D Atives In

(1) a. Japanese datives appear to systematically map, in properties, to English double object constructions (DOCs) and not to prepositional datives (Zushi 1992, Miyagawa and Tsujioka 2005). b. We argue (following Zushi 1992) that the “standard” order of arguments in Japanese datives is a derived one. c. We propose this follows from “weak ni’s” the fact that in Japanese, ni is never a case probe; rather the ni-phrase is a concordial element. d. We argue that this effect is general, observed with many cases of ni-phrases, including those appearing in locatives & possessives.