26.4509, Review: Cog Sci; Ling Theories; Semantics; Syntax: Robering (2014)

[The LINGUIST List via LINGUIST]

LINGUIST List: Vol-26-4509. Mon Oct 12 2015. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 26.4509, Review: Cog Sci; Ling Theories; Semantics; Syntax: Robering (2014)

Moderators: linguist at linguistlist.org (Damir Cavar, Malgorzata E. Cavar)
Reviews: reviews at linguistlist.org (Anthony Aristar, Helen Aristar-Dry, Sara Couture)
Homepage: http://linguistlist.org

*****************    LINGUIST List Support    *****************
Please support the LL editors and operation with a donation at:
              http://funddrive.linguistlist.org/donate/

Editor for this issue: Sara  Couture <sara at linguistlist.org>
================================================================


Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2015 18:03:47
From: Anna Alexandrova [aaalexand at gmail.com]
Subject: Events, Arguments, and Aspects

 
Discuss this message:
http://linguistlist.org/pubs/reviews/get-review.cfm?subid=36052437


Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/25/25-2070.html

EDITOR: Klaus  Robering
TITLE: Events, Arguments, and Aspects
SUBTITLE: Topics in the Semantics of Verbs
SERIES TITLE: Studies in Language Companion Series 152
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
YEAR: 2014

REVIEWER: Anna Alexandrova, Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa

Reviews Editor: Helen Aristar-Dry

SUMMARY

As is stated in the preface, the publication of the present volume was preceded by a workshop on verbal semantics (Aarhus, Denmark, 1st October 2010). The book, containing nine contributions, is divided in two parts, “Verb meaning and argument structure” and “Aspect and aktionsart”. However, this division appears to be somewhat formal, considering that many of the contributions are related, at least to some extent, to both domains.

The first part, “Verb meaning and argument structure”, contains four papers.

Anton Benz, in his paper “Ergativity and the object-oriented representation of verb meaning”, points out a curious analogy between the representation of the so-called one-place and two-place operations in object-oriented programming and case marking in ergative languages. One of the peculiarities of the object-oriented approach is that operations are defined within the class of the objects which are their main arguments. Thus, operations that can be compared to intransitive verbs are encoded in the class which corresponds to the subject NP, and operations that correspond to transitive verbs are encoded in the class that corresponds to the NP of the direct object. It is claimed that there are a number of semantic phenomena related to ergativity that show that “ergative case marking is conceptually connected with the object-oriented structure of the lexicon” (p. 86).

In “Grammatical metaphors and there-insertion in Danish”, Anne Bjerre and Tavs Bjerre account for a presentational focus construction, consisting in the insertion of an expletive that occupies the subject position, while the logical subject occurs in the object position. A typical example of this phenomenon is, for instance, the following Danish sentence: ‘Der ankommer et ungt par med to småbørn’ (‘There arrives a young couple with two kids’) (p. 89) This construction is widely considered to be an unaccusativity test for Danish and other Scandinavian languages, in that it is compatible only with unaccusative verbs, a subset of intransitive verbs, while it is largely ungrammatical with transitive verbs. However, this rule is violated by a small set of transitive verbs, occurring in grammatical metaphors and typically conveying the meaning of perception or sensation, as, for instance, in the following sentence: ‘Da jeg kom ind slog der mig en stank af tobaksrøg i møde
 ’ (‘When I entered there came toward me (lit.: there hit me) a stench of tobacco smoke’) (p. 103). Moreover, according to the authors of the paper, it is not obvious that there-insertion can occur only with unaccusatives, inasmuch as it can freely occur with some unergatives. Two constraints on semantic arguments are proposed in order to account for the behavior of the construction in question: (1) the subject must have the semantic role of theme and (2) the object position must be empty.

“Abstract objects of verbs”, by Klaus Robering, proposes a theory of “abstract objects”. Its aim is to solve a problem related to the fact that verbs tend to take arguments of quite diverse types. In an orthodox type-theoretic framework many verbs are represented as extremely polysemous. In this paper, it is shown that this problem can be avoided if these objects are accounted for as representing “non-objectual entities” in contexts from which they are excluded by type restrictions. Thus these objects are “abstract” in the sense that they function as representatives of other entities. Several instances of such a representation are assessed.

In “Object-orientation and the semantics of verbs”, by Andrea C. Schalley, a decompositional approach to verbal semantics is proposed. It is described as object-oriented and based on the Unified Modeling Language (UML), which is largely considered to be a standard formalism for object-oriented software design and analysis. A classification of aktionsarten, based on a generative approach, is developed, resulting in a far larger set of classes than the traditional Vendlerian classification. the central dynamic modeling elements of the UER (state, transition, and cause-signal in both their durative and non-durative [= default] version) are implemented.

The second part of the volume, titled “Aspect and aktionsart”, features five contributions.

The paper “Aspectual coercion and eventuality structure”, by Johannes Dölling, deals with the coercion effects triggered by the progressive aspect and temporal adverbials in English. Since Moens & Steedman (1988), the term ‘coercion’ is used to refer to the shifting of the eventuality type (e.g., semelfactive/activity), caused by a mismatch between the semantic properties of the predicate and, roughly speaking, its syntactic context. Dölling supports a two-stage approach to aspectual coercion, regarding it as a purely pragmatic phenomenon. Three types of coercive temporal adverbials are considered: durative (e.g., ‘for one day’), time-span (e.g. ‘in ten minutes’), and time-point (e.g., ‘at seven o’clock’). Several types of coercion are singled out. According to Dölling, coercion can be iterative, habitual, inchoative, additive, and subtractive. Pragmatics and world knowledge are shown to be fundamental for the coercion effect. Thus, when the iterative coercio
 n is pragmatically implausible because a certain event can hardly be repeated continuously, the habitual reading is yielded. Subtractive coercion is triggered by durative adverbials, when world knowledge suggests that the telic event, denoted by the verb phrase, cannot be completed or performed several times within a certain time span. Since the iterative interpretation is discarded for pragmatic reasons, only the non-culminating one remains available. An inchoative coercion “shifts a predicate of occurrences to a predicate of boundaries which are the beginning of such an occurrence” (p. 214), whereas an additive coercion is the opposite process, presupposing a shift “from a boundary predicate into an event predicate” (p. 221).

In “Phases in verbal semantics”, by Volkmar Engerer, an attempt is made to present a comprehensive overview of the most influential schools of thought concerning phasal verbs, including such scholars as Jackendoff, Pustejovsky, Partee and Bennett. The author claims that phasal verbs per se are given little attention in the literature on aspect. Some typological properties of phasal verbs are discussed. For instance, in German, there is no ‘finish’-like verb that could be combined with accomplishments to yield what Engerer labels as the ‘completive-terminative’ interpretation (i.e. ‘finish V-ing’). The completion of accomplishments is encoded by the element ‘fertig-’ (‘ready-’), added to the respective verbal stems. Then the author passes to the discussion of the concept of phase in medieval philosophy in order to “demonstrate the firm ancient roots of research in phases in the Western tradition” (p. 231). A further excursus into modern approaches to phasal
  verbs contains an account of the history of the notions of boundary, interval and coercion in relation to phasal verbs. Finally, Engerer proposes a model for the description of this verbal class, called Simple Phase Semantics, supposed to reconcile diverse theoretical perspectives.

Natalia Kotsyba’s paper “How light are aspectual meanings? A study of the relation between light verbs and lexical aspects in Ukrainian” is an attempt to account for the relationship between the grammaticalization of light verbs and lexical aspect. The paper opens with a discussion of the basic concepts related to lexical aspect, Aktionsart (in the Slavicist sense of the term), and light verbs, where the author tries to connect a range of theories, pertaining to quite diverse theoretical frameworks and, essentially, driven by different aims. Thus, a blend of Vendlerian semantics, Generative Lexicon and the Coercion theory, traditional Slavic aspectology, Zolotova’s Functional Communicative Grammar, Melč’uk’s Meaning-Text Theory, and some other theories is adopted in order to address such diverse issues as the connection between lightness and frequency and the correlation between the aspectual makeup of verbs and the occurrence of certain light verbs in the respective dic
 tionary definitions.

In the paper “The ‘say, do’ verb in Nyulnyul, Warrwa, and other Nyulnyulan languages is monosemic”, by William B. McGregor, an interesting case of verbal polysemy, typical of Australian Aboriginal languages, is assessed. The range of meanings and uses of the verb -J(I) ~ -D(I) is analyzed in two languages, Nyulnyul (Western Nyulnyulan) and Warrwa (Eastern Nyulnyulan), including ‘say’, ‘do’, ‘think’, and some other functions. In Yawuru and Warrwa, it also occurs in desiderative constructions with the meaning ‘to want’. This verb frequently occurs in serial and compound verb constructions in all Nyulnyulan languages, but their semantics are not derived compositionally. According to McGregor, the verb in question “plays an enormously important role in event (in the generic sense) representation in Nyulnyulan languages” (p. 303). Thus, for instance, when it occupies the slot of a verb classifier in CVCs, it neutralizes the [±telic] constrast, so that “the e
 vent is not categorised as either telic or atelic” (p. 315). It categorizes the eventuality as [+dynamic] (“an event or activity rather than a state”, p. 317). Finally, it is claimed that “a monosemic account is preferable to a polysemic one, if one is at all possible” (p. 322), and there is no reason for which the verb under study should not be regarded as monosemic.

In “Predicate classes: A study in compositional semantics”, Peter Oehl declares that the aim of the paper is “to design a concise model for the compositional lexical semantics of predicates” (p. 329). In his view, a fine-grained classification of predicate classes based on such a model should integrate aspect and argument structure. The metalanguage, adopted by the author, consists in a first-order predicate logic, supplemented with elements of generative syntax and semantics. The author arrives at the conclusion that the classical four-way classification of predicates, as devised by Vendler (1967), is not sufficient. The following 15 classes are proposed on the basis of syntactic criteria: (1) properties (know, smart, blind, man, tree), (2) states (bloom, have, surround, pregnant, geriatric), (3) incidents (flash), (4) affairs (rain, snow, bide), (5) acts (cough, swear, kiss, beat), (6) activities (sleep, eat, read, watch), (7) effects (doze off, arrive, explode, fall), (8) 
 developments (blossom, sink, rot), (9) processes (rot, grow), (10) achievements1 (start, dock, escape), (11) accomplishments1 (recover, recuperate), (12) performances1 (gain, climb, regenerate), (13) achievements2 (frighten, shoot, throw, kill, spill, pick up), (14) accomplishments2 (build, bring, fetch), (15) performances2 (carry, inch) (p. 355). Thus, ‘incidents’ correspond to [-telic], [-durative] semelfactives (Comrie 1976), whereas ‘processes’ correspond to Dowtian degree achievements (Dowty 1979).

EVALUATION

The collection of papers under review presents a variety of approaches towards verb classification and provides many useful insights into the relationship between the actional properties of verbs and their argument structure, with a strong focus on syntax. Diverse theoretical frameworks are represented, ranging from functionalism to Generative Lexicon. The interdisciplinary articles, using the principles of object-oriented programming to tackle some issues related to verb semantics and syntax will be of particular interest for computational linguists. At the same time, typologists will find a wealth of material regarding less studied languages. Specifically, I find Dölling’s paper particularly compelling, inasmuch as it provides a unified account of diverse phenomena that can be regarded as instances of aspectual coercion.

I am somewhat perplexed about Kotsyba’s paper “How light are aspectual meanings? A study of the relation between light verbs and lexical aspects in Ukrainian”. Needless to say, the application of the Vendlerian classification to the verbal system of a relatively under-researched Slavic language is an undoubtedly useful and interesting project. However, the way it is done in this paper raises some questions. First of all, the lexical vs. grammatical aspect dichotomy is not cleared up. The perfective/imperfective contrast in East Slavic is related both to actionality / lexical aspect (in the Vendlerian sense) and to the viewpoint aspect in a complex way. As a consequence, it has been claimed that there is no direct mapping between (im)perfectivity and (a)telicity (Padučeva 1996, Paducheva & Pentus 2007, Braginsky and Rothstein 2008). However, it seems that the author fails to distinguish between telicity and boundedness, so that perfectivity is confounded with telicity. The conf
 usion leads to mistakes. For instance, perfective delimitative verbs such as ‘pospaty’ (‘sleep for some time’) or ‘popratsiuvaty’ (‘work for some time’) are certainly not accomplishments, contrarily to what is stated on p. 266, in that they are [+durative] but [-telic].

As far as Oehl’s paper is concerned, the interesting classification of predicates, proposed therein, could probably benefit, first, from a comparison with similar classifications developed within other formal theories and, second, from a more explicit statement of attitude towards some basic TAM-related concepts. Thus, at first glance, it might seem that the author adopts the monodimensional approach to the aspectual domain, missing the distinction between lexical aspect and viewpoint aspect. The latter can be deduced from such statements as “Non-resultative durative verbs like ‘burn’ are always imperfective” (p. 337). The above-said approach is widely regarded as problematic (Dahl 1981; Smith 1991; Depraetere 1995; Bertinetto and Delfitto 2000; Tatevosov 2002 and many others). Subsequently it turns out that Oehl does recognize a distinction between atelicity and imperfectivity (pp. 338-339), but it is not quite clear how exactly they are discerned. The author refers to add
 itional actional classes, namely, semelfactives and degree achievements, but surprisingly avoids mentioning and accounting for the enormous amount of pre-existing research on the heterogeneity of achievements, degree verbs, atelic punctuals and related topics (e.g., Mittwoch 1991; Robison 1995; Dini and Bertinetto 1995; Bertinetto and Squartini 1995; Piñón 1997; Rothstein 2008; Marín and McNally 2011). It is not self-evident how Oehl’s model is related to the pre-existing research on this topic, carried out by formal semanticists and practitioners of some other frameworks, and what is new about it. The paper is by no means the first attempt at elaborating a more extended, fine-grained classification of predicates than the traditional Vendlerian/Dowtian classification, taking into account the argument structure. Classical examples are constituted, for instance, by the models of the predicate in the Role and Reference Grammar (Foley and Van Valin 1984; Van Valin 2005) and in Beth
  Levin’s seminal book (Levin 1993).

REFERENCES

Bertinetto, Pier Marco and Denis Delfitto. 2000. Aspect vs. Actionality: Why they should be kept apart. In Östen Dahl (ed.), Tense and aspect in the languages of Europe, 189–225. Berlin / New York: Mouton De Gruyter.

Bertinetto, Pier Marco and Mario Squartini. 1995. An attempt at defining the class of gradual completion verbs. In Pier Marco Bertinetto, Valentina Bianchi, James Higginbotham and Mario Squartini (eds.), Temporal Reference, Aspect and Actionality. I: Semantic and Syntactic Perspectives, 11–26. Torino: Rosenberg and Sellier.

Braginsky, Pavel and Susan Rothstein. 2008. Vendlerian classes and the Russian aspectual system. Journal of Slavic Linguistics 16(1). 3–55.

Comrie, Bernard. 1976. Aspect: an introduction to the study of verbal aspect and related problems. (Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Dahl, Östen. 1981. On the definition of the telic-atelic (bounded-nonbounded) distinction. In Philip Tedeschi and Annie Zaenen (eds.), Tense and Aspect, 79–90. New York City: Academic Press.

Depraetere, Ilse. 1995. On the necessity of distinguishing between (un)boundedness and (a)telicity. Linguistics and Philosophy 18(1). 1–19.

Dini, Luca and Pier Marco Bertinetto. 1995. Punctual verbs and the ontology of events. Quaderni del Laboratorio di Linguistica della Scuola Normale Superiore 9.

Dowty, David R. 1979. Word meaning and Montague Grammar: The semantics of verbs and times in Generative Semantics and in Montague’s PTQ. Dordrecht, Holland – London: D. Reidel Publishing Company.

Foley, William A. and Robert D. Van Valin. 1984. Functional Syntax and Universal Grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Levin, Beth. 1993. English verb classes and alternations: A preliminary investigation. Chicago Il. Vol. 37. Chicago, London: University of Chicago Press.

Marín, Rafael and Louise McNally. 2011. Inchoativity, change of state, and telicity: evidence from Spanish reflexive psychological verbs. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 29(2). 467–502.

Mittwoch, Anita. 1991. In defence of Vendler’s achievements. Belgian Journal of Linguistics 6(1). 71–85.

Moens, Marc & Mark Steedman. 1988. Temporal Ontology and Temporal Reference. Computational Linguistics 14(2). 15–28.

Padučeva, Elena V. 1996. Semantičeskie issledovanija: Semantika vremeni i vida v russkom jazyke; Semantika narrativa. 2nd ed. Moskva: Jazyki slavjanskoj kultury.

Paducheva, Elena & Mati Pentus. 2007. Formal and informal semantics of telicity. In Susan Rothstein (ed.), Theoretical and crosslinguistic approaches to the semantics of aspect, 191–215. Amsterdam - Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

Piñón, Christopher. 1997. Achievements in an event semantics. In Aaron Lawson (ed.), Proceedings of Semantics and Linguistic Theory VII, 276–293. Ithaca, NY: CLC Publications, Cornell University.

Robison, Richard E. 1995. The aspect hypothesis revisited: A cross-sectional study of tense and aspect marking in interlanguage. Applied Linguistics 16(3). 344–370.

Rothstein, Susan. 2008. Two puzzles for a theory of lexical aspect: the case of semelfactives and degree achievements. In J Dölling, T. Heyde-Zybatow and M. Shaefer (eds.), Event structures in linguistic form and interpretation, 175–198. (Language, Context, and Cognition). Mouton De Gruyter.

Smith, Carlota S. 1991. The parameter of aspect. Kluwer Academic Press.

Tatevosov, Sergej. 2002. The parameter of actionality. Linguistic Typology 6(3). 317–401.

Valin, Robert D. Jr Van. 2005. Exploring the syntax-semantics interface. New York. Cambridge University Press.

Vendler, Zeno. 1967. Linguistics in Philosophy. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Anna Alexandrova is a PhD student of linguistics at Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa (Italy). Her research interests include linguistic typology, Aktionsart, aspectual systems and verbal morphology both in synchrony and diachrony.




----------------------------------------------------------
LINGUIST List: Vol-26-4509	
----------------------------------------------------------