Table Of ContentSpanish Verbalisations and the
Internal Structure of Lexical
Predicates
Spanish Verbalisations and the Internal Structure of Lexical Predicates provides
the first comprehensive and empirically detailed theoretical analysis of the
different ways in which Spanish builds verbs from nouns and adjectives.
This book poses questions about the nature of theme vowels, parasynthesis
and the structural relation between the three major lexical word classes from
within a Neo-Constructionist framework that highlights the correlations between
the syntactic and semantic behaviour of verbs and their morphological make up.
Provided within are detailed empirical descriptions of each of the nine major
ways of building lexical verbs in Spanish, as well as an integral analysis of those
patterns that shows the significance of the contrast between them and their uses
to address some foundational questions in morphological theory.
Spanish Verbalisations will be of particular interest to researchers in formal
linguistics and Spanish.
Antonio Fábregas is Professor of Spanish Linguistics at the University of
Tromsø – The Arctic University of Norway.
Routledge Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics
Series Editor: Dale Koike
University of Texas at Austin
The Routledge Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics series provides
a showcase for the latest research on Spanish and Portuguese Linguistics. It
publishes select research monographs on various topics in the field, reflecting
strands of current interest.
Titles include:
The Evolution of Spanish Past Forms
Gibran Delgado-Díaz
Sociolinguistic Approaches to Sibilant Variation in Spanish
Edited by Eva Núñez
Heritage Speakers of Spanish and Study Abroad
Edited by Rebecca Pozzi, Tracy Quan and Chelsea Escalante
Topics in Spanish Linguistic Perceptions
Edited by Luis Alfredo Ortiz-López and Eva-María Suárez Büdenbender
Comunicación especializada y divulgación en la red
aproximaciones basadas en corpus
Gianluca Pontrandolfo y Sara Piccioni
Spanish in Miami
Sociolinguistic Dimensions of Postmodernity
Andrew Lynch
Spanish Verbalisations and the Internal Structure of Lexical Predicates
Antonio Fábregas
For more information about this series please visit: www.routledge.com/
Routledge-Studies-in-Hispanic-and-Lusophone-Linguistics/book-series/RSHLL
Spanish Verbalisations and
the Internal Structure of
Lexical Predicates
Antonio Fábregas
Series Editor: Dale A. Koike
Spanish List Advisor: Javier
Muñoz-Basols
First published 2023
by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa
business
© 2023 Antonio Fábregas
The right of Antonio Fábregas to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this book has been requested
ISBN: 978-1-032-26075-4 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-26080-8 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-28645-5 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003286455
Typeset in Times New Roman
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To my parents
Contents
1 Introduction: what a verbalisation is and what we assume in
this monograph 1
1.1 Verbalisations: the basics 1
1.2 Main verb types 3
1.2.1 Base-verbalisation relation 3
1.2.2 Verb types: Aktionsart and argument structure 4
1.2.3 The decomposition of lexical verbs 6
1.3 Nanosyntax and spell out 10
1.3.1 Primitive elements 11
1.3.2 Phrasal spell out 12
1.3.3 The exhaustive lexicalisation principle 12
1.3.4 The superset principle 13
1.4 Nouns, adjectives and prepositions 14
1.4.1 Nouns vs. adjectives 14
1.4.2 Prepositions 15
1.4.3 Adjectives are built as prepositional phrases
in Spanish 17
1.4.4 Exponency: adjectival exponents are bigger than
nominal exponents 18
1.5 Main claims in this monograph 22
2 Theme vowels: a syntactic analysis for Spanish 26
2.1 Overview of the chapter 26
2.2 Theme vowels: problems and restrictions 28
2.2.1 Theme vowels: problems for morphological
analysis 29
2.2.2 Toward a syntactic solution: Kayne (2019) 32
2.2.3 Theme vowels as manifestations of EventP 35
2.3 Verb, but no theme vowel: copulative verbs 40
2.4 The auxiliary verb haber as the theme vowel 45
viii Contents
2.5 Theme vowels without verbs 47
2.5.1 Theme vowels with denominal -dor 48
2.5.2 Theme vowels with denominal -ble 49
3 The internal syntactic structure of parasynthesis 54
3.1 Overview of the chapter 54
3.2 A natural syntactic hierarchy for lexical categories 56
3.2.1 The hierarchy in (prototypical) syntax 56
3.2.2 The hierarchy applied to category change: structure
extension vs. subordination 59
3.2.2.1 Comparing V > N with N > V 60
3.2.2.2 Comparing A > N with N > A 61
3.2.2.3 Comparing V > A with A > V 63
3.3 Parasynthesis as syntactic specification 65
3.3.1 What parasynthesis does, in action 67
3.3.2 Parasynthesis is only attested in hierarchically
compliant category-change 70
3.3.3 Asymmetries between denominal and deverbal
parasynthesis 72
4 Deadjectival verbs in -a, parasynthetic or not 77
4.1 Overview of the chapter 77
4.2 Deadjectival parasynthetic verbs in -a are always change
of state verbs 79
4.2.1 Change of state verbs as a natural class 80
4.2.2 The aspectual properties of deadjectival change of
state verbs 81
4.2.3 The causative-inchoative alternation and the internal
argument 87
4.2.4 Properties of the prefixes 87
4.3 Analysis: parasynthetic change of state verbs 88
4.3.1 The material spelled out by the adjectival
exponent 89
4.3.2 The role of PredP and the integration between the
adjective and the verbal structure 90
4.3.3 The aspectual interpretations 93
4.3.4 PredP as a preposition: additional evidence 95
4.3.5 The linearisation of the prefix 99
4.3.6 Where is the verbaliser? On the nature of verbal
formations with -a and a prefix 100
4.4 Prefix-less deadjectival verbs with plain -a 103
Contents ix
4.4.1 Non parasynthetic deadjectival change of state
verbs in -a 104
4.4.2 Deadjectival verbs in -a involving change of state not
predicated from an internal argument 108
4.4.3 Deadjectival verbs in -a: stative property 112
4.5 Conclusions 114
5 Denominal verbs in -a, parasynthetic or not 118
5.1 Overview of the chapter 118
5.2 Denominal verbs in -a: change of state verbs and other
predicate relations 120
5.2.1 Parasynthetic denominal formations 120
5.2.2 Non parasynthetic verbs in -a 125
5.2.2.1 Change of state readings 127
5.2.2.2 Stative verbs 129
5.3 Parasynthetic denominal verbs in -a with participant
readings (1): locative verbs 131
5.3.1 The properties of the base 133
5.3.2 Properties of the prefixes 134
5.3.3 Aspect 138
5.3.4 Analysis 140
5.3.4.1 Locatio and locatum correspond to the same
structure 141
5.3.4.2 Lexically strong prefixes 142
5.3.5 Non parasynthetic locative verbs in -a 143
5.4 Parasynthetic denominal verbs in -a with participant
readings (2): transfer verbs, possessive verbs and other
stative verbs 146
5.4.1 Possessive verbs as stative transfer verbs 149
5.4.2 Transfer verbs without a prefix 150
5.5 Denominal verbs in -a with participant readings (3):
instrumental verbs 151
5.5.1 Parasynthetic verbs 151
5.5.2 Prefix-less instrumental verbs 155
5.6 Non parasynthetic denominal verbs in -a: creation verbs
and other readings 155
5.6.1 Creation and activity performance verbs 156
5.6.2 Other interpretations 157
5.7 Interim summary: parasynthesis vs. non parasynthesis in
the absence of overt verbalisers 159
