University Tehran Language Research 2251-9289 6 1 2015 05 22 Passive Structure in Persian: A Minimalist Approach Passive Structure in Persian: A Minimalist Approach 1 20 56604 10.22059/jolr.2015.56604 FA Mazdak Anoushe Assistant Professor of Linguistics Department, Tehran University 0000-0002-4542-7847 Journal Article 2015 02 07 Whether or not there is a verbal passive construction in Persian has been ‎highly controversial. Traditional grammarians and most linguists have ‎argued that there is a structural passive construction in Persian, similar to ‎that observed in English. Within the framework of the Minimalist ‎Program, but more in the spirit of Emonds’s (2006) division of analytic ‎passives into verbal and adjectival, it will be argued that the Persian ‎so-called verbal passive construction is just an instance of adjectival ‎passive, or indeed, unaccusative CPr with a past participle serving as ‎its NV element. In line with what holds for verb movement in simplex ‎and complex predicates, it will be discussed in detail that Modern ‎Persian lacks verbal passive constructions and hence passive ‎projections, and in contrast to the grammatical verb budan ‘to be’ ‎which can be used either as a light verb in complex predicates or as a ‎perfect auxiliary in present/past perfect tenses, the grammatical verb ‎šodan ‘to become’, which is traditionally considered as a passive ‎auxiliary, is indeed a light verb hosted by an NV element. According ‎to this line of analysis, in Persian adjectival passives, the head [A-en] is ‎present in both LF and PF and the past participle is obligatorily ‎interpreted as an adjective. Whether or not there is a verbal passive construction in Persian has been ‎highly controversial. Traditional grammarians and most linguists have ‎argued that there is a structural passive construction in Persian, similar to ‎that observed in English. Within the framework of the Minimalist ‎Program, but more in the spirit of Emonds’s (2006) division of analytic ‎passives into verbal and adjectival, it will be argued that the Persian ‎so-called verbal passive construction is just an instance of adjectival ‎passive, or indeed, unaccusative CPr with a past participle serving as ‎its NV element. In line with what holds for verb movement in simplex ‎and complex predicates, it will be discussed in detail that Modern ‎Persian lacks verbal passive constructions and hence passive ‎projections, and in contrast to the grammatical verb budan ‘to be’ ‎which can be used either as a light verb in complex predicates or as a ‎perfect auxiliary in present/past perfect tenses, the grammatical verb ‎šodan ‘to become’, which is traditionally considered as a passive ‎auxiliary, is indeed a light verb hosted by an NV element. According ‎to this line of analysis, in Persian adjectival passives, the head [A-en] is ‎present in both LF and PF and the past participle is obligatorily ‎interpreted as an adjective. https://jolr.ut.ac.ir/article_56604_7c5c19a19d6ce2d3a58c749b478ae9a2.pdf