No HAVEs to GIVE? No problem!

On the Lack of Asymmetries between Ditransitive 3 Constructions in Slavic Have vs. Be Languages

Abstract

This paper explores a correlation, due to Harley (2002), that only languages that express predicative possession with a transitive verb like English have (i.e., languages with P_HAVE that incorporates into BE in her terms) allow double object constructions. We focus on Polish (a have-language) and Russian (a be-language) and show that the distinction between Have and Be languages and the availability of P_HAVE does not necessarily affect the properties (or existence) of double object constructions. We next turn to another potential diagnostic for the presence of a PP in a DOC, due to Bondarenko (2018), involving the availability of restitutive readings in DOCs. We show that Polish and Russian both lack restitutive readings in DOCs, suggesting that the presence of a PP/P_HAVE, which Polish has and Russian appears to lack, cannot be responsible for restitutive readings.