Intensional genitive in Polish

This paper aims to analyse the syntax of intensional genitive in Polish, assigned to internal arguments of specific intensional verbs. Intensional genitive appears in positions typical of accusative and nominative arguments, depending on whether it occurs in transitive or intransitive (unaccusative) structures, respectively. Although Polish intensional genitive is lexically constrained, it obeys structural case diagnostics, such as dużo ‘many’-type phrases and distributive po-phrases. Therefore, intensional genitive represents a structural case like the genitive of negation, but it is distinct from inherent genitive. Two analyses of intensional genitive case assignment in Polish are provided here. The first one, couched in the slightly modified version of case assignment by designated functional heads due to Chomsky (2000, 2001), takes case to be represented in the syntax as a single undifferentiated feature, which is then assigned a specific value (nominative, accusative or genitive) at PF. The other analysis is rooted in Dependent Case Theory of Baker (2015), where intensional genitive is viewed as an unmarked case, like the unmarked nominative, except that the former is spelt out in a VP, whereas the latter is spelt out in a TP. Both of the above-mentioned analyses are capable of deriving the full range of structures with intensional genitive in Polish, provided the assignment of intensional genitive is made sensitive to the type of verb used. Making intensional genitive depend on the verb type is problematic in the analysis based on Dependent Case Theory, because it blurs the distinction between the unmarked genitive and the dependent accusative.