On the -key toy-construction as Implicit Causatives

Abstract

The -key toy-construction is sometimes analyzed as periphrastic passives. The passive analysis, however, faces empirical and theoryinternal problems, suggesting that it may not be passives. It is instead proposed that they are a kind of causatives whose causers are implicit. -key is a phonological substantiation of a functional head licensing a causee. Both -key ha- and -key toystructures share a common complement whose head is realized as -key. The shared complement denotes a caused event. The difference between the two periphrastic constructions resides in the nature of the causative verbs involved. The causative auxiliary verb -ha projects its external argument, the causer, while the other “causative” auxiliary verb -toy does not. This “unaccusative” causative verb suppresses the causer on a par with a passivization suppresses an external argument, which is sometimes realized as an adjunct. The -key toy-construction is a causative whose causer is not present while the periphrastic causative explicitly projects a causer.