Transcript Nina`s slides on Goldberg 2005

Adele E. Goldberg. Constructions, Lexical
Semantics and the Correspondence Principle:
Accounting for Generalizations and
Subregularities in the Realization of Arguments.
 In Languages like English, there are regularities in
which arguments tend to be obligatorily expressed.
Researchers introduced an Argument Realization
Principle to capture these tendencies.
 Goldberg argues that the Argument Realization
Principle fails to account for counterexamples.
 However, constructions, Lexical Semantics and
discourse factors can account for the general
tendencies and the classes of exceptions.
 Constructions are a network of learned pairings of
form and function. In the constructional approach
adopted here motivation is the main concept for each
posited construction.
 Motivation explains why it is possible and natural that
this particular form-meaning correspondence should
exist in a given language.
 Argument Realization Principle (ARP):
 There must be one argument XP in the syntax to
identify each subevent in the event structure
template.
 Subevents include actions, causes and states:
 [x ACT <MANNER>]
(activity)
[x <STATE>]
(state)
[BECOME [x <STATE>]] (achievement)
[[x ACT<MANNER>] CAUSE [BECOME [y
<STATE>]]]
(accomplishment)
 The ARP implies that at least one argument
associated with each subevent must be syntactically
expressed. Thus it accounts for the tendency of
theme arguments to be explicitly expressed if motion
is predicated of them.
 1a. * Phil swept onto the floor.
 1b. Phil ACT <swept>

BECOME [dust <onto the floor>]
 1c. Phil swept the dust onto the floor.
 According to the ARP, example (1a) is unacceptable
because there is an overt syntactical argument
missing. Example (1b) correctly illustrates that there
must be two independent subevents, first the
sweeping action and then the motion of the dust onto
the floor caused by the sweeping.
 Also, according to the ARP, causative verbs should
obligatorily express the argument that undergoes the
change of state in all contexts.
 2. The owl ACT <killed>

Become <prey killed>
 The ARP says that an argument must identify the
second subevent designating a change of state,
therefore the patient argument must be clearly
expressed.
 However, languages like Russian, Korean, Chinese,
Japanese, Hindi, Hungarian, Arabic, Thai, and Laos
allow arguments that represent given information to
be unexpressed.
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Q: Did Ivan buy a newspaper?
A: Net, ne kupil.
No, (he) didn’t buy (it).
Q: Did you introduce Ivan to Masha?
A: Da, predstavil.
Yes, (I) introduced (him) (to her).
 Also in English, there are counterexamples to the
ARP.
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3. Margaret sneezed onto the computer screen.
4. Bill blew into the paper bag.
5. Celia spit into the wind.
6. Pat vomited onto the front seat.
 Even though there is an overt directional in each
example, the theme argument is unexpressed.
 The semantic decomposition of example (3) is
isomorphic with the semantic decomposition of (1b).
Both entail a caused motion of a theme to a location.
However, the possibilities of argument realization are
distinct.
 3b. Margaret ACT <sneeze>

BECOME [mucus <onto the computer
screen>]
 Verbs like sneeze, blow, spit and vomit are often
described as being intransitive, but the principles of
argument realization apply to the semantic
decompositions of propositions. The semantics of
verbs in isolation is not relevant.
 Two participants are involved in all of the examples
(3)-(6), an unexpressed theme argument that is
caused to move to the location designated by the
evident PP. Thus such verbs can optionally be
transitive.
 3’. Margaret sneezed mucus onto the
computer screen.
 4’. Bill blew air into the paper bag.
 5’. Celia spit saliva into the wind.
 6’. Pat vomited her lunch onto the front seat.
 It could be argued now that the semantics in
examples (3)-(6) is directly reflected in the syntax.
This means that a direct object is syntactically
incorporated into the verb. It could be claimed that
the ARP is actually a constraint on a level of
underlying representation.
 Support for such a view could be that for example the
verb spit is morphologically related to the
corresponding nominal form spit. However, verbs like
sneeze and blow do not have any nominal
morphological counterparts.
 It could be argued now that the verbs sneeze and
blow are derived from nouns, so that there is a
morphological gap with the result that the nouns
cannot be realized in their bare form. However, the
difference between example (1a) and examples (3)(6) is still not explained.
 Another critical point is that the theme arguments
cannot be semantically incorporated into the
meanings of the verbs in all examples. Therefore it
seems that semantic decomposition does not directly
determine argument realization.
 Also verbs of contribution can appear without an
overt theme argument, even though a directional
phrase is explicitly stated.
 7. Pat contributed to the Leukemia Foundation.
 In conclusion, verbs of bodily emission and verbs of
contribution can be realized without a theme
argument, even when an overt directional phrase
exists.
 The ARP also predicts that causative events that
include two subevents should therefore also have two
overt arguments. However, the patient argument can
be omitted.
 8a. Owls only kill at night.
 8b. Pat gave and gave, but Chris just took and took.
 8c. The kindergartener cut in straight lines.
 According to the ARP, there are no more obligatory
arguments than subevents. As an example, verbs of
surface contact are never obligatorily transitive, when
the omitted argument is semantically recoverable.
But there is one subclass of verbs of surface contact
that resists object omission.
 9. [Pat observes Chris petting a cat.] Chris pet *(her)
yesterday, too.
 10. [Chris approaches a cat that is known to bite.]
You’d better not stroke *(it)!
 11. [Pat and Bob were very affectionate at the
restaurant.] They caressed *(each other) throughout
the meal.
 All these instances are counterexamples to the claim
of the ARP that each subevent must be identified by
exactly one argument.
 A constructional approach can help!

There appear to be two generalizations in English:

(I) If motion is predicated of a theme argument, the
theme argument is generally overtly expressed.
(II) If a change of state is predicated of a patient
argument, the patient argument is generally overtly
expressed.

 How are these empirical generalizations motivated?
 The overt expression of arguments is determined by
lexical semantics and constructions. Constructions
that involve argument structure generalizations have
semantic roles associated with them. These are
defined as argument roles and correspond to the
traditional thematic roles. The role labels capture the
semantic properties associated with the respective
slots in an argument structure construction.
 Argument roles are defined in terms of the semantic
requirements of particular constructions, therefore
they are more specific and there are more choices
than with traditional thematic roles.
 Only specific argument roles are particularly
discourse-prominent, or profiled. In English clauses
for example, only roles that are realized as subject,
direct object, or the second object in ditransitive
sentences are considered to be profiled. Such roles
are highly discourse prominent, usually they are
either topical or focal in the discourse.
 Argument roles capture generalizations over
participant roles of individual verbs. Every verb is
conventionally associated with a specific number of
participant roles. The roles that are lexically profiled
are obligatorily expressed.
 Specific types of argument roles are more likely to be
profiled, and therefore obligatorily expressed, than
others. Generally, animate roles are more central and
relevant to be expressed than place or location roles.
 A participant role of the verb must be ‘fused’ with an
argument role of a construction to become clearly
expressed.
 Fusion can be described as the relation between
these two roles, because the constraints on both
roles must be simultaneously met by the argument
which requires the two roles.
 The Semantic Coherence Principle and the
Correspondence Principle restrict the ways in which
participant roles of a verb and argument roles of a
construction are fused.
 The Semantic Coherence Principle:
 The participant role of the verb and the argument role
of the construction must be semantically compatible.
The more specific participant role of the verb must be
construable as an instance of the more general
argument role. General categorization processes are
responsible for this categorization task and it is
always operative.
 The Correspondence Principle:
 The semantically salient profiled participant roles are
encoded by grammatical relations that provide them
a sufficient degree of discourse prominence: i.e., by
profiled argument roles.
 An exception arises if a verb has three profiled roles;
in this case, one can be represented by an unprofiled
argument role (and realized as an oblique argument).
 The Correspondence Principle can be overridden by
specifications of particular constructions.
 The Correspondence Principle is a default principle, it
can be overridden by certain constructions.
 Constructions can increase the prominence of an
argument, and constructions can also deemphasize a
specific argument.
 The theme argument of a change of location
predication and a patient argument of a change of
state predicate are usually profiled, which means
they are central participants within the discourse.
Thus they are obligatorily accessed for the respective
semantic representation.
 Generally, it is not necessary to assert that a
participant changes state or location unless the
attention is focused on that participant.
 In case the argument is an inherent argument of the
verb, it is a profiled participant role.
 According to the default Correspondence Principle,
profiled participants will be overtly expressed in
English.
 Thus the semantics of such predications along with
the Correspondence Principle accounts for the two
generalizations in (I) and (II).
 Since the Correspondence Principle is a default
principle, there are also constructions in which a
theme or patient argument is becoming
deemphasized.
 As seen above, verbs of bodily emission and
contribution can appear without a clearly expressed
theme argument. This violates generalization (I).
 The Implicit Theme Construction can help here.
According to this construction, the identity of the
theme argument is semantically recoverable by an
inference based on the meaning of the verb.
 In the case of verbs of contribution, the combination
of verb and construction is as follows:
 Page 9 at the bottom
 Two factors motivate the Implicit Theme
Construction, semantic recoverability and politeness.
 Semantic recoverability is a necessary condition
concerning argument omission. If speakers refer to
unexpressed arguments that are not recoverable,
they will not be understood.
 Also, these verb classes involve concerns about
politeness. The more explicit a description, the less
polite it is. The nominal counterparts to the verbs are
even ‘less polite’, because nouns are more ‘imagable’
than verbs. Therefore there is a pragmatic motivation
to leave the theme argument unspecified.
 11a. He spit into the wind.
 11b. His spit flew into the wind.
 The requirement of semantic recoverability is
satisfied in each of the following examples:
 12a. Owls only kill at night.
 12b. Pat gave and gave, but Chris just took and took.
 12c. The kindergartener cut in straight lines.
 In these examples, a further discourse condition is
necessary to allow object omission.
 Principle of Omission under Low Discourse
Prominence:
 Omission of the patient argument is possible when
the patient argument is construed to be
deemphasized in the discourse vis à vis the action.
That is, omission is possible when the patient
argument is not topical (or focal) in the discourse,
and the action is particularly emphasized (via
repetition, strong affective stance, contrastive focus,
etc.). [Goldberg 2000]
 There is no language in which focal elements are
omitted.
 In English, usually all topical arguments must be
expressed. However, if the action is specifically
emphasized, there is the possibility to exclude
arguments that are predictable (= non-focal) and nonrelevant (= non-topical).
 The Deprofiled Object Construction represents this
combination of discourse and syntactic
characteristics.
 Page 12 at the bottom
 The Deprofiled Object Construction is motivated by
the fact that it is not necessary to mention non-focal,
non-topical arguments, because they are predictable
and also non-relevant in the discourse.
 Additionally it can be noticed that the object is more
likely deemphasized when the predicate is
emphasized.
 It can also happen that arguments which should be
omitted according to the ARP, are nonetheless
obligatory.
 The transitive verbs drink, smoke, sing and write can
sometimes appear intransitively. The ARP correctly
predicts that they should be optionally intransitive.
 These verbs occur frequently in generic contexts
along with a habitual interpretation. A context which is
‘covered’ by the Deprofiled Object Construction.
 Pat drinks; Pat smokes; Chris sings; Sam writes.
 The result of the frequent use of these verbs in such
a context is the grammaticalization of a lexical option.
 Thus, if a verb occurs frequently in a specific
discourse context that license the omission of the
non-subject argument, it will become over time a
conventional and grammaticalized option for the verb
to leave out the argument.
 Therefore listeners will reanalyze the intransitive use
of the verb as a lexical option instead of being
licensed by a specific discourse context by means of
the Deprofiled Object Construction.
 The fact that synonyms of these verbs do not allow
object omission and also have lower frequencies,
supports the idea that the high frequency of verbs like
drink, smoke, sing and write is an important point for
their historical reanalysis.
 13. Pat drank/#imbibed last night.
 14. Pat wrote/#drafted last night.
 Verbs such as imbibe and draft have a low frequency
and thus do not appear regularly in the context of the
Deprofiled Object Construction.
 Their rare appearance in this context has not enabled
a reanalysis to regard the intransitive use as a lexical
option.
 As a result, the Deprofiled Object Construction can
motivate currently productive cases as well as
lexicalized idiosyncratic cases.
 Verbs of surface contact like pet, stroke, and caress
are obligatorily transitive verbs, which directly
contradict the predictions of the ARP.
 It is normal to pet, stroke, or caress animate beings
that are usually prominent in the discourse.
 In the discourse context captured by the Deprofiled
Object Construction, animate participant roles can be
omitted because they become less prominent.
 15. The devoted zoo-keeper patted and stroked all
day.
 16. The well-trained masseuse always caressed with
a firm hand.