Deriving Ewe (Tongugbe) nyá-constructions

Ewe (Kwa, Niger-Congo) has a construction known in the literature as the nyá -construction ( Ameka 1991 , 2005a ; Collins 1993 ; Duthie 1996 ; Adjei 2014 ). The logical internal argument of the construction occurs in subject position and the logical external argument is either absent on the surface or represented in the construction as a for -PP. In this paper, I consider the syntax of the Ewe nyá -construction, exploring data from the Tongugbe dialect. I show that the nyá -construction shares properties with English middles. I demonstrate that the agent or experiencer for -PP that may occur in the nyá -construction is its external argument, projected in Spec vP. Further, I argue that even if the for -PP is not overtly realized, it is syntactically projected in Spec vP, contrary to theories like Bruening 2013 . The analysis I put forward provides support for the Theta-Criterion, which forces all arguments to be syntactically projected.