Experiencers with (un)willingness

The paper contributes to the raising vs. control debate with respect to modals through (A) novel data; (B) the investigation of a domain in which it has proven particularly problematic: volitional modality. We analyze oblique arguments of experiencer verbs embedded under German wollen ‘want’ and propose that they support both generalized raising and the abandonment of the classical version of the Theta Criterion. Byproducts of the analysis include a syntactic account involved in a class of datives in the language together with the initial characterization of a related modal in German which is expressed through the same item as volition and which we term weak.