Nominalization – lexical and syntactic aspects

The main tenet of the present paper is the thesis that nominalization – like other cases of derivational morphology – is an essentially lexical phenomenon with well defined syntactic (and semantic) conditions and consequences. More specifically, it will be argued that the relation between a verb and the noun derived from it is subject to both systematic and idiosyncratic conditions with respect to lexical as well as syntactic aspects

The Unaccusativity/Unergativity Distinction in Urdu

oai:ojs.katze.sprachwiss.uni-konstanz.de:article/1The article discusses the classification of intransitive verbs into two distinct classes, i.e. unaccusative and unergative (Perlmutter 1978, Burzio 1981, 1986). Burn, fall, drop, sink etc. having patient/theme subject, are supposed to be unaccusative verbs. Work, play, speak, smile etc., having agentive subject, are supposed to be unergative verbs. The unergative/unaccusative distinction has been shown to exist crosslinguistically and language specific tests have been proposed as diagnostics. We find tests for unaccusativity/unergativity distinction for Urdu/Hindi too. On the other hand, we find that there are many Urdu/Hindi intransitives that act both like unaccusatives as well as unergatives in different semantic contexts. Different authors have pointed out this fact for other languages especially of Romance and Germanic families ((Van Valin 1990, Zaenen 1993, Keller and Sorace 2003). This article therefore proposes to abandon a strict two-way distinction between unaccusatives and unergatives and proposes semantic features to model the validity/invalidty of different syntactic constructions involving intransitive verbs

Causative eventive chains and selection of affixes in Portuguese nominalisations

In Portuguese, different suffixes are used to construct event deverbal nouns from the same base verb. In this paper, we focus on deverbal nouns constructed from causative verbs. Being event nouns, the meanings of the derivatives of these suffixes differ slightly. We aim to contribute to the understanding of the mechanisms involved in semantic rivalry between affixes, specifically with regard to the knowledge of the semantic features of the verbal base that are sensitive to the semantics of each affix. We propose that the semantic features of the affix must be semantically compatible with semantic features of the lexical-semantic structure of the base verb. Because of a coindexation mechanism (Lieber 2004), the semantic features of the affix will coindex with the semantic features of the verb that are most compatible with its own features (Rodrigues & Rio-Torto 2013; Rodrigues 2008). Our hypothesis permits us to explain why there are so many verbs with different deverbal nouns, with different affixes. The affixes in those situations are not acting as rivals, since they are not competing with each other to exclude each other

Morphology and Syntax of Gerunds in Truku Seediq: A Third Function of Austronesian "Voice" Morphology.

Ph.D. Thesis. University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa 2017

Postmodifying prepositional phrases in English and Spanish (with special reference to locative modifiers)

Las frases preposicionales constituyen el tipo más frecuente de posmodificación en todos los registros del inglés (Biber et a. 1999: 634). En el español, las expresiones locativas suelen incorporar un pronombre relativo y un verbo (the books [which are] on the table > los libros que están encima de la mesa), o bien expresarse mediante una frase introducida por la preposición de (los libros de encima de la mesa). Wonder (1979) sostiene que el español permite el uso de preposiciones que no sean de en las frases locativas en el caso de "situaciones ‘activas'" (el aterrizaje en pleno campo) frente a "situaciones estáticas" (*el sofá en la sala), y también si la frase puede tener una función adverbial antes que, o además de, una interpretación adjetiva (el ruido en la calle), sobre todo si dicha frase encierra la idea de una posición alternativa para un objeto, o bien un contraste con otro objeto similar (el sofá en la sala contigua). El presente estudio pretende examinar este argumento y, además, explorar la posmodificación preposicional en español de un modo más general, a la par que propone una explicación sobre la elección de estructura en español que se basa en el criterio de la densidad léxica