Light verbs and structural case

In this paper, we focus on a group of the Kurdish, Korean and Persian Light Verb Constructions (LVCs); consisting of a semantically light verb (LV) and a verbal noun (VN). It is argued that the LVs, capable of case marking and hosting verbal features, in combination with T function either as nominative and accusative case markers or only as nominative case markers. It is shown that the arguments of VNs can be structurally licensed via T and LV whose case assigning roles are not thematically restricted. Although these LVs as the most thematically bleached natural verbs seem very similar to v in the Minimalist Program, the way they are analyzed in this work indicates that the LVs can not support the notion of v(P) as a head above VP in a clause.