2313-8912Research Result. Theoretical and Applied Linguistics2313-891210.18413/2313-8912-2023-9-4-0-63310APPLIED LINGUISTICS<strong>The structures of Malay language existential sentences</strong><strong>The structures of Malay language existential sentences</strong>SultanFazal Mohamed MohamedSultanFazal Mohamed Mohamedfazal@ukm.edu.myZawawiAhmad Syafiq Amir AbdullahZawawiAhmad Syafiq Amir Abdullahsyafiqamir2017@gmail.comRazakRogayah ARazakRogayah ARogayah@ucsiuniversity.edu.myUCSI University, MalaysiaNational University of Malaysia, Malaysia20239400

This study aims to analyze the syntactic structures of existential sentences in Malay and focuses on the verb ada to produce generalization regarding existential verbs in Malay. Our findings showed that the transitive verb ada is motivated by the position of the verb as it occurs as a ditransitive verb in the ada-DP-VP structure, while in the DP-ada structure it acts as an unaccusative verb. The position of ada is motivated by the Definite Constraint when the DP occurs preceding the verb. The analysis of the derivation the DPDefinite for the unaccusative verb of the structure DPDefinite-ada showed that the DPDefinite is generated from the complement position of ada and is moved to the [Spec,TP] in the syntactic structure. The derivation of the&nbsp; DPDefinite is due to two factors: one, is the need for feature checking by the EPP with regards to the uninterpreted feature[uN*] at Tense node and secondly, due to the feature checking of uninterpreted zero case marking at DPDefinite which loses its accusative case due to it being a complement to the verb ada. We assume that the existential construction for ada-DP-VP is not the output from the derivational process as claimed by previous researchers, but rather both constructions have different syntactic structures in the VP shell.

This study aims to analyze the syntactic structures of existential sentences in Malay and focuses on the verb ada to produce generalization regarding existential verbs in Malay. Our findings showed that the transitive verb ada is motivated by the position of the verb as it occurs as a ditransitive verb in the ada-DP-VP structure, while in the DP-ada structure it acts as an unaccusative verb. The position of ada is motivated by the Definite Constraint when the DP occurs preceding the verb. The analysis of the derivation the DPDefinite for the unaccusative verb of the structure DPDefinite-ada showed that the DPDefinite is generated from the complement position of ada and is moved to the [Spec,TP] in the syntactic structure. The derivation of the&nbsp; DPDefinite is due to two factors: one, is the need for feature checking by the EPP with regards to the uninterpreted feature[uN*] at Tense node and secondly, due to the feature checking of uninterpreted zero case marking at DPDefinite which loses its accusative case due to it being a complement to the verb ada. We assume that the existential construction for ada-DP-VP is not the output from the derivational process as claimed by previous researchers, but rather both constructions have different syntactic structures in the VP shell.

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