Predication with _beautiful of face_

[Yehuda N. Falk]

Joan Bresnan wrote:
>Hi.
>For the "weak of mind", "slender of body" examples, you suggest a
>possible analysis in which "weak" or "slender" is predicated of the
>object of the preposition `of', which is the possession of the
>subject: He is weak of mind => His mind is weak, etc.  One could
>certainly do c- to f-structure  gymnastics to produce these relations,
>but I wonder whether that is the right kind of approach...
>
>Why don't we say:
>
>    He is checkered of coat.  ==> His coat is checkered.
>    He is happy of bulldogs.  ==> His bulldogs are happy.
>    He is beaufiful of sports cars. ==> His sports cars are beautiful.
>    He is expensive of school. ==> His school is expensive.
>    He is hairless of chihuahua?  ==> His chihuahua is hairless.
>
>It seems to me that in the "A of N" construction, the A really is
>predicated of the subject, and the `of' phrase semantically restricts
>the adjectival property to something which is an inherent part or
>property of the subject.
>
>I am not familiar with the Arabic construction, though.   Perhaps it
>is not so restricted?

I don't know the Arabic construction, but I am familiar with the
(presumably cognate) Hebrew one. In Hebrew, as in English, this is a
high-register construction.

The Hebrew construction has the adjective in construct state form, and then
the noun.

(1)  a.  ha-jirafa      hi arukat        cavar.
          the-giraffe(F) is long.F.CONSTR neck
          'The giraffe is long of neck.'

      b.  ha- tinok   haya kxol          eynayim.
          the-baby(M) was  blue.M.CONSTR eyes
          'The baby was blue of eye.'

The adjective agrees with the subject, even though it describes the
post-adjective noun. I don't think we want to say that the adjective 'long'
or 'blue' is predicated of the subject.

So far as I can tell, the Hebrew construction is limited to body parts
(including abstract body parts like 'mind/intelligence'). I think this is
true in English, too. I would bet that the Hebrew construction is lexical
-- a kind of compound. The construct state is used in N-N compounds, so it
is not implausible that it would also be used in A-N compounds.

So, e.g., _kxol-eynayim_ would be an adjective with
  (^ PRED) = 'blue-eyed <(^SUBJ)>'

(For what it's worth, the post-adjective thing is a noun, not an NP.)

This might work for English too.


                            Yehuda N. Falk
       Department of English, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
                     Mt. Scopus, Jerusalem, Israel
                        msyfalk at mscc.huji.ac.il
      Personal Web Site    http://pluto.mscc.huji.ac.il/~msyfalk/
     Departmental Web Site    http://atar.mscc.huji.ac.il/~english/


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Oh the cow in the meadow goes moo
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