Table Of ContentASPECTUAL ROLES AND
THE SYNTAX-SEMANTICS
INTERFACE
by
CAROL L. TENNY
University of Pittsburgh, U,S.A.
Springer-Science+Business Media, B.V.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Tenny, Carol.
Aspectual roles and the syntax-semantics interface I by Carol L.
Tenny.
p. cm. -- (Studies in 11ngulstlcs and phllosophy v.52)
Includes bibllographical references and indexes.
ISBN 978-0-7923-2907-7 ISBN 978-94-011-1150-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-94-011-1150-8
1. Grammar, Comparative and general--Aspect. 2. Semantlcs.
3. Grammar, ComparatIve and general--Syntax. 4. Modallty
(LlngulstlCS) 1. TTtle, II. Series.
P281 . T374 1994
401' .43--dc20 94-15056
ISBN 978-0-7923-2907-7
Printed on acid-free paper
AU Rights Reserved
© 1994 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
OriginaUy published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 1994
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1s t edition 1994
No part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or
utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
inc1uding photocopying, recording or by any information storage and
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ASPECTUAL ROLES AND THE SYNTAX-SEMANTICS INTERFACE
Studies in Linguistics and Philosophy
Volume 52
Managing Editors
GENNARO CHIERCHlA, University of Milan
PAULINE JACOBSON, Brown University
FRANCIS 1. PELLETIER, University ofA lberta
Editorial Board
JOHAN V AN BENTHEM, University ofA msterdam
GREGORY N. CARLSON, University of Rochester
DAVID DOWTY, Ohio State University, Columbus
GERALD GAZDAR, University of Sussex, Brighton
IRENE HElM, MIT., Cambridge
EWA N KLEIN, University of Edinburgh
BILL LADUSAW , University of California at Santa Cruz
TERRENCE PARSONS, University of California, Irvine
The titles published in this series are listed at the end of this volume.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE ix
CHAPTER ONE: LINKING SYNTACTIC ARGUMENT
POSITIONS AND ASPECTUAL ROLES 1
1.1. INTRODUCTION AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1
1.1.1 Aspect and delimitedness 3
1.1.2 Argument structure: Three types of syntactic
arguments 7
1.2. DIRECT INTERNAL ARGUMENTS 10
1.2.1 The Measuring-Out Constraint on direct
internal arguments 10
1.2.2 Verbs with non-measuring direct arguments 13
1.2.3 Three kinds of Measuring-out 15
1.2.4 More evidence of measuring arguments:
adverbs, entailments, mass/count
distinctions 18
1.2.5 Measuring-out in the semantics literature 29
1.2.6 Ambiguity: optional measuring arguments 32
1.2.7 Converting non-measuring into measuring
direct arguments: resultatives and verb
particles 36
1.2.8 Adding measuring direct arguments: cognate
objects, his/her way, reflexives, expletive
body parts 38
1.2.9 Deleting measuring direct arguments:
Unspecified NP Deletion 43
1.2.10 Direct and indirect internal arguments
compared: conative, antipassive, resultative,
locative, and holistic interpretations 44
1.2.11 Direct internal arguments and external
arguments compared: resultatives,
unaccusatives, psych verbs 57
1.3. INDIRECT INTERNAL ARGUMENTS 68
1.3.1 The Terminus Constraint on indirect internal
arguments 68
1.3.2 Non-terminus indirect internal arguments 69
1.3.3 Event terminus and path objects 72
v
vi TABLE OF CONTENTS
1.3.4 Event tenninus and implicit path objects 75
1.3.5 Only one tenninus per event. The Single
Delimiting Constraint. 78
1.3.6 A note on double object constructions 81
1.4. EXTERNAL ARGUMENTS. THE NON-MEASURING
CONSTRAINT ON EXTERNAL ARGUMENTS 83
1.5. ASPECTUAL ROLES 94
1.5.1 Aspectual roles 94
1.5.2 Aspectual roles and thematic roles 99
1.5. 3 Verb classes and operations over aspectual
roles 106
1.6. THE ASPECTUAL INTERFACE HYPOTHESIS 113
1.6.1 The Aspectual Interface Hypothesis 113
1.6.2 The AIR and Universal Alignment 117
1.6.3 AIR and thematic hierarchies 118
1.6.4 The AIR and possible and actual forms 121
NOTES 125
CHAPTER TWO: EVENT STRUCTURE AND ASPECTUAL
ROLES 131
2.1. THE EVENT NUCLEUS 131
2.1.1 Compositionality of events 131
2.1.2 The event nucleus 134
2.2. SYNTACTIC PROCESSES SENSITIVE TO THE EVENT
NUCLEUS 140
2.2.1 Case and verbal morphology: Russian
verbal prefixes, Finnish accusative and
partitive case 141
2.2.2 Syntactic phenomena involving direct
internal arguments and a secondary
predicate: English verb-particle
combinations, English resultative secondary
predicates 145
2.2.3 Passive-type phenomena and affectedness:
English nominal passives, Japanese numeral
quantifiers, Ba construction in Mandarin 156
2.2.4 Interpretive rules: Predicate clefting in
Haitian Creole 168
2.2.5 Discussion 170
TABLE OF CONTENTS VII
2.3. THE SPECIAL STATUS OF ARGUMENTS IN
ASPECTUALSTRUCTURE 174
NOTES 178
CHAPTER THREE: LEXICAL CONCEPTUAL STRUCTURES
AND ASPECTUALROLES 182
3.1. LEXICAL CONCEPTUAL STRUCTURE 182
3.2. THE RELATION BETWEEN LEXICAL CONCEPTUAL
STRUCTURES AND ASPECTUAL ROLES 186
3.2.1 Aspectual roles imply part of LCS. Part of
LCS reduces to aspectual roles 186
3.2.2 Modularity 190
3.3. SOME PHENOMENA ILLUSTRATING THE
MODULARITY OF LEXICAL CONCEPTUAL
STRUCTURES AND ASPECTUAL ROLES 193
3.3.1 Operations on aspectual grids: adding
measuring arguments 193
3.3.2 Manner-of-motion verbs and PATH and
TERMINUS roles; conflation 195
3.3.3 Lexical subordination, resultatives and
conflation; Measure roles 198
3.3.4 Manner and obligatory terminus 203
3.3.5 Denominal verbs and incorporation 206
3.3.6 In~~enable body parts and possessor
rrusmg 213
3.3.7 The locative alternation again 216
NOTES 220
REFERENCES 222
NAME INDEX 235
LANGUAGE INDEX 239
SUBJECT INDEX 240
PREFACE
All work is work in progress. The ideas developed in this work
could be (and probably will be) developed further, revised, and
expanded. But it was time to write them down and send them out.
Some of these ideas about linking had their origins in my 1987
dissertation. However, this work has grown beyond the
dissertation in a number of important ways. The most important of
these advances lie in, first, articulating aspectual roles as linguistic
objects over which lexical semantic phenomena can be stated, and
over which linking generalizations are stated; second, recognizing
that syntactic phenomena may be classified as to whether or not
they are sensitive to the core event of event structure; and third,
recognizing the modularity of aspectual and thematic/conceptual
structure, and associating that modularity with a difference between
language-specific and universal language generalizations. The three
chapters of the book are organized around these ideas.
I have tried to state these ideas as strong theses. Where they make
strong predictions I have meant them to do so, as a probe for future
research. I hope that other researchers will take up the challenge to
investigate, test and develop these ideas across a wider realm of
languages than I -- as one person -- can do.
Some apologies and some thanks are in order:
Apologies to my gentle and patient reader, who finds him or
herself hopping around because ideas are presented in the wrong
order. I have tried to help out with cross-references as much as
possible, but sometimes every idea needed to be presented first,
which was impossible.
Apologies to those whose work I should have cited, but managed
to miss. There is so much written on aspect, lexical semantics, and
related areas that it is nearly impossible to know of it all. That is,
of course, no excuse.
ix
x PREFACE
I have received support and encouragement from many sources
while I worked on this book, and have many people to thank:
Frank Heny, for showing a strong interest in the early stages of
this work and for the many challenging and productive discussions
that ensued; Elizabeth Ritter, for moral support, encouragement
and discussion, and invaluable help with the index; Ken Hale, for
advice and encouragement; Margaret Speas, Beth Levin, and Sarah
Rosen for their interest and encouragement and useful comments;
Charles Kollar, for moral support and assistance with mansucript
preparation; and of course my family, for their ongoing faith in me:
my parents, Francis and Nancy Tenny, my brother Charles Tenny,
and my sister Laura Tenny Brogna
Thanks are also due to a number of people in the linguistics
department of the University of Pittsburgh. I am grateful to my
department and to my chairman, Dan Everett, for time off from
teaching duties to finish this work; to Carolyn Anderson for
miscellaneous technical support and good cheer; to Dorolyn Smith
for help with emergency Xeroxing. And of course to my students,
who ask good questions.
CHAPTER ONE
LINKING: SYNT ACnC ARGUMENT POSITIONS
AND ASPECTUAL ROLES
1.1 INTRODUCTION AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
The theory developed in this work is a theory about the interface
between syntax and lexical semantics. The existence of an interface
implies a limited autonomy, or modularity, of syntax from lexical
semantics and vice versa. Different rules and systems may be used
to describe each one to a large extent, but these rules and systems
interact, or intersect, or are visible to each other through a narrow
common vocabulary. However we may choose to think about it, an
interface requires that some element of one system be hooked up to
some element of the other system. It is a basic thesis of this work
that what is hooked up on the lexical semantic side is a set of
aspectual properties, related to the particular aspectual property I
will call delimitedness. Under this view, the intersection between
syntax and lexical semantics is basically an aspectual one.
Furthermore, the interactions between the two components are
highly constrained, since they are organized around a limited
vocabulary of aspectual notions. This theory therefore maintains
the basic assumption of the autonomy of syntax, focusing on the
locus of the intersection between syntax and lexical semantics.
Linguists have realized for some time that there is one area in
which syntax and lexical semantics must interact. This is the
problem of linking; or the question of how thematic roles are
mapped into syntactic positions. (Fillmore (1968), Ostler (1979),
Carter (1988), L. Levin (1985), Carrier-Duncan (1985), Dowty
(1991), Jackendoff (1990a), Grimshaw (1990), Wechsler (1991»
That there are strong cross-linguistic generalizations about what
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