Dative Experiencer Research Articles

On Psych Verbs and Optional Clitic Doubling in Catalan and Other Ibero-Romance Languages

Although undesired under a theoretical viewpoint, natural languages often show cases of “true” optionality. According to a reformulation of the Interface Hypothesis (Sorace 2006), highly complex constructions are more susceptible to optionality and change. Psych verbs that select a subject dative experiencer fall under this definition. Ibero-Romance languages use different strategies to reduce this morphosyntactic inconsistency. Whereas Catalan and Spanish reinforce the deviant construction through additional morphological markers (dative clitic doubling and subsequent grammaticalization of the clitic as subject-verb agreement marker), Portuguese avoids inherent datives at all, using structural case instead. These innovations in argument structure have significant consequences: clitic doubling with full DPs and the grammaticalization of the clitic pronouns are blocked, in contrast to Catalan and Spanish. It becomes evident that a closer look at how argument structure is codified in the lexicon is needed in order to better understand processes of language change.

UKRAINIAN EQUIVALENTS TO ENGLISH SENTENCES: WHAT THEY REVEAL ABOUT DATIVE EXPERIENCER AND EXPLETIVE CONSTRUCTION

This paper presents a comparative study of Ukrainian sentences with Dative experiencer and their English equivalents. While Ukrainian allows null-subject sentences, in English there is a structural subject it. Moreover, in Ukrainian, there are sentences with Dative experiencers in the sentence initial position. Interestingly, the same kind of predicates that licenses Dative experiencer construction in Ukrainian, licenses the it-extraposition in English. Thus, the objective of this research is to establish what predicates belong to this category and what there is in the structure of the predicate that allows or disallows the described kinds of construction. We suggest that the adjectival predicates that do not allow it (or Dative experiencer in Ukrainian) have CAUSE-head introducing a causing event in their structure which blocks it-insertion. Key words: Dative experiencer, expletive, CAUSE, it-extraposition, predicate, English, Ukrainian.

On the acquisition of Spanish psych predicates

Spanish psych verbs like gustar (‘like’/‘please’) have a non-agreeing dative experiencer that asymmetrically c-commands the agreeing nominative theme (e.g., Cuervo 2003). Intervention accounts (Friedmann et al. 2009) thus predict children will experience difficulties with constructions that involve movement of the nominative-bearing argument past the dative DP. In this study we evaluate this prediction with a corpus study and an experimental study. Results from the corpus study show that children under the age of 7 underuse the DPnom-V-DPdat order (Theme-Verb-Experiencer) with gustar compared to adults, in line with our predictions. In a picture-matching task we tested 4-6-year-olds on d-linked wh-questions with actional and psych verbs. Results reveal that while children display the expected Nom > Dat wh-phrase extraction asymmetry with actional verbs, they show a Dat > Nom asymmetry with psych verbs. Moreover, children perform worse when the two arguments match in number features (i.e., sg-sg) compared to when they mismatch (i.e., sg-pl), but crucially, only in wh-questions that involve intervention. Our results cannot be fully explained under input-based accounts and are most in line with a structural account such as featural Relativized Minimality (Rizzi 2004).

Hoe drukte men schade uit in het Oudfries? Skathia en wedijverende gezegdes

This article aims to study the semantic and morphosyntactic role of the predicate skathia ‘to harm, damage’ and its competitors skatha dwā ‘to do damage’, evel dwā ‘to do evil’, and dera ‘to harm’ in the Old Frisian legal stipulations, and thereby contribute to the growing interest in Old Frisian (morpho-)syntax. This is achieved by collecting all the attestations of these predicates in the given corpus and analyzing their semantics and distribution over the centuries. The involvement of a dative experiencer in the use of these predicates will play a crucial role in the data analysis.

БЪЛГАРСКИТЕ ДЕЗИДЕРАТИВНИ ГЛАГОЛИ И ТЕХНИТЕ УКРАИНСКИ СЪОТВЕТСТВИЯ В ПАРАЛЕЛЕН КОРПУС / BULGARIAN DESIDERATIVE VERBS AND THEIR UKRAINIAN COUNTERPARTS IN A PARALLEL CORPUS

All uses of Bulgarian desiderative verbs of the type «glagoli» ‹ми› се ‘feel like ‹verb›ing’ (e. g., спи ми се ‘be sleepy’, работи ми се ‘feel like working, be in a mood for work’) and their prefixed phase derivatives were excerpted from a parallel corpus of Bulgarian and Ukrainian fictional texts. In the corresponding Ukrainian sentences, the specific semantics of the construction is most often expressed either by an independent lexical item – the verb хотітися ‘want, feel like’ or хотіти ‘want’ – or by a combination of a reflexive verb and an optional dative experiencer, as in (мені) працюється ‘I want to work, feel like working; I work eagerly; my work is going well’. The latter counterpart is of particular interest due to its structural similarity to the Bulgarian desiderative verbs. The comparison shows that the constructions in the two closely related languages are considerably different in meaning (which is the reason why this correspondence is only the third most frequent) and that although they have a lot in common (as attested by their lexical diversity), translators tend to overestimate the degree of similarity between them. Keywords: Bulgarian language, desideratives, dispositional constructions, reflexive–dative constructions, Ukrainian language

Dative experiencers with nominal predicates in Romanian: a synchronic and diachronic study

AbstractThis article investigates the evolution of the Romanian pattern [dative clitic + ‘be’ + N] (cf.Mi-e foame, lit. me.dat=is hunger, ‘I’m hungry’) from the 16th century until present-day Romanian. This pattern traces back to the Latinmihi estconstruction (lit. me.datis), but is semantically more restricted than its Latin ancestor in that it can only express a physiological or psychological state. The aim of our study is to examine to what extent the dative experiencer behaves like a subject and the noun denoting a state like a predicate. We argue that, although certain subject diagnostics raise problems in Romanian, due to the obligatoriness of clitics and the scarcity of controlled infinitives, this pattern is clearly an instance of non-canonical subject marking with quirky dative case. The tendency toward expansion of this construction in present-day Romanian contradicts the hypothesis proposed in language typology according to which non-canonical subject marking tends to recede in favor of canonical marking in European languages.

Datives with psych nouns and adjectives in Basque

AbstractThis paper explores the formal expression of two Basque dative argument types in combination with psych nouns and adjectives, in intransitive and transitive clauses: (i) those that express the experiencer, and (ii) those that express the stimulus of the psychological state denoted by the psych noun and adjective. In the intransitive structure involving a dative experiencer (DatExpIS), the stimulus is in the absolutive case, and the intransitive copulaizan‘be’ shows both dative and absolutive agreement. This construction basically corresponds to those built upon thepiaceretype of psychological verbs typified in (Belletti, Adriana & Luigi Rizzi. 1988. Psych-verbs andθ-theory.Natural Language and Linguistic Theory6. 291–352) three-way classification of Italian psych verbs. In the intransitive structure involving a dative stimulus (DatStimIS), the experiencer is marked by absolutive case, and the same intransitive copula shows both absolutive and dative agreement (with the latter corresponding to the dative stimulus and not to the experiencer). We show that the behavior of the dative argument in the two constructions is just the opposite of each other regarding a number of morphosyntactic tests, including agreement, constituency, hierarchy and selection. Additionally, we explore two parallel transitive constructions that involve either a dative experiencer and an ergative stimulus (DatExpTS) or a dative stimulus and an ergative experiencer (DatStimTS), which employ the transitive copula *edun‘have’. Considering these configurations, we propose an extended and more fine-grained typology of psych predicates.

Datives with psych nouns and adjectives in Basque

AbstractThis paper explores the formal expression of two Basque dative argument types in combination with psych nouns and adjectives, in intransitive and transitive clauses: (i) those that express the experiencer, and (ii) those that express the stimulus of the psychological state denoted by the psych noun and adjective. In the intransitive structure involving a dative experiencer (DatExpIS), the stimulus is in the absolutive case, and the intransitive copulaizan‘be’ shows both dative and absolutive agreement. This construction basically corresponds to those built upon thepiaceretype of psychological verbs typified in (Belletti, Adriana & Luigi Rizzi. 1988. Psych-verbs andθ-theory.Natural Language and Linguistic Theory6. 291–352) three-way classification of Italian psych verbs. In the intransitive structure involving a dative stimulus (DatStimIS), the experiencer is marked by absolutive case, and the same intransitive copula shows both absolutive and dative agreement (with the latter corresponding to the dative stimulus and not to the experiencer). We show that the behavior of the dative argument in the two constructions is just the opposite of each other regarding a number of morphosyntactic tests, including agreement, constituency, hierarchy and selection. Additionally, we explore two parallel transitive constructions that involve either a dative experiencer and an ergative stimulus (DatExpTS) or a dative stimulus and an ergative experiencer (DatStimTS), which employ the transitive copula *edun‘have’. Considering these configurations, we propose an extended and more fine-grained typology of psych predicates.

"Orhiko xoria Orhin lakhet": izen/adjektibo psikologikoak, gai lokatiboak eta predikazioa / Psych nouns and adjectives, PPthemes and predication (or a leopard cannot change its spots)

Belleti & Rizzi (1988) lanetik aurrera, asko dira hizkuntzalaritza teorikoak predikatu psikologikoez eman dizkigun irakaspenak, baina ez dira horrenbeste izen edo adjektibo psikologikoek sortzen duten predikazioarekin lotutakoak. Adger & Ramchand-ek (2006) Eskoziako gaelikoaz egindako azterketa da salbuespen horietako bat. Hizkuntza honetan, egoera psikologikoa adierazten duten izenak daude, eta esperimentatzailea eta gaia, izen horiekin batera datozen preposizio sintagmak izaten dira. Euskaraz ere izen eta adjektibo psikologikoak daude, laket adibidez, eta gai lokatiboarekin batera jasotzen dira, hots, postposizio sintagma batekin. Esperimentatzailea, berriz, absolutiboarekin, ergatiboarekin edo datiboarekin marka daiteke egitura zein den. Lan honetan erakutsiko dugunez, gai lokatiboak osagai bakarra osatzen du izen eta adjektibo psikologikoarekin, bai gaelikoz bai euskaraz; ez, aldiz, esperimentatzaileak, zeina Predikatu Sintagma (Bowers 1993) baino goragoko buru bati zor zaion: Aplikatiboari, datiboaz markatzen denean, dela Adger & Ramchand-en Jabetza Aplikatibo burua, dela Pylkkänen-en Goi Aplikatiboa 2008 [2002], eta Boz buruari (Kratzer 1996, Berro 2015) esperimentatzailea ergatiboaz markatzen denean. Lana, Joakin Gorrotxategi irakasleari eskaini nahi diogu. Ez gara ikerkuntza eremu berekoak, baina eremu batetik bestera dagoen aldea gorabehera, hizkuntza da hiruron lurralde miresgarria, eta esaera zaharrak dioen bezala, Orhiko xoria, Orhin lakhet.

Status gramatyczny predykatywnych SZKODA , WSTYD , ŻAL raz jeszcze

The apparently nominal forms szkoda ‘pity’, wstyd ‘shame’, zal ‘regret’, when used predicatively, have been analysed either as ‘quasi-verbs’ (inflecting only for tense and mood), or as adverbs, or as nouns. The author recalls and reinforces arguments against their verbal analysis, and shows that such forms are categorially ambiguous. In their adverbial guise, they may be modified by other adverbs, they do not agree with the copula, they may co-occur with a dative experiencer, and they may occur in other predicative constructions, apart from copular constructions. In their nominal guise, they may be modified by adjectives, they agree with the copula, they do not easily combine with a dative experiencer, and they do not occur in other predicative constructions. The author also argues that this categorial ambiguity is correlated with the two copular constructions in Polish: one involving the purely verbal copula byc ‘be’ and the other involving the so-called ‘pronominal’ copula to (byc).

Obligatory dative clitic-doubling of type III experiencers in Bulgnais

The correlation between the position of the Dative experiencer of a type III psych-verb relative to the verb itself and the obligatory vs. optional nature of an associated Dative clitic has seldom been noted in the literature, and it has never previously been explained. This paper presents relevant new data from Bulgnais (Bologna, Italy), and it proposes that these verbs, in the languages that require the Dative clitic with the preverbal Dative experiencer, have an additional strong lexical property beyond inherent Case licensing. Like Case licensing, this property requires feature checking, which is satisfied alternately by the clitic (unmarked word-order) or by the experiencer phrase. Only when the clitic checks the lexically required feature can the full experiencer move to the preverbal position, because otherwise, it is frozen in a postverbal position by its role in checking the mentioned strong lexical feature, which occurs lower in the verbal domain.

Non-oblique syntax for a dative experiencer in Korean

This paper provides an analysis of a dative experiencer in Korean and argues that not all semantically oblique experiencers have the syntax of a PP. I...

Deletion of Reflexive Clitics with the Verb Custar in European Portuguese: An MTC Account

<p class="p1">The impersonal verb <em>custar </em>(lit. ‘cost’) in European Portuguese selects for a dative experiencer argument and an infinitival clause, which may be preceded by the preposition <em>a</em>. Interestingly, a reflexive clitic co-referential with the experiencer argument can be deleted (under conditions to be specified) if it is within the prepositional infinitival complement, but not within its prepositionless counterpart. We argue that the presence of the preposition <em>a </em>preceding the infinitival complement of <em>custar </em>correlates with obligatory control and show how deletion of reflexive clitics within the prepositional infinitivals can be captured under the movement theory of control (<em>MTC</em>; see e.g. Hornstein 1991, 2001; Boeckx, Hornstein and Nunes 2010). More specifically, we show that if the infinitival subject is a deleted copy left by the “controller”, this copy can trigger deletion of the reflexive clitic as a way to satisfy a superficial ban on morphologically identical clitics in a local domain.

Psych verbs in Uyghur

English psych verbs fall into three types, namely, Subject Experiencer (SE), Object Experiencer (OE) and Dative Experiencer (DE) verbs. Unlike English SE verbs, noncausative Uyghur verbs fall into two categories: accusative and oblique psych verbs according to the case marking of their objects. Apart from typical transitive constructions [NP8 NP0 VERB], Uyghur employs light verb constructions of the type [N/ADJ bol-/qil-]. We argue that light verb constructions of the type [NP8 NP-Ace N/Adj qil-] are analytical causative configurations. Oblique psych verbs occur in light verb constructions of the type [NPs NP-ABL/-DAT ADJ/N-ACC bol-/qil-], in which bol- functions as BECOME, while qil functions as no/GET, and the latter is an analytical causative configuration. Our classification of Uyghur non-causative verbs into accusative and oblique psych verbs has ramifications for causativizations ofUyghur verbs. For example, the causative morpheme cannot be attached to accusative psych verbs, but is perfectly fine with oblique psych verbs. We argue that morphological causatives in Uyghur are lexical causatives in nature, as Uyghur has relatively few zero causatives like the English verbs worry and please. Uyghur analytical causative constructions of the type [NP8 NP-ABLI-DAT ADJIN-ACC] correspond to English make constructions. The fact that the Target/Subject Matter restriction is dissolved in analytical causative constructions in Uyghur in turn supports our analysis of morphological causatives as lexical causatives and light verb constructions as analytical causatives.

Backward- and Forward-Looking Potential of Anaphors

Personal pronouns and demonstratives contribute differently to the encoding of information in the mental model and they serve distinct backward- and forward-looking functions. While (unstressed) personal pronouns are the default means to indicate coreference with the most prominent discourse entity (backward-looking function) and typically mark the maintenance of the current topic, demonstratives are used to refer to a less prominent entity and serve the additional forward-looking function of signaling a possible topic shift. In Experiment 1, we present an ERP study that examines the time course of processing personal and d-pronouns in German (er vs. der) and assesses the impact of two prominence features of the antecedent, thematic role and sentential position, as well as neurophysiological correlates of backward- and forward-looking functions of referential expressions. We tested the comprehension of personal and d-pronouns following context sentences containing two potential antecedents. In addition to the factor pronoun type (er vs. der), we varied the verb type (active accusative verbs vs. dative experiencer verbs) and the thematic role order (canonical vs. non-canonical) in the context sentences to vary the antecedent's prominence. Time-locked to pronoun-onset, the ERPs revealed a general biphasic N400-Late Positivity for d-pronouns over personal pronouns with further subtle interactions of the prominence-lending cues in the early time window. The findings indicate that the calculation of the referential candidates' prominence (backward-looking function) is guided by thematic role and positional information. Thematic role information, in combination with initial position, thus represents a central predictor during referential processing. Coreference with a less prominent entity (assumed for d-pronouns) results in processing costs (N400). The additional topic shift signaled by d-pronouns (forward-looking function) results in attentional reorienting (Late Positivity). This is further supported by Experiment 2, a story continuation study, which showed that personal pronouns trigger topic maintenance, while d-pronouns yield topic shifts.

Syntactic prominence in Icelandic Experiencer arguments: quirky subjects vs. dative objects

AbstractAs has often been demonstrated, Icelandic Quirky Subjects largely behave like canonical nominative subjects and unlike topicalized objects. Among verbs selecting for Quirky Subjects, experiential predicates with a dative Experiencer subject and a nominative Stimulus object are the most common type. Recently, several studies have proposed a sub-class within this group of dat-nom-verbs, characterized by an alternation in their argument mapping. Here, both the dative Experiencer and the nominative Stimulus can occur as either the syntactic subject or object.This paper empirically investigates this class as well as the extent to which its alternation is determined by semantic and pragmatic factors.

A Review of Early English Impersonals: Evidence from Necessity Verbs

Early English impersonals have been the subject of numerous studies, and many systems of classification have been proposed, as well as theories on their evolution into personal constructions. Jespersen's (1927) theory of reanalysis of the preposed dative experiencer into a nominative subject (from þam cynge licodon peran to the king liked pears) has been defended and rejected in roughly equal measure since it was first published. The present study will contrast Jespersen's theory with that of Allen (1995), testing both against data on necessity verbs such as þurfan, need, behove and mister. A 4.1 million-word corpus is used which includes the Helsinki Corpus plus a random selection of texts from the Dictionary of Old English Corpus, the Corpus of Middle English Prose and Verse, the Lampeter Corpus and the Corpus of Early English Correspondence Sampler. Findings suggest that while reanalysis does account for the evolution of some lexemes, others require the examination of linguistic features that fall outside the scope of this kind of syntactic change.

The Demonstrative Ku ‘He' Binding in the Dative Construction

The dative marker -eykey 'to' can be attached to the experiencer or goal in Korean. There are two kinds of eykey-marked elements or phrases: a dative experiencer and dative goal. There are big syntactic differences between the dative experiencer and the dative goal: that is, the dative experiencer can be responsible for the agreement of the subject honorification and the subject-oriented binding, but the dative goal cannot. The dative experiencer is a syntactic subject, whereas the dative goal is an indirect object. The demonstrative ku 'he' can appear as a bound variable which Principle A regulates (cf. Kang 2010). The dative goal can bind the demonstrative ku, but not the reflexive caki 'self' in the complement position of the dative construction. While the reflexive caki in the complement position triggers a binding-freezing effect of the goal, the demonstrative ku in the complement position drives the binding-thawing effect of the goal.

Psych Verb Constructions and Case Alternation in Korean (/Japanese)

An experiencer in psych verb constructions in Korean and Japanese is realized either as having dative case or as having nominative case. The case alternation has been regarded as a real alternation, without considering the possibility that the alternation affects syntactic computation. In the paper, on the contrary, I argue that the alternation reflects structural differences. According to Nichols typology, Korean and Japanese are representative dependent marking languages where dependent markers are abundantly used. What I claim in the paper is that due to the prevalence of the markers, the mode of syntactic combination is different in K/J. Based on the information of the dependent markers, nominals combine, looking for their appropriate predicate (Y. Choi 2007, 2008a， b, 2009). Case markers are the major dependent markers which direct the way for nominals to combine. Thus， the case alternation is predicted to reflect alternation in structural combination. A dative experiencer is predicted to combine with a theme just like a subject in regular transitive constructions. A nominative experiencer is predicted to combine with the theme just like a subject in double subject constructions. The predictions are proved by the parallel behaviors between dative subject psych verb constructions and transitive constructions and between nominative subject psych verb constructions and double subject constructions.

Teaching languages—understanding cultures. A few remarks on feeling and experiencing in Hindi

University of WarsawThis article offers an overview of the expression of emotions in the Hindi language. First it discusses the Hindi word man, which in day-to-day communication denotes that something that is inside an individual, where one’s thoughts are born and thanks to which one can feel. Then, with reference to the opinion of Owen M. Lynch that in Hindi there is no specific equivalent of the verb to feel, the argument focuses on the analysis of a few examples of sentences in English, Hindi and Polish; all the English sentences feature the verb to feel, though not all of them refer to emotions/emotional states. The analysis reveals that in Hindi the equivalents of the verb to feel are less frequently used than in English (Polish stands somewhere in between). They appear especially in situations when one wants to share feelings that have been experienced with others. Also of great importance is that in Hindi in the majority of the sentences analysed the so-called experiencer subjects, or dative experiencer subjects, are used.