. Tarooi -ga Hanako-ni [ti kaisya-o yame-ta]-to omow-are-ta.
Taro-nom Hanako-dat company-acc quit-pst-c think-pass-pst
‘Taroi was thought that hei quit the company.’
Although the subject of the embedded predicate cannot bear accusative Case, it still can undergo
passivization, yielding apparent long-distance passivization.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.22 (1293-1356)
6.3.1.2 Dative goal passives as long-distance passivization

Another type of apparent long-distance passives discussed in the literature contain
the predicate iw-u ‘to say.’ (41b) is the example used by Toyoshima (1996) and
Huang (1999) to illustrate that passivization can take place across a tensed/finite
clause boundary. (Note that stressing Bill-ga in (41b) ensures the right bracketing
and also licenses a relevant gap in the embedded clause.):
(41) a. John-ga [Bill-ga Mary-o hihansi-ta-to] it-te-iru.
John-nom Bill-nom Mary-acc criticize-pst-c say-asp-prs
‘John is saying that Bill criticized Mary.’ Active
b. Mary-ga John-ni [Bill-ga Mary-o hihannsi-ta-to]
Mary-nom John-dat [Bill-nom criticize-pst-c
iw-are-tei-ru. Passive
say-pass-asp-prs
‘Mary is (being) said by John that Bill criticized.’ (Toyoshima’s translation)
The verb iw-u ‘to say’ does not allow ECM/raising to object. Then how can we
analyze passives like (41b)? There are two reasons to think that the structure given
in (41b) is not the correct one. First, the verb iw-u ‘to say’ is a ‘verb of speaking’,
which takes a dative addressee argument, which can satisfy the EPP feature of
-rare in the passive (see Section 3.3.1).
(42) a. John-ga Mary-ni [Bill-ga Ken-o hihansi-ta-to]
John-nom Mary-dat Bill-nom Ken-acc criticize-pass-c
it-{ta/tei-ru}.
say-{pst/asp-pres}
‘John told Mary that Bill criticized Ken.’ Active
b. Mary-ga John-ni [Bill-ga Ken-o hihansi-ta-to]
Mary-nom John-dat [Bill-nom Ken-acc criticize-pst-c]
iw-are-{ta/tei-ru}.
say-pass-{pst/asp-pres}
‘Mary was told by John that Bill criticized Ken.’ Passive
The passive (41b) is acceptable to me only if Mary is the addressee of John’s state-
ment, which strongly suggests that the nominative DP in (41b) does not originate
as the accusative DP in the embedded clause but rather as the addressee of the
matrix predicate iw-u ‘to say.’ Hence (41b) involves local passivization.
Second, Japanese allows pro, and in fact the person who is criticized by John
in (41b) can be but does not have to be Mary, and the null embedded object in
(43a) can be replaced with an overt pronoun, as shown in (43a). In contrast, the
interpretation of the trace created by local passivization (43b) has to match the
derived subject, and the gap cannot be replaced with an overt pronoun, as shown
in (43c) (see Section 6.1):
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.23 (1356-1400)
(43) a. Maryi -ga John-ni ti [Bill-ga kanozyoi/j -o hihansi-ta-to]

Mary-nom John-dat [Bill-nom her-acc criticize-pst-c
iw-are-ta. [Passive]
say-pass-pst
‘Maryi is (being) told/was told by John that Bill criticized heri/j .’
b. Mary-ga John-ni Mary-o hihans-are-ta.
Mary-nom John-dat criticize-pass-pst
‘Mary was criticized by John.’
c. *Maryi -ga John-ni kanozyo(-zisin)i/k -o hihans-are-ta.
Mary-nom John-dat her(-self)-acc criticize-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Maryi was criticized her(self)i by John.’
This shows that the empty category in (41b) is different from that in (43b), and
hence (41b) cannot be the right derivation. Instead, I argue that the correct active
and passive pair of the string given in (41) is as follows:10
(44) a. Johni -ga Maryj -ni [Bill-ga proi/j/k hihansi-ta-to]
John-nom Mary-dat Bill-nom him/her criticize-pst-c
it-{te-iru/ta}.
say-{asp-pres/pst}
‘John {tells/told} Mary that Bill criticized {him/her}.’ [Active]
b. Maryi -ga Johnj -ni ti [Bill-ga proi/j/k hihansi-ta-to]
Mary-nom John-dat [Bill-nom him/her criticize-pst-C
iw-are-{tei-ru/ta}. [Passive]
say-pass-{asp-pres/past}
‘Mary {is (being) told/was told} by John that Bill criticized {him/ her}.’
In conclusion, this section shows that the evidence for Ā-movement is unfounded,
and passivization distributes differently from relativization and topicalization.
Therefore, I conclude that Japanese passives involve A-movement.
6.4 Does -rare select for an argument?
I have established in the preceding section that Japanese passives involve A-

movement. One question that might arise is why the existing literature commonly
assumes that Japanese (indirect) passives involve control and what the evidence
is for that. This section reexamines some of the well-known arguments in favor
of the control analysis: namely, compatibility with subject-oriented adverbials,
10. Note that stressing the embedded subject ‘Bill-ga’ ensures an object pro in the embedded
clause to associate with the nominative DP in the matrix clause; in general, it is difficult for the
embedded object pro to refer to the matrix subject (see Huang 1984, 1989).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.24 (1400-1465)
incompatibility with inanimate/abstract DPs, and adversative connotations car-

ried by many passives. I will review the three phenomena in turn and show that
the characterizations of these phenomena given in the literature are incorrect, and
there is no evidence that -rare assigns a θ-role.
6.4.1 Compatibility with subject-oriented adverbs

It has been argued that the nominative DP in the ni-passive (both direct and
indirect passives) should be in a thematic position, since it can combine with
subject-oriented adverbs (e.g. orokanimo ‘stupidly’ and wazato ‘deliberately, in-
tentionally’), which are alleged to require a subject DP denoting an agent or
experiencer (Kuroda 1979; Huang 1999; Fukuda 2006; Hoshi 1994, 1999; among
others).
(45) a. Daitooryooi -ga orokanimo CIA-ni ti koros-are-te simat-ta.
president-nom stupidly CIA-dat kill-pass-te perfect-pst
‘Stupidly, the president was killed by the CIA.’ Acc. PSV
b. ?Dorobooi -ga wazato keisatukan-ni ti tukama.e-rare-ta.
thief-nom deliberately policeman-dat catch.se-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The thief was caught deliberately by the policeman (it was the thief ’s
intention).’ [A:mean 2.93] Acc. PSV
Sentences like those above are generally taken as evidence that the nominative DP
of the accusative passive has an experiencer or affectee θ-role (assigned by
-rare). However, what does this distribution really show? What can we conclude
from it?
First of all, orokanimo ‘stupidly’ is not a subject-oriented VP adverb but
a speaker-oriented sentential adverb, which reflects the speaker’s interpreta-
tion/evaluation of the event denoted in the sentence. The use of orokanimo
‘stupidly’ implies that the speaker assumes that the subject of the sentence has
some control over the event denoted in the sentence, hence it is sentient. Cru-
cially, English passives are also compatible with ‘stupidly,’ as illustrated (stupidly,
the president was caught by the police) and no one disputes the fact that they
are derived by movement. If compatibility with ‘stupidly’ is evidence for control,
English passives can be also analyzed as control constructions.
In contrast, the adverb wazato ‘deliberately’ is a subject-oriented adverb. Nev-
ertheless, an experiencer θ-role is not a licenser, as illustrated below:
(46) a. Ken-ga (*wazato) Naomi-o aisi-ta.
Ken-nom deliberately Naomi-acc love-pst
‘Ken loved Naomi deliberately.’
b. Ken-ga (*wazato) kotae-ga wakat-ta.
Ken-nom deliberately answer-nom figure.out-pst
‘Ken deliberately figured out an answer.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.25 (1465-1539)
Kitagawa & Kuroda (1992: 42) argue that wazato requires a particular type of
agent θ-role, what they call ‘procedural agency,’ which expresses that what one
willfully brings about is the procedure for the realization of an eventuality de-
noted by the argument structure of the predicate. I take their proposal to mean
that wazato requires an agentive v.
Nevertheless, there are two reasons to reject the conclusion that this property
comes from -rare. First, it turns out that wazato ‘intentionally, deliberately’ is also
compatible with the subject of unaccusative predicates, as illustrated below:
(47) a. Ken-ga minna-no mae-de wazato koron-da.
Ken-nom everyone-no front-loc deliberately all-pst
Lit. ‘Ken fell deliberately in front of everyone.’
b. Doroboo-ga wazato keisatukan-ni tukamat-ta.
theif-nom deliberately policeman-dat be.caught-pst
Lit. ‘The thief was caught deliberately by the policeman (it was the thief ’s
intention: unambiguous).’ [A:mean 4.85]
These sentences do not contain -rare and the nominative DP of these unaccusative
verbs is generally taken as patient or theme, thus not meeting the purported
licensing condition of wazato.11 However, the sentences in (47) are both well-
formed. In fact, the rating of (47b) is much higher than that of (45b): all ex-
cept one participant gave (47b) a 5 or 4. (Note that ‘deliberately’ unambiguously
modifies the ‘thief.’) The mean rating of (45b) is marginal (2.93): 33 out of 74
participants (44.5%) gave it a 1 or 2. This further questions the validity of using
subject-oriented adverbs as a touchstone for the experiencer θ-role.
Second, the nominative DP of the passive is not always compatible with
subject-oriented adverbials. The following intransitive passives are typical exam-
ples of indirect passives.
(48) a. *Ken-ga wazato tuma-ni nige-rare-ta.
Ken-nom deliberately wife-dat escape-pass-pst
Int. ‘Ken was deliberately escaped from by his wife.’ Source PSV
b. *Ken-ga wazato ame-ni hu-rare-ta.
Ken-nom deliberately rain-dat descend-pass-pst
‘Ken was deliberately rained upon.’ on-Directional dative PSV
11. The unaccusative verb tukam.ar-u (be_caught), which consists of tukam ‘to grab’ and the
low passive ‘-rar’, is the stem for the transitive verb tukam.a.e-ru ‘catch’, which is used as the
main verb in (45b). The transitive verb tukam.a-e-ru ‘catch’ consists of the stem tukam.ar-
u ‘be.caught’ and a low causative morpheme ‘-(s)e,’ (cf. sizum-u ‘to sinkvi ’ vs. sizum-e-ru ‘to
sinkvt ’).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.26 (1539-1577)
All linguists seem to agree that the nominative DP in the indirect passive receives
a θ-role from -rare. Then, the unacceptability of (48a) and (48b) are least ex-
pected. The fact that wazato ‘deliberately’ is incompatible with the nominative DP
in indirect passives shows that compatibility with subject-oriented adverbs is not
a reliable diagnostic to show that the nominative DP in the passive bears an agent
or experiencer θ-role.12
6.4.2 Incompatibility with inanimate/abstract DPs
Incompatibility with inanimate and abstract nominative DPs in ni-passives is an-

other property that has been taken as a manifestation of the selectional restric-
tion imposed on the external argument of -rare (e.g. Inoue 1976; Kuroda 1979;
Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992; Hoshi 1994; Fukuda 2006; Goro 2006). However, as
shown in Section 3.3.2.2, this generalization is based on a restrictive set of data
(i.e. accusative passives derived from (pseudo-)ditransitive predicates). Once more
data are taken into consideration, the generalization no longer holds. There are a
great number of counter-examples to this generalization, including the ones pre-
sented in Section 3.2. The following examples are discussed in Kuroda (1979) as
exceptions to the generalization.
(49) a. Kono siro-wa Tokugawa-gun-ni koogeki.s-are-ta.
this castle-top Tokugawa-army-dat attack.do-pass-pst
‘This castle was attacked by the Tokugawa army.’
b. Sono sima-wa umi-ni kakom-are-tei-ru.
that island-top sea-dat surround-pass-asp-prs
‘That island is surrounded by the sea.’ [A:mean 4.89, C:4.91]
Here are more instances of ni-passives with an inanimate/abstract nominative DP.

(50) a. Ken-no yuuki-ga ooku-no hito-ni tatae-rare-ta.
Ken-no courage-nom many-no person-dat praise-pass-pst
‘Ken’s courage was praised by many people.’ [Abstract DP]
12. Assuming that what licenses wazato ‘deliberately’ is ‘procedual agency’, as proposed by
Kitagawa & Kuroda (1992), it is still puzzling why the nominative DP of some passives are com-
patible with wazato. Although I do not intend to fully account for the licensing mechanism of
the subject-oriented adverb wazato, the direction I pursue is that wazato forces the nominative
DP to move to the volition projection that licenses control predicates like tai ‘to want.’ Crucially
this projection is higher than Voice in Cinque’s hierarchy (Cinque 1999, 2004). This makes it in
principle possible for either external arguments or internal smuggled ones to associated with ‘to
want.’ However, as we can see from (48a) (the nominative is source) and (48b) (the nominative
DP is on-Directional), not all type of arguments can move into the volition projection. The
licensing conditions for subject-oriented adverbs will be left for future research.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.27 (1577-1630)
b. Ken-no seikoo-ga dooryoo-ni netam-are-tei-ru.

Ken-no success-nom colleague-dat envy-pass-asp-prs
‘Ken’s success is envied by his colleagues.’
(51) a. Atarasii syoosetu-ga hihyooka-ni kokuhyoos-are-ta.
new novel-nom critics-dat attack-pass-pst
‘The/My new novel was attacked by critics.’ [Inanimate]
b. Sono hooseki-wa senmonka-ni kanteis-are-ru.
that jewel-top specialist-dat evaluate-pass-prs
‘That jewel will be appraised by a specialist.’
c. Sono omiyage-wa minna-ni yorokob-are-ta.
that souvenir-top everyone-dat please-pass-pst
‘That souvenir pleased everyone.’
d. Eigo-wa ooku-no hito-ni hanas-are-tei-ru.
English-top many-no person-dat speak-pass-asp-prs
‘English is spoken by many people.’ [C:mean 4.75]
e. Siro-ga heitai-ni kakom-are-ta.
castle-nom soldiers-dat surround-pass-pst
‘The/Our castle was surrounded by soldiers.’
f. Hesokuri-ga tuma-ni tukaw-are-ta.
secret.savings-nom wife-dat use-pass-pst
‘The secret savings were used by his wife.’
(52) a. Bentoo-ga dareka-ni tabe-rare-ta.
box.lunch-nom somebody-dat eat-pass-pst
‘The box lunch was eaten by somebody.’
b. Naomi-no nikki-ga Ken-ni yom-are-ta.
Naomi-no diary-no Ken-dat read-pass-pst
‘Naomi’s diary was read by Ken.’
c. Naomi-no huku-ga Ken-ni yogos-are-ta.
Naomi-no clothes-nom Ken-dat soil-pass-pst
‘Naomi’s clothes were soiled by Ken.’
d. Naomi-no kami-ga Ken-ni ki-rare-ta.
Naomi-no hair-nom Ken-dat cut-pass-pst
‘Naomi’s hair was cut by Ken.’
e. Nooto-ga Ken-ni yabuk-are-ta.
notebook-nom Ken-dat rip-pass-pst
‘The notebook was ripped by Ken.’
(53) a. [Ken-ni kodomo-ga iru-no]-ga Naomi-ni
Ken-dat child-nom exist-no-nom Naomi-dat
si-rare-te-shimatta.
know-pass-ger-perfect
Lit. ‘That Ken has children was found out by Naomi.’ [Passive]
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.28 (1630-1699)
b. Naomi-ga [Ken-ni kodomo-ga iru-no]-o sitte-shimatta.

Naomi-nom Ken-dat child-nom exist-no-acc know-perfect
‘Naomi found out that Ken has children.’ [Active]
(54) a. [Ken-ga heya-ni haitteiku-no]-{ga/wa} Naomi-ni
Ken-nom room-dat enter.go-no-{nom/top} Naomi-dat
mi-rare-tei-nai.
see-pass-asp-neg
‘That Ken entered the room was not seen by Naomi.’ [Passive]
b. Naomi-ga [Ken-ga heya-ni haitteiku-no]-o mi-tei-nai.
Naomi-nom Ken-nom room-dat enter.go-no-acc see-asp-neg
‘Naomi didn’t see that Ken entered the room.’ [Active]
The examples above show that the generalization that -rare is incompatible with
inanimate/abstract DPs is empirically inadequate. Therefore, I conclude that -rare
does not impose selectional restrictions on the nominative DP in the ni-passive.
6.4.3 Adversative connotations
One well-known property of the Japanese passive is its ‘adversity’ connotations.

Many passives carry strong connotations that the referent of the nominative DP
is adversely affected by the event denoted in the rest of the sentence (Wierzbicka
1979; Kuroda 1979; Oehrle & Nishio 1981; Kuno 1983; Shibatani 1990; Washio
1993; among others). Consider the following accusative, source, and genitive-
accusative passives:
(55) a. Ken-ga oya-ni Ken-o sute-rare-ta.
Ken-nom parent-dat abandon-pass-pst
‘Ken was abandoned by his parent.’ [Accusative]
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni Ken-kara nige-rare-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi.’ [Source]
c. Ken-ga Naomi-ni Ken-no huku-o yabuk-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat clothes-acc rip-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was ripped (his) clothes by Naomi.’ [Gen.-Acc]
All the passives in (55) give a listener the impression that Ken is adversely affected
by the event. The literature standardly attributes the adversative connotations as-
sociated with the referent of the nominative DP to the θ-role that -rare assigns. At
least three sorts of θ-roles have been proposed: (1) malefactive (i.e. ‘adversely’ af-
fected) (Kuno 1973; Kuroda 1979; inter alia), (2) affectee (Hoshi 1994; Kitagawa
& Kuroda 1992; inter alia), and (3) experiencer (Miyagawa 1989; Huang 1999;
inter alia). Some linguists, such as Kitagawa (1979), Hoshi (1991, 1995, 1999),
Kitagawa & Kuroda (1992), Huang (1999), Matsuoka (2004), Ariji (2006), pro-
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.29 (1699-1739)
pose that -rare always assigns a θ-role. However, the most widely adopted view
is that -rare in ‘indirect passives,’ but not in ‘direct passives,’ assigns a θ-role (see
Kuno 1973; Hasegawa 1988; Miyagawa 1989; Washio 1990). If the nominative DP
were always selected by the passive morpheme -rare, we would expect that every
occurrence of the nominative DP in the -rare passive would associate with a par-
ticular semantic value or a unique θ-role. Alternatively, if -rare optionally selects
for an argument, we should be able to articulate the exact distribution of its op-
tionality. However, I will show below that neither of these predictions holds in the
Japanese passive. Thus I will conclude that -rare never assigns a θ-role, and that
adversity connotations arise from the variety of source structures underlying this
construction.
We can readily reject the first option that -rare always assigns a θ-role. None
of the three θ-roles proposed in the literature are compatible with abstract DPs.
However, as we have seen in the previous section, abstract DPs can serve as the
nominative DP in the accusative passive (see (50), (53a), and (54a) for examples).
The next option is that -rare ‘optionally’ assigns a θ-role. This raises the question of
its distribution – exactly when it does and does not assign a θ-role. As mentioned
above, the standard assumption is that -rare in the indirect (or adversative) passive
always assigns a θ-role. Traditionally a defining characteristic of indirect passives
has been an apparent lack of an active source (Kuno 1973; Shibatani 1990; Washio
1993; among others). However, within the current approach, all core passives have
an active source, and thus the dichotomy between direct and indirect passives is
no longer tenable. Therefore, I will adopt a stricter criterion – the intransitive pas-
sive – in this section to evaluate the claim that -rare in indirect passives assigns a
θ-role.
If -rare in the intransitive passive assigns a unique θ-role, the prediction is that
every nominative DP in the intransitive passive (i.e. dative, source, and possessive-
dative passives within the current approach) should bear that θ-role. If there is
a counter-example, it is likely that the adversative connotations carried by other
intransitive passives stem from factors other than the θ-role assignment. The three
θ-roles proposed in the literature – malefactive, affectee, and experiencer –
will be examined in turn below:
Malefactive/adversative. Although many passives carry adversative connotations,

it cannot be the case that -rare discharges a malefactive θ-role, because many
intransitive passives that carry ‘positive’ or ‘neutral’ connotations have been re-
ported in the literature (see especially Alfonso 1971 and Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992
for examples). Some examples are given below:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.30 (1739-1810)
(56) pro Kireina ozyoosan-ni nak-are-ru-to chotto uresii-mono-da.

beautiful girl-dat cry-pass-prs-and little happy-thing-cop
‘It’s kind of nice when (you) are cried over by a beautiful girl.’
[Positive: Alfonso 1971]
(57) a. proi Ame-ni hur-are-te kusabanai -ga seiki-o
rain-dat descend-pass-and plants-nom vigor-acc
torimodosi-ta. [Positive: Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992]
regain-pst
‘The plants were revitalized because they were rained on.’
b. proi Ame-ni hur-are-te mizuumi-no suimeni -ga sizukani
rain-dat descend-pass-and lake-no surface-nom quietly
yure-tei-ru.
waver-asp-prs
‘The surface of the lake is tranquilly wavering with rain.’
[Neutral: Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992]
Alluding to examples like (56), Alfonso (1971), as cited in Wierzbicka (1988: 258),
says,
Most textbooks state that the passive Japanese intransitive verb is adversative.
Taken as a textbook generalization, this statement has its merits; the data do indi-
cate that this passive is generally used in environments where the subject has been
unfavourably affected. But taken as a linguistic rule, namely that this passive is
intrinsically adversative, the statement is invalid. In Japanese Language Patterns we
stated that this passive, like any other passive, is a plain statement of fact, and that
if any emotional overtones are present (unfavourable or favourable) they are due
to factors other than the form -areru itself. We came to this conclusion because
we could not reconcile an intrinsically adversative theory with the data as we saw
them. There are many instances where this passive is used, and where all the native
speakers we consulted failed to find any adversative overtones.
There is also a well-cited intransitive passive lacking adversative connotations

(Alfonso 1971; Shibatani 1990; Washio 1993; Kitagawa & Kuroda 1992). The fol-
lowing sentence is adapted from Washio (1993: 63):
(58) Bokura-wa soto-de suzusii kaze-ni huk-are-ta.
we-top outside-loc cool wind-dat blow-pass-pst
Int. ‘We enjoyed the cool wind outside.’
Lit. ‘We were blown at by the cool wind outside.’
Within the current approach, (58) is an at-Directional dative passive, which has
the following active counterpart:
(59) Kaze-ga bokura-{ni/*o} hui-ta.
wind-nom we-{dat/*acc} blow-pst
‘The wind blew at us.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.31 (1810-1866)
Examples like (58) are problematic if we want to claim that -rare assigns a
malefactive θ-role to the subject of indirect passives. In order to maintain this
claim, linguists have denied that (58) is an indirect passive. We can illustrate this
with Washio (1993: 63), who argues, based on the Mongolian data given below,
that the verb huk- in Japanese actually has a transitive use (though it never surfaces
in the active voice).
(60) a. bid gadaa serüün salxind üleegdev.
we-top outside cool wind-dat blow-pass-pst
Lit. ‘We were blown by the cool wind outside.’
b. serüün salxi üleej bana.
cool wind blow be
‘The cool wind is blowing.’
c. sali namajg üleev.
wind me-acc blow-pst
‘The wind blew me.
The verb ülee- ‘to blow’ in Mongolian may take a direct object as shown in (60c),
and Mongolian lacks intransitive indirect passives (within the current approach,
this means that Mongolian disallows raising from an oblique position (or pseudo-
passives)). Based on these facts, Washio (1993) argues that (60a) must be derived
from (60c). Extending the Mongolian case to Japanese, he concludes that (58) is an
instance of the direct passive (or accusative passive), where the nominative DP is
underlyingly a direct object of the verb huk-, and the passive (58) is derived from
its active transitive counterpart (see also Shibatani 1990: 331–332, who came to the
same conclusion as Washio 1993). However, this is not an acceptable argument: we
certainly cannot attribute every instance of a lack of adversity connotations to the
optional transitive use of an intransitive verb that never surfaces in the active voice.
It is critical for the contention of this book that we can identify the exact dis-
tribution of ‘adversity’ -rare. If ‘adversity’ connotations were coextensive with ‘the
availability of an active counterpart,’ we would expect at least every single intran-
sitive passive (which in principle lacks an active counterpart) to carry ‘adversity’
connotations. Nevertheless, the data reviewed above show that the presence of ad-
versity connotations does not even cover all the instances of intransitive passives.
Therefore, the conclusion drawn from the above discussion is that if -rare assigns
an optional θ-role, it cannot be malefactive.
Affectee. The next question is whether -rare optionally assigns an affectee θ-

role or not. Many linguists assume that this is the right generalization. It is most
explicitly formalized in Kitagawa & Kuroda (1992), who propose that ‘the passive
morpheme -rare requires the subject to be “affected” by the event or state described
by the complement clause, and affectedness interpretations can be of positive,
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.32 (1866-1918)
negative or neutral nature, depending on the (lexical) semantics/pragmatics in-

volved in each sentence rather than necessarily being “adversative” (cf. Wierzbicka
1979; Oehrle & Nishio 1980). Kitagawa & Kuroda’s (1992) generalization seems
to cover many instances of the intransitive passive. Yet there are still some cases
that cannot be explained by their loose notion of an affectee θ-role. Consider
the following intransitive passive (i.e. the source passive):
(61) Ken-ga Naomi-ni nige-rare-ta-ga, sono-koto-de eikyoo-o
Ken-nom Naomi-dat escape-pass-pst-but, that-thing-by effect-acc
ukeru-koto-wa naka-ta.
receive-thing-top neg-pst
‘Ken was escaped from by Naomi, but he was not affected by that.’
If -rare were to mean ‘be affected,’ (61) should result in contradiction. However,
(61) is entirely well-formed. This shows that the referent of the nominative DP in
the intransitive passive does not have to be affected at all. The affectee connota-
tions obtained in the source passive (55b) are cancelable, and thus they are just
implicatures. Hence, I conclude that the subject of intransitive passives does not
receive an affectee θ-role.
Experiencer. This brings us to the last option: that is, -rare optionally assigns an
experiencer θ-role. Unlike the first two θ-roles, this is not an easy hypothesis to
falsify. Nevertheless, I will show below that -rare in intransitive passives does not
assign a unique θ-role to its subject. Rather the embedded predicate imposes some
restriction on the nominative DP. First, consider the following passives:
(62) a. Sono gakko-wa yuusyuuna gaksei-ni nige-rare-ta.
that school-top smart student-dat escape-pass-pst
Lit. ‘That school was escaped from by smart students.’ [Source Passive]
b. Sono mura-wa ooame-ni hu-rare-ta.
that village-top heavy.rain-dat descend-pass-pst
Lit. ‘That village was descended upon by heavy rain.’
[on-Directional dative Passive]
These passives show that -rare is compatible with inanimate DPs like ‘school’
or ‘village.’ If -rare assigns an experiencer θ-role, the well-formedness of these
sentences means that ‘school’ and ‘village’ can serve as an experiencer (i.e. an ar-
gument of -rare) in the intransitive passive. Now recall our earlier discussion about
the verb nak-u ‘to cry’ that there is an animacy restriction on the cause argument
(or the nominative DP) in the passive voice (see Section 3.5.2.4). Suppose a situ-
ation where a school is planned to undergo destruction, and all the teachers and
the students who graduated from that school gathered in front of the school and
cried. Even in this situation, the following passive is ill-formed:
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.33 (1918-1979)
(63) *Sono gakko-wa minna-ni nak-are-ta.

that school-top everyone-dat cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The school was cried over by everyone.’ [Cause Passive]
Replacing ‘that school’ with an animate DP, such as ‘John,’ makes the sentence
well-formed. The contrast between (62a) and (63) cannot be explained if the
nominative DPs in both sentences are selected by -rare.
In sum, this section has demonstrated that even if the passive -rare assigns a
θ-role, a unique θ-role that is compatible with all intransitive passives is not iden-
tifiable. The nominative DP of the intransitive passive cannot be a malefactive,
affectee, or experiencer argument, and the adversative connotations that many
passives carry can be canceled, so they are just implicatures. Since we are unable
to identify exactly when -rare selects for an argument and what thematic role it
assigns, we reject the claim that -rare optionally (i.e. in indirect passives) assigns a
θ-role and conclude that -rare never selects for a theta-argument.
The remaining question is how to account for the cases in which adversity
connotations are indeed present (e.g. (55)). If the adversity connotations do not
stem from -rare, what is responsible for such connotations? The following section
addresses this issue.
6.4.3.1 Where does the affectedness come from?

If not because of the θ-role, why do many Japanese passives carry adversative con-
notations? One possibility is that the affectedness arises due to the information
structure of passive voice. Passivization in general affects the external argument of
a predicate, and an internal argument of the predicate occupies Spec,TP, making
it the subject or topic of the sentence. It is conceivable that information structure
plays some role in the passive voice, and is responsible for the adversative connota-
tions to some degree. Regardless of the animacy of the subject, in general the pas-
sive voice indeed tends to carry affectee connotations that are not always present
in the active counterpart. For example, Keenan (1985: 269) presents the follow-
ing active-passive pairs to illustrate that there are stronger affectee connotations
present in the passive than in its active counterpart:
(64) a. Someone has slept in this bed.
b. This bed has been slept in.
(65) a. John saw Mary entering the building at 6 o’clock.
b. Mary was seen entering the building at 6 o’clock.
(66) a. John changed his job.
b. John’s job was changed.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.34 (1979-2020)
See the following pair in French.13

(67) a. Jean a vu Pierre.
John have seen Pierre
‘John saw Pierre.’
b. Pierre a été vu par Jean.
Pierre has been seen by John
‘Pierre was seen by John.’
This is also true in Japanese passives. In the following active-passive pairs, the ac-
cusative passive counterparts carry strong affected connotations, which are not
necessarily present in the active counterpart.
(68) a. Ken-ga sono hon-o mi-ta.
Ken-nom that book-acc see-pst
‘Ken saw that book.’
b. Sono hon-ga Ken-ni mi-rare-ta.
that book-nom Ken-dat see-pass-pst
‘That book was seen by Ken.’ [Acc. PSV]
(Connotations: That book shouldn’t be seen by Ken.)
(69) a. Ken-ga John-no kaisya-o yame-ta.
Ken-nom John-no company-acc quit-pst
‘Ken quit John’s company.’
b. John-no kaisya-ga Ken-ni yame-rare-ta.
John-no company-nom Ken-dat quit-pass-pst
‘John’s company was quit by Ken.’ [Acc. PSV]
(Connotations: a huge loss for John’s company.)
Since this is not a property unique to Japanese passives, I will set aside this type of
affectedness associated with the passive voice.
Now we turn to ‘affected’ or ‘adversity’ connotations specific to Japanese
passives. The idea I pursue is that ‘affected’ connotations arise from structural
properties, while ‘adversity’ connotations are implicatures that stem from meta-
linguistic factors – the choice of predicate and real-world knowledge. Specifically,
my proposals are as follows:
(70) a. ‘Affected’ connotations are a by-product of the structure: the nominative
DP is originally merged into the structure as (1) a possessor of the internal
argument, (2) an on-Directional dative, or (3) a source argument of the
predicate.
13. Thanks to Vincent Homer for help with the French example.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.35 (2020-2083)
b. ‘Adversity’ connotations are attributable to (1) the lexical semantic/prag-

matic properties of the predicate or (2) the interaction between (1) and
the θ-role that the nominative DP receives.
The next section explains and motivates the two proposals in turn.
6.4.3.2 The source of affectedness
In general, three types of passives carry strong affected connotations: (1) the geni-
tive passive, (2) the on-Directional dative passive, and (3) the source passive. None
of these arguments are a direct object (theme/patient) of the predicate embed-
ded under -rare, and thus the affected connotations perceived from these passives
are different from the connotations perceived from the instances we saw in (68b)
and (69b). The three structures are discussed in turn below:
The genitive passive. The derived subject of genitive passives, whose external
merge position is a genitive DP of the internal argument within the moved VP,
generally carries strong adversely affected connotations, as exemplified below:
(71) a. Naomi-wa hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta. Kinship
Lit. ‘Naomi was died by (her) mother.’ [A:mean 4.68, C:4.33]
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni kodomo-o sikar-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat child-acc scold-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was scolded (his) child by Naomi.’
c. Ken-ga Naomi-ni kao-o tatak-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Keni was hit (his) face by Naomi.’ Inalienable
d. Ken-wa Naomi-ni huku-o yabuk-are-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-dat clothes-acc rip-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was ripped (his) clothes by Naomi.’ Alienable
If presented without context, all the genitive passives in (71) carry a sense of ad-
versative affectedness.14 However, the following example demonstrates that the
‘adversity’ aspect is attributable to the choice of the predicate:
14. The treatment of the four genitive passives differs depending on the linguist. For example,
Shibatani (1990) argues that ‘affectedness’ is only present with cases involving alienable posses-
sors like (71d), but not with cases involving inalienable possessors like (71c). To me, however,
(71c) and (71d) do not differ much in terms of the degree of affectedness. As is well-known,
alienable and inalienable possessors tend to behave differently crosslinguistically (Nichols 1988;
Alexiadou 2003). This is also true in Japanese (Ura 1994; Ishizuka 2010; among others), and it
is plausible that the finer details of the possessor-raising step differ between the two types of
genitive passives. However, I do not distinguish the two genitive passives here (see Section 3.6
for the proposed structure).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.36 (2083-2146)
(72) Ken-ga Naomi-ni kodomo-o home-rare-ta.

Ken-nom Naomi-dat child-acc praise-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was praised (his) child by Naomi.’
In (72) ‘Ken’ is still affected by ‘Naomi’s praising of his son’ but very likely in
a positive way. What is important here is that the genitive passive always gives
the impression that the derived subject is ‘affected’ by the event. This is because
the nominative DP is a possessor (i.e. a genitive DP) of the affected object (i.e.
the object that undergoes change) of the predicate, and the degree of affectedness
perceived correlates with how much the possessed NP is affected by the activity
denoted by the predicate. The way the nominative DP of the genitive passive is af-
fected is rather indirect, only through its possessed NP. The possessor itself is not
an affected argument (i.e. not undergoing physical changes), and the effect is very
likely to be emotional given that the possessor is often an animate DP. In conclu-
sion, the affected connotations carried in the genitive passive are a by-product of
the syntactic genitive relation between the nominative DP and the possessed NP
that is an affected argument of the predicate (see also Washio 1993 for a similar
idea, which he calls ‘adversity by exclusion’ – i.e., if one is affected by an event
without being directly involved in it, then he is adversely affected).
The on-Directional dative passive. On-Directional dative passives also carry

strong affected connotations, as exemplified below:
(73) a. Taroo-ga ame-ni hur-are-ta.
Taro-nom rain-dat descend-pass-pst
‘Taro was rained on.’
b. Densya-de Naomi-ga roozin-ni kusyami-o s-are-ta.
train-loc Naomi-nom old.man-dat sneeze-acc do-pass-pst
‘Naomi was sneezed on by an old man in the train.’
I propose that ‘affectedness’ arises because the nominative DP is an ‘on-Directional’

argument of the predicate: it is an affected argument in the sense that it receives
a direct impact from the activity denoted by the predicate (cf. see also Pylkkänen
(2002) for an idea of ‘directionality,’ which is discussed in her proposal for low ap-
plicatives (or possessive passives in a traditional term)). For example, for (73a) to
be felicitous, ‘Taro’ has to get wet from rain (i.e. literally, he has to be ‘rained on’),
and for (73b) to be felicitous, sneezing has to be directed at ‘Naomi’, which results
in affected connotations.
The source passive. The source passive also carries affected connotations. This
is because the nominative DP is originally merged as the kara-marked source
argument of the predicate (see also Pylkkänen 2002).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.37 (2146-2202)
(74) a. Otto-ga tuma-ni nige-rare-ta. [A:mean 4.82]

Lit. ‘The husband was escaped from by his wife.’
b. Ken-ga doroboo-ni okane-o nusum-are-ta. [A:mean 4.77]
Keb-nom thief-dat money-acc steal-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was stolen his money from by a thief.’ Source PSV
In (74a), ‘husband’ is affected, rather indirectly, because he is the source of his

wife’s escaping. Likewise, in (74b), ‘Ken’ is affected because money was stolen
‘from him.’
In this section, I have argued that the affected connotation is a by-product
of the thematic role that the nominative DP has originally received. The affected
connotations arise because the nominative DP is merged as a possessor of the af-
fected (or theme) argument of the predicate or as an ON -Directional dative or
source argument of the predicate. The way the possessor nominative is affected
is rather indirect, through its possessed DP, whereas the directional dative or
source argument is affected more directly from the event denoted by the pred-
icate. Furthermore, I argue that connotations of ‘adversity’ stem from the lexical
semantics/pragmatics of the predicate.
The remaining question is how to deal with the cases that are not a possessor,
directional, nor source argument of the predicate but still carry strong adver-
sity connotations. My proposal is that the ‘adversely affected’ connotations stem
from the interaction between the thematic role of the nominative DP and the lex-
ical semantics/pragmatics of the predicate with which -rare merges (see (70)). Let
me elucidate this point with more examples below.
6.4.3.3 The source of adversative connotations

In this section, we will examine two passives that are reported to carry strong
adversative connotations in the literature, but whose nominative DPs are not a
genitive DP of the internal argument, on-Directional, or source argument of the
predicate.
The first example, which is adapted from Kuno (1973), is presented below:
(75) John-ga Mary-ni koibito-o ziman.s-are-ta.
John-nom Mary-dat lover-acc bragging.do-pass-pst
‘John was bragged about heri lover to by Maryi .’ Dative Passive
The passive (75) carries strong adversative connotations and passives like this have
been taken as a typical example of the indirect passive lacking an active counterpart
(e.g. Kuno 1973). However, within the current approach, the nominative DP John
in (75) is originally merged as the addressee of a verb of speaking (i.e. zimansu-
ru ‘to brag’; see Section 3.3.1 for the structure). Now the question is where the
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.38 (2202-2277)
adversative connotations come from? My proposal is that they arise from the fact
that the nominative DP is merged as an addressee argument of zimansu-ru ‘to
brag.’ The verb zimansu-ru itself has negative connotations, and from real-world
knowledge, native speakers know that being the ‘addressee’ of someone’s bragging
is an unpleasant experience.
We can show that the adversity connotations are just implicatures, because
the passive is still felicitous even if John is not affected at all. Consider (76) in the
context that John is deaf.
(76) John-ga Mary-ni koibito-o zimans-are-ta ga, toozen sono
John-nom Mary-dat lover-acc brag-pass-pst but, naturally that
koto-ni-wa kizuka-nakat-ta.
thing-dat-top realize-neg-pst
Lit. ‘John was bragged to about her lover by Mary, but naturally (he) didn’t
realize that.’
In (76), it is impossible for ‘John’ to be affected by Mary’s bragging since he could

not hear what ‘Mary’ said. However, the passive is still well-formed, demonstrating
that the adversity connotations available with (75) are just implicatures.
Additionally, we can make the adversity connotations disappear by replacing
‘to brag’ with another verb of speaking, such as ‘to confess’:
(77) John-ga Mary-ni ai-o kokuhaku.s-are-ta.
John-nom Mary-dat love-acc confession.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘John was confessed her love to by Mary.’
The passives (75) and (77) share the same syntactic structure: the predicate in
both sentences is a verb of speaking, which takes an accusative theme and a dative
addressee. In addition, the two verbs have the same decomposition: they consist
of a noun (ziman ‘bragging’ and kokuhaku ‘confession’) and a light verb su-ru ‘do.’
Nevertheless, the adversative connotations are only present with (75).15 Therefore,
I conclude that the adversative effects associated with (75) are due to the lexical
property of the predicate and are not inherent to the θ-role of the nominative DP
nor to the passive morpheme -rare.
Let us turn to the next example. The following dative Cause passive, which
is taken from Washio (1993: 54), is another representative example of indirect
passives that is known to carry strong adversity connotations:
(78) Gakusei-ga kodomo-ni nak-are-ta.
student-nom child-dat cry-pass-pst
Lit. ‘The student was cried over by the child.’ [Dative Cause PSV]
15. Needless to say, if one assumes a context such that Ken dislikes Naomi and wants to avoid
being confessed to, then an adversity interpretation is available. However, what is important is
whether (77) always (or inherently) carries such connotations or not: and the answer is No.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.39 (2277-2326)
Washio (1993) attributes the adversative connotations to the principle of ‘adver-

sity by exclusion’ (which is the principle proposed by Washio (1993) proposed; see
Section 6.4.3.2). According to Washio (1993), ‘adversity by exclusion’ is available
when the nominative DP of the passive does not relate to any argument position
of the embedded verb. Therefore, the intransitive passive is a typical case in which
this principle applies. Contrary to Washio (1993), under the current approach,
gakusei ‘student’ is licensed as a dative Cause argument of the verb nak-u ‘to cry’
(see Section 3.5.2.4). However, ‘cause’ is not an affected argument of the predi-
cate (‘cause’ doesn’t undergo change because of crying). My proposal is that the
adversity connotations come from the pragmatic force of the activity denoted in
the predicate and the nominative DP being the ‘cause’ of it. Given our real-world
knowledge, if someone cries because of you, you are likely to feel guilty or at least
uncomfortable, which results in adversity connotations. The effects of the choice
of predicate become evident if nak-u ‘to cry’ is replaced with another verb like
odorok-u ‘to be surprised’, which also takes a dative ‘cause’ argument:
(79) a. Naomi-ga Ken-ni odorok-are-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-dat be.surprised-pass-pst
‘Naomi surprised Ken.’ [Dative Cause PSV]
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni odoroi-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat be.surprised-pst
‘Ken was surprised at Naomi.’ [Active]
The passive (79a) is interpreted neutrally, entirely lacking adversity and affected
connotations. Naomi is just a cause and (79a) is just a statement of a fact. Hence,
I conclude that the lack of adversity/affected connotations in (79a) shows that the
adversity perceived from (78) is simply a by-product of the lexical pragmatics of
the predicate ‘to cry.’
This chapter concentrates on movement properties of Japanese passives and re-

examines the arguments provided in favor of a control analysis. Comparing the
distributions of the gap in causative versus passive constructions, I first show that
the gap contained in the passive cannot be pro, but must be a trace or copy of a
moved element (note that the embedded object in the accusative passive is not
a position for PRO to occur). Then I reexamine the reconstruction facts, which
have been taken as an argument against a movement derivation of the passive in
the literature. It turned out that the purported generalization reflected a partial
view of the empirical paradigm. Once more data are added, a different picture
arises: the nominative DP in the passive reconstructs under the dative goal and
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:43 F: LA19206.tex / p.40 (2326-2330)
locative Ps but not under the dative by-phrase. The fact that the nominative DP
reconstructs under dative goal DPs or locative Ps is sufficient to show that the
derivation involves movement and that the landing site is the surface nomina-
tive position. Then I turn to the question of whether the passive involves A- or
Ā-movement. I show that the passive shows different distribution from relativiza-
tion and topicalization and conclude that the Japanese passive is an A-movement
phenomenon. The last section shows that strong ‘affected’ connotations associated
with many nominative DPs in the passive come from the nominative DP bearing
the possessor, on-Directional, or source θ-roles. Further, I propose that the
lexical semantic/pragmatic properties of the predicate are always responsible for
‘adversity’ connotations. Crucially, ‘affected’ connotations may arise in the passive
however it is not due to the nominative DP receives an affectee or malefactive
θ-role from -rare.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.1 (63-155)
chapter 7
The extra-thematic passive
This chapter investigates the ‘extra-thematic passive,’ whose nominative DP is not

licensed within the moved VP. The extra-thematic passive exhibits properties that
are very different from the core passive, and it cannot be generated by the smug-
gling analysis developed in the previous chapters. Crucially, some native speakers,
including myself, consistently reject this type of passives, which suggests that the
extra-thematic passive involves a different licensing mechanism from the gram-
mar that generates the core passive. I will refer to the grammar that generates the
core passive as Grammar-Q, and the grammar that generates the extra-thematic
passive as Grammar-L. In this chapter, I will address the following questions: How
is the extra-thematic passive licensed (i.e. Grammar-L)? How does Grammar-L
differ from Grammar-Q? What factors give rise to individual variability? How is
Grammar-L acquired?
As the low mean ratings of the following examples show, the extra-thematic
passive is unacceptable when presented without context:
(1) a. *Ken-ga Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta. [A:mean 1.09]
Lit. ‘Ken was run by Naomi.’
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that Naomi ran.’
b. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni oyog-are-ta. [C:mean 1.39]
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that Naomi swam.’
c. *Ken-wa musuko-ni oyog-are-ta. [C:mean 1.61]
Ken-top son-dat swim-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was swum by his son.’
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that his son swam.’
d. *Ken-wa musume-ni odor-are-ta. [C:mean 1.56]
Lit. ‘Ken was danced by his daughter.’
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.2 (155-213)
e. *Naomi-wa Lisa-no hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta. [A:mean 1.69]

Lit. ‘Naomi was died by Lisa’s mother.’
Int. ‘Naomi was affected by the fact that Lisa’s mother died.’
f. *Ken-wa Naomi-no kaisya-ni toosan.s-are-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-no company-dat bankrupt.do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was gone bankrupt by Naomi’s company.’
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that Naomi’s company went bankrupt.’
[C:mean 1.81]
g. *Ken-wa misiranuhito-ni zisatus-are-ta.
Int. ‘Ken was affected by the fact that a stranger committed suicide.’
[A:mean 1.55, C:mean 1.59]
As mentioned in Section 3.7, the extra-thematic passive is said to be well-formed

once supported by a rich context that explicates how the nominative DP is af-
fected (Kubo 1992; Kuroda 1992; Shibatani 1994; inter alia). However, why does
the affected context determine the well-formedness of the sentence? As correctly
pointed out by Shibatani (1994), the requirement of extraneous semantic support
is never the case with causatives or direct passives (i.e. core passives), whose argu-
ments are licensed by clearly defined θ-roles, or even in a construction involving
an actual experiencer. The following causative sentence is implausible, but clearly
grammatical without extraneous semantic support:
(2) Daitooryoo-ga utyuuzin-ni syokuzi-o tabe-sase-ta.
president-nom aliens-dat meal-acc eat-caus-pst
‘The President {let/made} aliens eat the meal.’
Since real-world plausibility does not explain why some passives require adver-
sative context and others do not, the difference must be structural. Shibatani
(1994) develops a semantico-pragmatic account to constructions containing
extra-thematic arguments. His idea is that it is the affected context that explicates
the ‘relevance of the extra-thematic argument to the described scene’ that allows
it to be integrated into clausal semantics. The analysis I pursue in this chapter is
similar in spirit to Shibatani’s (1994), but differs in implementation: I will advance
a syntactic treatment of his idea.
In this chapter, the results of the questionnaire surveys play a crucial role in
understanding what kind of affected contexts can license extra-thematic passives.
The following section reports the methodology used in the surveys. Then I will
return to the investigation of Grammar-L.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.3 (213-246)
Chapter 7. The extra-thematic passive 207
7.1 Methodology of the surveys
The primary task used to collect grammaticality judgments was a 5-point scale
judgment task.1 Reviewing studies that investigate potential confounding factors
that systematically contribute to variation in judgments, Schütze (1996: Ch. 6.3)
has made some methodological recommendations. The potential confounding
factors include instructions, the number of grammatical and ungrammatical sen-
tences, order of presentation, repeated presentation, judgment speed, modality,
register, preparation, context, experience such as linguistic training, parsability (in
terms of length and complexity), frequency (lexical items as well as structures),
and lexical content (see Schütze for a complete list of potential confounding fac-
tors). Schütze’s (1996) recommendations were taken into consideration when I
designed the questionnaires, especially Questionnaires B and C.
The experiment for questionnaire A was conducted in summer 2007, and
questionnaires B and C were given in summer 2008. Several aspects of the method-
ology were shared across the three surveys. Prior to questionnaire A, a pilot study,
whose results are not reported here, was conducted in order to understand the
general judgment pattern of non-linguists, and the results were used to balance the
number of acceptable and unacceptable sentences.2 In addition to grammaticality
judgments, the following personal information was collected: sex, age, hometown,
frequently-used Japanese dialects, foreign languages, education, and familiarity
with linguistics literature. The questionnaire explicitly mentioned that its pur-
pose was not to measure one’s language command, and there were no right or
wrong answers. The participants were all naïve non-linguist native speakers, and
thus were not familiar with the standard analyses of Japanese passives.3 The mode
of the questionnaires was written. In the following sections, the aspects of the
methodology varying across the questionnaires are reported.
1. This task was chosen instead of a magnitude estimation task – a judgement collection tech-
nique that has received significant attention over the past decade – because the effect size we are
interested in is big enough to be captured by a 5-point scale. In addition, recent studies reveal
that the magnitude estimation task does not necessarily provide more accurate data than 5- or
7-point scale tasks (e.g. Sprouse 2009; Bard et al. 1996; Keller 2001; Featherston 2005).
2. The results of questionnaire A basically replicate the results of the pilot questionnaire.
3. Although concerns about using the data collected from non-linguists are discussed in the
literature (e.g., Schütze 1996), I decided to conduct the survey with non-linguists because it
was important for me not to have participants who are familiar with the standard analysis of
Japanese passives.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.4 (246-307)
7.1.1 Questionnaire A
74 naïve native speakers participated in the questionnaire A survey, and 56 of them

were undergraduate students of Chuo University, Rikkyo University, and Seizyo
University, majoring in Japanese history or Japanese culture and literature. All the
participants resided in Tokyo at the time of the survey. The experimental setting
was their regular classrooms with their familiar history professor, who was naïve
to the purpose of the survey, as an experimenter.
The survey consisted of two tasks. One task asked the participants to rate the
acceptability of stimuli sentences transcribed in Japanese on a scale from 1 to 5 (1 =
very unnatural, 5 = completely natural). There were 120 stimuli sentences, and
12 of them were presented in supportive context. Contextualized items were pre-
sented after the ones without contexts. The translation of the Japanese instructions
used for the non-contextualized sentences is as follows:
(3) Please read the following sentences, and judge whether it sounds like a natu-
ral Japanese sentence or not (natural means that it can be readily understood,
and you can imagine a situation in which you or other native speakers would
utter the sentence). Do not imagine a special context, and do not think too
much. If you have to think of it as a metaphoric expression, you can consider
it unnatural.
Using a scale from 1(very unnatural) to 5 (natural), circle the relevant num-
ber.
Following instruction (3), two exemplar sentences, one which I consider unequiv-
ocally good and one unequivocally bad, were provided with the sample ratings 5
and 1, respectively, as shown below:
(4) a. Kinoo Taroo-ga Hanako-to isoide gakko-ni it-ta.
yesterday Taro-nom Hanako-with quickly school-dat go-pst
‘Yesterday, Taro went to school with Hanako quickly.’ [5]
b. *Kinoo Taroo-ga Hanako-ni isoide gakko-ni it-ta.
yesterday Taro-nom Hanako-dat quickly school-dat go-pst
Lit. ‘Yesterday, Taro went to school to Hanako quickly.’ [1]
For stimuli presented in supportive context, the following instruction was given:
(5) In the context given, rate how natural the sentence is.
The other task asked the participants to identify the referent of an anaphor zibun
‘self ’ or a silent possessor in some sentences (multiple choice tasks). The survey
was self-paced and took about 25 minutes to complete. Factors such as order of
presentation and repeated presentation (especially with different contexts) were
not controlled for in this survey.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.5 (307-344)
7.1.2 Questionnaires B and C
The same methodology was used in questionnaires B and C. Originally the two
questionnaires were intended to be one questionnaire, but it was divided into two
in order to minimize the effect caused by repeated exposure of the participants
to the same lexical items/sentences. The two questionnaires were answered by un-
dergraduate students in their regular classrooms, and with their familiar history
professor, who also distributed questionnaire A and was naïve to the purpose of
the study, as an experimenter. Two versions with different orders of the items were
prepared for each of B and C, and the four versions were randomly assigned to
students. 108 undergraduate students of Chuo University, Rikkyo University, and
Seijyo University, majoring in Japanese history or Japanese culture and literature
participated in the survey: 54 students completed Questionnaire B and 54 Ques-
tionnaire C. None of the participants took part in the questionnaire A survey. All
the participants resided in Tokyo at the time of the study.
The surveys involve two tasks. One task asked the participants to judge the
acceptability of 61 stimuli sentences transcribed in Japanese (50 were presented
in no context, followed by 11 presented in contexts), assigning them numerical
scores from 1 to 5 (1 = very unnatural, 5 = completely natural). The instructions
used were constructed based on the following English instructions, which were
recommended by Wayne (1997: 91, Table 9).4
“. . . We would like you to imagine that your job is to teach English to speakers
of other languages. . . . Please read the sentence, then ask yourself if the sentence
seems English-sounding or not. Suppose one of your students were to use this sen-
tence. If we ignore pronunciation, would the student sound like a native speaker?
Or would the sentence seem strange or unnatural to a native speaker no mat-
ter how it was pronounced? Your task is to tell us how English-sounding each
sentence is, using a scale.”
The rough translation of the Japanese instructions used is as follows:

(6) “First, imagine that your job is to teach Japanese to speakers of other lan-
guages. Then we would like you to judge how the sentence sounds to a native
speaker on a scale of 5. For example, if one of your students uttered the sen-
tence and the sentence sounds like a sentence uttered by a native speaker, then
give it a 5. If you think that the sentence sounds like unnatural Japanese to a
native speaker, please rate it as 1. In short, please rate the sentence depending
on how natural you think the sentence would sound to a native speaker, using
a 5-point scale. Please do not take the truth of the content into consideration
when rating.
4. Thanks to Carson Schütze (personal communication) for bringing this to my attention.

JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.6 (344-404)
Use the criteria, 5 = Japanese spoken by a native speaker, 1 = unnatural

Japanese and circle a number. ”
The two exemplar sentences in (4), which were the same ones used in question-
naire A, followed the instructions.
For stimuli with context, the following instructions were given (again non-
contextualized ones were presented before contextualized ones):
(7) In the context given, please rate how much the sentence sounds like an utter-
ance given by a native speaker.
The other task asked the participants to come up with a context that makes a
given ‘extra-thematic passive’ sentence acceptable. This task was presented before
the contextualized stimuli were presented in order not to bias their answers. The
translation of the Japanese instructions used for this task was as follows:
(8) Please write down a situation in which you can imagine a native speaker
would utter the sentence. If you do not think a native speaker would ever
say the sentence under any circumstances, or if you cannot think of such a
situation, then please say so.
The questionnaires were self-paced and took about 15 minutes to complete. 12

out of the 50 context-less sentences were intended to be pure fillers: namely, they
contained constructions other than passives and they had nothing to do with the
testing points of the study. The number of the pure fillers might appear to be low,
but no more than two stimuli were designed to test the same testing point; thus,
it was unlikely for the participants to figure out the purpose of each stimulus and
develop strategies or theories to answer the questionnaires.
7.1.3 Results
As reported above, the methodology used in questionnaires B and C was much

more controlled than the methodology used in A. However, the results of ques-
tionnaire A survey are reported together with the results of B and C surveys
throughout the book. I decided to do so because some sentences were tested in
both surveys, A and B/C, and the mean ratings were extremely close, exhibiting no
significant differences, as illustrated below:
(9) a. Sono sima-wa umi-ni kakom-are-tei-ru.
‘That island is surrounded by the sea.’ [A:mean 4.89, C:4.91]
b. Naomi-wa hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Naomi was died by (her) mother.’ [A:mean 4.68, C:4.33]
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.7 (404-460)

Lit. ‘Ken was committed suicide by a stranger.’ [A:mean 1.55, C:1.59]
d. *Ken-ga Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was run by Naomi.’ [A:mean 1.09, B:1.67]
The reason we do not obtain significant differences despite the methodological

differences was probably an artifact of the peculiarities of the construction cho-
sen, and the results should not be generalized. In addition, the results from the
questionnaires somewhat deviate from the general pattern of non-linguist speakers
reported in the literature. Specifically, non-linguists are said to make fewer distinc-
tions between levels of grammaticality (i.e. they tend not to use the end points of
the scale) (see Schütze 1996: 115). However, as we can see from the mean ratings
above, many participants of the questionnaires used the end points of the scale (1s
and 5s). I speculate that this is because the stimuli sentences lie at the extremes of
the acceptability scale: some extra-thematic passives are in fact incomprehensible
without supportive context, whereas other passives are entirely grammatical.
7.2 Adversative context and extra-thematic passives
In order to understand the distribution of the extra-thematic passive, I first tested

the validity of the general claim that adversative context improves the acceptability
of gapless passives (i.e. extra-thematic passives). As the low mean ratings below
show, simply specifying how the nominative DP is affected by the described event
did not suffice to make the extra-thematic passive well-formed:
(10) a. *Naomi-wa musuko-ni kikenna yama-ni nobo-rare-ta
Naomi-top son-dat dangerous mountain-loc climb-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Naomii was climbed on a dangerous mountain by heri son.’
[C:mean 1.70]
5
b. *Ken-wa tuma-ni suupaa-de hatrak-are-ta.
Ken-top wife-dat supermarket-loc work-pass-pst.
Lit.‘Keni was worked at a supermarket by hisi wife.’ [C:mean 1.67]
5. In (10b), the affected connotation arises from the traditional family value in Japan. Tradi-
tionally, earning money was considered to be a husband’s role, and husbands often do not want
their wives to work and earn money, especially at the supermarket where the neighbors are likely
to find out that their wives are working.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.8 (460-502)
c. *?Ken-wa osanai musume-ni hito.doori-no ooi tokoro-de

Ken-top small daughter-dat people.passing-no many place-loc
hasir-are-ta.
run-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Keni was run by hisi young daughter in the crowded place.’
[C:mean 2.17]
d. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni sinkoo.syuukyoo-o hazime-rare-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-dat new.religion-acc begin-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was joined a new cult by Naomi.’ [C:mean 1.69]
[Kubo 1992; Pylkkänen 2002]
In addition, I presented the following three extra-thematic passives with and with-
out (non-possession priming) adversative context in the surveys (the mean ratings
below are when presented without context):
(11) a. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
Ken-top Naomi-dat run-pass-pst
b. *Naomi-wa Lisa-no hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Naomi was died by Lisa’s mother.’ [A:mean 1.69]
[A:mean 1.55, cf. C:mean 1.59]
The proposed smuggling analysis – Grammar-Q – does not generate any of the
passives given in (11), as the nominative DP is not an argument licensed in the
moved VP domain. The verb hasir-u ‘to run’ in (11a) is a manner intransitive
verb, lacking the lower VP layer to satisfy the EPP feature of -rare.6 (11b) and
(11c) contain active unaccusative predicates (i.e. sin-u ‘to die’ and zisatu.su-ru
‘to commit suicide’), which in principle allow a possess-raising derivation. How-
ever, (11b) already contains a proper name no-phrase, which blocks the no-phrase
source of the nominative DP. Similarly, (11c) contains ‘a stranger’ as a potential
head noun, which is semantically incompatible with a possessor. Compare the
mean ratings of (11b) and (11c) with the following well-formed genitive passive
counterparts:
6. The verb hasir-u also has a transitive use to mean ‘be obsessed with,’ but the intended read-
ing here is ‘to run,’ and the low mean rating in (11a) suggests that the participants were dealing
with the intransitive hasir-u ‘run’ when they provided judgements for (11a).
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.9 (502-587)
(12) a. Naomi-wa hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta. [A:mean 4.68]

(Int. ‘Naomi had her mother die on her.’)
b. Ken-wa musume-ni zisatus-are-ta. [A:mean 3.91]
Ken-top daughter-dat commit.suicide-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was committed suicide by (his) daughter.’
The extra-thematic passive (11a) was also presented in the following adversative
context written in Japanese.
(13) Context Ken and Naomi were playing tag in the park. Ken was it. Naomi ran
away from him when he was about to catch her.
a. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
73 out of 74 participants gave a ‘1 or 2’ to this sentence without context. In context,

54 people out of 74 (73% of the participants) still gave it a ‘1 or 2’. 10 gave it a 4 or
5, 10 gave it a 3. Table 7.1 summarizes the results.
Table 7.1 Grammaticality judgment results for (13)
no context 1.09 0.34 68 5 1 0 0 74

% (92) (7) (1) (0) (0) (100)
in context 2.01 1.12 31 23 10 8 2 74
% (42) (31) (13) (11) (3) (100)
Although the context made (13a) acceptable to some participants, it did not suffice
to make (13a) acceptable to the majority of participants.
The passive (11b) was also presented in the following adversative context:
(14) Context Naomi and Lisa are roommates. One day Lisa’s mother died and
Lisa cried all night. Naomi couldn’t study for her exam the next day nor sleep
at all.
*Naomi-wa Lisa-no hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta. [A:mean 1.66]
The results with and without context are summarized in Table 7.2.
The results given in Table 7.2 show that 62 (83.8%) out of 74 participants
rated it as 1 (impossible) or 2 (very degraded). Thus the sentence is still ill-formed
to many speakers, even in affected context.
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no context 1.69 1.06 44 18 6 3 3 74

% (60) (24) (8) (4) (4) (100)
in context 1.66 1.02 45 17 6 4 2 74
% (61) (23) (8) (5) (3) (100)
The passive (11c) was presented in the following adversative context:

(15) Context On his way to work Ken happened to see a stranger committing
suicide by jumping off a high building. He had nothing to do with that person,
but still got upset and felt very sick, so he went home.
??Ken-wa misiranuhito-ni zisatus-are-ta. [A:mean 2.01]
Reading the above extra-passive in the supportive context (15) in Japanese, 53

(71.6%) out of 74 participants rated it as 1 or 2, and 11 (14.1%) rated it as 4 or 5.
Thus (15) was still unacceptable to many speakers. The results with and without
context are summarized in Table 7.3:

no context 1.55 0.94 48 17 5 2 2 74
% (65) (23) (7) (3) (3) (100)
in context 2.01 1.19 34 19 10 8 3 74
% (46) (26) (14) (11) (4) (100)
In short, the above affected contexts did not make the three extra-thematic
passives well-formed to many speakers. Further, it is not the case that the speak-
ers who accepted one of them accepted all the extra-thematic passives presented
in adversative contexts: none of the participants gave a 4 or 5 to all three extra-
thematic passives. Therefore, the results of the questionnaire A survey do not
confirm the general claim. Furthermore, the distribution is not consistent enough
to decide who has Grammar-L and who has Grammar-Q. This raises the ques-
tion of whether or not the affected contexts used in the questionnaire were the
right kind. Since I appear not to have Grammar-L, there is a potential risk that the
affected context I created is not appropriate. In the next section, the defining char-
acteristics of the affected context that make the extra-thematic passive well-formed
will be investigated.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.11 (651-706)
7.2.1 What is the right kind of context?
One potential reason none of the three adversative contexts used in the ques-
tionnaire A survey significantly improved the acceptability of the extra-thematic
passives might be that -rare requires the nominative DP to ‘be affected’ in a spe-
cific way, and one has to come up with one of a very restricted set of ways in which
the nominative DP is affected. In order to understand the right kind of adversative
context, I closely worked with two native Japanese speaker linguists, Okabe (Lin-
guist A, hereafter) and Nakatani (Linguist B, hereafter), who have high tolerance
to the extra-thematic passive.
7.2.2 Data from linguistically-trained native speakers

Linguist A is a female in her early 30s, who specializes in language acquisition and
has been exposed to the literature of Japanese syntax from her early 20s. Linguist
B is a male in his late 30s, who specializes in semantics/syntax and has also been
exposed to the literature of Japanese syntax from his early 20s. Therefore, both
linguists are very familiar with the traditional analysis of Japanese passives.
Linguist A reported that she could not accept (11a) in the context (13a) I pro-
vided in questionnaire A (she would give it a 3 out of 5). Instead, she provided me
with the following context that renders (11a) acceptable.
(16) a. Context Ken-ga 1-kai-ni sunde-ite, 2-kai-ni Naomi-ga sunde-iru. Itumo
Naomi-no ashioto-wa hijyoo-ni urusaku, sonoseide Ken-wa maiban ne-
murenai. soshite kyoo-mo mata . . .
‘Ken lives on the first floor and Naomi lives on the second floor. Ken can-
not sleep every night since Naomi’s footsteps are very loud. And today
again . . . ’
b. Ken-wa Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was run by Naomi.’ [B:mean 1.89]
Even in this context, (16b) remains ill-formed to me. To investigate the reaction of
other native speakers, I included this context as one of the stimuli in questionnaire
B. The results show that not many speakers considered the passive well-formed in
context (16a): out of 54, only 7 gave it a 4 or 5 (13.0%), 5 gave it a 3 (9.3%), and
42 gave it a 1 or 2 (77.8%).
What is more surprising is that even among the speakers who tend to ac-
cept extra-thematic passives, the content of affected context they need varies quite
significantly. This is consistent with Shibatani’s (1994: 472) claim that the extra-
thematic constructions exhibit a great deal of interspeaker variability with respect
to acceptability. Linguist B reported that he needed direct interaction between
Ken and Naomi to accept (16b), and thus he cannot accept it in the context (16a)
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.12 (706-770)
provided by Linguist A. For him, although the tag-context (13a) is not optimal, it
is better than context (16a) since it involves direct contact between the two people.
According to Linguist B, the situation in which he can easily accept (16b) would be
that there was an agreement between Ken and Naomi beforehand that she would
not run, but she broke the agreement and did run.
Based on his suggestions, the following context was prepared and included in
the questionnaire.
(17) Context Ken and Naomi raced on foot to school. Ken told Naomi repeat-
edly that she was not allowed to run. However, Naomi ran on the way and
eventually arrived at school first.
a. *Ken-wa Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was run by Naomi.’ [C:mean 3.15]
The context significantly improves the grammaticality judgment of this passive

compared to the rating for the same sentence presented without context. Further-
more, I found “extraordinary variation” in results, that is 26 gave it a 4 or 5, 20
gave it a 1 or 2, and 3 gave it a 8. Although we do not exactly know what motivates
the 26 participants to give this sentence a 4 or 5, it could be the case that they have
Grammar-L. The results when presented in no context, in context (16a), and in
context (17) are summarized in Table 7.4.

no context 1.67 1.01 30 12 7 4 1 54
%7 (56) (22) (13) (7) (2) (100)
context (16a) 1.89 1.14 27 15 5 5 2 54
% (50) (28) (9) (9) (4) (100)
context (17) 3.15 1.37 8 12 8 16 10 54
% (15) (22) (15) (30) (19) (100)
The following passive containing an unergative verb oyog-u ‘swim’ was pre-
sented in a similar kind of context.
(18) Context During the trip, Ken told his son not to swim in the sea around here
since it was deep. However, his son didn’t listen to him and went swimming.
a. Ken-wa musuko-ni hukai umi-de oyog-are-ta.
Ken-top son-dat deep sea-loc swim-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was swum by his son in the deep sea.’ [B:mean 2.15]
The results when presented with and without context are summarized in Table 7.5.
7. The data reported in this row are the results of the questionnaire B survey.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.13 (770-854)
no context 1.61 1.07 34 11 4 3 2 54

% (63) (20) (7) (6) (4) (100)
in context 2.15 1.22 21 16 8 6 3 54
% (39) (30) (15) (11) (6) (100)
In this context, 9 out of 54 gave it a 4 or 5, but 37 out of 54 gave it a 1 or 2. 8 gave it

a 3. Without context, the mean rating was 1.61: 5 gave it a 4 or 5, 45 gave it a 1 or 2,
4 gave it a 3. Consequently, the context in (18) did not improve the extra-thematic
passive very much compared to the context in (17).
Here is the third example containing an unergative verb in a similar context:
(19) Context Ken’s daughter wanted to become a dancer, but she had a heart
problem, and Ken told her to give up her dream. However, she couldn’t give
it up and went out to dance without telling her father.
a. Ken-wa musume-ni odor-are-ta.
Lit. ‘Keni was danced by hisi daughter.’ [B:mean 1.91]
The results are summarized in Table 7.6. Without context the mean rating was
1.56: 48 gave it a 1 or 2, 4 gave it a 3, 2 gave it a 4 or 5. The acceptability of this
sentence did not improve much in this context.
The contexts – (17), (18), and (19) – involve similar settings: the described
event is contrary to the wishes of the nominative DP (Ken), because the dative
DP was told not to do so beforehand. Although it is difficult to identify the exact
reason (17) was more effective than other contexts, there are differences among the
three contexts. In the latter two situations the nominative and dative DPs stand in
a kinship relation, and the described event is likely to have more serious impact
on the nominative DP than the first context. However, the results show that it is
not the degree of affectedness that determines the well-formedness of the extra-
thematic passive.
There are two plausible explanations. One is that context (17) differs from (18)
and (19) in terms of the degree of unexpectedness of the referent of the nominative
no context 1.56 0.79 32 16 4 2 0 54

% (59) (30) (7) (4) (0) (100)
in context 1.91 1.10 25 17 6 4 2 54
% (46) (32) (11) (7) (4) (100)
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.14 (854-936)
DP. In (18) and (19), even though a son or a daughter was told not to do a certain
thing by the father, that does not mean that the children agreed not to do so. On the
other hand, in (17), the context states that ‘Ken and Naomi raced on foot to school’,
and the presupposition is that Naomi agreed to do so at one point. Therefore, the
degree of unexpectedness of the nominative DP might be larger in (17) than in the
other two contexts, which results in the higher acceptability of the extra-thematic
passive in context (17).
Alternatively, the lower acceptability in contexts (18) and (19) might be due
to processing factors – namely, a garden-path effect. The kinship relations in-
volved in the latter two passives initially lead the parser to process the sentences as
genitive passives. However, due to the restriction on the predicate type, the struc-
ture does not converge and regardless of the type of affected context presented,
the passives are just ill-formed, and the parser fails to reanalyze the sentences as
extra-thematic passives. If this account is correct, this suggests that introducing an
extra-thematic DP in the passive is a last-resort mechanism: if there is a way to li-
cense the nominative DP in the passive clause-internally (i.e. using Grammar-Q),
that takes precedence. However, we need more data to determine the exact reason
for the lower acceptability of the passive in the latter two contexts. In the next sec-
tion, we will extend the scope to non-linguists and investigate what counts as the
right type of affected context for the non-linguist speakers.
7.2.3 Data from the surveys
As we have seen thus far, there is a great deal of interspeaker variability with respect
to the kind of adversative context that can license the extra-thematic passive. In
order to collect data from non-linguists, the participants of questionnaire B and
C surveys were asked to write down a situation in which they think a given extra-
thematic passive would be well-formed. I generalized their answers depending of
the type of context. Table 7.7 shows the results for the extra-thematic passive (11a),
repeated below as (20).
(20) Ken-wa Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta. [A:mean 1.09, B:1.67]
(The above mean ratings are without context)
Interestingly, Table 7.7 shows that eight speakers reported that they could accept
(20) if Naomi ran away from Ken, which is basically the context I provided in ques-
tionnaire A (see (13)). However, as mentioned earlier, 54 out of 74 (73%) people
gave a ‘1 or 2’ to (20) in context (13). Although the participants of the question-
naire C survey are different from those who answered the questionnaire A survey,
it is unlikely that the participants of the questionnaire C survey behave entirely
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.15 (936-984)
differently from the participants of the questionnaire A survey (see the mean rat-
ings given with example (11c)). This suggests a discrepancy between what people
think is well-formed and what they actually judge well-formed. Another interest-
ing point is that seven speakers seem to share the same intuition as Linguist B (i.e.
context 2 in Table 7.7): there must be an agreement between Ken and Naomi be-
forehand and Naomi broke it. Context 2 is a subclass of context 3, thus 19 out of
35 valid answers involve some kind of ‘behavior’ unexpected to the nominative
DP in the passive. The ‘unexpected’ context seems to be a better characteriza-
tion of context that licenses the extra-thematic passive than the traditional-term
‘affected/adversative context’.
A plausible context for the following extra-thematic passive, which also con-
tains an unergative verb, oyog-u ‘to swim,’ was asked in Questionnaire B.
(21) Ken-wa Naomi-ni oyog-are-ta. [C:mean 1.39]
(The above mean rating is when presented without context)
The results given in Table 7.8 were similar to the pattern we just saw in Table 7.7.
Table 7.7 Context that makes (20) acceptable
Context # of speakers
1 Same as nige-rare-ta ‘was run away from’ 8
2 Naomi agreed with Ken beforehand that she wouldn’t run 7
3 Naomi’s behavior was unexpected to Ken 12
4 Ken didn’t want Naomi to run 7
5 Naomi ran on Ken 1
6 (20) is ill-formed regardless of context 11
7 No answer 6
8 Other reading of hasir-u/irrelevant 2
1 Naomi agreed with Ken beforehand that she wouldn’t swim 15
2 Naomi’s behavior was unexpected to Ken 2
3 Naomi swam before Ken did 11
4 Ken didn’t want Naomi to swim 3
5 Add a no-phrase relation between Ken and Naomi 2
6 Ken is a possessor in a locativeP (in Ken’s pool) 1
8 No answer 5
9 irrelevant 3
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.16 (984-1054)
Table 7.8 shows that 15 participants said that there must be an agreement be-
tween Ken and Naomi beforehand. Thus, this is the similar pattern we observed
with hasi-rare-ta ‘run-pass-pst’ in (20). Context 1 is a subclass of context 2. Thus
17 participants were able to accept (21) in ‘unexpected context.’ Interestingly, 3
participants suggested context inducing a no-phrase relation. For these speakers,
contexts seem to allow them to override the predicate restriction for possessor-
raising.
What is different from the previous ‘run’ example is that eleven people re-
ported that the passive is acceptable if Naomi swam before Ken. Therefore, the
following item was also tested in the survey.
(22) Ken wanted to swim first in the pool before the water gets dirty, but Naomi
swam before he did.
a. Ken-wa Naomi-ni saki-ni oyog-are-ta. [C:mean 4.02]
Ken-top Naomi-dat before swim-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was swum by Naomi before (him).’
The mean rating of this sentence was 4.02, and hence this sentence was basically
well-formed to many speakers. 41 out of 54 people gave it a 4 or 5. 5 gave it a
3, 8 gave it a 1 or 2. When we compare this mean rating to all the mean ratings
we have seen in this chapter, this is extremely high. Although I do not have data
for (22a) when presented without context, I speculate that (22a) is probably ac-
ceptable even without context, but crucially with an overt adverbial sakini ‘before.’
Presumably, the presence of the overt adverbial saki-ni ‘before’ makes the following
comparative active source available:
(23) Naomi-ga Ken-yori saki-ni oyoi-da.
Naomi-nom Ken-than before-dat swim-pst
‘Naomi swam before Ken.’
If this analysis is correct and displacement from a comparative phrase is possible

for passive formation in Japanese, what the eleven speakers suggested (i.e. add a
‘before’ context) is in fact to change the extra-themtaic passive to a core passive by
using context to insert a comparative adverbial phrase. (22a) is consistent with the
proposed smuggling analysis. Since the verb oyog-u ‘to swim’ contains an active
v, it is compatible with -rare. Adding the comparative phrase supplies a lower VP
layer with overt material that can satisfy the EPP feature of -rare and the EPP
feature of T.
A context that makes (24) acceptable was also asked in the questionnaire C
survey. Table 7.9 summarizes the results.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.17 (1054-1104)
1 Add a possessive relation between Lisa and Naomi 10
2 Add a potential/loose no-phrase relation between L and N 10
3 Naomi is affected by Lisa’s mother’s death 7
4 Naomi didn’t want Lisa’s mother to die 2
5 Naomi is indirectly affected (i.e., through Lisa) 2
7 No answer 9
8 irrelevant (cause of her death, etc) 5
(24) *Naomi-wa Lisa-no hahaoya-ni sin-are-ta. [A:mean 1.66]

Unsurprisingly, Table 7.9 shows that 20 speakers gave a context creating some kind
of no-phrase relation between the two referents. The easiest way to make (24) com-
patible with Grammar-Q is to give Naomi a clause-internal source by making it a
possessor of Lisa’s mother. Note that establishing a possessive relation is one way
to set up an affected context; thus contexts 1 and 2 are subclasses of context 3.
The data we have seen in this section confirm the general claim that affected
(or unexpected) context improves the acceptability of the extra-thematic passive,
but this holds only for some speakers. The data also confirm Shibatani’s (1994)
claim that there is a considerable amount of interspeaker variability with gapless
indirect passives (understood as the extra-thematic passive and the genitive pas-
sive involving very loose no-phrase relations). It is not easy to identify the exact
factors that control for the well-formedness of the extra-thematic passive. How-
ever, speakers who have high tolerance to extra-thematic passives seem to have
strong intuitions about what the context should be. Although the properties vary,
we can list some general tendencies/properties of the context that improve the
acceptability of this type of passives:
(25) a. The two referents (the nominative DP and the dative DP) must be ani-
mate.
b. The two referents need direct interaction.
c. The event denoted by the complement clause must be adversative (i.e.
it must have negative impacts on the referent of the nominative DP). For
example, the event can be something unexpected to (or against the wishes
of) the referent of the nominative DP. (e.g. There is an agreement between
the two referents that the event should not happen.)
In the following section, a preliminary analysis of Grammar-L is proposed.

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7.3 The proposed analysis of Grammar-L
This section proposes an analysis of Grammar-L, the grammar that generates the
extra-thematic passive. The discussion with speakers of Grammar-L made me
realize that the meaning the speakers of Grammar-L get for the extra-thematic
passive (26a) is very similar to the meaning I get for sentence (26b):
(26) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
?
b. * Ken-ga Naomi-ni hasiru-{koto/no}-o s-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat run-{thing/nominalizer}-acc do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was {done/given} a running by Naomi.’
Despite the awkwardness, the meaning of (26b) is clear. The semantic similarities
between the two sentences have led me to hypothesize that speakers of grammar-Q
in fact can generate the structure very similar to that of the extra-thematic passive,
using the overt main (or heavy) verb su-ru ‘to do.’ Note that the nominative DP
in (26b) is not extra-thematic unlike Ken-ga in (26a). It is originally licensed as a
directional dative argument of the main verb su-ru. Japanese main verb su-ru takes
an eventive object and an optional directional dative DP (Ahn 1990). The active
counterpart of (26b) is given below:
(27) Naomi-ga Ken-ni hasiru-{koto/no}-o si-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-dat run-{thing/nmlz}-acc do-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi {did/gave} a running to Ken.’
In fact, the extra-thematic passive seems to share some important properties with
the ‘Directional dative’ passive that is derived from the main verb su ‘to do.’
First, the Directional dative passive derived from su-ru in general carries strong
adversative connotations, as exemplified below (see also Section 6.4.3.1):
(28) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni pro s-are-ta.
Ken-nom Naomi-dat it do-pass-pst
Lit. ‘Ken was done (it) by Naomi.’
b. Naomi-ga Ken-ni si-ta.
Naomi-nom Ken-dat do-pst
Lit. ‘Naomi did (it) to Ken.’
Although in (28a) the deed Naomi did to Ken is unspecified, the sentence gives a
listener the impression that whatever Naomi did was unfavorable to Ken. Interest-
ingly, this is also true for the active counterpart given in (28b).
Secondly, according to Grimshaw & Mester (1988), Japanese main verb su-ru
‘to do’ places thematic restrictions on its subject, which must be agentive. Once the
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.19 (1162-1229)
main verb su-ru ‘to do’ undergoes passivization, the external argument of su-ru is
realized as a dative DP. This animacy restriction is consistent with the properties
of adversative context given in (25) (the two referents must be animate and need
direct interaction). We can understand that the animacy requirement imposed on
the referent of the nominative DP in the extra-thematic passive comes from the
adversity condition. Namely the nominative DP has to be a sentient being, who is
capable of perceiving adversity.
(29) *Sono hon-ga (Naomi-ni) pro s-are-ta.
that book-nom Naomi-dat it do-pass-pst
‘That book was done it (by Naomi).’
A similar type of affectedness and animacy restriction is obtained from the

following on-Directional passives introduced in Chapter 3.
(30) a. Densya-de Naomi-ga roozin-ni seki-o s-are-ta. [Passive]
[A:mean 3.20 (s.d. 1.38)]
b. ?Densya-de roozin-ga Naomi-ni seki-o si-ta. [Active]
train-loc old.man-nom Naomi-dat cough-acc do-pst
‘An old man coughed on Naomi in the train.’ [A:mean 2.99 (s.d. 1.33)]
(31) a. Naomi-ga Ken-ni onara-o s-are-ta. [Passive]
Naomi-nom Ken-dat fart-acc do-pass-pst
‘Naomi was farted on by Ken.’ [A:mean 3.51 (s.d. 1.34)]
b. Ken-ga Naomi-ni onara-o si-ta. [Active]
Ken-nom Naomi-dat fart-acc do-pst
‘Ken farted on Naomi.’ [A:mean 3.05 (s.d. 1.35)]
The sentences in (30) and (31) carry strong adversative connotations, and they are
not compatible with inanimate DPs. What is interesting is the mean ratings and the
standard deviation of these sentences. The values show a great deal of variability
in terms of accepting on-Directional constructions for both the active and passive
counterparts. This pattern is different from the one observed with accusative and
regular goal dative passives. This seems to suggest that there is interspeaker vari-
ability in terms of whether or not su-ru ‘to do’ can select for a dative on-Directional
argument, and the variability is carried over to the passive counterpart.
The similarities between ‘on-Directional’ dative passives and the extra-
thematic passive lead to a natural hypothesis that speakers of Grammar-L has
a silent applicative head that functions as the main verb su-ru ‘do,’ and this
head is unavailable to speakers of Grammar-Q. In short, the difference between
Grammar-L and Grammar-Q is reduced to the availability of silent do head. The
context requirement can be understood that speakers of Grammar-L need the right
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.20 (1229-1268)
inference made from adversative context in order to access this silent head and
accept extra-thematic passives. How does the structure of extra-thematic passives
look like? It is the same as regular Directional dative passives except that the di-
rectional argument is introduced by a silent applicative head merged with VP. The
on-Directional DP is smuggled over the external argument and raised to the nom-
inative position in the passive, as illustrated below (the step of DativeP attracting
vP is omitted):
(32) a. Ken-ga Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was done ran on by Naomi.’
b. TP
DP
Ken-ga VoiceP T
pst
VP
vP -rare
PP DP VP v
vP V
Ken on Naomii
PROi run (do)
The strong adversative connotations and animacy restriction observed with the
extra-thematic passive can be straightforwardly explained: this is because the nom-
inative DP in the extra-thematic passive is underlyingly the on-Directional DP
selected by the main verb su ‘to do.’ Significantly, under the current proposal, the
lexical property of -rare is invariant in the core passive and in the extra-thematic
passive.
There is independent support for the presence of a silent predicate. Recall the
discussion given in Section 2.2, unlike the causative construction, the passive con-
struction in Japanese cannot modify the passive morpheme -(r)are independently
from the verb stem to which it attaches. The earlier example (4a) discussed in
Section 2.2 is repeated below as (33):
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(33) Ken-ga nando-mo Naomi-ni nagur-are-ta.

Ken-nom many.times-mo Naomi-dat hit-pass-pst
(i) ‘Ken was hit by Naomi many times.’
(ii) ‘*Ken was affected many times by Naomi’s (single) hitting.’
The passive (33) is only compatible with the reading (i) but not (ii). Interestingly,
linguist B, who was unable to find the ambiguity in (33), reported that he could
find the ambiguity with sankai ‘three times’ in the following sentence:8
(34) Ken-ga san-kai Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
Ken-nom 3-times Naomi-dat run-pass-pst
(i) ‘Ken was affected by Naomi with her three-time running.’
(ii) ‘Ken was affected three times by Naomi with her running.’
I can find the same ambiguity with the paraphrased-version of (34) (i.e. (35)):
(35) Ken-ga san-kai Naomi-ni hasiru-{koto/no}-o s-are-ta.
Ken-nom 3-times Naomi-dat run-{thing/nmlz}-acc do-pass-pst
(i) ‘Ken was done [a three-time running by Naomi].’
(ii) ‘Ken was done [a running by Naomi] three times.’
This strongly suggests that, at least for linguist B, (34) contains two predicates
(although one is silent), which can be independently modified by an adverb.
The proposed analysis of Grammar-L shares many insights with the applica-
tive analysis of Japanese adversative passives proposed by Pylkkänen (2002). In her
analysis, an argument introduced by an applicative head moves to the nominative
position for Case reasons. In my analysis, the on-Directional DP introduced by
silent do moves to the nominative position to satisfy the EPP feature of T. The
critical difference between Pylkkänen’s proposal and mine is that in my analysis
the applicative grammar is not something all Japanese native speakers have.
Now one question arises: Does the population of Japanese native speakers con-
sist of speakers of two different grammars of passive constructions? I will address
this question in the following section.
7.3.1 Does Grammar-L contain Grammar-Q?
In theory, speakers of Grammar-L can always generate the core passives that con-
tain an animate nominative DP, using the silent do with pro. This gives us two
options: (1) speakers of Grammar-L always derive animate passives by inserting an
on-Directional dative DP headed by silent do. Thus they do not generate animate
core passives (both direct and indirect in traditional terms) using Grammar-Q;
8. Unfortunately, I did not have a chance to ask linguist A whether she gets the ambiguity.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.22 (1325-1389)
and (2) even for speakers of Grammar-L, the silent applicative head do is a last
resort grammar, which can be accessed only with an inference that is drawn from
certain adversative context. The speakers derive the core passive including pseudo-
passives and genitive passives, using Grammar-Q (i.e., without the silent do).
Namely, Grammar-Q takes precedence over Grammar-L. I would like to argue for
the latter. There are two reasons for this.
First of all, the speakers of Grammar-L I interviewed also allow passives with
inanimate or abstract nominative DPs, which shows that they do have Grammar-
Q. Kubo (1992), who systematically accepts the extra thematic passive, considers
the following accusative passive well-formed:
(36) Taroo-no yuuki-ga ooku-no hito-ni tatae-rare-ta.
Taro-no courage-nom many-no person-dat praise-pass-pst
‘Taro’s courage was praised by many people.’
Since the derived subject of the directional dative passive derived from the silent
do cannot be inanimate or abstract nouns, this passive must involve raising of the
theme argument of the embedded predicate from the VP domain.
Further support for the claim that speakers of Grammar-L also have Grammar-
Q comes from the results of the surveys. The mean ratings of the following passives
with an inanimate subject are extremely high:
(37) a. Sono sima-wa umi-ni kakom-are-tei-ru.
‘That island is surrounded by the sea.’ [A:4.89, C:4.91]
b. Eigo-wa ooku-no hito-ni hanas-are-tei-ru.
English-top many-no person-dat speak-pass-asp-prs
‘English is spoken by many people.’ [B:mean 4.75]
Recall that some participants accepted the extra-thematic passive in context. This
must mean that some of the participants have Grammar-L. So if the speakers with
Grammar-L do not have Grammar-Q, we would expect them to reject these sen-
tences. However, this was not the case. As for (37a), 73 out of 74 participants of
questionnaire A rated it as 4 or 5. 1 speaker gave it a 1. 51 out of 54 participants of
questionnaire C gave it a 4 or 5, 3 gave it a 3. As for (37b), 50 out of 53 gave it a 4
or 5, 2 gave it a 3, and 1 gave it a 2. The results of the surveys make it plausible that
Grammar-Q is in general shared with all Japanese speakers. In other words, core
passives are generally derived without the silent do.
Turning to genitive passives, if the speakers of Grammar-L derive the passive
using the silent ‘do,’ we would expect them to get the ambiguity reported by lin-
guist B (see Section 7.3). However, linguist A, who found the following causative
sentence ambiguous, reported that the ambiguity is not available with the fol-
lowing genitive passive. According to her, the lack of ambiguity is because the
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passive sentence involves only one event, whereas the causative sentence involves
two events:
(38) a. Taroo-ga isoide Hanako-ni booshi-o kabur-(s)ase-ta.
‘Taro-nom quickly Hanako-dat hat-acc put.on-cause-pst
(i) ‘Taro quickly caused Hanako to put her hat on.’
(ii) ‘Taro caused Hanako to quickly put her hat on.’ Causative
b. Taroo-ga itumo Hanako-ni syokuzi-o tabe-rare-ta.
Taro-nom always Hanako-dat meal-acc eat-pass-pst
Lit. (i) ‘Taro was always eaten (his) meal by Hanako.’
Int. (ii) *‘Taro was affected by the fact that Hanako always ate his meal.’
Passive
In addition, linguist A gave the following genitive passive a 1, and the causative a 5.
Both of the following sentences contain two adverbs denoting opposite properties:
the reading that is necessary to make sense is to relate one adverb to one predi-
cate (i.e. one adverb should modify the embedded predicate and the other should
modify the passive or causative morphemes).
(39) a. *?Taroo-ga totemo Hanako-ni sukoshi kao-o hippatak-are-ta.
Taro-nom very Hanako-dat little face-acc slap-pass-pst
Int. ‘Taro was very much affected by the fact that Hanako slapped his face
a bit.’ Passive
b. Ken-wa isoide, kodomotati-ni yukkuri miti-o watar-(s)ase-ta.
Ken-top quickly children-dat slowly street-acc cross-cause-pst
‘Ken quickly caused children to cross the street slowly.’ Causative
The fact that linguist A accepted (39b) but not (39a) means that she uses
Grammar-Q in order to derive (39a), not the same grammar she uses to generate
the extra-thematic passive.
Furthermore, linguist A found the following on-Directional dative passive in-
felicitous unless Ken gets wet. This strongly supports my proposal that Ken is
licensed as the on-Directional argument of the verb hu-ru ‘to descend.’
(40) Ken-wa ame-ni hu-rare-ta.
Lit. ‘Ken was descended upon by rain.’
Linguist A reported that she could not accept (40) in a situation like the following:
(41) Context Ken was in charge of a big event. But on the day of the event, it
heavily rained, and the event was cancelled.
As predicted, (40) is infelicitous in contexts like (41) to me. From the patterns
reviewed thus far, it seems fair to conclude that linguist A uses Grammar-Q when-
ever possible, and Grammar-L kicks in when the passive cannot be generated by
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Grammar-Q and the correct inference (made from certain adversative context) is
available.
However, unlike linguist A, some linguist speakers of Grammar-L including
linguist B told me that they could accept (40) in context (41). Since we already
know that there is a great deal of interspeaker variability in terms of adversative
context necessary for the inference that allows speakers to accept extra-thematic
passives, this is not very surprising. The adversative context given in (41) was not
appropriate for linguist A but appropriate for linguist B to make the inference
necessary to accept (40).
7.4 Issues centering on individual variability
We now turn to the last question posited at the beginning of this chapter: How
is Grammar-L acquired? Why do some speakers have it but not all? The stan-
dard analyses of Japanese direct and indirect passives are based on properties that
have been established on the basis of introspective judgments by many linguist
native speakers over the years. One of the basic problems that motivated the cur-
rent research is a fundamental disagreement between introspective judgments and
the grammaticality judgments reported in the literature on some data that turn
out to be of crucial importance for distinguishing competing theories. The con-
trast between well-formed and ill-formed sentences to me is extremely sharp and
very systematic: my grammar can generate only a subset of the passives that are
predicted to be grammatical by the traditional analyses.
When we encounter a situation like this, the first question we ask is whether
this is an idiolect. Are my internal grammars significantly different from the rest of
the Japanese community? This seems not to be the case: I have never encountered
a passive uttered by a native speaker that struck me as ungrammatical, nor have
I ever experienced difficulty in communicating with other native speakers using
Japanese passives. The results of the surveys indicate that many speakers indeed
share the same grammar as mine, systematically rejecting a subset of the passive
that are predicted to be well-formed by the traditional analyses.
Then what is the variability on the extra-thematic passive attributable to?
There are potentially many factors: dialects (geographically determined), age,
gender, education, personal experience, linguistic training, and so forth. We can
readily rule out gender. Linguists in general, both male and female, seem to have
Grammar-L. Further, age is unlikely to be the determining factor, either. This is be-
cause many of the linguists I consulted, both older and younger than I, agree with
the judgments reported in the literature. Dialects seem not to be the principal fac-
tor either: both Kuroda, a linguist who pursues the uniform theory of Japanese
passives, and I speak Tokyo dialect. Unfortunately the questionnaires used to col-
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lect data were not designed to test variables such as region and age effects, and thus
I am unable to investigate these effects further here.
One factor that seems to contribute to the acquisition of Grammar-L is an ex-
periential one, namely exposure to the relevant linguistic literature and examples
of Japanese passives. Whenever I asked a grammaticality judgment of the following
extra-thematic passive, linguists said that it is acceptable with contextual support,
whereas non-linguists said that it is not acceptable.
(42) Ken-ga Naomi-ni hasi-rare-ta.
Linguist A, who has previously worked on Japanese passives, reported that as soon
as she heard the extra-thematic passive, a situation compatible with it came to her
mind, so she could immediately accept the passive. Recall the following context
provided by linguist A:
(43) ‘Ken lives on the first floor and Naomi lives on the second floor. Ken cannot
sleep every night since Naomi’s footsteps are very loud. And today again . . . ’
This is very different from the way I parsed (42): the sentence struck me as ill-
formed, and I have to come up with various different situations and see whether
the sentence sounds better or not. Similarly, some participants of the surveys said
that (42) is not a Japanese sentence, and a native speaker would never say such a
sentence. The fact that linguist A can immediately come up with a situation that
is compatible with (42) suggests that this is not the first time she thought about
the situation that makes the extra-thematic passive acceptable, which is indeed the
case since she has worked on Japanese passives before (cf. Okabe & Okubo 2005).
It is understandable that the more one is exposed to the extra-thematic passive
and the appropriate adversative context, the easier it becomes for him/her to ac-
cess the adversative context that is necessary to accept the extra-thematic passive.
However, the difficulty is that some non-linguist speakers who participated in the
surveys were able to come up with a context that allows them to accept the extra-
thematic passive. Exactly how the silent do head is acquired would still be in need
of explanation.
This chapter has investigated the adversative context that is said to improve the
acceptability of the extra-thematic passive, which is ungrammatical under the
proposed smuggling analysis of the core passive. The results of the surveys show
that the extra-thematic passives are ill-formed to many speakers when presented
JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 9:46 F: LA19207.tex / p.26 (1546-1583)
without context. For some speakers, contexts seem to improve the acceptability,
but there is a considerable amount of variability with respect to the type of con-
text that is needed to accept the extra-thematic passive. The generalization drawn
from the collected data is that the context needs to explicate that the event denoted
by the complement clause is unexpected and rather contrary to the wishes of the
referent of the nominative DP in this type of passives.
I have proposed that the grammar of the speakers who accept the extra-
thematic passive in context (Grammar-L) has a silent head whose function is
equivalent to the main verb su-ru ‘to do.’ This silent do head merges with VP
and selects for a directional argument. The structure merges with vP and -rare
and undergoes regular passivization operation. In other words, the extra-thematic
passive is just another instance of directional dative passive containing a silent do
head that is not readily accessible to all native speakers. I have argued that the
animacy restriction is due to the selectional property of the main verb su-ru ‘do’
and affected connotations arise because the nominative DP is underlyingly the
on-Directional argument. It is the general properties of on-Directional dative pas-
sives that they carry affected connotations (see Section 6.4.3.1). Under the current
approach, the difference between Grammar-L and Grammar-Q is reduced to the
presence of the silent do head.
The proposed analysis of the extra-thematic passive makes some predictions.
If the silent head contained in the structure of extra-thematic passives is indeed a
silent counterpart of the main verb su-ru ‘do,’ we expect some correlation between
the distribution of the overt main verb su-ru ‘do’ and that of the silent main verb
do. The results of the surveys show that whether or not the main verb su-ru ‘do’
can license an on-Directional dative argument varies across speakers (both in
the active and in the passive). Then the prediction is that the speakers who do not
like the active sentence containing an on-Directional dative argument and su-ru
‘do’ would consistently reject its passive counterpart (see (30) and (31)). Similarly,
the speakers who do not accept the on-Directional dative passive derived from the
overt main verb su-ru ‘to do’ (e.g., (30a) and (31a)) would consistently reject the
extra-thematic passive. The predictions need to be tested in the future.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 20:03 F: LA19208.tex / p.1 (62-134)
chapter 8
Conclusions
8.1 A new analysis of Japanese passives
This book revisited and reexamined the passive voice system in Japanese, within
the current understanding of the syntactic theory – Cartographic Minimalism. I
have developed a unified raising analysis of the passive voice system, assuming
simple and invariant lexical features of the passive morpheme -rare. The analysis
pursued was a modular one, where interactions between the passive morphology
-rare and independently motivated principles of UG give rise to different clusters
of properties observed with different kinds of passive sentences containing -rare.
Specifically, I have proposed the following lexical properties of -rare: (1) it instan-
tiates Passive Voice; (2) it merges with ‘active voice’ v as its complement; (3) it
has the EPP feature that attracts a VP layer to its Specifier, stranding the vP; (4)
it comes with an optional dative Case that generally attracts the vP containing the
external argument of the complement of -rare and an optional null Case that at-
tracts vP containing PRO. Raising of a DP is solely triggered by the EPP feature
of T: the closest unchecked DP in the moved VP is attracted to the nominative
position.
One of the contentious claims I made in this book is that the range of DPs that
can move to the nominative position in Japanese is not restricted to theme and
goal of typical ditransitive verbs, but includes addressee, kara-marked source,
various types of dative phrases (i.e. theme, on/at-Directional, and cause), and
the no-phrase of the internal argument of the verb embedded under -rare. Extend-
ing the potential active source in this way allows us to subsume many instances
of indirect/gapless passives under direct passives, thus unifying the two types of
passives in Japanese.
8.2 Properties that the proposed analysis accounts for
The proposed lexical properties of -rare account for some important distributional
properties of Japanese passives. The first property is that -rare cannot combine
with pure unergative verbs (e.g. oyog-u ‘to swim’]). This is because pure unergative
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 20:03 F: LA19208.tex / p.2 (134-199)
verbs lack a VP layer containing overt material, which is needed to satisfy the EPP
feature of -rare.
The second property is that the genitive passive is restricted to instances
involving possessor-raising out of an underlying internal argument (i.e. the no-
phrase needs to be contained in the moved VP). The possessor-raising out of the
external argument is ruled out because of Relativized Minimality: the smuggled
DP within the VP is always closer to the nominative position than the no-phrase
of the external argument (i.e. [VP DP V] [DP-no NP] VP v]).
The third property concerns ditransitive predicates. There is a ban on double
datives in Japanese passives. I have argued that this property stems from a gen-
eral property of Japanese. Namely, the dative-marking of the goal argument in
the ditransitive construction is a dependent Case: the dative is only available when
an accusative DP is present. The new generalization is that the dative phrase in
the passive with ditransitive predicates is compatible with a goal interpretation,
but not with a by-phrase interpretation. This pattern is not restricted to proto-
typical ditransitive predicates, but applies to pseudo-ditransitive verbs, which do
not require but still can take a dative DP in addition to an accusative DP, such as
verbs of speaking and creation. The proposed derivation and the general principle
of minimality account for this fact. Namely, the goal argument contained in the
moved VP is closer to the nominative position than the external argument. Conse-
quently, the dative goal argument is always attracted to the dative projection that
is introduced by -rare.
Contrary to the standard analysis of Japanese indirect passives, I have argued
that the nominative DP of Japanese passives is never selected by the passive mor-
pheme -rare. I have shown that the well-known adversely affected connotations of
indirect passives are not due to the θ-role the nominative DP receives but just
implicatures, and they can be canceled. I have proposed that ‘affected’ conno-
tations are a by-product of the structure. They arise when the nominative DP
is originally merged into the structure as (1) a possessor of the internal argu-
ment, (2) an on-Directional dative, or (3) a source argument of the predicate.
Further, I attribute the ‘adversity’ connotations carried by many passives to (1) the
lexical semantic/pragmatic properties of the predicate embedded under -rare or
(2) the interaction between the lexical semantics of the verb and the θ-role that
the nominative DP receives.
8.3 Implications
The raising approach is theoretically favorable, since it accounts for the different
clusters of properties observed in different passive types while maintaining unifor-
mity. Under the current analysis, Japanese has only one passive morpheme, -rare,
JB[v.20020404] Prn:13/07/2012; 20:03 F: LA19208.tex / p.3 (199-221)
Chapter 8. Conclusions 233
and the derivation of passives always involves movement. The different clusters of
properties observed across different passives are due to the differences in the ex-
ternal merge position of the derived subject. Passive systems in Asian languages,
such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese, are reported to behave very
differently from the passive voice system in the well-studied western languages like
English, resulting in a bifurcated view of languages (Asian vs. Western languages).
In contrast, my research brings Japanese much closer to other languages than pre-
viously assumed, addressing the question of what universal grammar is and what
the possible properties of human languages are. There have been various attempts
to figure out the universal characterization of passive voice (see Shibatani 1985 for
a review of such attempts). Hopefully the research reported here will introduce a
new view about the passive voice system in Asian languages and potentially open
a new way to characterize the universal properties of the passive voice system.
The proposed analysis might raise the question of where the surface differ-
ences between English and Japanese passives come from. The differences between
the two passives can be condensed into the following two general properties of
Japanese: (1) Japanese allows possessor-raising while English does not; and (2)
Case-markers or postpositions must disappear under movement in Japanese. The
strong adversative connotations that are carried with Japanese passives straightfor-
wardly fall out from this difference: Japanese allows possessor-raising, and strong
adversative connotations are characteristics to genitive passives. Why Japanese al-
lows possessor-raising and Case disappearance under movement is an intriguing
question that needs further research.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:6/07/2012; 15:29 F: LA192RE.tex / p.1 (61-225)
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JB[v.20020404] Prn:11/08/2012; 10:09 F: LA192NAM.tex / p.1 (54-168)
Name index
A K P
Abels, Klaus 17, 42 Kayne, Richard S. 17, 42, 48, Pylkkänen, Liina 18, 128, 136,
53, 57, 106, 127 137, 140, 200, 225
Kishimoto, Hideki 53, 70–72
C Kubo, Miori 47, 76, 94, 95,
Cinque, Guglielmo 1, 11, 16, 102, 116, 117, 119, 120, 126, R
29, 36, 37, 131, 190 137–139, 144, 145, 157, 158, Rizzi, Luigi 1, 11, 12, 38
Collins, Chris 14–16, 38, 41, 226
46, 120, 127, 131, 132 Kuroda, S.-Y. 9, 18, 53, 60, 66,
67, 129, 137–140, 143, 150, S
166, 170, 188–190, 192–196, Saito, Mamoru 32, 102–104,
H 206 106
Harada, Shin-Ichi 69 Shibatani, Masayoshi 5, 7, 18,
Harley, Heidi 26, 40, 43 L 21, 26, 27, 31, 37, 39, 53, 77,
Hoshi, Hiroto 60, 66, 67, 138, Landau, Idan 97, 104, 105 95, 97, 105, 116, 137, 138, 140,
140–142, 167, 173, 188, 190, 146–148, 159, 165, 167,
192 M 192–195, 199, 206, 215, 221
Huang, C.-T. James 18, 60, Miyagawa, Shigeru 18, 33, 34,
138, 140–143, 165–167, 182, 52, 53, 70, 95, 97, 123,
183, 186–188, 192 146–151, 155, 156, 192, 193 W
Washio, Ryuichi 39, 40,
N 192–195, 200, 202, 203
J Nishigauchi, Taisuke 30–32, Watanabe, Akira 102, 103,
Jaeggli, Osvaldo 2, 13 34, 37 109, 146, 147
JB[v.20020404] Prn:17/08/2012; 11:33 F: LA192SUB.tex / p.1 (54-197)
Subject index
A Japanese see dative E

abilitive 5, 25, 26, 44 by-phrase ECM (raising-to-object) 52,
see also potential 183–186
abstract (DP) 59, 60, 66, 67, equidistance 72
190, 192, 226 C
active voice cartographic (cartography)
v 11, 35, 39–41, 43, 46, 92, 93 approach 1, 11, 36 G
vP/verb 35, 39–40, 43, 46 Cartographic Minimalism 1, genitive DP (phrase) 7, 8, 18,
11 76, 94, 97, 101, 106, 199, 201
activity verb 32
cartography 11, 15, 29, 36 see also possessor
manner of 121, 122
causative 4, 16, 26, 30, 36, 37, genitive passive 76, 94, 95,
affectee 195–197
59, 69, 77–79, 101, 127, 101, 102, 106, 109, 110, 114,
ambiguity 27, 29, 107, 108,
140, 166, 167, 183, 189, 115, 145, 199, 200, 212, 218,
110, 114, 159, 160, 168, 225,
206, 226, 227 221, 226, 227, 232, 233
226 see also scope
construction/sentence 7, genitive-dative passive 96, 97,
ambiguity, structural
69, 82, 123, 140, 159, 166, 136, 153, 156, 158–159, 163
ambiguity
167, 206, 224, 226, 227
anaphor 175
morpheme -(s)ase 5, 6, 77,
zibun 159, 162, 167, 208
123, 140, 227
-binding 56, 130, 182 H
passive 162, 163
otagai 185 hierarchy
low/lexical 26, 40, 45, 189
animacy 8, 23, 34, 64, 66, 67, universal (Cinque’s) 1, 11,
Cinque’s hierarchy 190
90, 155, 197, 223 16, 36, 49, 190
clause reduction see
restriction 23, 66, 89, 90, animacy 34
restructuring
154, 196, 223, 224, 230 thematic 78, 90
control 37, 38, 48, 66, 127–129,
applicative 140, 200, 225 honorific 25–27, 29, 44, 46–49
131, 132, 138, 140–143, 150,
silent applicative head 165, 167, 168, 173, 182,
223, 224, 226 187, 188
aspectual verb 29, 30, 35, 36, analysis/approach 60, 66, I
38, 39, 49, 87 140, 165, 167, 170, 185, 187 Icelandic 57, 58
atelic event 32 construction 150, 175, 179 impersonal passive 18, 51, 52
predicate/verb 33, 37, 38, inanimte (DP) 8, 9, 31, 32, 56,
190 59, 60, 66, 67, 89, 90,
B 190–192, 196, 223, 226
benefactive 87, 93, 94, 119, see also abstract (DP)
125, 174 D individual variability
binomial dative by-phrase 14, 60, 65, see variability
each 174–175, 179 66, 73–75, 88, 123–126, 129, individual-level predicate 52
zutu 176–181 156, 160–164, 177, 180 instrumental 55, 80, 93, 94
Burzio’s Generalization 13 depictive 128, 131, 132 interspeaker variability 7, 21,
by-phrase (English by-phrase) directed motion verb 44, 68 69, 121, 215, 218, 221, 223, 228
13, 14 Double-o Constraint 69 see also variability
intransitive 97 154–157, 165 see also reconstruction 18, 56, 57, 71,
causative 69 NQF-long, NQF-short 98, 99, 165, 167–174, 177, 178,
passive 79, 125, 189, 181, 182
193–197, 203 reflexive 5
predicate/verb 7, 8, 35, 39, O zibun 108, 114, 160
40, 41, 79, 81, 84, 138, 179, object pro 142, 166, 167, 187 see also zibun
194, 195, 212 object PRO 165 relative clause 54, 56, 57, 102,
transtive-intransitive otagai 184, 185 106, 109, 112
(alternation) 40, 45 relativization 2, 54–57, 75, 92,
intransitivizer 9, 26, 35 125, 126, 157, 182, 183, 187,
see also low passive P 204
P-stranding 56 Relativized Minimality 12, 38,
polysemy 5, 27 108, 182, 232 see also
L possessor 20, 55, 57, 71, 76, 77, minimality
lexical passive see low passive 97, 102, 108, 109, 137, 138, restructuring 29, 30, 38
lexical property (feature, 159, 161, 198, 199–201,
entry) 4, 16, 28, 38, 41, 43, 208, 212, 221, 232
44, 46, 49, 52, 90, 144, 202 S
see also genitive DP
location 78, 87 scopal ambiguity 168
passive 58, 144 see also
locative 55, 57, 67, 71, 72, 80, scopal (scope) interactions
genitive passive,
87, 93, 94, 103, 150, 162, 169, 168, 179
genitive-dative passive
170–173, 177–181, 209 scope 18, 23, 29, 167–170, 177,
raising 91, 94–97, 100–106,
low passive 9, 26, 35, 40, 45, 180
111, 157, 160, 199, 232, 233
83, 90, 189 -rigid 168
potential 8, 26, 27, 90 reconstruction 170
see also ablative scrambling 71, 72, 149, 151, 168
PRO 38, 48, 70, 73, 120, 127, spontaneous 5, 26, 27, 45
M 128, 131–133, 141, 142, 150, stative verb 87, 121
malefactive 18, 140, 192, 193, 151, 159, 168 see also object structural ambiguity 110, 160
195 PRO su-ru (main verb, su-ru) 222,
manner of activity pro 56, 141, 142, 150, 159, 223, 230
predicate/verb 121–123, 157 161, 166–167, 186–187, 222, subjacency 56
middle (voice) 5, 16, 25, 26, 223 subject honorific 25, 26, 39,
38–41, 44, 45 pronominal binding (effect) 44, 46–49
Minimalism 1, 11 56, 182 subject-object asymmetry
minimality 12, 17, 38, 63, pseudo-passive 7, 8, 23, 42, 166
70–74, 101, 108, 111, 165, 182, 79–83, 91, 93 subject-oriented
232 psych-predicate 88, 90 adverb 187–190
motion verb 44 see also
anaphor see zibun
directed motion verb
Q
quantified phrase (QP) 168, T
N 174–175 telicity 32
NQ see Numeral Quantifier temporal 56, 103
NQF see Numeral Quantifier adjunct 128, 131, 132
Floating R adverb 28, 91, 150, 169–173
NQF-long 147, 149, 150, 152, raising predicate/verb 37, 40 topic
155, 157 raising construction 47 construction 150, 182
NQF-short 147–149, 152, real-world plausibility drop 54, 120–122
154–156 (knowledge) 66, 67, 107, topicalization 182, 183, 187
null object 141, 166, 167 202, 203, 206
Numeral Quantifier (NQ) 23, reciprocal anaphor otagai U
97, 146–152 see otagai unaccusative 11, 12, 16, 38, 39,
Numeral Quantifier Floating reconstruct 71, 94, 169–173, 43, 44, 92, 95, 97, 138, 149,
(NQF) 23, 97, 99, 146–152, 177–180 150, 156, 181, 189, 212
Subject index 249
unergative 6, 7, 9, 17, 39, 42, 148, 155, 215, 218, 221, 223, volitional (volition-oriented)
44, 48, 79, 85, 89, 95, 99, 228, 230 adverb 43, 44, 127, 130–132
100, 140, 149, 150, 180, 216, individual 22, 228
217, 219, 231 interspeaker 7, 21, 69, Z
112–114, 121, 215, 218, 221, zibun 44, 57, 63, 108, 114, 115,
V 223, 228 159–164, 167, 182, 208
variability 7, 21, 22, 35, 65, 66, volition 16, 36, 37, 39, 190
69, 86, 106, 112–115, 121,

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Ishizuka, Tomoko, 1968-

© 2012 – John Benjamins B.V.

vi A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

2.3.1 Establishing a pattern with long passivization 29

Table of contents vii

5.2 Traditional analyses 138

viii A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

2.1 Long vs. embedded passives 30

A modular analysis of the passive in Japanese

I would like to thank Hilda Koopman, Dominique Sportiche, Anoop Mahajan,

Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives

1.1 The general research program

2 A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

will be provided in the remainder of this introductory chapter as well as in the

1.2 Modularity of grammar

One of the major discoveries of modern syntax is modularity of grammar. Prop-

Chapter 1. Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 3

1.3 The passive voice system in Japanese

1.3.1 The traditional dichotomy

Japanese passive sentences contain a synthetic passive morpheme -(r)are, which

4 A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

b. Keni -ga (keisatsu-ni) ti tsukamae-rare-ta.

The traditional dichotomy capitalizes on apparent differences in the availability

Chapter 1. Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 5

1.4 Coalescing the two types of passives

1.4.1 The polysemy of -rare

a. John-ga moohu-ni kurum.ar-ta.

6 A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

1.4.2 Distributional differences between -rare and -sase

5. I conducted a 5-point scale grammaticality judgment survey (1-impossible, 5-acceptable)

Chapter 1. Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 7

However, these indirect passives exhibit a considerable amount of interspeaker

1.4.3 Indirect passives are pseudo- and genitive passives

The above examples illustrate an important difference between English and

8 A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

The absence of original Case under movement is in fact a general property of

Chapter 1. Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 9

(9) a. Naomi-ga {sono hanasi/ # Ken}-ni nai-ta.

b. {Sono hanasi/ # Ken}-ga (Naomi-ni-wa) nak-e-ta.

10 A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

1.5 Research questions

Chapter 1. Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 11

1.6 Framework and theoretical tools

12 A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

PF movement, LF movement, complex definitions about interventions, multiple

1.6.1 The principles and parameters treatment of English passives

The transformational rule-based approach to English passives (see Chomsky 1965)

Chapter 1. Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 13

(15) Burzio’s Generalization

14 A Modular Analysis of Japanese Passives

The little v is likewise present in Japanese passives, and is in fact morpholog-

1.6.2 Collins’ (2005) smuggling analysis

Chapter 1. Towards a unified theory of Japanese passives 15

(19) Derivational Steps

the American National Standard for Information Sciences – Permanence