The Kikamba Passive Construction: A Challenge for the Government and Binding based Analyses

Abstract

Studies relating to the passive construction have focused on two main areas: I) the universal characterisation of the construction, (Comrie 1977, Perlmutter and Postal 1983, Siewierska 1984 and Keerwn 1985); and 2) the interested in the formulation of theories on the passive construction, (Chomsky 1965, 1981; Jaeggli 1986; Roberts 1987; Baker 1988; Afarli 1989, 1990; Perlmutter and Postal 1983; Postal, 1986). Recent Government and Binding based approaches analyse the passive morpheme as an argument of the verb which must receive the External Theta-role and the Structural Case assigned by the verb (Roberts 1987; Baker 1988; and Afarli 1989, 1990). This paper describes the passive construction in Kikamba and examines the descriptive adequacy of the Government and Binding claims.