Abstract.  Bantu languages display a number of constructions that raise serious questions about the universality of the theory of abstract Case as currently realized in the Minimalist Program. Chomsky (2000) claims that positing uninterpretable features (like Case features) is not purely stipulation but that uninterpretable features are justified by their visible effects in the syntax. This paper presents evidence that the syntactic effects predicted by Case theory are not borne out in Bantu languages, which in fact display effects that are only predicted to be possible in the absence of uninterpretable Case features. Evidence includes constructions where Case‐checking should require a DP to cease being active, but it does not do so (e.g., compound tenses and raising constructions), as well as instances where Case‐checking could not have occurred, but the constructions are nonetheless acceptable (e.g., possible‐constructions and locative inversion). It is claimed that uninterpretable Case features are not present in Bantu languages and that it is instead gender features that make a goal active for Agree (following Carstens 2011).

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Locative inversion patterns are instances of a non‐canonical word order where a locative phrase (in a canonically SVO language) moves to preverbal position, leaving the thematic subject postverbally. There are a wide variety of morphosyntactic variations in this basic inversion pattern cross‐linguistically (and even within individual languages), and the evidence suggests that different syntactic mechanisms are used in different instances to generate the same surface word orders, both in English and in various Bantu languages. Analyses and diagnostic evidence are presented for all of these languages showing that, despite the range of variation, similar syntactic mechanisms appear to be at play across languages. The non‐canonical patterns that occur in locative inversion constructions raise important questions for theoretical assumptions about Case licensing, agreement, and locality in particular, and the theoretical work in those areas is addressed as well.

In Lubukusu and Lusaamia, the wh-expression ‘how’ agrees in φ-features with the subject of its clause. We show that agreement on ‘how’ is not always identical to subject agreement on the verb: the two diverge in certain locative inversion and subject extraction environments. On the basis of these facts, we argue that ‘how’ is a vP adjunct with downward-probing uφ independent of the uφ that underlies subject agreement. We also explore locality paradoxes that arise in connection with agreeing ‘how’ in locative inversion constructions. These present challenges to the traditional notion of equidistance from a probe as an explanation for inversion, show that operators may have ‘‘active’’ φ-features even while they are Ā-opaque, and offer insight into the mechanisms making locative inversion possible.