The Analysis of Secondary Ditransitive Verbs in Jafi Kurdish Language in the Framework of Distributional Morphology

The purpose of this paper is to show that, firstly, the Jafi dialect of Kurdish language can transform single transitive verbs into secondary ditransitive verbs in two ways, and secondly, the constructions containing them are analyzed better under the framework of the Distributional Morphology (DM). In the first way, one of the prepositions along with the indirect object are added to the sentence containing transitive verbs. In the second method, in addition to them, the applicative–causative morpheme should be added to the root of the transitive and intransitive verbs. There are some evidences that the syntax-oriented approach of DM is better able to analyze the syntactic structure, categorization, semantic, and phonetic representation of these constructions. The results of the analysis of the main and secondary ditransitive constructions of the Jafi variety support the existence of low applicative phrase (ApplP_low) and high applicative phrase (ApplP_high) respectively in the literature. ApplP_low is placed below VP for showing syntactic alignment of the main ditransitive constructions; however, ApplP_high is placed above the VP and below the voice phrase (Voicep) to introduce the syntactic arrangement of secondary ditransitive constructions. It can be concluded that the syntactic-based approach of DM can differentiate the categorization, phonetic, and semantic representation of secondary and main ditransitive verbs appropriately.
Introduction
Argument structure refers to the set of arguments associated with each predicate, in addition to the predicate itself, each bearing a distinct semantic role. The argument structure of the main ditransitive verbs contains two internal arguments and one external argument, and in terms of the linear order, ditransitive verbs appear in two forms of double object construction (DOC) as in (1a) and double complement construction (DCC) as in (1b) in English and many other languages. In DCC, the order of the internal arguments is in the form of direct object and indirect object. In some languages, a preposition or a postposition or both of them simultaneously come along with the indirect object. Despite this, the linear sequence of DOC is in the order of an indirect object and then a direct object, and there is no extra pre or postposition between the two objects. However, in a number of languages, various suffixes and morphological markers appear in ditransitive constructions, indicating that linear order alone is not a reliable criterion for distinguishing between DOC and DCC.

a) I give Ahmad the money.
b) I give the money to Ahmad.

Contrary to the above classification, constructions containing ditransitive verbs in Jafi, as a variety of the central dialect of the Kurdish language that is spoken in most of the cities of Hawraman region in the northwest and west of Kermanshah province, are divided into two categories: basic transitional ditransitive verbs and secondary ditransitive verbs. Basic transitional object verbs include two classes: (a) possession transfer verbs such as "dän=giving" and (b) place transfer verbs like "(ha)närdin=sending". Secondary ditransitive constructions are also divided into two subgroups: (a) prepositions are added along with the indirect object to sentences containing transitive verbs, as in (2a) and (b) in addition to this, the applicative–causative morpheme /ên/ in the present tense and /(ä)n/ in the past should be added to the root of the transitive and intransitive action verbs as in (2b). As the  data in (2a) and (2b) show, this action affects the syntactic capacity, semantic and phonetic representation, and even the event structure of the construction

a) (min) bo däik-im dafr-ak-än- im (bo- i) šor   -d

      (I) for mother-my dishes- DE (for him) wash- PTM
      "I washed the dishes for my mother."

b) ema be aw (pêi)čêšt-(i)     a- xor- ên - in

       We- to him  food- accu –PTS- eat- Ap-CAS
            "We feed him."
Most research has been carried out under the generative framework of lexicalism and syntactic-oriented approaches based on English ditransitive data. However, different languages have different ditransitive constructions with their own characteristics. Each researcher refers to a specific criterion for identifying ditransitive constructions (Bars & Lasnik, 1986; Harley, 2002; Jackendoff, 1990; Larsen, 1988). In this regard, Pilkanen (2008) presents the semantic criteria of transfer of possession and location from the direct object to the indirect object as a prerequisite for the low applicative phrase (ApplP_low) in basic ditransitive verbs. He also cites the criterion of linking the external argument with the event structure of the entire verbal phrase (VP) to determine the high applicative phrase (ApplP^high) in verbs that require secondary objects. In this context, Harley (2013) provides evidence from Hiaki language in support of the findings of Pilkanen (2008) in the domain of “little v’ Phrase. He states that the behavior of applicative constructions shows that the causative-making head of v does not introduce the external argument; rather, it only introduces the morphological and semantic features of the causative argument and event. However, a higher head called “voiceP” introduces the external argument to the structure syntactically.
Therefore, the current study seeks to answer a fundamental question regarding how the argument structure of secondary ditransitive constructions in the Jafi variety of Kurdish is represented within the framework of Distributional Morphology (DM) (Harley, 2012; Sadighi, 2009), as follows:
How are the argument structures of secondary ditransitive constructions in Jafi categorized, and how are they semantically and phonetically represented within the syntactic-oriented framework of DM?
Methods
This is a theoretical study using the qualitative approach. In order to analyze the data, we adopted a generative framework, especially its latest form, the Distributional Morphology. Researchers are native Kurdish speakers of Jafi variety belonging to the central dialect of Kurdish language. In addition to using linguistic intuition, the researchers also used the linguistic judgment of other native speakers of Jafi Kurdish to ensure the accuracy of data. The purpose of this paper is to show that, firstly, the Jafi dialect of Kurdish language can transform single transitive verbs into ditransitive verbs in two ways, and secondly, the constructions containing them are better analyzed under the framework of the Distributional Morphology (DM). In the first way, one of the prepositions along with the indirect object are added to the sentence containing transitive verbs. In the second method, in addition to them, the applicative–causative morpheme should be added to the root of the transitive and intransitive action verbs. Thus, some evidences like the unmarked linear order of secondary ditransitive constructions indicate that the syntax-oriented approach of DM, in which the syntax is the productive engine that generates the combination and construction of words in the same way as phrases and sentences, is better able to analyze the syntactic structure, categorization, and semantic representation of these constructions.
Results
The results of the analysis of the main and secondary ditransitive constructions of the Jafi variety support the existence of low applicative phrase (ApplP_low) and high applicative phrase (ApplP^high) respectively in the literature. ApplP_low is placed below VP for showing syntactic alignment of the main ditransitive constructions; however, ApplP^high is placed above the _VP and below the voice phrase (Voicep) to introduce the syntactic arrangement of secondary ditransitive constructions. The results indicate that the syntactic-based approach of DM can differentiate the categorization, phonetic, and semantic representation of secondary and main ditransitive verbs appropriately. Therefore, categorization is complete in phonetic form for phonetic representation and in logical form for semantic representation.
Phonetic representation takes place based on the features obtained from the final nodes of the syntactic alignment in the spell-out stage. Thus, these features are subjected to special morpho–syntactic processes of merger, movement, re-alignment, and case-marking in order to achieve the final phonetic form and to prevent the derivation from being crashed.
Semantic representation is also obtained according to the logical form and event structure resulting from the syntactic alignment as in Hovav and Levin (2008). The core category (“little v’ Phrase) and shell category (VP) introduce the causal event structure and resultative event structure into the syntactic alignment, respectively. Adding the indirect object causes the AspP category to chang the action event structure of the sentence into a telic event structure. The applicative semantic role is obtained from the second head of the ApplP^high category. This head also establishes the relationship between applicative category with the entire verbal event structure. The agent argument is also introduced in the head of the VoiceP. Beyond this, the head of the VoiceP establishes the relationship between the external argument and the vP phase. Other categories such as TP and CP are present in syntactic alignment to complete the process of categorizing predicates and arguments and turning them into full statements.
Conclusion
Argument structure of ditransitive verbs is one of the challenging topics in linguistic texts. In this regard, the present paper investigated secondary ditransitive verbs in the Jafi dialect of the Kurdish language. The results indicated that the syntactic-oriented approach of DM can best explain the categorization, phonetic and semantic representation of the argument structure of secondary ditransitive construction of Jafi variety; thus, providing a suitable answer to the basic question of the current study. With the help of many arguments including the unmarked linear order of these constructions, it was confirmed that the categorization, semantic and phonetic representation of these constructions, unlike those of the main ditransitive verbs, begin in the syntactic section and are completed in the post-syntactic stages, in accordance with the revised version of Pilkanen (2008), as explicated in the previous section The analysis of these constructions under the current theoretical linguistic trends can shed more light on the study of various aspects of Kurdish dialects specifically and other Iranian languages in general. Thus, many subjects and issues remain to be studied under the syntactic-based approach of DM by future researchers.
Ethical Considerations
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Funding
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Conflict of interest
The authors declare no conflict of interest.