Case and Voice properties of complex event nominalizations: A Voice-bundling approach

Abstract This study examines case and Voice properties of complex event nominalizations (CENs) in Lithuanian (Baltic). CENs in some languages exhibit an ergative case pattern and a passive-like VoiceP lacking a projected external argument (e.g., Alexiadou 2001, 2017; Salanova 2007; Imanishi 2014). Evidence from Lithuanian shows that ergativity and passive Voice are not the necessary components of CENs. First, Lithuanian CENs do not exhibit an ergative case pattern: they have two distinct structural genitive cases, a possessive genitive and a nonpossessive genitive, which are analogous to a nominative-accusative case pattern found in active transitive constructions. Second, Lithuanian CENs do not exhibit passivization: they have a syntactically projected external argument and a theme grammatical object with structural object case, namely the nonpossessive genitive. I capture the Lithuanian pattern by extending a Voice-bundling approach (Pylkkänen 2002, 2008; Harley 2017) to the nominal domain: CENs contain n voice act P, which performs the functions of both, a nominalizing n and an active thematic Voice bundled together. The n voice act head i) nominalizes the verbal structure, and ii) introduces an external argument as well as assigns structural object case to the theme. Overall, this study demonstrates that CENs can have the same transitive structure found in verbal clauses.