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Passive vs. Unaccusative Predicates: A Phase-based Account

This research article provides evidence from Jordanian Arabic (JA) that passive predicates, unlike unaccusative predicates, project phases. Two tests are formulated to demonstrate this difference, namely long-distance agreement (between T0 and the internal argument) and quantifier stranding. Following Alexiadou et al. (2006), Alexiadou and Doron (2012) and Bruening (2013), we attribute this difference between passive and unaccusative predicates to the presence of Voice Phrase in the former but not the latter. In so doing, this article challenges a number of assumptions that equally qualify passive and unaccusative predicates as phases, or lack thereof, in natural languages (see e.g., Chomsky 2000; Legate 2003; Centeno and Vicente 2008; Deal 2009).