Abstract

This paper argues that the Theta Criterion does not hold in Japanese and that theta roles are deterrnined contextually with argument NPs being optional rather than obligatory. The primary empirical evidence for this claim is derived from the fact that Japanese does not have either anaphoric or pronominal NPs nor are Japanese verbs inflected for person, number and/or gender. Anaphoric and pronominal relationships are expressed in this language at the level of lexical iterns, verbal compounding, verb-prefixes and the like. lt is thus suggested that theta theory is subject to language-specific parameterization in that languages may differ with respect to whether or not theta roles are required to surface syntactically as phrasal categories. Some of the general consequences that this claim may have for linguistic theory are discussed on the basis of the Japanese data presented.