Polish equatives as symmetrical structures 69
(11) TP
T′vPtojestMarekØTv PredPDP Pred′DPdobry s tudentPredThe representation in (11) differs from the structure proposed by Citko (2008) for
Polish predicational clauses with the pronominal copula to insofar as in her theory
the verb być ‘to be’ occupies the head of PredP, whereas in the representation offered
here, być ‘to be’ appears in v and is treated as a subtype of unaccusative verbs, along
the lines proposed for the English copula by Mikkelsen (2005: 167). Being unac-
cusative, the verb być ‘to be’ does not discharge any external theta role, and it does
not assign accusative case. However, in contradistinction to other unaccusative
verbs which take a VP complement, the verbal copula is followed by a small clause
complement (PredP). Following Citko (2008), we will place to in (11) in T and will
treat it as a kind of expletive copula which lacks any tense features until the verb
być ‘to be’ has adjoined to it at LF (a different approach to to is taken by Bondaruk
2013b, who treats to as a Pred; since this approach raises the problem of ordering the
pronominal copula in front of the verb być ‘to be’ in sentences such as (9), it is not
adopted here). (11) is a structural representation of both sentences (9) and (10a), but
their derivation is different. In the case of (9) Marek ‘Mark’ enters into Agree with
T, thereby it has its nominative case valued and subsequently moves to [Spec, TP]
to satisfy the EPP feature of T. Both Citko (2008) and Bondaruk (2013b) argue that
Agree operating in (9) is multiple, i.e. T targets both the subject and the predicate
and simultaneously values the case feature of either of the two DPs as the nomina-
tive. However, it is always the closest DP, i.e. the subject that moves to [Spec, TP].
The application of Multiple Agree in to być predicational clauses will turn out to be
crucial for the argumentation presented here and will be returned to while discuss-
ing the person restriction surfacing in this kind of structure, which is nonetheless
absent from equatives.