4.1. Delimiting the psych causative alternation in Polish

Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia (Reference Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia2014) emphasise that only eventive OE verbs participate in the psych causative alternation. This is because the other argument of eventive OE verbs (beside the Experiencer) represents a Cause, and only those predicates which, in Reinhart's (Reference Reinhart2000, Reference Reinhart, Hastings, Jackson and Zvolenszky2001) model, have a [+c] argument (consistent with an Agent, a Cause or an Instrument interpretation, as in (22a) above) may undergo the causative/anticausative alternation. As has been noted in section 2, eventive OE verbs in Polish (and in general) may have an animate or inanimate Cause, provided the animate entity does not act intentionally. The Cause status of the non-Experiencer argument of eventive OE verbs follows from the fact that in a sentence like (27) below the phase brak pieniędzy ‘the lack of money’ is a direct cause of Eve's irritation.

1. (27) Brak-ø pieniędzy zirytował Ew-ę.

   lack-nom money irritated.pfv Eve-acc

   ‘The lack of money irritated Eve.’

As regards stative OE verbs, they never license a Cause argument, and hence can never undergo the psych causative alternation. The other argument of these verbs (beside the Experiencer) is a Target or Subject Matter (henceforth, T/SM), following Pesetsky Reference Pesetsky1995. The T/SM argument is evaluated by the Experiencer either positively or negatively, but it never has any causal relation with the state of the Experiencer. This is illustrated in (28) below, in which matematyka ‘maths’ serves as a T/SM argument, since it is positively evaluated by the Experiencer.Footnote ¹² However, this phrase does not trigger Eve's state of fascination, and therefore cannot be interpreted as a Cause.

1. (28) Matematyka-ø fascynuje Ew-ę.

   maths-nom fascinates.ipfv Eve-acc

   ‘Maths fascinates Eve.’

Both the eventive OE verb zirytować ‘to irritate’, in (27), and the stative fascynować ‘to fascinate’, in (28), alternate with SE verbs, as can be seen in (29) and (30), respectively:

1. (29) Ewa-ø zirytowała się (brak-iem pieniędzy).

   Eve-nom got.irritated.pfv refl lack-instr money

   ‘Eve got irritated with the lack of money.’

2. (30) Ewa-ø fascynuje się *(matematyk-ą).

   Eve-nom fascinates.ipfv refl maths-instr

   ‘Eve is fascinated with maths.’

In the above-mentioned data, the argument that is not the SE is a T/SM, which is either obligatory, as in (30), or optional, as in (29). In both (29) and (30), the T/SM argument is evaluated by the Experiencer either negatively, as in (29), or positively, as in (30). Sentence (29) clearly differs in meaning from (27). In the former the lack of money is evaluated negatively by Eve, while in the latter the lack of money makes Eve irritated. The alternations like (29) and (30) above will be analysed in some detail in section 5. They cannot be subsumed under the psych causative alternation, as they host a T/SM argument, either obligatorily or optionally, and hence are not intransitive.

The anticausative variant of (27) is provided in (31) below:

1. (31) Ewa-ø zirytowała się (przez brak pieniędzy).

   Eve-nom got.irritated.pfv refl because-of lack money

   ‘Eve got irritated because of the lack of money.’

The SE verb in (31) is clearly intransitive, and the Cause phrase may be optionally realised by means of przez a ‘because of’-phrase.Footnote ¹³ The psych verb in (31) is also followed by the reflexive marker się, whose function is elaborated in section 4.2. The alternation between (27) and (31) is an instance of the psych causative alternation (see also (26)), whose analysis within the Theta System is undertaken in section 4.2.

4.2. The psych causative alternation in Polish in the Theta System

Before turning to an analysis of the psych causative alternation in Polish, let us first focus on how OE verbs in English are analysed in the Theta System. Reinhart (Reference Reinhart2000, Reference Reinhart, Hastings, Jackson and Zvolenszky2001, Reference Reinhart2002, Reference Reinhart, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016) treats OE verbs as triadic, containing in their lexical entry the clusters [+c], [-c +m] and [-m], which correspond to the Cause, Experiencer and T/SM, respectively. Consequently, the lexical entry of an OE verb is as follows:

1. (32) V_OE < [+c]₁, [-c +m]_ACC, [-m]₂>

The entry in (32) shows that the [+c] merges externally, whereas [-m] is always merged internally (see (20)). The Experiencer, [-c +m], is free to merge either externally or internally, and appears with the accusative case, which follows from the presence of [+c] in the underlying thematic in (32). The Cause and T/SM, present in (32), cannot co-occur (see the T/SM restriction of Pesetsky Reference Pesetsky1995: 60), which is accounted for in the Theta System by appealing to the notion of feature distinctness:

1. (33) Feature Distinctness

   1. a. Two indistinct θ-roles cannot both be realised on the same predicate.

   2. b. Distinctness of feature sets: α is distinct from β iff α and β are counterspecified for a certain feature f. (Reinhart Reference Reinhart, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016: 60)

Under the definition in (33b), the clusters [+c] and [-m] are indistinct, as there is no feature for which they are counterspecified. And (33a), in turn, predicts that these two clusters cannot be realised in the same predicate, as confirmed by (34):

1. (34) *The doctor's letter worried Lucie about her health. (Reinhart Reference Reinhart, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016: 60)

Since OE verbs cannot realise the Cause and the T/SM argument together, these verbs may be associated with the following two cluster sets: (i) [+c], [-c +m], or (ii) [-c +m], [-m]. In the former scenario, the [+c] cluster always merges externally (see (20b)), and the Experiencer must then merge internally and be associated with accusative (see (20c)), as can be seen in (35):

1. (35) The doctor worried Lucie.

In the latter case, the [-m] role, which is merged internally, moves to Spec, TP to satisfy the EPP, which accounts for the backward binding facts, illustrated in (36):

1. (36) His_i health worried every patient_i. (Reinhart Reference Reinhart, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016: 64)

The pronominal variable binding in (36) is accounted for by the fact that the [-m] argument, which originates inside the VP, is c-commanded by the Experiencer, and is subsequently moved to Spec, TP (as originally proposed in Belletti and Rizzi Reference Belletti and Rizzi1988). The Experiencer in (36) remains in situ and bears the accusative case.Footnote ¹⁴ Consequently, two distinct derivations are available for OE verbs in the Theta System. Still another derivation is possible for OE verbs in the Theta System. In this derivation, the lexical entry of an OE verb is affected by decausativition, as in (23) (see section 3 above), which eliminates the [+c] cluster from the lexical entry of the OE verb and makes it a two-place predicate. Decausativisation has a role to play in a sentence such as (37).

1. (37) Lucie worried about her health.

In (37), the [-m] cluster and the [-c +m] cluster merge internally, and it is the latter that moves to Spec, TP to satisfy the EPP, because it is not assigned accusative case once the [+c] is eliminated in the course of decausativisation (see (20c)).

Having presented the way the various structures with OE verbs in English (and cross-linguistically)Footnote ¹⁵ are derived in the Theta System, let us now turn to an analysis of the psych causative alternation in Polish within the Theta System. Example (27), repeated for convenience below as (38), selects the Cause, brak pieniędzy ‘lack of money’ and the Experiencer, Ewę ‘Eve’, which correspond to the clusters [+c] and [-c +m], respectively (see (19) above). No T/SM cluster is realised in the presence of the Cause argument in (38), as predicted by Feature Distinctness in (33) above.

1. (38) Brak-ø pieniędzy zirytował Ew-ę.

   lack-nom money irritated.pfv Eve-acc

   ‘The lack of money irritated Eve.’

The marking procedure in (20) determines that the [+c] cluster is marked with the index 1, which, following the merging instruction in (21), is merged externally. The other cluster, corresponding to the Experiencer, is then merged internally and is assigned accusative case in accordance with (20c). In order to derive (31), repeated for convenience below as (39), the decausativisation operation must remove the [+c] cluster.Footnote ¹⁶

1. (39) Ewa-ø zirytowała się (przez brak pieniędzy).

   Eve-nom got.irritated.pfv refl because.of lack money

   ‘Eve got irritated because of the lack of money.’

Example (39) contains the reflexive marker się, which, following Reinhart's (Reference Reinhart, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016) suggestions made for Romance languages, might be taken to indicate that in Polish, unlike in English, accusative case is not fully eliminated in the course of decausativiation, but rather leaves a residue (Marelj and Reuland Reference Marelj, Reuland, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016: 186). It is the reflexive that absorbs the residual accusative case after decausativisation has applied in (39). Consequently, się in (39) is not an argument, but rather a kind of expletive (for a detailed analysis of reflexive SE verbs in Dutch, see Marelj and Reuland Reference Marelj, Reuland, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016: 223).Footnote ¹⁷ Since the SE verb zirytować się ‘to irritate’ in (39) is monadic, the marking procedure does not affect it (see (19)). By instruction (21a), the sole argument of zirytować się ‘to get irritated’ in (39) (the Experiencer Ewa ‘Eve’), is merged externally. The resulting structure has only an external argument and hence is unergative. In this way, the puzzle relating to two different mappings of the Experiencer, the internal or external, can be given a straightforward account in the Theta System. Since the Experiencer represents a mixed cluster, it is not marked in the lexicon. Once the [+c] reduction takes place, the Experiencer may be mapped onto an external argument. In the subsequent section, an attempt is made to verify whether SE cognates of Polish eventive OE are indeed unergative, as predicted by the Theta System.

4.3. Are SE cognates of eventive OE verbs in Polish unaccusative or unergative?

The unergative status of SE verbs participating in the psych causative alternation, advocated in the Theta System, seems to find empirical support in a number of languages. Reinhart (Reference Reinhart2000, Reference Reinhart, Hastings, Jackson and Zvolenszky2001, Reference Reinhart, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016) argues that SE variants of OE verbs in English, Hebrew and Dutch are unergative. Marelj (Reference Marelj2004) treats SE alternants of OE verbs in Serbo-Croation as unergative. Rákosi (Reference Rákosi2006: 55) and Jurth (Reference Jurth, Bloch-Rozmej and Bondaruk2017, Reference Jurth, Bloch-Rozmej and Bondaruk2018) analyse SE verbs alternating with eventive OE verbs in Hungarian as unergative.

A different treatment of SE verbs alternating with eventive OE predicates is due to Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia (Reference Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia2014). They analyse OE/SE alternations in Greek and Romanian and argue that SE variants of eventive OE verbs are unaccusative, rather than unergative. They provide three arguments in favour of this claim. The first argument is based on meaning and relates to the fact that SE cognates of eventive OE verbs in the languages analysed express a change of state, in a way typical of anticausatives (Levin and Rappaport Hovav Reference Levin and Hovav1995). However, this claim seems questionable in light of the fact that SE alternants of OE verbs in a number of languages, including Spanish (Marín and McNally Reference Marín and McNally2011) and Polish (Rozwadowska Reference Rozwadowska, Cyran, Kardela and Szymanek2012), have been treated as inceptive, referring to an onset of the state, not to the change of state itself. Secondly, SE alternants of eventive OE verbs can co-occur with the same range of PP-Causes that are typically found with anticausatives.Footnote ¹⁸ The Cause-PP characteristic of Polish anticausatives is introduced by the P od ‘from’, as in (40) below:

1. (40) Okno-ø zbiło się od podmuchu wiatr-u.

   window-nom broke.pfv refl from gust wind-gen

   ‘The window broke from the gust of wind.’

Alternating SE verbs also admit the Cause od-phrase, as can be seen in (41):

1. (41) Ewa-ø zirytowała się od nadmiaru obowiązków.

   Eve-nom got.irritated.pfv refl from excessive duties

   ‘Eve got irritated from too many duties.’

However, Cause od-PPs are not only possible with unaccusatives, as in (40), but can also be found with unergatives, as in (42):

1. (42) Marek-ø skakał od nadmiaru energii.

   Mark-nom jumped from excessive energy

   ‘Mark jumped from too much energy.’

Since od-PPs, expressing Cause, may be found with both unaccusatives and unergatives in Polish (see (40) and (42)), their availability with the SE form, as in (41), does not bear on the status of this verb. This casts some doubt on the validity of Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia's (Reference Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia2014) argument that Cause-PPs diagnose the unaccusativity of SE cognates of eventive OE verbs. The final argument, mentioned by Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia (Reference Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia2014: 65), to support the unaccusative status of the SE form relates to the availability of modification by by itself, which is typically found in anticausatives (see Chierchia Reference Chierchia, Alexiadou, Anagnostopoulou and Everaert2004, Alexiadou et al. Reference Alexiadou, Anagnostopoulou, Schäfer and Frascarelli2006, among others), as shown in (43):

1. (43) The vase broke by itself.

However, in Polish the modification by sam, the Polish equivalent of by itself, is also possible in unergatives. This is illustrated in (44), taken from Malicka-Kleparska (Reference Malicka-Kleparska2012: 90), where the verb wlata ‘flies’ is unergative, not unaccusative:

1. (44) Ta forsa-ø sama wlata w kieszeń.

   this money-nom by.itself flies into pocket

   ‘The money pours into the pocket by itself.’

No other pieces of evidence for the unaccusative status of SE cognates of eventive OE verbs have been provided by Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia (Reference Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia2014).

Since two approaches to SE variants of alternating OE verbs are available, the question arises whether Polish SE verbs participating in the psych causative alternation are unergative, as predicted by the Theta System, or unaccusative, as postulated by Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia (Reference Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia2014). A number of tests that have been posited in the literature in order to distinguish unaccusative from unergative verbs either do not apply to Polish or do not yield conclusive results. In Russian, the genitive of negation may optionally affect an internal argument, but it can never affect an external argument, which makes it possible to draw the line between unergatives and unaccusatives in this language (see Pesetsky Reference Pesetsky1982, Schoorlemmer Reference Schoorlemmer1995). This test, however, is inapplicable to Polish, as can be seen in (45) and (46) below (see also Witkoś Reference Witkoś1998: 228):

1. (45)

   1. a. Do domu wszedł pies-ø. unaccusative

      in house came dog-nom

      ‘A dog came into the house.’

   2. b. Do domu nie wszedł pies-ø /*ps-a.

      in house not came dog-nom/*dog-gen

      ‘A dog didn't come into the house.’

2. (46)

   1. a. Do domu wleciał motyl-ø. unergative

      in house flew butterfly-nom

      ‘A butterfly flew into the house.’

   2. b. Do domu nie wleciał motyl-ø /*motyl-a.

      in house not flew butterfly-nom/*butterfly-gen

      ‘A butterfly didn't fly into the house.’

In neither (45b), with the unaccusative verb wejść ‘to come’, nor in (46b), containing an unergative verb wlecieć ‘to fly’, does the sole argument become genitive under negation.

Levin and Rappaport Hovav (Reference Levin and Hovav1995) note that resultative phrases may be predicated of internal, not external, arguments, and they are therefore licit with unaccusatives, but banned with unergatives.Footnote ¹⁹ This test does not distinguish unaccusatives from unergatives in Polish, as both these types of predicates can co-occur with resultatives, as shown in (47) and (48) below, respectively:

1. (47) Piec-ø rozgrzał się do czerwoności. unaccusative

   oven-nom got.hot.pfv refl to redness

   ‘The oven heated up until it became red.’

2. (48) Człowiek-ø wykrwawił się na śmierć. unergative

   man-nom bled.pfv refl to death

   ‘The man has bled to death.’

Another unaccusativity diagnostic proposed for Dutch, German and English refers to the possibility of pronominal (adjectival) use of participles (Hoekstra Reference Hoekstra1984). Only participles of unaccusative verbs can be felicitously used as prenominal adjectival modifiers in German, as shown in (49a), in contradistinction to participles formed from unergative verbs, which cannot be so used, as demonstrated in (49b):

1. (49)

   1. a. der eingeschlafene Student unaccusative

      the fallen-asleep student

   2. b. *der gearbeitete Student unergative

      the worked student (Alexiadou et al. Reference Alexiadou, Anagnostopoulou and Everaert2004: 6)

Cetnarowska (Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002, 2004) argues that unaccusative and unergative verbs in Polish differ in the availability of resultative adjectives ending in -ły, as can be seen in (50), taken from Cetnarowska (Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002: 64):

1. (50)

   1. a. wychudłe dziecko unaccusative

      thinned child

   2. b. *zadzwoniły pacjent unergative

      phoned patient

Although this test seems to properly distinguish unaccusatives from unergatives in Polish, it does not apply to reflexive verbs (Cetnarowska Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002: 68), which form their resultative adjectives by means of the morpheme -n-/-t-, as illustrated in (51):

1. (51)

   1. a. umyć się umyte dziecko

      wash refl washed child

   2. b. zdenerwować się zdenerwowany człowiek

      irritate refl irritated man

Since SE alternants of eventive OE verbs in Polish are always reflexive (see (49b)), that is, they co-occur with the reflexive marker się, they form their resultative adjectives in a way different from unaccusatives (see (50a)). Consequently, the formation of the resultative -ły adjective cannot be used to determine the status of SE cognates of eventive SE verbs in Polish.Footnote ²⁰

Having pointed out some problems with unaccusativity diagnostics in Polish, let us now turn to those tests which can diagnose unaccusativity in this language. Cetnarowska (Reference Cetnarowska, Bański and Przepiórkowski2000, Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002) discusses three tests that may be used to draw the line between unaccusative and unergative predicates in Polish.Footnote ²¹ The first test relates to impersonal passives in -no/-to, which are felicitous with unergatives, but not with unaccusatives, as shown in (52) and (53), from Cetnarowska (Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002: 64):Footnote ²²

1. (52) *Wyrośnię-to w atmosferz-e terror-u.Footnote ²³ unaccusative

   grew.up-to.pfv in atmosphere-loc terror-gen

   ‘They grew up in an atmosphere of terror.’

2. (53) Zadzwonio-no po lekarz-a. unergative

   phoned-no.pfv for doctor-acc

   ‘They phoned for a doctor.’

Let us now check how this test works for an SE alternant of an eventive OE verb, found in (31), repeated as 54 below:

1. (54) Ewa-ø zirytowała się (przez brak pieniędzy).

   Eve-nom got.irritated.pfv refl because.of lack money

   ‘Eve got irritated because of the lack of money.’

The verb zirytować się ‘to get irritated’ may be used in the -no/-to impersonals, as can be seen in (55):

1. (55) Zirytowa-no się.

   got.irritated-no.pfv refl

   ‘They got irritated.’

Consequently, the SE form in (55) behaves like an unergative verb in (53) but unlike the unaccusative verb in (52).Footnote ²⁴

The second test that has been adopted by Cetnarowska (Reference Cetnarowska, Bański and Przepiórkowski2000, Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002) to distinguish unaccusatives from unergatives in Polish is based on distributive po-phrases (see Pesetsky Reference Pesetsky1982 for a similar test adopted for Russian). These phrases are felicitous with objects of transitive verbs, as in (56).

1. (56) Kupili-śmy po książ-ce.

   bought-1pl po book-loc

   ‘We bought a book each.’

When applied to unaccusative and unergative verbs, the test indicates that at least some unaccusative verbs (for instance, those referring to appearance or disappearance) can be used with the distributive po-phrase. This is shown in (57):

1. (57) Z każdej klasy przyszło po rodzic-u. unaccusative

   from each class came po parent-loc

   ‘There came a parent from each class/grade.’ (Cetnarowska Reference Cetnarowska, Bański and Przepiórkowski2000: 41)

In contrast, unergative verbs are much less acceptable with po-phrases, as shown in (58):

1. (58) ?*Z każdej klasy zadzwoniło do szkoły po rodzic-u.

   from each class phoned to school po parent-loc

   ‘A parent from each class/grade phoned the school.’ (Cetnarowska Reference Cetnarowska, Bański and Przepiórkowski2000: 41)

Cetnarowska (Reference Cetnarowska, Bański and Przepiórkowski2000: 41) emphasises that native speakers’ judgements vary a lot for sentences like (57) and (58). When the test based on distributive po-phrases is applied to SE variants of eventive OE verbs, it results in ungrammaticality, as in (59):

1. (59) *Z każdej klasy zirytowało się po rodzic-u.

   from each class got.irritated.pfv refl po parent-loc

   ‘A parent from each class got irritated.’

The unacceptability of (59) indicates that SE cognates of eventive OE verbs behave as unergatives with respect to the distributive po-phrase (see (58)), and not as unaccusatives (see (57)). The predictions of this test, however, are far less clear than those based on -no/-to impersonals (see (55)), because they are subject to considerable speaker variation.

The final test adopted by Cetnarowska (Reference Cetnarowska, Bański and Przepiórkowski2000, Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002) involves na- and po-prefixed verbs (see Pesetsky Reference Pesetsky1982 and Schoorlemmer Reference Schoorlemmer1995 for a similar diagnostic applied to Russian). These prefixed verbs can quantify over their objects, as in (60), where the phase szklanek ‘glasses’ surfaces in the partitive genitive:

1. (60) Na-tłukl-iście szklan-ek.

   na-broke-2pl glasses-gen

   ‘You have broken a lot of glasses.’

These prefixed verbs can also quantify over the sole argument of an unaccusative verb, as in (61), provided the verb refers to appearance or movement (Cetnarowska Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002: 59).

1. (61) Na-rosło chwast-ów.

   na-grew weeds-gen

   ‘There have grown so many weeds.’

However, prefixed unergative verbs do not license the partitive genitive, as in (62):

1. (62) *Na-śpiewało dziec-i w naszym bloku.

   na-sang children-gen in our block

   ‘There have sung so many children in our block of flats.’ (Cetnarowska Reference Cetnarowska, Boucher and Plénat2002: 59)

SE variants of eventive OE verbs may be prefixed with na- or po-, as shown in (63), but then the resulting structure has an impersonal interpretation:

1. (63) Po-irytowało się ludz-i.

   po-irritated refl people-gen

   ‘One made many people irritated.’

   (Intended: *‘A lot of people got irritated.’)

The sentence in (63) can only have an agentive interpretation in which somebody made a lot of people irritated, not the interpretation in which a lot of people got irritated. Consequently, the grammaticality of (63) does not allow us to draw any conclusions as to the status of the SE verb.

Finally, the sole argument of the SE alternant exhibits subject-like properties in that it has some control over the event, as shown in (64), where the Subject Experiencer controls the PRO subject with the Agent theta role:

1. (64) Ewa-ø zirytowała się [żeby PRO pokaz-ać kto tu rządzi].

   Eve-nom got.irritated.pfv refl in.order.to show-inf who here rules

   ‘Eve got irritated to show who rules here.’

The surface subject of unaccusatives, in turn, has no control over the event, and therefore sentence (65) is totally unacceptable:

1. (65) Trawa-ø zazieleniła się *([ żeby PRO powit-ać wiosnę]).

   grass-nom got.green.pfv refl in.order.to welcome-inf spring

   ‘The grass has become green to welcome spring.’

All in all, the evidence presented in this section has shown some similarities in syntactic behaviour between SE alternants of eventive OE verbs in Polish and unergatives. The arguments provided by Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia (Reference Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia2014) in favour of the unaccusative status of SE forms have turned out not to be valid for Polish. Consequently, it seems that the psych causative alternation is amenable to the analysis offered by Reinhart (Reference Reinhart2000, Reference Reinhart, Hastings, Jackson and Zvolenszky2001, Reference Reinhart, Everaert, Marelj and Reuland2016), and the Theta System makes good predictions for the mapping of Object and Subject Experiencers in Polish.

5.1. Case linking of Experiencers found with stative OE verbs in Polish

It has been noted in section 4.1 that stative OE verbs do not have a Cause argument, but instead they have a T/SM. For instance, in (66) below, the stative OE verb interesować ‘to interest’ takes a [-c +m] and a [-m] argument, where the former corresponds to the Experiencer, and the latter corresponds to the T/SM:

1. (66) Fizyka-ø interesuje Ew-ę.

   physics-nom interests.ipfv Eve-acc

   ‘Physics interests Eve.’

To be able to account for the accusative case on the Experiencer in (66), it is necessary to assume that the lexical entry of interesować ‘to interest’ contains, in addition to the two clusters mentioned above, a [+c] cluster. Accusative case is licensed in the Theta System in accordance with (20c), repeated for convenience as (67) below:

1. (67) V with a [+] cluster and a fully specified cluster [/α/ -c] is marked for acc.

   (Reinhart Reference Reinhart2002: 255)

However, in order to block the actual realisation of a Cause (i.e., the [+c] cluster) in sentences with stative OE verbs like (66), an assumption must be made, following Reinhart (Reference Reinhart2002: 27), that the realisation of [+c] for stative OE verbs is frozen in the lexicon. In other words, although the [+c] cluster is present in the lexical entry of stative OE verbs, it is never sent off to syntax. The argument linking in (66) proceeds in the following way: the [+c] cluster is marked as 1, while the [-m] cluster is assigned the index 2 (see (20)). The Experiencer, being a mixed cluster, that is, [-c +m], does not have any index. Since the Experiencer bears accusative case, it must merge internally in (66). Consequently, both arguments of the stative OE verb interesować ‘to interest’ merge internally, and the structure of this verb resembles that of double object unaccusatives (see Belletti and Rizzi Reference Belletti and Rizzi1988), except that accusative case is assigned to the Experiencer. Finally, in order to satisfy the EPP, the [-m] argument of the stative OE verb in (66) moves to Spec, TP. The schematic derivation of (66) in the Theta System is depicted in (68):Footnote ²⁵

1. (68) [_TP[_DP fizyka[_−m] ] [_VP interesuje [_V [_DP Ewę[_{−c +m}] ] [_V t_interesuje t_fizyka]]]]

   physics interests Eve

As was noted in section 4.1, stative OE verbs in Polish regularly alternate with SE verbs. A sentence like (66) above has an SE alternant, as in (69):

1. (69) Ewa-ø interesuje się fizyk-ą.

   Eve-nom is.interested.ipfv refl physics-instr

   ‘Eve is interested in physics.’

The lexical entry of interesować ‘to interest’ is the same in (69) as in (66), and it includes the clusters [+c], [-c -m] and [-m]. The [+c] cluster is eliminated in the latter case by the reduction operation, as is the accusative case.Footnote ²⁶ The [-m] cluster is marked 2 and is merged internally. The [-c +m] cluster, associated with the Experiencer, merges externally by (21a) to satisfy the EPP. Since in (69) the verb is not marked with accusative case, the Experiencer is free to merge externally, unlike in (66), where it merges internally due to the accusative case marking available from the verb. Consequently, in the Theta System, the alternations between stative OE verbs and their SE variants are derived in the same way as the alternations between eventive OE verbs and their SE counterparts, that is, by means of reduction. This is different from Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia (Reference Alexiadou and Iordăchioaia2014), for whom only eventive OE verbs participate in the psych causative alternation, whereas stative OE verbs are involved in a different type of alternation.

Although the analysis of stative OE verbs in Polish, carried out in the Theta System, is capable of accounting for the accusative case on the Experiencer, it does so at the cost of positing a [+c] cluster for stative OE verbs which is never lexicalised. The postulation of [+c] in the lexical entries of stative OE verbs saves Burzio's (Reference Burzio1986) Generalisation, according to which accusative case is assigned only in the presence of an external argument. However, it is not at all certain whether Burzio's Generalisation is operative in Polish (see Bondaruk et al. Reference Bondaruk, Rozwadowska and Witkowski2017b, who argue that this generalisation does not hold in the case of Polish stative OE verbs, which assign structural accusative to the Experiencer, despite the fact that these verbs do not project any Cause, even an implicit one). In adversity impersonal constructions like (70) below, the accusative may be assigned even though no external argument is projected (for an analysis of adversity impersonals in Polish, see Kibort Reference Kibort2004, Reference Kibort2008).

1. (70) Drog-ę zawiało śnieg-iem.

   road-acc covered.pfv snow-instr

   ‘The road was covered with snow.’

In (70), the accusative case is assigned to the phrase drogę ‘road’ in spite of the fact that the sentence does not exhibit any external argument.Footnote ²⁷ Consequently, it seems that Burzio's Generalisation is not universal (for a similar conclusion reached on the basis of data from languages other than Polish, see Haider Reference Haider and Toman1985; Haegeman Reference Haegeman1986; Woolford Reference Woolford1993; Reference Woolford1997; Bennis Reference Bennis, Alexiadou, Anagnostopoulou and Everaert2004, among others).Footnote ²⁸ Since Burzio's Generalisation is not valid cross-linguistically, positing a [+c] cluster that is never lexicalised, just to save the generalisation, seems to be a highly dubious move.

To wrap up, the way the Experiencer of stative OE verbs in Polish (and in other languages) is assigned accusative case in the Theta System is highly problematic. The accusative case marking of the Experiencer crucially depends on the [+c] cluster, which must be present in the lexical entry of an OE verb, even though it is never lexicalised. It is the [+c] cluster which guarantees that a stative OE verb is associated with the acc feature in the lexicon (see (20c)/67 above). The Theta System maintains Burzio's Generalisation, but the validity of this generalization has been questioned for a number of languages, including Polish. Consequently, the Theta System solution to the case linking puzzle associated with accusative Experiencers of stative OE verbs in Polish (as well as in other languages), turns out to be untenable.

5.2. Argument and case linking of dative Experiencers in Polish

OE verbs with dative case marked Experiencers are generally considered to be unaccusative (Pesetsky Reference Pesetsky1995; Reinhart Reference Reinhart2000, Reference Reinhart2002; Landau Reference Landau2010, among others). These verbs have two arguments, neither of which expresses causation. They do not have any [+c] alternate, either. As a result, following Reinhart (Reference Reinhart2000, Reference Reinhart2002), a verb like podobać się ‘appeal to’, illustrated in (71) below, will have a lexical entry as in (72), where the [-c -m] cluster corresponds to the T/SM argument, while the [-c] cluster represents the Experiencer:

1. (71) Kryminały-ø podobaj-ą się Mark-owi.

   detective.stories-nom appeal.to-3pl refl Mark-dat

   ‘Detective stories appeal to Mark.’

2. (72) [-c -m], [-c]

In (72), the T/SM argument is associated not only with the feature [-m], as has been proposed for the T/SM argument of stative OE verbs with accusative Experiencers (as in (66) above), but also with the [-c] feature. According to the theta role specifications in (19) above, the T/SM argument is only associated with the [-m] feature, which accounts for the fact that in many cases the T/SM argument may also serve as a Cause (see for instance (27) with (29) and (31)). In (71), the phrase kryminały ‘detective stories’ is not a possible Cause, and hence its feature specification is [-c -m]. This creates a new problem for the lexical entry of a stative OE verb like interesować ‘to interest’ in (66). Since the T/SM argument of a stative OE verb, as in (66), can never act as a Cause, we would expect the same feature cluster for the T/SM argument of stative OE verbs with both the accusative and dative Experiencer. However, if the T/SM in (66) were specified as [-c -m], then by instruction (20c/67), it would be associated with accusative case, hence blocking accusative case marking of the Experiencer (see Rákosi Reference Rákosi2006: 65, who observes that the choice between [-m] ad [-c -m] clusters in the Theta System has consequences for case marking). For this reason, it is necessary to propose two distinct feature specifications for the T/SM argument, one for the T/SM argument of stative OE verbs with Experiencers in the accusative, and another for the T/SM of OE verbs with dative Experiencers, even though they are semantically alike.

In the Theta System, dative Experiencers of verbs like appeal to are treated as part of an unaccusative structure (Reinhart Reference Reinhart2000, Reference Reinhart2002). The dative Experiencer of a dyadic predicate (as in (71)) is associated with the feature [-c] and is merged internally by instruction (20a). The [-c +m] specification of the Experiencer, in turn, allows for its internal or external merge, as was shown in section 4.2. Since dative Experiencers of dyadic predicates disallow an unergative derivation, they must be specified as simply [-c]. In spite of being [-c], the dative Experiencer, as in (71) above, must be interpreted in the semantics as [-c +m], following Marelj (Reference Marelj2004: 68). This allows for the satisfaction of the Principle of Full Interpretation, reproduced in (73) below:

1. (73) The Principle of Full Interpretation

   For the purposes of interpretation all clusters must be fully specified.

   (Marelj Reference Marelj2004: 67)

The Principle in (73) predicts that the unary [-c] cluster, as in (72), must be expanded to [-c +m]. This happens in the semantics, but not in the syntax (Marelj Reference Marelj2004: 69). The reason for positing the Principle of Full Interpretation is related to the fact that the underspecified [-c] cluster associated with the dative Experiencer is ambiguous, and hence may be interpreted either as [-c -m] or as [-c +m]. If the two interpretations of the [-c] cluster were possible in (71), then the sentence Detective stories appeal to Mark would entail that Mark appeals to detective stories, which is not possible. Thus, in order to avoid illicit interpretations, underspecified clusters, such as [-c], must be fully specified in the semantics.

Since the entry of the verb in (71), provided in (72), contains two [-] clusters, both of which are marked with index 2, they are both merged internally. No accusative case is assigned, as the [+c] cluster is missing in this case. Subsequently, the [-c -m] cluster moves to Spec, TP to satisfy the EPP, deriving (71).Footnote ²⁹ Case linking of the Experiencer in (72) is performed by means of a lexicon marking procedure, as in (74) below:

(74)    The unary clusters [-c] and [-m] require inherent case (or an adposition, depending on the morphological inventory of the language).

(Rákosi Reference Rákosi2006: 37)

In addition to (74), Marelj (Reference Marelj, Gelderen, Barðdal and Cennamo2013: 161) proposes the following linking procedure:

1. (75) [-c] → DAT

The procedure in (75) determines that the [-c] cluster is assigned dative case, where [-c] corresponds not only to dative Experiencers, as in (71), but also to a Recipient/Beneficiary/Goal (see (19) above).Footnote ³⁰ As we shall see in section 5.3, Polish dative Experiencers do not pattern with Goals or Beneficiaries, which casts serious doubt on treating the former on a par with the latter.

5.3. Problems for argument and case linking of Polish dative Experiencers in the Theta System

The most serious problem for argument linking of Polish dative Experiencers within the Theta System, presented in section 5.2, concerns the unaccusative status of OE verbs hosting this type of Experiencer. OE verbs with dative Experiencers in Polish seem to have an external argument, the Experiencer, and therefore they cannot be regarded as unaccusative. The evidence in favour of the external argument status of the dative Experiencer is based on binding. In Polish, reflexive pronouns are subject-oriented, that is, they are subject-bound (Willim Reference Willim1989, Reinders-Machowska Reference Reinders-Machowska, Koster and Reuland1991). This is illustrated in (76):

1. (76) a. Marek-ø₁ opowiedział Ew-ie₂ o sobie_1/*2.

   Mark-nom told.pfv Eve-dat about himself/*herself

   ‘Mark has told Eve about himself.’

   b. Marek-ø opowiedział Ew-ie₂ o swojej_1/*2 siostrze.

   Mark-nom told.pfv Eve-dat about self's_1/*2 sister

   ‘Mark has told Eve about his sister.’

In (76a) the anaphor sobie ‘himself’ may only be bound by the nominative subject Marek ‘Mark’, and can never be co-referential with the dative object Ewie ‘Eve’. Likewise, the possessive anaphor swój ‘self's in (76b) must be bound by the subject Marek ‘Mark’, not by the object Ewa ‘Eve’. Since they are subject-oriented, anaphors in Polish cannot be bound by dative Goals (76a–b), an issue that is addressed below.

Dative Experiencers behave like external arguments in that they can bind anaphors.Footnote ³¹ This is noticeable in the case of dative Experiencers, found with non-verbal predicates like żal ‘regret/sorrow’, strach ‘fear’, wstyd ‘shame’, szkoda ‘pity’, etc. (see Bondaruk and Szymanek Reference Bondaruk and Szymanek2007), as can be seen in (77):

1. (77) Mark-owi₁ jest żal siebie₁.

   Mark-dat is sorrow himself-gen

   ‘Mark feels sorry for himself.’

The dative Experiencer in (77) binds the anaphor siebie ‘himself’, and thus behaves like a subject in sentences (76a–b) above. The non-verbal predicate in (77) is dyadic (the other argument beside the Experiencer, being the anaphor siebie ‘himself’), not monadic, and consequently, it turns out to be problematic for the claim made in the Theta System that dative Experiencers of dyadic verbs merge internally (see section 5.2).Footnote ³² Although dative Experiencers with non-verbal predicates, as in (77), can bind anaphors, verbal predicates like podobać się ‘to appeal to’ resist anaphor binding by the dative Experiencer, as shown in (78):

1. (78) Mark-owi₁ podobaj-ą się *swoje₁/jego₁ obrazy.

   Mark-dat appeal-3pl refl *self's/his paintings-nom

   ‘Mark likes his paintings.’

Example (78) contains the possessive anaphor swój ‘self's’. The anaphor siebie ‘himself’ is impossible in (78), because it lacks nominative case, associated with the T/SM position of verbs like podobać się ‘to appeal to’. The possessive anaphor is disallowed in (78), which might be taken to cast doubt on the claim made above that dative Experiencers act as external arguments with respect to binding. However, there is an independent explanation for why anaphors are impossible with OE verbs selecting dative Experiencers. The reason why anaphors are banned in sentences like (78) is related to the Anaphor Agreement Effect (AAE), first observed by Rizzi (Reference Rizzi1990), which specifies that anaphors cannot be found in sentence positions associated with agreement. In Polish, only nominative case marked nouns determine verbal agreement, and therefore an anaphor placed in the nominative case marked position is blocked by the AAE.Footnote ³³ In (78), the possessive anaphor is contained within the nominative case marked nominal, and consequently, its occurrence is illicit under the AAE (see Gogłoza and Łęska Reference Gogłoza2018, who have confirmed the validity of the AAE in sentences with dative Experiencers in Polish via experimental studies).Footnote ³⁴ By contrast, an anaphor contained in a sentence with a non-verbal predicate like (77) is marked for the genitive, and therefore it is not blocked by the AAE. Despite the fact that the possessive anaphor in (78) is impossible due to the AAE, a possessive pronoun is perfectly legitimate in this case. However, if an anaphor with predicates like podobać się ‘to appeal to’ surfaces in a case different from the nominative, the dative Experiencer can bind it. This is the case in (79), taken from Witkoś (Reference Witkoś2008: 303–304):

1. (79) Nowak-om₂ spodobały się [nowe książki-ø Kowalsk-ich₁

   Nowak-pl.dat appealed.to refl new books-nom Kowalski-pl.gen

   o sobie_1/2].

   about each other-loc

   ‘The Nowaks liked the Kowalskis’ new books about themselves/each other.’

In (79), the anaphor may be bound either by the possessive DP Kowalskich ‘the Kowalskis’’ or by the dative Experiencer Nowakom ‘the Nowaks’. The anaphor sobie in (79) is embedded within the nominative T/SM and is marked for the locative, hence the AAE does not block it. A detailed analysis of the binding possibilities of OE verbs selecting dative Experiencers in Polish can be found in Witkoś and Meyer (Reference Witkoś and Meyer2018); it is not elaborated on here due to space limitations.Footnote ³⁵

Since dative Experiencers in Polish can bind subject-oriented anaphors, provided the AAE does not block this possibility, we must conclude that they are external arguments (see Nikolaeva Reference Nikolaeva2014 for a similar proposal concerning Russian Experiencers, and Citko et al. Reference Citko, Germain and Witkoś2018, who argue that dative Experiencers in Polish are placed in Spec, vP). Consequently, OE verbs with dative Experiencers project the Experiencer in an external argument position, and therefore they cannot be viewed as unaccusative (contra Miechowicz-Mathiasen and Scheffler Reference Miechowicz-Mathiasen, Scheffler, Witkoś and Fanselow2008).

The claim that OE verbs with dative Experiencers in Polish are not associated with an unaccusative structure raises a problem for the argument linking of dative Experiencers, proposed in the Theta System. As was noted in section 5.2, dative Experiencers of dyadic verbs are specified as [-c] in the lexicon, which guarantees that they merge internally. This line of analysis is untenable for Polish dative Experiences of dyadic psych predicates, whose behaviour with respect to binding proves that they must merge externally. Moreover, the [-c] specification of dative Experiencers in Polish would make them identical to dative Goals. This, however, cannot be maintained, as dative Experiencers can act as anaphor binders, as shown in (79) above, whereas dative Goals never bind anaphors, as demonstrated in (76a–b). The problem of the theta features associated with dative Experiencers cannot be solved by simply treating them on a par with accusative Experiencers, that is as [-c +m], because this kind of mixed cluster may be merged not only externally, as required for dative Experiencers, but also internally. This is due to the fact that this cluster is not marked in any way in the lexicon (see (20)). It is not possible to force the external merge of the dative Experiencer by the EPP, due to the fact that the Experiencer never occupies the Spec, TP position, (evidenced by the fact that it never controls verbal agreement (see footnote 29)). It is the nominative case marked T/SM argument that always determines verbal agreement in the structures under consideration and it normally fills the Spec, TP position.Footnote ³⁶ Consequently, we are left with no lexical entry for dative Experiencers in Polish, and hence we cannot derive the dative case of the Experiencer from its theta specifications. All in all, dative Experiencers in Polish give rise to insurmountable problems for the Theta System and its extension, proposed to account for the morphological dative case by Marelj (Reference Marelj, Gelderen, Barðdal and Cennamo2013).