Structural Case Assignment in Pashto Unaccusatives

Abstract

This paper is an effort to explore the assignment of structural/abstract Case in
Pashto unaccusative constructions from a minimalist perspective. A three pronged
approach is adopted in this paper: one, it takes the minimalist hypothesis that ϕ-
features agreement between a functional category/ head and a relevant nominal
results in assigning structural Case to that nominal as its starting point and applies
the same to Pashto constructions in the present, past, and future tenses; two, as so
far no structures have been suggested for Pashto unaccusative constructions,
therefore, this paper suggests three structures/ derivations for unaccusative Pashto
verbs in the three Pashto tenses; three, for Pashto unaccusative constructions this
paper hypothesizes that ϕ-features agreement between T and the relevant nominal
results in assigning nominative Case to that nominal and ϕ-features agreement
between ʋ or Voice functional category and the relevant nominal results in
assigning accusative Case to that nominal. These three strands are put together
and the output is evaluated and tested at the touch stone of different Pashto
examples taken from a wide spectrum of daily life.