dativerecipientlike

Dativerecipientlike is a term used in linguistics to describe a category of nominal arguments that bear dative case and participate in a verb’s recipient-like semantics without necessarily serving as the syntactic recipient in a ditransitive construction. The label is used in theoretical and typological discussions to capture cases where recipient-related interpretation exists in the semantics, even if the syntactic position or case marking diverges from a canonical recipient.

The core idea is that certain arguments function like recipients in meaning—benefiting or receiving the result of an action—yet their grammatical realization does not conform to the standard indirect-object slot. Dativerecipientlike arguments typically involve dative marking and show distribution that resembles recipient roles, but they may appear as oblique arguments, adjuncts, or in alternative object positions depending on the language’s syntax and case system. This category is most often discussed in languages with rich case systems or flexible word order, where multiple arguments can bear recipient-related interpretation.

Cross-linguistic usage varies. In some languages, a dative-marked noun can convey recipient-like semantics without occupying the canonical recipient position; in others, the same semantic role is expressed through prepositional phrases or alternative case forms. The exact realization depends on the language’s morphology and syntactic construction, making the label useful primarily as a descriptive tool in comparative studies of argument structure.

Dativerecipientlike is related to but distinct from genuine recipient, beneficiive, and experiencer roles. It serves as a way to discuss how recipient-like meaning can be realized across languages, and it remains a topic of debate among theorists regarding its boundaries and theoretical utility.