The Journal of Studies in Language ISSN:1225-4770(Print) 2671-6151(Online) 언어연구

It is often assumed that all arguments undergo external merge (EM) inside the thematic domain. Based on this standard assumption, applied arguments are introduced below TP. This work provides crosslinguistic evidence suggesting that not all applied arguments are introduced in this fashion. It shows that discourse participants are applied arguments introduced in the left periphery. We collect evidence from Meadow Mari, southern dialects of Basque, Galician, Lebanese Arabic, and Magahi. The phenomena involve control constructions, case assignment, clitic realizations, and honorific mismatches. A theoretical implication of this work is that an argument-introducing head can be realized in CP. Hence, A-properties can be observed in what is often considered to be an A’-domain. Consequently, this work calls for a re-conceptualization of 𝜃-roles. The semantic-role that a nominal argument bears is largely determined by the syntactic context in which it undergoes EM.