Abstract
This paper investigates case and agreement patterns in Iranian languages, mainly focusing on Zazaki and Kurdish varieties. Empirically, the paper discusses the typologically rare double-oblique pattern, along with a novel way of splitting the oblique. On the basis of the syntactic behavior of oblique-bearing arguments, the paper argues that the term ‘oblique’ corresponds to distinct cases, ranging from structural accusative case to nonstructural dative case and ergative case. Oblique number agreement is case-sensitive, targeting only ergative-oblique out of the oblique cases. In order to capture the facts, I adopt a Multiple Agree account (Hiraiwa 2005), in which partial number agreement is a process that takes place in the morphology via Impoverishment, and not in the syntax proper.
The study proposes to capture the case patterns in Iranian languages along the lines of Svenonius (2006), in which arguments bearing nonstructural case get their licensing from a combination of two heads (cf. Chomsky 1993), one of which is Stem, the locus of split-ergativity in Iranian. A chain is established between Stem and v, which yields the nonstructural case on internal arguments, whereas the ergative case on external arguments is the result of the chain between Stem and Voice.
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Notes
It is identical to the standard/literary Kurdish variety described in Thackston (2006) in most respects, including the alignment system.
Following Dixon (1994), S stands for the subject of an intransitive verb, A for the subject of a transitive verb and O for the object in a transitive verb.
This pattern is also found in the dialect spoken around Diyarbakır, studied by Dorleijn (1996:62, 118), in some languages of the Tatic group, spoken further to the East, around the Caspian Sea (e.g. Vafsi and Kafteji, Stilo 2009:706, 709). Among the other branches of Iranian, Stilo (2009) also mentions West Balochi and Roshani, Kaufman (2016, 2017) Wakhi, and Windfuhr (2009:34) adds Semnani and Yaghnobi. Payne (1980) discusses the double-oblique pattern in Pamir and gives a diachronic account of its development.
In fact, Öpengin and Anuk (2015, 2016) are the first researchers to draw a short descriptive sketch of the case and agreement patterns in the Zazaki variety, which they also call Mutki Zazaki. Although they alter their descriptive generalizations in their latter study, their descriptions still show a few discrepancies from our intuitions. As such, I choose to independently describe Mutki Zazaki and make reference to Öpengin and Anuk (2015, 2016) in cases where data converge. It is possible that the variation in descriptions is a result of the exact locations, i.e. villages, each variety is spoken in.
This is not a common type of syncretism, yet it should be noted that Iranian languages exhibit a wide range of uncommon syncretisms. For instance, in Anbarani dialect of Taleshi, the DIR versus OBL case distinction is retained only in 1sg (Paul 2011:81), and other persons are syncretic. Kaufman (2016:5) reports another uncommon syncretism in Wakhi, where 3sg and 1pl are syncretic while other pronouns have distinct forms.
The personal pronouns in AK do not exhibit syncretism within or across DIR and OBL (Atlamaz 2012:73). MK also has no syncretism between DIR and OBL forms of the personal pronouns; however, within the DIR paradigm 3sg and 3pl are syncretic, and have the exponence ‘ew.’ Moreover, both AK and MK mark gender only in the third singular in the OBL (Gündoğdu 2011:51).
Another possibility is that topichood might play a role. Thanks to Alison Biggs (p.c.) for bringing this to my attention. Topichood does not appear to be a factor: Both sentences çı bı? ‘what happened?’ and Kemal çı ke? ‘what did Kemal do?’ can be answered with either option.
I should also note that in MZ even in a context where the subject lacks volitionality/responsibility (e.g. having to run down a hill due to its steepness), the subject of an unergative verb may only get OBL, and not DIR.
Although ‘optionality’ certainly requires an in-depth investigation in each case, it might be more prevalent than it is usually considered. For instance, Lithuanian shows a parallel optionality to MZ unaccusatives, in the context of passivization without any correlates. F. Sigurðsson et al. (2018) show that verbs like help in Lithuanian allow their dative object either to change to the nominative or retain its case in passives. The nominative theme agrees with the participle, while the dative does not.
See also Haig (2017) on the absence of DOM in Kurdish and Zazaki despite its presence in some other Iranian languages.
I thank a reviewer for pointing out that OBL is already not treated monolithically in Iranian linguistics, and it is usually suggested that OBL O in the present stem is taken as ACC, and OBL A in the past stem is regarded as ERG (cf. Payne 1980; Dorleijn 1996; Stilo 2009; Haig 1998, 2008; Atlamaz 2012; Baker and Atlamaz 2014; Atlamaz and Baker 2016, 2018; Karimi 2013, 2015; Kaufman 2017; but see Bobaljik (2008:fn. 3) where no distinction among oblique cases is drawn for some other languages). Acknowledging this classification, the categorization here is based more on syntactic behavior of arguments bearing the OBL case, therefore still differs from the previous literature in which the syntactic aspect is not the prominent factor.
A reviewer asks whether a ‘high passive,’ in which you have an active clause case license the object, then passivize on top of that, could provide an alternative explanation for the case preservation property of passive. This suggestion resembles the grammatical object passive or new passive (e.g. Maling and Sigurjónsdóttir 2002; Legate 2014b), in which the agent is partially projected. In this construction although the verb bears passive morphology, the theme remains as the grammatical object (with accusative case). Although it is an interesting suggestion and it could explain the fact that the verb shows default agreement (as in the Icelandic new passive), it does not explain other facts. One of the hallmarks of the grammatical object passive is that raising the thematic object to the grammatical subject position is ungrammatical, in contrast with the canonical passive. However, we see that the theme shows the behavior of a grammatical subject in MZ, in that it can bind the subject-oriented reflexive (23)–(24). The same argument extends to another potential interpretation of the reviewer’s ‘high passive’ as impersonal passive.
Given Haig’s (2008) remarks on quirky patterns in Iranian languages, we can treat this pattern as an unstable property, likely to change via levelling to the whole paradigm over time.
Still, if we concentrate on the synchronic picture, 2sg person behaves like the persons in Muş Kurdish, in that the OBL O bears structural case, and the S argument bears DIR. I leave the significant issue it raises for syntactic versus morphological ergativity or person-based ergativity noted by a reviewer for future research (cf. Legate 2014a; Deal 2016; Polinsky 2017).
A reviewer suggests that the two passive structures are incomparable for case purposes since MZ has synthetic passive, whereas MK has periphrastic passive. However, their discussion focuses on AK, which does not allow syntactic passivization and thus does not play a role in this discussion. They say that AK, which on the surface has the same form as MK, i.e. the main verb realized as a participle, and a light verb bears the agreement, does not allow by-phrases. The claim here is not that all the dialects that exhibit similar surface realizations would need to behave identically. In fact, I suggest the opposite, in that two morphologically different systems may have the same or very similar syntactic systems for a certain operation such as passive. It is clearly a non-trivial question why, of the two dialects that look alike, only one (i.e. MK) allows syntactic passivization and the other one (i.e. AK) does not. However, I make no claim with respect to the status of the OBL argument in AK. Since the criteria for the nature of OBL arguments are based on their syntactic behaviors, I focus on languages in which these are applicable, such as MZ and MK.
Regarding the synthetic vs analytic passives, it is possible to give examples of several, (closely) related Iranian languages/dialects, which differ in their choice of the passivization strategy without it necessarily having a syntactic effect. For instance, Sorani (Kareem 2016) and Hawrami (Holmberg and Odden 2004) have synthetic passives, unlike MK. Among varieties of Zazaki, the Siverek dialect also has synthetic passives (Todd 2002), whereas the closely-related dialect studied by Csirmaz and Ceplová (2004), Kenstowicz (2004) has periphrastic passives. Despite the surface difference, they all behave like syntactic passives. From a crosslinguistic perspective, it is even possible to see the two strategies of passives within the same language, e.g. Latin, while generally a synthetic passive language, the periphrastic passive is employed for perfect tenses without necessarily corresponding to a deep structural difference that affects the syntax of the passive (Embick 2000) (Thanks to David Embick (p.c.) for the discussion of this point).
Some speakers use the form biNP ‘with NP’ for by-phrases. I should note that Gündoğdu (2011) also suggests that O bears ACC case; here I provide several arguments to substantiate that claim.
PRO-control tests for subjecthood could not be applied to the Zazaki data, as non-finite complementation is not an option in Zazaki. In the contexts where languages use non-finite complement clauses in which PRO is licensed, Zazaki (and Kurdish) resorts to a finite clause with subjunctive mood, and does not have a PRO subject.
In Hawrami, a case-marked cognate object indicates progressive aspect (Holmberg and Odden 2004).
A reviewer suggests that (47) is ungrammatical because reflexive binding is not possible for their consultant. I would like to direct the attention of the reviewer to fn. 42, in which I discuss the existence of two groups of speakers for AK for this construction (as well as in MZ): one group of speakers, call it Group A, does not allow reflexive binding; yet the other group of speakers, Group B, find the reflexive binding possible.
Unlike the dyadic experiencer construction, which is discussed in Sect. 3.3.3, the experiencer construction here contains a sole argument regardless of this variation with respect to reflexive binding. Therefore, the sole argument functions as a grammatical subject for some, but not others.
Note that there is also some variation at the morpho-phonological level, which I again illustrate in the example (47) and those in fn. 42. For instance, the past copula in this example is realized as bû for Group B speakers, whereas it is -u for Group A (although Group A speakers also have bû in other examples, e.g. (54b) or relevant examples from Atlamaz 2012; Baker and Atlamaz 2014). Similarly, the adjectival predicate ‘cold’ is pronounced as sar by Group B, while as sor by Group A. One could treat these variations as reflexes of two separate dialects, or just surface-level variations of the same dialect due to the colloquial nature of these languages. According to the latter view, which I have chosen, we are dealing with the same dialect that has two groups of speakers for reflexive binding, but does not attribute much importance to the variation in phonological differences. Note that not much would hinge on the choice of either option; treating them as two separate dialects would just mean that the discussion here focuses on the grammar of Group B speakers. Finally, the reviewer’s example places the phrase containing the reflexive before the predicate. Group B speakers expressed no such preference.
Haig (2008:305–310) describes this class as verbs with verbs of sensory perception, desire, and obligation.
A reviewer raises some questions concerning the status of (50) in AK. Baker and Atlamaz (2014:10) say: “...AK does not (as far as we know) have the relevant clause type, but Sorani does ...” However, the reviewer suggests that this construction is available in AK. Clearly, more investigation is needed here, but since our focus is on the significance of the MZ pattern, I leave this for future work.
Note that this conclusion is also compatible with the well-established fact that transitive clauses in ergative languages have subjects in ergative case, but intransitive clauses do not (Baker 2015). I also conclude the oblique on intransitives is distinct from the oblique on transitive subjects.
It is also possible to implement a case decomposition approach for the case representation, as such individual cases like “nominative,” “dative,” etc. are not the names of individual features in the grammar. Rather, these names stand proxy for different combinations of features; see Halle and Vaux (1998) and Calabrese (2008) for two such approaches. On Calabrese’s (2008) system [source] differentiates ERG from other cases, with ERG being [+source], and other cases [−source].
A reviewer suggests that given that OBL is syncretic in a single language for more than one case, it is desirable to explore a featural decomposition to spot the feature they share. I agree with the reviewer that a featural decomposition is natural, and in fact possible. For instance, in Calabrese’s (2008), the feature [+motion] distinguishes ERG, DAT and ACC from NOM. Acknowledging a decomposition approach, I still preserve the traditional labels for exposition, since they suffice to explain the facts.
This generalization may be relaxed to capture the optionality of this non-canonical agreement. One option is to say that 3rd person is morphosyntactically ambiguous between having the person feature encoded and lacking the person features. Atlamaz and Baker (2018) speculate that this could be an instance of speakers controlling more than one dialect/style of Kurmanji (e.g. diglossia between AK and SK) or a grammatical effect. Their grammatical effect follows the implementation of Multiple Agree by Marušič et al. (2015) in which agreement is a two-step process: Agree-Link, happening in the syntax and Agree-Copy which happens at PF. The relative ordering of Agree-Copy with respect to other PF operations could be what is leading to this variation. At this point, this aspect also remains at the speculative level.
It should be noted that Atlamaz and Baker (2018) also make use of the feature-geometry to explain the contrast between local and non-local persons. They suggest that when number (plural) fuses with the oblique case, plural agreement can show up on the verb; when number does not fuse with the oblique case, there is no agreement between an oblique subject and a verb. With local persons, the participant node between K(ase) and number blocks the fusion. Thus, their nominals consist of the Kase > Participant > Number hierarchy. Thus a slight change in the tree representations here, in which Kase dominates person and number Atlamaz and Baker (2018:20), and allowing the probe to look further down past Kase would mean that T would look at case feature (ERG) and keep looking further down. When it finds person feature next, the search fails.
Another option is to capture this systematic asymmetry via Impoverishment (credits to David Embick and Jonathan Bobaljik (p.c.) for independently bringing this up). The Impoverishment would delete the person feature of the DP1 (indicated via the subscript 1) in the context of ERG once the features are transferred to T. This is illustrated in (i).
-
(i)
[αperson]1
→
∅
/[__ erg]
This Impoverishment would be followed by the Impoverishment rules in (60). As far as I can tell, either approach makes the correct prediction empirically. Both options capture the fact that local pronouns and other nominals differ in their ability to trigger number agreement, in that only the latter may do so. I opt for the feature-geometry.
-
(i)
A similar line of analysis (and its variations) that incorporates Multiple Agree with Impoverishment has in fact been proposed to account for Algonquian theme signs (Oxford 2014, 2017; Despić and Hamilton 2018). For instance, Despić and Hamilton (2018) suggest that in Algonquian languages, Voice has access to the ϕ-features of multiple arguments via different methods: in the syntax, the object is probed downwards via Agree, and subject ϕ-features are accessed via Merge. Post-syntactically, although only the features of the object are spelled out, the features of the subject can affect the features of the object. Implementing a system of markedness conditions, they propose that the marked feature of the object, e.g. [+Participant], is deleted postsyntactically via Impoverishment prior to vocabulary insertion in the context of [–Participant] feature of the subject. This is illustrated in (i).
-
(i)
Although the contextual markedness does not straightforwardly extend to the pattern in Iranian languages, what is common to both this approach and that of Despić and Hamilton (2018) is that the postsyntactic deletion of certain feature(s) in the context of another feature.
-
(i)
For instance, VIs for the auxiliary ‘be,’ which usually has different exponence, are left out. Some other remarks are in order regarding VIs: it is possible to do a more worked-out phonology for the VIs or reduce them, but since it is not the main concern here, I leave them as is. I also make the assumption that the inherent features in VIs carry more weight in terms of specification than the contextual information.
The case/phi-features of ERG and NOM-bearing arguments are dissociated (in the sense of Embick 1997; Embick and Noyer 2001) into agreement morphemes. However, the case/phi-features of ACC/DAT-bearing arguments remain on T, thus are never realized. That’s why, there is no VI for the latter arguments. This accords with suggestions of two reviewers.
Given that the same configuration is strongly disallowed in MZ, I lean towards interpreting the MK sentence in (68c) as another indication that the features of the internal argument are visible. Despite the variation in (68c), (68b) is invariably ungrammatical with the plural agreement on the verb.
The structures are not exactly identical to the ones in Atlamaz and Baker (2018:e.g. (51)) in terms of how subject and object are represented. They represent the nominal as hierarchically organized ϕ-features. I choose to illustrate them simply as NPs, since it makes no difference for this part of the discussion.
The failure of the expected correlations between stem and clausal tense is attested in other Iranian languages as well. For instance, the Awroman dialect of Gorani has a tense, which is based on the present stem, and referred to by MacKenzie (1966, cited in Haig 2008) as the Imperfect. Crucially, the Awroman Imperfect has past-tense reference despite the present stem. Similarly, the Badīn dialect of Northern Kurdish has a past irrealis (‘I would have done X’) based on the suffix da- plus the present stem of the verb. Again, it expresses a past-time reference. A very similar development is noted in Talyshi, where an imperfect tense with past tense reference is found, but based on the present stem of the verb (Stilo 2009). These instances further support the view that “in Iranian it is not primarily some semantic notion of ‘pastness’ or ‘perfectivity’ that is crucial to triggering ergativity, but the historical link between certain verb forms, and a particular alignment type” as stated by Haig (2008:9).
Thus unsurprisingly in Iranian linguistics, even for the languages like Wakhi, some dialects of which have split-ergative pattern (upper dialect of Wakhan) as well as other dialects with only nominative-accusative alignment (lower dialect of Wakhan), the discussion is usually about stem, and not tense (or aspect) (e.g. Bashir 2009 and other articles in Windfuhr 2009).
The authors use the term ‘T’ in their paper in its traditional sense, as referring to the T node, but their ‘T’ in fact corresponds to the morpheme ‘Stem.’ Given the examples in (81)–(85), I take it that this morpheme is introduced lower in the clause, whereas the copula is introduced in T.
Kalin and Atlamaz (2018) note that unlike causative morphology, V-Stem allomorphy is not blocked by an overt exponent for Asp in Kurdish. This is indeed expected given that v is immediately dominated and linearly adjacent to Stem, whereas Asp is higher in the structure, thus does not interact for allomorphic purposes.
It is reminiscent of AgrP of Chomsky (1993) in terms of requiring more than one head for case assignment.
A reviewer suggests that Svenonius’s (2006) concept of chain and its implementation here makes it structural rather than nonstructural. This is because it is determined in the syntax by structural relations/configuration among multiple heads, unlike the classic Inherent case view, which essentially boils down to assignment of inherent case by a head due to its particular features. As the reviewer notes, a view I also share, Inherent case assignment actually requires a specific configuration of Transitivity (for ERG) and ‘pastness’ (which is a property of Stem, not of T). Therefore, the classic view faces problems, a view I do acknowledge. That is the motivation behind the chain operation. However, I refrain from calling the necessary configuration among multiple heads ‘structural’ and would like to reserve the term ‘structural’ to its standard definition, as in e.g. Chomsky (1981, 1986), Woolford (2006). That one of the heads is the head that assigns the θ-role to the ERG DP is also relevant, since on-structural case was traditionally the case assigned along with a θ-role. As such, structural refers to instances where case is lost under A-movement as opposed to nonstructural where case is preserved under A-movement.
An example of unergative predicates is shown in (i). Note the presence of a clitic as well.
-
(i)
Related to fn. 31 and the current discussion, it should be noted that literature on dialects of Wakhi reports different case properties for different dialects. For instance, Bashir (1986) notes that past intransitive subjects may get both OBL and DIR, and this correlates with volitionality or topichood. Payne (1980) notes the same pattern, but says that the two coexist in free variation in the past stem. Kaufman (2016, 2017) reports the existence of only OBL in the same contexts for the dialect he investigates. Thanks to Daniel Kaufman (p.c.) for the elicitation of Wakhi data from Husniya Khujamyorova, and the discussion.
-
(i)
Nie (2017) suggests that ergative case may be assigned by Voice to its DP specifier only if the vP sister of Voice has the correct set of nominal licensing features: [D, ϕ], where D is the nominal features, and ϕ is the agreement features. The basic idea behind Nie’s (2017) view is similar to that of Deal (2010), in that ergative requires Voice to access information lower in the tree. See also Legate (2017) who suggests that what counts for “transitivity” is different in different languages.
However, it should be noted that although it is commonly assumed that ERG is restricted to past tense or perfective aspect, the experiencer subjects discussed in Sect. 3.3.3 demonstrates that this is not exceptionless. We see that ERG applies not only to initiator, but also experiencer, which is another external argument role.
Again languages/dialects (even clause types) might differ in their level of “OBL spreading.” For instance, Wakhi intransitives exhibit a different behavior depending on the dialect. The discussion of the precise factors, particularly the language external ones, which condition this variation, however, would take us too far afield. Likewise, experiencers are OBL-DIR, rather than OBL-OBL. I leave these important issues unresolved in this paper.
These rules are stated in slightly different terms in the latest version of Atlamaz and Baker (2018), as a reviewer notes, and they leave out (104), yet the basics of the system remain the same. Thus, I cite the version in which the rules are more explicitly stated.
Note that taking Stem to be a case domain would also not capture the facts.
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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Julie Anne Legate, David Embick, Akiva Bacovcin, Rajesh Bhatt, Jonathan Bobaljik, Dalina Kallulli, Laura Kalin, Songül Gündoğdu, Einar F. Sigurðsson, Daniel Kaufman, Alison Biggs, Sabine Laszakovits for their very helpful comments and suggestions. I also thank the audiences at University of Vienna, the 1st North American Conference in Iranian Linguistics (NACIL1; Stony Brook), and the participants at FMART. Thanks to three anonymous NLLT reviewers whose comments and feedback helped improve the paper greatly. I am grateful to many people for their judgments (directly or by proxy) and patience, particularly Ali Akkuş, Zemire Akkuş, Cahit Gezer, Hüseyin Baran, Gülsen Aytekin, and Necati Yağmur (Zazaki varieties); Sezgin Baran, Bilal Çetin, Songül Gündoğdu, Murat Yolun, Ümit Atlamaz, Murat Yıldırım (Kurdish varieties); Husniya Khujamyorova for Upper Wakhi (via Daniel Kaufman). Thanks also to Luke Adamson and Rob Wilder for proofreading the paper at different stages.
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Akkuş, F. On Iranian case and agreement. Nat Lang Linguist Theory 38, 671–727 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11049-019-09457-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11049-019-09457-8