DOCSLIB.ORG

I. Introduction

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
I. Introduction I. INTRODUCTION The aim of this work is to analyze the differences and similarities between English and Czech predications with regards to their level of semantic dynamism. First of all, I will concentrate on the whole concept of dynamism in semantics. This includes the general characteristics as well as the concrete realization of the category in English and Czech. I will then describe the characteristic features of predicates and their categorical division according to the grammatical and semantic criteria. This division was made presumably on the ground of the book A Functional Analysis of Present Day English on a General Linguistic Basis by Vilém Mathesius. I have tried to describe the characteristics of predications in English and compare them to predications in Czech. In this linguistic analysis of English and Czech predications I have concentrated especially on the major differences between them as English and Czech are not closely related language. This analysis will serve as the basis for my further study. I will then explain other differences between the two languages as I will concentrate in more detail on the specific features of English that are not typical for Czech, especially sentence condensation and the tendency of English to nominal expression of reality. Another major difference between English and Czech is their system of tenses that I will describe later. English has a very complex system that combine the present, past and future tenses existing in Czech with progressive and perfect aspects. The choice of a concrete type of tense always depends on the dynamism of a concrete situation. As the dynamism of some situation is later modified by the choice of language units to describe it, I will set up, in the next part of my analysis, a scale of dynamism that reflects both of the stages. I will explain all of the categories but in most detail those categories where the expression of the same extra-linguistic considerably differs in English and Czech. I will further support my conclusions with concrete examples of predications from the first two chapters of two original books and their translations. As original sources served for my study Karel Čapek’s book Válka s Mloky and -1- Main Street written by Sinclair Lewis. Čapek’s book was translated by Ewald Osers and Main Street by Eva Kondrysová. I have chosen these two books because they were written in similar periods of time and because their first two chapters are of a similar length. I have also preferred to have one original text and one translation in both of the languages so that I could minimize the risks of including in my analysis subjective style of a translator instead of an objective reality. The concrete examples presented in this part of the study are always the most typical examples that represent the true reality, not some outskirt phenomena. All of the conclusions that I have made concerning predications and their dynamism are supported by arguments, illustrated by examples and are fully correspondent with the results of the statistic comparison. II. THE CONCEPT OF DYNAMISM The most dynamic part of speech is a verb because verbs are “fitted (by their capacity to show tense and aspect, for example) to indicate action, activity and temporary or changing conditions” (Quirk, Greenbaum 1972: 48). Nouns, as the least dynamic part of speech, occupy a position opposite to that of verbs. They could be characterized as “stative” because they refer to entities that are regarded as stable, whether concrete or abstract (Quirk, Greenbaum 1972: 48). Other parts of speech are somewhere between these two. This fact is true both in English and Czech though there are differences in dynamism within the categories themselves. Even some nouns, for example, are not truly stative. Gerund is a special kind of an English noun. As it was formed from a verb, it is characteristic for some features that are common for nouns and others that are common for verbs. Gerund, therefore, has a certain level of dynamism. An example of a gerund is the noun “reading” in Reading books is my favourite hobby . Similarly, a verbal noun in Czech is more dynamic than other nouns: Mám rád čtení knih (Vachek 1980: 109). -2- English adjectives are generally more dynamic than their Czech counterparts in that they have the possibility not just to denote a permanent quality of a person or a thing but also one which occurs only in the particular situation as in the sentence He was late in coming that day (Vachek 1980: 104). As Czech adjectives are lacking this property, the sentences must be translated with a verb: Toho dne se opozdil . In spite of this, it would not be proper to say that Czech adjectives are fully stative. There is a certain group of adjectives, verbal adjectives, which have a higher degree of dynamism than other adjectives (“dělající”, “spící”) (Komárek 1986: 142). Considering the characteristic features of adjectives, such as their ability to denote some temporary quality, their similarity to verbs in the passive voice, it is possible to say that adjectives are more dynamic than nouns. Even the most dynamic part of speech, the group of verbs, has an inside diversity. Verbs are usually divided into two basic groups in semantics – into dynamic and stative verbs. Whereas stative verbs denote some rather permanent quality (know, like), dynamic verbs refer to some action, changing situation (dance, rain) (Hladký 1998: 73-74). Even stative verbs, however, are not truly stative in that they can be conjugated and express a change in this way (I knew it but I don’t know it anymore ). All of them are therefore more dynamic than dynamic adjectives or nouns. This does not concern those verbs which are not fully grammatically independent. Such verbs that lost the semantic centre of gravity are very much similar to a copula and can not be bearers of dynamism though they may seem like that ( They are getting ready ) (Vachek 1980: 104). III. PREDICATION TYPES IN ENGLISH AND CZECH As I am going to analyze the English and Czech predicates on the basis of their dynamism, it is necessary to present the linguistic classification of the system of predication -3- in both languages. According to Mathesius, there are four main types of predication: actional predication, qualifying predication, existential predication and possessive predication. Actional predication is a predication that denotes taking some action. The most frequent way of expressing action in both languages is a purely verbal predication in the finite verb form: I saw her yesterday - Včera jsem ji viděl . However, there is also the verbo-nominal predication which is quite common in English and not much common in Czech. Verbo- nominal predication is a predication that combines a verb and a noun (Mathesius 1975: 104). A several subcategories of verbo-nominal predication could be established in order to illustrate properly this kind of predication. In the first subcategory, both the action and the agent are expressed by a single nominal expression functioning as the rheme of the sentence. In the second subcategory, the agent and the action are divided between the theme and the rheme of the actual statement. The example of the first subcategory in English is the sentence with the common English existential construction “there is”: There has been a steady rising in the prices of gold. Not placing the rheme at the beginning of the sentence is enabled by the use of “there is” which serves as a theme but has almost void meaning. As English has a fixed word order, this construction offers one of the small number of possibilities for placing the rheme towards the end of the statement. The action is expressed nominally by the gerund (“a steady rising”), not by the verb (Vachek 1980: 98). A little different type of sentences with the construction “there is” represents this example: There was a sharp wind blowing. Here, it is not obvious whether “there was” belongs to the “wind” or whether it is a part of the construction “there was a blowing” with “wind” as an attribute though the first possibility seems to be more likely. The use of “there is” in English sentences is common in these instances: when the subject is unknown or when it does not have to be expressed, when the entire action is the rheme and therefore it suits better the requirements of the functional sentence perspective. Sometimes, the only explanation for using the construction can only be -4- the tendency of English for nominal expression of verbal action (Mathesius 1975: 105). This could be one of the reasons why no similar construction exists in Czech. The second subcategory where the agent and the action are distributed between the theme and the rheme can be found in Czech as well, though they are less common than in English. These verbo-nominal structures have four types: possessive, causative, adverbial and a predication affected by adjectival qualification (Mathesius 1975: 106). Possessive type of actional predication is expressed by a noun that is connected to a copula “have” or to another verb with similar meaning. Instances of such constructions in English are: “to have a shave”, “to have a smoke” etc. Another example could be the sentence I have no hesitation in stating that you are wrong (Mathesius 1975: 106). This possessive predication is possible in Czech as well. Though these predications may seem like those of a verbal kind, “have” in many ways resembles a copula from the semantic point of view (Dušková 1994: 409). These are some instances of actional predication of the possessive type in Czech: Už jsi měl snídani? Měli jsme spolu takovou debatu.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Cross-Disciplinary Collaboration for Teaching Colors in Menominee
    The Complexity of Simple Things: Cross-disciplinary Collaboration for Teaching Colors in Menominee Monica Macaulay Linguistics Department Rita MacDonald School of Education 3/9/17 UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 1 Who we are • Language documentation, • Applied linguistics, SLA description, analysis and TESOL • Language teacher & teacher educator Rita Monica Menominee Language and Culture Commission 3/9/17 UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 2 3/9/17 UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 3 Menominee Language • Algonquian language of Wisconsin • Documented 1921-1949 by Leonard Bloomfield • MM: working with community since 1998 3/9/17 UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 4 Menominee Language Revitalization Current status: • Fewer than 5 L1 speakers, all elderly • Small number of proficient L2 speakers • No external communiMes of speakers • 2016-present: Tribal program to train teachers 1. to speak Menominee (14 months) 2. to become teachers for pre-school immersion 3/9/17 UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 5 Menominee Language Revitalization Current status: • Fewer than 5 L1 speakers, all elderly • Small number of proficient L2 speakers • No external communiMes of speakers • 2016-present: Tribal efforts to train teachers 1. to speak Menominee (14 months) 2. to become teachers for pre-school immersion COLORS!! 3/9/17 UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 6 Past Attempt: CL’s lesson § doctoral student in Included sentences like these Curriculum and Instruction for me to translate: § interested in intergenerational • What color do you see? transmission of language • I see orange. § no training in linguistics • What’s your favorite color? § some SLA training • My favorite color is blue. § had idea of lesson on colors as • Touch someone wearing red. sample lesson for teachers • Touch someone wearing a red shirt.
    [Show full text]
  • The Japanese Government Project for Machine
    THE JAPANESE GOVERNMENTPROJECT FOR MACHINE TRANSLATION Makoto Nagao, Jun-ichi Tsujii, and Jun-ichi Nakamura Department of Electrical Engineering Kyoto University Sakyou-ku, Kyoto, Japan 606 1 OUTLINE OF THE PROJECT post-editing, access to grammar rules, and dictionary maintenance. The project is funded by a grant from the Agency of The project is not primarily concerned with the devel- Science and Technology through the Special Coordi- opment of a final practical system; that will be developed nation Funds for the Promotion of Science and Technol- by private industry using the results of this project. ogy, and was started in fiscal 1982. The formal title of Technical know-how is already being transferred gradu- the project is "Research on Fast Information Services ally to private enterprise through the participation in the between Japanese and English for Scientific and Engi- project of people from industry. Software and linguistic neering Literature". The purpose is to demonstrate the data are also being transferred in part. Finally, complete feasibility of machine translation of abstracts of scientific technical transfer will be done under the proper condi- and engineering papers between the two languages, and tions. as a result, to establish a fast information exchange The Japanese source texts being used are abstracts of system for these papers. The project term was initially scientific and technical papers published in the monthly scheduled as three years from the fiscal year of 1982 JICST journal d Current Bibliography of Science and with a budget of about seven hundred million yen, but, Technology. At present, the project is only processing due to the present financial pressures on the government, texts in the electronics, electrical engineering, and the term has been extended to four years, up to 1986.
    [Show full text]
  • Development of Copula and Auxiliary BE in Children with Specific Language Impairment and Younger Unaffected Controls*
    F;rsr Langnoge, 22 (2002). 137-172. Printed in England Development of copula and auxiliary BE in children with Specific Language Impairment and younger unaffected controls* KATE L. JOSEPH LUDOVICA SERRATRICE University of Mancltester GINA CONTI-RAMSDEN I ABSTRACT Children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI) have well- known difficulties with the obligatory use of verbal tense-marking morphology which they use optionally for a longer period of time than typically developing children. Copula BE and auxiliary BE are two tense markers that have been shown to be problematic for children with SLI, but their status as independent allomorphs is somewhat controversial in the literature. In the present study we argue for copula BE and auxiliary BE as two separate tense markers showing different developmental curves both for children with SLI and for younger unaffected controls. It is suggested that copular versus auxiliary status, morphological form, and the frequency of the lexical construction containing BE all affect children’s provision of copular and auxiliary forms. Implications for identifying variables constraining optionality are discussed. INTRODUCTION Children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI) have long been * This research was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council, ESRC grant to Gina Conti-Ramsden (grant number R000237767). We would like to thank Rachel F. Hick for help with data collection, Brian Faragher for help with statistical analyses, and Kevin Durkin, Stan Kuczaj and an anonymous reviewer for their helpful comments on a previous draft. Finally, our special thanks go to the three children with SLI and their families who participated in the study. Address for correspondence: Human Communication and Deafness, School of Education, University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL, UK.
    [Show full text]
  • English Predication and Semantic Roles
    DISCOURSE AS A FORM OF MULTICULTURALISM IN LITERATURE AND COMMUNICATION SECTION: LANGUAGE AND DISCOURSE ARHIPELAG XXI PRESS, TÎRGU MUREȘ, 2015, ISBN: 978-606-8624-21-1 ENGLISH PREDICATION AND SEMANTIC ROLES Claudia Leah Assist. Prof., PhD, University of Oradea Abstract: This paper aims at highlighting some aspects regarding the English predication and the semantic roles, seen from complexity perspective. In doing so, it starts from verbs and types of predicates and continues with the semantic roles involved in a verbal relation. A clear distinction between different roles is required as each type is worth not only mentioning, but also debating and describing. Keywords: relations, semantics, predication, role As in any other language, the English predicate is considered to be the main part of the sentence that says something about the subject, showing what, who or how the subject is. Birds fly./ John is a doctor. John is happy. According to its abilities and characteristics the predicate may be: verbal or nominal. In its turn, verbal predicate is of two kinds: simple verbal predicate, expressed by a verb or a phrasal verb in a personal mood: The child eats an apple every day. They were taken care of by John. compound modal verbal predicate, made of: a semiauxiliary modal verb (to express a modal action feature: necessity, possibility, desire, etc.) and a basic verb, usually an infinitive: You must see a doctor. They can give the answer. We could have come if they had been invited. The most common semiauxiliary modal verbs are: can, could, may, might, must, to have to etc.
    [Show full text]
  • Subject-Predicate Sentence Structure
    International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature ISSN 2200-3592 (Print), ISSN 2200-3452 (Online) Vol. 5 No. 7; December 2016 [Special Issue on Language and Literature] Flourishing Creativity & Literacy Australian International Academic Centre, Australia The Chinese and Kazakh Languages Comparative Study: Subject-Predicate Sentence Structure Nurhalyk Abdurakyn Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Kazakhstan Alina Nurzhayeva Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Kazakhstan Anar Mustafayeva (Corresponding author) Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Kazakhstan E-mail: [email protected] Dariga Kokeyeva Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Kazakhstan Kaldybay Kydyrbayev Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Kazakhstan Received: 14-08-2016 Accepted: 17-10-2016 Advance Access Published: November 2016 Published: 10-12-2016 doi:10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.5n.7p.197 URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.5n.7p.197 Abstract This article compares subject-predicate sentence and subject-predicate-object sentence forms with extended sentence of the Kazakh language. It compares Chinese and Kazakh sentences with subject-predicate sentence structure and studies differences of verb-predicate sentences word order. Detailed comparative study of Chinese and Kazakh language differences and characteristics. Morphology structure of Chinese language belongs to radical language, and Kazakh language belongs to the type of adhesive language, syntax of Chinese and Kazakh Languages in the same syntactic structure often used in different ways, the morphological role in Chinese and Kazakh language is also not the same, and even the same kind of grammatical means in Chinese and Kazakh languages are various. According to the analysis of languages, the different positions of word order, the function of words and grammatical word order are different too.
    [Show full text]
  • Serial Verb Constructions Revisited: a Case Study from Koro
    Serial Verb Constructions Revisited: A Case Study from Koro By Jessica Cleary-Kemp A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in charge: Associate Professor Lev D. Michael, Chair Assistant Professor Peter S. Jenks Professor William F. Hanks Summer 2015 © Copyright by Jessica Cleary-Kemp All Rights Reserved Abstract Serial Verb Constructions Revisited: A Case Study from Koro by Jessica Cleary-Kemp Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics University of California, Berkeley Associate Professor Lev D. Michael, Chair In this dissertation a methodology for identifying and analyzing serial verb constructions (SVCs) is developed, and its application is exemplified through an analysis of SVCs in Koro, an Oceanic language of Papua New Guinea. SVCs involve two main verbs that form a single predicate and share at least one of their arguments. In addition, they have shared values for tense, aspect, and mood, and they denote a single event. The unique syntactic and semantic properties of SVCs present a number of theoretical challenges, and thus they have invited great interest from syntacticians and typologists alike. But characterizing the nature of SVCs and making generalizations about the typology of serializing languages has proven difficult. There is still debate about both the surface properties of SVCs and their underlying syntactic structure. The current work addresses some of these issues by approaching serialization from two angles: the typological and the language-specific. On the typological front, it refines the definition of ‘SVC’ and develops a principled set of cross-linguistically applicable diagnostics.
    [Show full text]
  • Positional Verbs in Nen
    CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by The Australian National University Positional Verbs in Nen Nicholas Evans AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY In this paper, I lay out the workings of the rather unusual system of positional verbs found in Nen, a language of the Morehead-Maro family in Morehead dis- trict, Western Province, Papua New Guinea. Nen is unusual in its lexicalization patterns: it has very few verbs that are intransitive, with most verbs that tend to be intransitive cross-linguistically realized as morphologically middle verbs, including ‘talk’, ‘work’, ‘descend’, and so on. Within the fifty attested morpho- logically intransitive verbs, forty-five comprise an interesting class of “positional verbs,” the subject of this paper; the others are ‘be’, its derivatives ‘come’ and ‘go’ (lit. ‘be hither’ and ‘be thither’), and ‘walk’. Positional verbs denote spatial positions and postures like ‘be sitting’, ‘be up high’, ‘be erected (of a building)’, ‘be open’, ‘be in a tree-fork’, ‘be at the end of something’. Positional verbs differ from regular verbs in lacking in¿nitives, in possessing a special “stative” aspect inÀection and an unusual system for building a four- way number system (building large plurals by combining singular and dual markers), and in participating in a productive three-way alternation between positional statives (like ‘be high’), placement transitives (like ‘put up high’), and get-into-position middles (like ‘get into a high position’). The latter two types are more like normal verbs (for example, they possess in¿nitives and participate in the normal TAM series), but they are formally derived from the positionals.
    [Show full text]
  • More Thoughts on the Communicative Function of the English Verb
    JAN FIRBAS MORE THOUGHTS ON THE COMMUNICATIVE FUNCTION OF THE ENGLISH VERB The present treatise forms the second instalment of a study dealing with some aspects of the shift from verbal to nominal expression within the structure of the English language. The first instalment entitled Thoughts on the Communicative Function of the Verb in English, German and Czech (Brno Studies in English I, Prague 1959, pp. 39—63) has provided a wider setting for the problems to be dealt with in the present paper. It has shown that in all the three examined languages the verb ranks below the noun in that it displays a definitely lower frequency as conveyer of the rheme proper.1 In all the three languages this detracts from the communicative value of the verb and promotes the shift towards nominal expres­ sion. The present study sets out to inquire into the shift from verbal to nominal expression in greater detail. It focusses its attention on English, constantly com­ paring it with Czech. This comparison will make it possible to ascertain the qualitative differences the two languages display in regard to the shift towards nominal expression. As the starting, or rather zero, point from which the shift may be traced, it is proposed to regard the highest degree of communicative value a verb can possibly attain. The degree of communicative value of the verb depends on the total amount of functions the verb can perform in a sentence at the given moment of communi­ cation (spoken or written).2 These functions can be specified as (i) grammatical, (ii) semantic, and as (iii) those performed within functional sentence per­ spective.3 Any disengagement of the verb from a function it could as a verb perform weakens its communicative value and contributes towards the shift away from verbal expression.
    [Show full text]
  • Problem of Stative Verbs in Orlu Dialect of Igbo
    TOWARDS A CLASSIFICATION OF IGBO VERBS: THE PROBLEM OF STATIVE VERBS IN THE ORLU DIALECT OF IGBO E.M.Onumajuru Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures University of Port Harcourt, Nigeria The criteria for the classification of Igbò verbs have generated controversies among old and modern linguists and grammarians of indigenous and foreign descents. Some maintain that stative verbs (also called State verbs) are marginal in number and are therefore not appropriate to be used among the criteria for classifying Igbò verbs. This study explores the Orlu variety of Igbò (a dialect spoken by a sizeable population in the Orlu area of Imo State in South-Eastern Nigeria) in order to justify the validity of including stative verbs among the criteria for the classification of Igbò verbs. Our empirical analyses show that though stative verbs are fewer in number than the dynamic verbs, (also called verbs of activity and movement) they have non- negligible, distinctive, morpho-syntactic and semantic behaviours which lend credence to their inclusion among the criteria for classifying Igbò verbs. Les critères de la classification des verbes en langue Igbò ont fait l’objet d’une contro- verse parmi les linguistes et grammairiens anciens et modernes d’origines autochtone et étran- gère. Certains d’entre eux croient que les verbes statifs (dits aussi verbes d’état) sont trop peu nombreux pour qu’ils soient considérés parmi les critères de classification verbale en Igbò. Ce travail a pour objectif d’étudier le parler d’Orlu (un dialecte Igbò parlé par une population im- portante dans l’agglomération d’Orlu dans l’Etat Imo au sud-est du Nigeria) afin de justifier la validité de l’inclusion des verbes statifs parmi les critères de classification des verbes Igbò.
    [Show full text]
  • Information Cited Above on Classification and the Mimeographed Phonology, There Is No Other Published Material on Karang to Date
    Studies in African Linguistics Volume 14, Number 1, April 1983 MOOD AND ASPECT IN KARANG* Edward H. Ubels Societe Internationale de Linguistique, Cameroun The paper describes the formal and semantic properties of the mood and aspect categories of the Adamawa language, Karang. Three in­ herent aspect verb classes are established--events, processes, and states--on the basis of semantic and morphological distinctions. A fundamental opposition of the mood-aspect system is between factive and non-factive moods, which distinguish actual and potential situa­ tions. Non-factive mood is formally indicated by a high tone and subdivides into the categories subjunctive, predictive, and non­ predictive. Verbo-nominals are marked as non-factive. The formal categories of aspect are progressive, habitual, perfect, and non­ perfect. When inherent and formal aspect categories with semantically contradictory components are combined, inherent aspect is overriden. The perfective meaning of the perfect category also overrides the imperfective meaning of the progressive. 1. Introduction The goal of this paper is to present a semantic characterization of the inherent and formal categories which occur in the tense-aspect-mood system of the Karang verb. 1 Having said that much, the next task is to state the ways *1 wish to thank John \.,ratters for his idec:s and advice while I was writing this paper. I am grateful to Russell Schuh for his comments and dis­ cussion on the preliminary draft. Finally, I would like to thank the General Delegation for Scientific and Technical Research of Cameroon for permission to do this research, and the Karang people for their willing assi~tance, trust, and encouragement during the period we "orked together.
    [Show full text]
  • Lecture 16 Semantics: Semantic Properties of Words
    28 March 2013 Aaron J. Dinkin Linguistics 1 [email protected] Lecture 16 Semantics: semantic properties of words Semantics: the study of linguistic meaning. When a word has multiple conceptually related meanings, this is polysemy: pool: ‘facility constructed for swimming’, ‘puddle’ pig: ‘porcine animal’, ‘disgusting person’ bright: ‘emitting light’, ‘intelligent’ What seems like a single meaning may be polysemy on closer examination: bank: ‘financial institution’, ‘building where a financial institution is housed’ Consider the sentence My money is in the bank: this has at least two meanings: • ‘I have deposited my money in a bank account’ • ‘I left my wallet in the bank building’ This is because the two meanings of bank refer to different (but related) things. Often we can think of polysemy as the result of vagueness: some words have basic meanings that are slightly vague, and the details of the meaning are filled in by context. In other cases multiple meanings are connected by metaphorical association; this is the case with bright and pig. Polysemy is not the same thing as homophony— i.e., when two distinct words with unrelated meanings have the same form. E.g., bank also means ‘land at the side of a river’; pool also means ‘billiards game’; but these are different lexemes than the meanings of pool and bank above. It’s just a coincidence that ‘financial institution’ and ‘riverside’ are both bank; learners of the language learn these as two separate “dictionary entries” with nothing to do with each other except phonetic resemblance. (Note, as usual, spelling is not important: see/sea are homophones just like bank and bank.) Bound morphemes can have homophones as well: the English plural-noun and 3d-person-singular-verb affixes are homophones —well, their regular allomorphs are, anyway.
    [Show full text]
  • Two Types of Verb Particle Constructions Mikael Vinka
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by ScholarlyCommons@Penn University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics Volume 6 Issue 1 Proceedings of the 23rd Annual Penn Article 24 Linguistics Colloquium 1-1-1999 Two Types of Verb Particle Constructions Mikael Vinka This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. http://repository.upenn.edu/pwpl/vol6/iss1/24 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Two Types of Verb Particle Constructions This working paper is available in University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics: http://repository.upenn.edu/pwpl/vol6/ iss1/24 Two Types of Verb Particle Constructions* Mikael Vinka 1 Introduction Swedish Verb Particle Constructions (VPCs) are often claimed to be constrained in such a way that the particle must precede the object (Taraldsen 1991, Holmberg & Platzack 1995, Svenonius 1996 etc.). Therefore, (la) and (2a) are well formed, whereas (lb) and (2b) are ill formed. (1) a Kallesatte pa TVn. V Prt Obj Kalle switched on TV.the 'Kalle switched on the TV.' b *Kallesatte TVn pa. *V Obj Prt Kalle switched TV.the on 'Kalle switched the TV on/ (2) a Kalle smutsade ner trojan V Prt Obj Kalle dirtied down shirt.the 'Kalle made the shirt dirty.* b *Kalle smutsade trojan ner *V Obj Prt Kalle dirtied shirt.the down 'Kalle made the shirt dirty.' However, closer examination reveals that (1) and (2) differ in various fine points of syntactic distribution. In (3) and (4) the full DP objects of (1) and (2) are replaced with pronouns. In contrast to (1 b), (3b) is well formed, even though the object precedes the particle.
    [Show full text]