Japanese event nouns and their categories

This dissertation studies the syntax and semantics of event nouns (with special attention to Japanese Verbal Nouns) within the framework of the Minimalist Program (Chomsky 1995). It has been generally assumed that syntactic categories, such as nouns or verbs, are described in the binary features [±N] [±V]. Nouns are [+N] [−V] and Verbs are [−N] [+V]. Event nouns (or Verbal Nouns) pose a question of this binary feature system since they show both verbal properties and nominal properties. Interestingly, Japanese Verbal Nouns show verbal properties in so-called Light Verb Constructions, and elsewhere they are nouns. That is, the categorial status of Verbal Nouns is sensitive to environment. To account for this, I adopt Distributed Morphology (Alexiadou 1999; Harley and Noyer 1999; Marantz 1997; Pak 2001 among others). In Distributed Morphology, syntactic categories are not primitive. Rather, the categorial status is determined by the closest functional projections, such as v or D.; In Chapter 2, I claim that Verbal Nouns are verbs when they appear as a complement of v. The existence of aspectual adverbs and manner adverbs reveals functional projections, such as AspectP, VoiceP, and vP in Verbal Nouns. The current approach also leads us to reconsider the so-called Light Verb su ‘do’. I argue that su is a one-argument verb, taking NP as a complement.; In Chapter 3, I attempt to show that the accusative Case on Verbal Nouns is an inherent Case when they appear as verbs. So-called double accusative constructions in Japanese and unaccusative Verbal Nouns in Light Verb Constructions degrade judgments. I claim that a source of degraded judgments comes from the inherent Case. For relevant Case-checking, I adopt San Martin and Uriagereka's (2002) Case-valuation system.; In Chapter 4, I argue that Verbal Nouns are nouns when they appear as a complement of D. One of the problems of Verbal Nouns as nouns is various word orders, especially ‘the head noun + numeral + classifier + Case’. In this word order, the sentence becomes unacceptable. I claim that the ‘numeral + classifier’ for Verbal Nouns has a strong [+event] feature which must be overtly checked.