Ettlinger - Constructional Compositionality and the English Resultative

7/31/2019 Ettlinger - Constructional Compositionality and the English Resultative

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Constructional Compositionalityand the English Resultative

MARC ETTLINGERUniversity of California, Berkeley

June 1, 2005

1.INTRODUCTION:Recent work on grammatical constructions in English (Lakoff 1987, Goldberg 1995, Kay &Fillmore 1999, Fillmore, Kay & OConnor 1988) has provided strong evidence that the meaningof an utterance is not always derivable from its lexical parts and that the semantics of a sentenceis partly comprised of meaning ascribed to syntactic constructions. Lacking in most of these

accounts, however, is a detailed description of how the syntactic and semantic constraints ofdifferent constructions can combine together and result in the appropriate syntactic forms andsemantic interpretations.1 The aim of this paper is to take, as a starting point, the form andmeaning of the resultative construction and examine how it can be combined with the set ofconstructions known in the transformational literature as raising constructions, such as it-cleftsand topicalization. The grammaticality of topicalized resultative phrases reveals that theresultative construction consists of a number of different, related, sub-constructions, each with itsown semantic and syntactic properties. A cognitively grounded radial structure for the resultativeis advanced based on the different form and meaning constraints of the sub-constructions.Generation of the appropriate sentence forms for a topicalized resultative also requires preciselydefining a theory of CONSTRUCTIONAL COMPOSITIONALITY,or how multiple constructions can

combine to create a new construction. To do so, a distinction is drawn between constructions thatare composed ad hoc and those that are related to other constructions but specifically enumeratedin the grammar. This cline is discussed with respect to topicalized resultatives, which, because ofcertain idiosyncratic properties, must be explicitly enumerated in the grammar and is notcomposed ad-hoc.

The resultative construction has received significant attention as of late in both Constructional(Goldberg & Jackendoff 2004, Boas 2003) and Minimalist (Embick 2004, Levin 2002, Rothstein2001) literature. Resultatives, as shown in (1), are made up of a subject, verb, resultative phrase(RP; in bold in the examples) and an optional object:

(1) Some Resultative Examples:a. Mary painted the house red. (Rothstein 2001, p.157)b. The pond froze solid.c. Dobson and his mob laughed you off the street. (Boas 200, p. 4)

1 See, however, Zwicky 1994 for an outline of what a formalism shouldcapture, and Kay & Fillmore 1999 for adetailed formal definition of the WXDY construction as juxtaposed with the constructions it syntacticallyapproximates.


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The semantic paraphrase in (1)a) and (1)c) is SUBJ causes OBJ to become RP by VERBingand in (1)b) SUBJ becomes RP by VERBing. What categorizes these as resultatives is that theydescribe the state of an argument resulting from the action denoted by the verb (Boas 2003, p.1), a final state not necessarily implicit in the verb itself.

Despite the recent investigations into the semantics (Goldberg 1995, G&J 2004) of theresultative and argumentation concerning how the internal syntactic structure of the constructionis derived (Embick 2004, Rothstein 2001), the syntactic behavior of the resultative phrase itselfis not well catalogued beyond the RP constituency test shown in (2) and the understanding of apreposed directional phrase as a main clause phenomenon wherein it can not be embedded as asubordinate clause of an assertion (2c).

(2) Previous syntactic tests of the resultative phrase.a. Constituency of the RP and verb

i. *Mary painted the house happily red. (Rothstein 2001)ii. Mary pained the house red happily.

b. Positional requirement of the RPi. I turned on the light.ii. I turned the light on.

iii. I painted the house red.iv. *I painted red the house. (Aarts 1989)

c. Preposed directional as main clause phenomenoni. She ran into the garden.

ii. I guess that she ran into the garden.iii. Into the garden she ran.iv. *I guess that into the garden she ran. (Green 1976)

This paper will deal with the constraints on transposing the RP to the beginning of an utterance,often known as raising (Ross 1967, Chomsky 1977). In (3)a), the resultative phrase in the formof a PP can be topicalized, while in (3)b) the PP can not; adjectival phrase RPs have a similardivergence in behavior shown in (3)c), (3)d).

(3) Different behavior of RP topicalization:a. Into the room I ran.b. #Outside the park I smashed the ball. (=I smashed the ball out of the park.)c. *Clean I wiped the table.d. Away the ball rolled.

1.1.ORGANIZATION OF THE PAPERSection three of this paper investigates the properties of the RP exhibited in (3) and I argue thatthe movement is conditioned by semantic considerations and is not based on the syntacticstructure of the resultative construction. In addition, I show that the resultative construction hascertain idiomatic properties in the form of constraints on word-order. These constraints on wordorder favor a Construction Grammar approach, which then requires an investigation into theradial category structure of the resultative construction, also part of section three.


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Beyond defining the radial category structure of the resultative, a Construction Grammaranalysis of topicalizing and it-clefting a resultative requires an understanding of how theseinformation structure constructions are combined with the resultative an under-explored topicin the construction grammar literature. This issue of Constructional Compositionality isaddressed in section four where ad-hoc composition is contrasted with inherited composition for

pre-existing constructions which can provide a foundation for a model of sentence processingand production.

To discuss it-clefting and topicalizing the resultative construction, a construction grammardefinition of these information structure constructions is need as well; these are provided insection two which discussed syntactic constructions in Embodied Construction Grammar. TheEmbodied Construction Grammar (ECG, Bergen & Chang 2005) formalism, which extendssome of the principles of standard Constructions Grammar retains most of the essential tenets asexpressed in Goldberg (1995), Tomasello (2003) and Croft (2001). Before addressing the issuesabove, a brief introduction of ECG is also provided in section two. ESsentially, ECGincorporates a neurally plausible and computationally implementable framework to provide a

way of defining form constraints on constructions and, crucially here, semantic constraints aswell; crucial because, as mentioned earlier, the extraction of the resultative is determined bysemantic and not syntactic factors contra what is predicted by a model of syntax autonomousfrom semantics. While it is assumed that the reader has some familiarity with the basicarguments that have been posed for the need for Constructions in grammar (Goldberg 1995,Lakoff 1987, Langacker 1987, Fillmore, Kay & OConnor 1988, Kay & Fillmore 1999) therelevant similarities and differences between ECG and Construction Grammar are in the nextsection.

2.ECG/CONSTRUCTION GRAMMARECG shares with Construction Grammar the observation that linguistic knowledge is comprisedof pairings of meaning and form, or Constructions, at all levels of representation. A grammarexpressed in ECG or any other instantiation of CG will use Constructions to represent all aspectsof the grammar from phonological form to pragmatics in formal elements ranging frommorphemes to full idiomatic expressions. Given the need for at least some set of Constructions,as has been shown in Lakoff (1987), Kay & Fillmore (1999), Fillmore, Kay & OConnor (1988),Goldberg (1995) and others, Occams razor dictates that no other grammatical elements areneeded unless it can be shown that they are necessary and that the phenomena is otherwiseunexplainable with constructions. Further evidence for the need for constructions as a basicelement of grammar comes from a number of other areas: psychology (Saffran 1996, Bowerman1985 and many others), exemplar-based approaches to language (Bybee 1998, Croft 2001), andtheories of language acquisition (Tomasello 2003, Goldberg 1999 and others). This literaturegenerally shows that a grammar comprised of constructions is the best model of capturing how amind learns, processes and produces language.

ECG and CG also both organize constructions into more complex structures; instead of havingthousands of independent constructions making up the grammar of a language, they are related toeach other through inheritance hierarchies, wherein a construction can incorporate, orinherit,

Discuinheri


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aspects of its form and/or meaning from another construction. Inheritance is the basis of severalimportant theoretical aspects of CG/ECG:

First, it formally expresses Lakoff (1987)s description of a construction being based on anotherand Langacker (1987)s proposal that the inventory of a language is structured. If one

construction clearly motivates the existence of another because of commonalities of form andmeaning, as in the case of the caused-motion construction being metaphorically extended to theresultative, then the resultative can be said to inherit from the caused-motion construction. Thisrelationship is discussed in greater detail in 3.5 on the radial structure of the resultative.

Second, if a Construction calls for a particular constituent, a verb for example, then allconstructions that inherit from the Verb Construction, such as the form-meaning pairing for thelexical item throw, can act as that constituent. This obviates the need for a separate categorysystem within the grammar beyond constructions themselves.

Finally, Goldberg (1995) suggested that inheritance of form and/or meaning from two or more

constructions - called multiple inheritance - is how constructions such as a topicalized-transitive-resultative construction are formed. While its clear that this construction does incorporateelements of both the topicalizationconstruction and the resultative construction, what is lessclear is whether this particular construction the topicalized-resultative - is an enumerated partof the learned grammar of English or whether it composed dynamically, on the spot, whenneeded, through unification. So, given that the topicalized-transitive-resultative construction hasthe form RP-SUBJ-V-OBJ, open questions include whether this form is specifically enumeratedand learned as part of an English-speakers grammar or whether this form arises from theresolution of form requirements for the transitive-resultative constructions with the formrequirements of the topicalization construction. If the answer is the latter, then is this resolutionof requirements enacted dynamically at the time of production or processing or is it part of aninheritance hierarchy that is part of the grammar of the speaker? Lastly, what, precisely, are theconstructions that the grammar writer needs to define to capture the grammar of English andwhat are the form constraints and requirements of each construction? The answer, it seems, isthat it depends.

Despite the similarities discussed above, ECG introduces an additional set of principles forformulating a grammar, beyond those established by CG. ECG aims, as a main goal, to provide aneurally plausible and computationally implementable formalism; this requires makingadditional claims about the process of understanding an utterance. The key difference betweenthe two in their basic definitions of a Construction the difference that makes ECG embodied is that ECG claims that the meaning side of a construction is not simply a predicationalexplication of the construction, but rather involves a process of generating inferences through theembodied simulation of the semantics of the construction. This allows for real-world knowledgeto be part of linguistic processing and requires that the grammatical formalism be stated preciselyenough for the simulation to be tested computationally while adhering to general cognitiveprinciples on the organization of knowledge.

This is done is through the use ofimage schemas.End


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2.1.IMAGE SCHEMASTo cognitively ground each Construction, its meaning is defined in terms ofimage schemaswhich encode fundamental human sensorimotor experiences (Lakoff 1987). Image schemasshare, with Frame Semantics (Fillmore 1982), Force-dynamic schemas (Talmy 1988) and

Semantic schemas (Langacker 1987) the important observation that meaning is arranged intoschemata such that all of the components of a schema and the relationships among componentsare all part of the meaning of any single part of the schema. A classic example is the meaning ofhypotenuse, which, in addition to meaning the longest sideof a right triangle, also evokes, as partof its meaning, the right-triangle itself, the other two side and the right angle.

Formally, each schema, as the meaning portion of a construction, will have a set ofROLESassociated with it to express its components and each role can be constrained to be of a certaintype such as animate entities, locations, containerand so on. Because natural language semanticsextends well beyond singular primitive image schemas, schemas share with constructions theproperty of being organized into more complex structures.

One type of relationship is schema inheritance, or the SUBCASE relationship, which indicates thatthe schema is a further specification of the subcased schema. For example, the schema INTO,which expresses the semantics of the lexical item into, is an example of the more generaltrajector-landmarkschema as described in Langacker (1987). This observation is encodedthrough the statement that the INTO schema is a subcase of the trajector-landmark schema asshown in Figure 1. This entails that the INTO schema inherits every role of the trajector-landmarkschema, the trajector and the landmark, and that the INTO schema may be used as a trajector-landmark schema if a construction calls for it. The INTO schema adds additional detail to thetrajector-landmark schema by requiring the landmark be a container - which has an interior andexterior - and by requiring the trajector to be an object.

Beyond the semantics of the trajector-landmark schema, the INTO schema also evokes the source-path-goal schema. This is formally accomplished with another type of relationship, evokes,which allows for the inclusion of additional, backgrounded schemas to further articulate theschemas meaning. The relevant schemas are shown in Figure 1 with italicized roles indicatingthat the role is inherited:

Figure 1: Schemas Relevant for defining INTO.

schema INTOsubcase Trajector-Landmarkevokes SPGroles

trajector: Obj ectlandmark: Container

mappingstrajector SPG.t raj ectorlandmark.interior SPG.Goal

landmark.exterior SPG.Source

schema TRAJECTOR-LANDMARKroles

trajector

landmark

schema SOURCE-PATH-GOALroles

trajectorsourcepathgoal

schema CONTAINERroles

interior

exterior

Discuswhy imschem

End


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The MAPPINGS in the INTO schema unify the two schemas together by binding the roles of oneonto the other representing which represents the neural process of binding. The interior of thecontainer is bound to the goal in the SPG schema and the exterior of the container is bound to thesource of the source-path-goal schema.

Thus, the primitive image schemas, trajector-landmark and source-path-goal, may be combinedwith the containment schema to create a more complex scene through composition.

2.2.CONSTRUCTIONSIn ECG, linguistic forms are tied to schemas through constructions. Each construction will havea form specification, a meaning specification and a set mappings correlating the components ofform onto roles of the schema. The form specification can include constituents, reflecting thepossibility that constructions can combine together to form other constructions and may also, butnot always, include phonological representations and specifications as to the order ofconstituents.

2.2.1.LEXICAL CONSTRUCTIONSTo illustrate this more concisely, it is useful to go through a few examples. The first example inFigure 2 represents the construction for the lexical item run. The schemas and constructionsspecify that [n] (as indicated by theform entry of the construction) is a verb (as indicated by

the subcase relationship of the Run construction) of directed motion (Directed Motion issubcasedby the Run schema) along a path (the Run schema evokes the SPG schema). Notice thatthere is no information about the syntactic argument structure or how the arguments ofrun arerelated to thematic roles. This contrasts with certain transformational approaches where eachlexical item has, as part of its entry in the lexicon, its argument structure syntax. This approach is

best exemplified by the Projection Principle (Chomsky 1981) where the selection of a lexicalitem includes the insertion of the syntactic structure of a verb and its arguments (asubcategorization frame) into a syntactic tree. In ECG, however, the meaning of the verb [ n] is

nothing more than the evocation of the Run schema. The run schema has certain semantic rolesas part of its definition, including a runner, and it is the job of argument structure constructionsto provide syntactic slots for any arguments and to link these syntactic arguments to the roles ofthe schema. Constructions of this sort - the run construction which are made up ofphonological material paired with a schema are called LEXICAL CONSTRUCTIONS.2

Figure 2: The run construction

2 This label does not imply that these make up a special category of constructions, rather it simply provides a usefulshorthand.

construction RUNsubcase of verbform: [n]

meaningschema: Run

schema RUNsubcase of: directed motionevokes: SPG

rolesrunner direction motion.agent

path SPG.pat h

schema DIRECTED MOTIONsubcase of: predicationroles

agent

predication.protagonist


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2.2.2.SYNTACTIC CONSTRUCTIONSAnother type of construction is shown in Figure 3. These constructions have no phonologicalcontent as part of their form and instead express syntagmatic relationships between constituents.

The data in (4) provide the linguistic evidence for positing these syntactic constructions:

(4) Undergoer of transitive for action and experience verbs:a. Action Verbs

i. Jason hit Alex undergoer = patientii. Alex was hit. undergoer = patient

b. Experience Verbsi. I enjoyed the spectacle undergoer = stimulus

ii. The spectacle was enjoyed (by all). undergoer = stimulus

Sentence (ii) in each set shows that the transitive argument structure requires but one argument

and all four sentences have an undergoer (in bold), so only the undergoer is required in thetransitiveargument structure construction.3 Sentence (i) in each set shows that active voice addsan additional argument, the actor, which always appears before the verb. The single argument inthe passive construction, the undergoer, is also required to appear directly before the verb.Differentiating (a) and (b) is the fact that the undergoer takes on different thematic rolesdepending on the type of transitive verb used, or the type of predication instantiated.

Figure 3: Some syntactic constructions

3 The relationship between this construction and the evidence in (4) to the VP in Principles and Parameters is worthinvestigating. An important distinction is that this construction is not based on constituency tests, however.

construction ACTIVE TRANSITIVEsubcase of Finit e Clauseconstituents

Transitivesubject : NP

formsubject < t ransit ive.verbmeaning

voice active

subj ect Transitive.actor

construction TRANSITIVEsubcase of Arg St ruct ureconstituents

verb: Transit ive VERBNP : NP

meaningTransit ive Predication:

NP

Trn Pred.undergoer

schema TRANSITIVE PREDICATIONsubcase of: predicationroles

actor

undergoer

schema TRANSITIVE ACTIONsubcase of: transitive predicationroles

agent trn.actor

patient trn.undergoer

schema EXPERIENCEsubcase of: transitive predicationroles

stimulus trn.undergoer

experiencer trn.actor

construction PASSIVE TRANSITIVEsubcase of Finite Clauseconstituents

Transitiveform

transitive.NP < transitive.verbmeaning

voice active

transitive.NP Trn.predication.undergoer


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These observations are translated into ECG through the argument structure constructions for atransitive predication in Figure 3. The transitive construction pairs a single verb with a singlenoun phrase represented by the two constituents, verb and NP, in the transitive construction andthe one NP is the undergoer of the verb represented by its mapping to the undergoer role in thetransitive-predication schema.

The transitive-predication schema represents the schematic understanding of any transitivepredication while the transitive-action schema captures the schematics of a predicated action.The transitive-action has the undergoer as a patient, which is formally represented by themapping of agent to actor and patient to undergoer, while the roles mappings of an experiencepredication is captured through mapping the undergoer to the stimulus in the experience schema.

Turning, now, to the voice constructions, in the active-transitive construction, a new NP is addedto the transitive argument structure and we see, for the first time, form constraints on word order.This new NP, the subject, is required to come directly before the verb as indicated by the


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subject directlyprecede the verb, the only place the object can go is before the subject, resultingin the O S V word order in (5)b).

With these construction defined, we can now examine the behavior of the resultativeconstruction and in particular what happens making the resultative phrase is the topic.

3.ACLOSER LOOK AT THE RESULTATIVEThis section aims to expand the understanding of the resultative construction by developing anaccount for the grammaticality of topicalizing the resultative phrase while defining its radialcategory structure based on this behavior.

The resultative construction can appear similar in form to the depictive and secondarypredication but the semantics are distinct as shown by the minimally different examples in (6).

(6) The depictive, secondary predication and the resultative:

a. I cooked the carrots naked. (=I was naked when I cooked my carrots.)b. I ate the carrots soft. (=The carrots were soft when I ate them.)c. I cooked the carrots soft. (=The carrots became soft by me cooking them.)

In the depictive (or Rothstein (2001)s subject-oriented adjuncts) (6)a) the adjectival phrasemodifies the subject of cook through a modification relationship between adjective and noun,independent of the verb. Therefore, there are no selectional criteria between the verb andadjective as seen in (7)a) any adjective can be used with any verb. 4 Also, no additionalsemantics are introduced by the construction that isnt predictable from the component pieces.

In the secondary predicate construction, (6)b), the adjectival phrase softmodifies the object ofthe verb, again without any additional semantics beyond basic adjective-noun modification andwithout any selectional criteria between the verb and adjective (7)b).

With the resultative, however, the adjective or the resultative phrase (RP) must beconstruable as a direct result of the verb and the meaning paraphrase introduces the notion of

4 Despite the fact that there is no reason why the verb should condition the adjective one can be in any state onewishes when cooking carrots there actually do appear to be pragmatic considerations the constrain the adjective.Consider:

i) ?I cooked the carrots heavy.ii) I married Jim heavy.iii)??I cooked the carrots embarrassed.

iv) ?I cooked the carrots completely embarrassed and ashamed.v) ?I cooked the carrots happy.vi) I drove to school happy.

While it seems odd to construe (i) as I was heavy when I cooked the carrots, (ii) seems acceptable. There are likelyseveral different constraints involved. First, there must be an aspectual/telicity/time duration compatibility betweenthe verbal event and the telicity of the adjective this seems to account for (i) being ungrammatical as compared to(ii). Phonological weight seems to come into play as shown in comparing (iii) and (iv). Finally, some sortexpectedness or correlation does seem to be involved, for example in the contrast be (v) and (vi). Its not completelyclear how the constraint on these last two would be formulated or even what the generalization is.


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causationwhich is not part of the semantics of any of the individual lexical components. Theseproperties motivate the need for a construction incorporating the additional meaning andconstraints that are not part of the verbs. (Goldberg 1995, G&J, Boas 2003).

(7) Selectional criteria for the resultative, the depictive and secondary predication

a. Depictive No verb-adjective constraints.i. I cooked the carrots clothed.ii. I cooked the carrots drunk.

iii. I sold the carrots naked.b. Secondary predicate No verb-adjective constraints.

i. I eat my carrots hard.ii. I eat my carrots yellow.

iii. I chopped my carrots raw.c. Resultative Verb must be construable as having caused the result state

i. *I cooked the carrots hard. (=The carrots became soft by me cooking them.)ii. *I cooked the carrots raw. (=The carrots became soft by me cooking them.)

iii. *I chopped my carrots soft. (=The carrots became soft by me chopping them.)iv. I baked the carrots soft. (Baking can be a way of making carrots soft.)3.1.DERIVING THE RESULTATIVE FROM CAUSED MOTIONThe caused motion construction (8e) is best treated as the source of the resultative (8f) for anumber of reasons outlined in Goldberg (1995). First, caused-motion can be construed as being aspecific type of resultative where the result is represented by a locative prepositional phrase. Thismirrors the fact that depictives are semantically similar to adjunct prepositional phrases depictingwhere the subject is when doing or undergoing the action described by the main verb (8a vs. 8b)and secondary predicates are semantically similar to adjunct PPs that modify the object (8c vs.8d):

(8) Adjunct Prepositional Phrase for Depictives and Resultativesa. I cooked carrots in the room. (I was in the room when I cooked the carrots)b. I cooked carrots naked. (I was naked when I cooked the carrots)

c. I cooked the carrots in the pot. (The carrots were in the pot when I cooked them)d. I cooked the carrots unpeeled. (The carrots were unpeeled when I cooked them.)

e. I chopped the carrots into the dish. (The carrots went in the dishby chopping them.)f. I cooked the carrots soft. (The carrots became softby me cooking them.)

This unifies the semantics of both constructions via similar paraphrases: (8e) means CAUSEDthe carrots TO MOVE into the dish BY chopping them which parallels the resultative (8f)CAUSED the carrots TO BECOME softBY cooking them. These two paraphrases, CAUSETO MOVE and CAUSE TO BECOME, can be related to each other through a STATES areLOCATIONS (Lakoff & Johnson 1980) metaphoric extension of the caused-motion construction


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(Goldberg 1995). The following mappings are part of the STATES are LOCATIONS or EVENTSTRUCTURE metaphor:5

(9) EVENT STRUCTURE metaphora. STATES are LOCATIONS

b. CAUSES are FORCESc. CAUSATION is FORCED MOVEMENTd. DIRECTION OF CHANGE is DIRECTION

The items on the right, the source domain, are all roles in the movement-in-space schema - theimage, or script, or frame that we use to conceptualize and understand motion in space. On theleft, in the target domain, are the roles that each of the motion roles are mapped to and they formour understanding of causation and events.

However, it is not simply the generic event structure metaphor that provides the basis forextending the caused-motion construction to the resultative, but the specific case of the

CAUSAL PATHS metaphor. The additional CAUSAL PATH mappings are in (10) and theyrepresent the EVENT STRUCTURE source domain along a path. Combining the motion-in-space schema with the source-path-goal schema adds a path and goal to the source domain. Thisallows for the inclusion of a result role in the target domain:

(10)CAUSAL PATH metaphora. ACTION is SELF-PROPELLED MOTIONb. RESULTS IN is LEADING TOc. RESULTING STATE is END OF PATH

With these metaphorical mappings, the caused-motion construction can be mapped to theresultative construction as shown in Table 1.

Table 1: Mapping Caused Motion to the Resultative

Caused Motion I threw the ball to in the basket

SOURCE DOMAIN forceforced

movementaffected entity direction location

EVENT

STRUCTUREcause causation affected entity

directionof change

state

CAUSALPATH cause causation affected entity result state

Resultative I painted the house red

Paraphrase causer means result state

The mapping of direction and location in the basic motion-in-space schema to the goal, or end ofpath, in the source-path-goal schema which is then mapped to the resulting state in the target

5 Please see Lakoff (1999) for a very thorough explication of this metaphor as well as arguments for its existence.


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domain of causation. This explains the requirement in the resultative construction that the resultstate must be an end-of-scale, non-gradable states ruling out examples like those in (11):

(11)Prohibited non-end-of-scale resultativesa. *Mel wiped the table dirty. (The table is a little dirty/*a little clean)

b. *Black hammered the metal safe. (The metal is a little safe/* a little flat.)

Also, the verb, the forced movement in the source domain, is mapped to causation in theCAUSAL PATHS target domain. The causation, then, is ascribed to the verb in the resultative it is painting that is understood to be the causation for the redness of the house. Since the causer,the subjectI, is the root of the force, then painting is understood as the means by which thecauser caused the result state. Hence we get the paraphrase of the resultative construction Icaused the house to be redby painting it.

Through the CAUSAL PATH metaphor, the family of resultative constructions can be expandedfurther to include two other constructions. States can be represented with prepositional phrases in

addition to adjectival phrases as shown in (12) and locations can be represented with adjectivalphrases as seen in (13). This is possible because the extension of the caused-motion to theresultative constructions is based on semantic schemas and not on form.

(12)State resultatives with prepositional phrasesa. That pushed him into a depression.b. Rock music eventually sent Jazz into obscurity.

(13)Property resultatives with adjectival phrasesa. Krakauer pushed the other climber clear of the mountain.b. I kick the ball away.

3.2.TYPOLOGY OF THE RESULTATIVEThus, a typology of the resultative can be expressed by three parameters: the semantics of the RPcan either entail a change of state or a change of location, the resultative phrase can berepresented as either an adjectival phrase or a prepositional phrase and the verb can either beintransitive, transitive or an unselected transitive (G&J 2004): 6

6 An unselected transitive is when the verb + object is ungrammatical absent the resultative phrase. Examplesinclude:

i) She talked them into a stupor. (Cf. *She talked them.)ii) She drove the tires bald. (Cf. *She drove the tires.)


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(14)Typology of the resultativePrepositional Phrasesa. Intransitive

i. PathShe danced out of the room (Cf. She danced (around) in the room)

She went out of the room by means of dancingii. PropertyThe toast burned to a crisp.The toast became crisp by burning.

b. Transitivei. Property

She burned the toast to a crisp.She caused the toast to be crisp by burning the toast

ii. PathJohnny hit the ball outside the park.Johnny caused the ball to be outside the park by hitting it.

c. Unselected transitivei. PathThe nurse rolled us into the hospitalThe nurse cause us to be in the hospital by rolling (Cf. ??She rolled us.7)

ii. PropertyShe talked them into oblivion.She caused them to be in oblivion by talking (Cf. *She talked them)

Adjectival Phrasesd. Intransitive

i. PropertyThe board fell flat.The board became flat by falling

ii. PathThe boat sailed ashore.The boat went ashore by sailing.

e. Transitivei. Property

He wiped the table cleanHe caused the table to be clean by wiping

ii. PathShe shook the door free.She caused the door to be free by shaking.

f. Unselected transitivei. She drove the tires bald.

She caused the tires to be bald by driving (Cf. *She drove the tires)

7 The possible interpretations of this are idiomatic:(i) The earthquake rocked and rolled us for 4.2 seconds. (www.ratw.com/issues/13/la.htm)

(ii) Those kids would have rolledus for our GPS units (www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.asp?ID=19493)


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The rest of this section deals with the syntactic behavior of the RP for resultatives varying alongtwo of the parameters: the syntactic category of the RP and the semantics of the RP. 8 Thefollowing four types of resultative constructions are considered with respect to theirgrammaticality with the RP topicalized:

Syntactic Category of the RPPP AP

Cause Location kick the ball into the room kicked the ball awaySemanticsof the RP Cause Property broke the vase into pieces wiped the table clean

Previous analysis (Green 1976) of the topicalization of resultatives has focused on directionalphrase preposing in subordinate clauses. In this work, Green treats the preposing of theprepositional phrase in a path resultative as universally acceptable when part of a main clause.Her focus is on the factors that conditions the acceptability of preposing in subordinate clauses:

(15)Directional phrase preposing as main clause phenomenona. *I guess that into the garden she ran.b. *It seems that into the garden she ran.c. ?I realize that into the garden she ran.d. I knew that into the garden she ran.

While (15a,b) show that directional phrase preposing is generally unacceptable in subordinateclauses, (15d) suggests that the picture is more complex. Green hypothesizes that preposingemphasizes and asserts the content of the clause which contradicts the lack of assertiveness in themain clause verbs in (15a,b). The semi-ungrammatical (15c), with the semi-assertive verb realize,supports this hypothesis. This data is extremely useful in articulating the semantic and pragmatic

implications of preposing a directional. However, prior to examining whether resultative phrasescan be preposed in a subordinate clauses, it is important to determine what conditions preposingin a main clause.

A purely syntactic approach to the resultative construction would predict that the adjectivalphrase resultatives pattern together and that the prepositional phrase resultatives pattern witheach other. Instead, however, the next few sections show that it is the semantics that drive thesyntactic properties of these four constructions, lending further credence to the constructionalaccount in general.

3.3.PPPATH RESULTATIVES:The examples in (16) show cases where a prepositional phrase RP denotes a change of location.

8 While the argument structure of the resultative construction is ignored in this paper and all the examples are basictransitive resultatives, it is important to examine how this parameter affects the syntactic properties of the resultative

phrase as well particularly in light of the fact that intransitive resultatives lack causation as part of its semantics.


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(16)PP-path resultativesa. Johnny threw the ball out of the park. (Path verb, path PP)b. Johnny threw the ball outside the park. (Path verb, locative PP)c. Johnny smashed the ball out of the park. (Non-path verb, path PP)d. ?Johnny smashed the ball outside the park. (Non-path verb, locative PP)

In the first three examples the path along which the trajector travels to reach the PP goal isimplicated by the verb (b) or prepositional phrase (c) or both (a). The phrase out of the park(16a,c) suggests the schematic diagram on the left in Figure 5 while outside the park (16b,d)suggests the diagram on the right. The difference between the two is the path implicated by outof the park.

Figure 5: Schematic diagrams for out of the park and outside the park

Similarly, a verb like throw in (16)a) and (16)b) has, as part of its image schematic semantics apath; the utteranceI threw the ball implies that the ball followed a path even though none isexplicitly stated. On the other hand, a verb like smash does not have path as part of its basicimage schema; I smashed the ball does not imply that the ball traveled a path. Therefore, in(16)d), where neither the verb nor the prepositional phrase suggests a path, the construction doesnot implicate caused motion.

The PP can be topicalized and it-clefted in all three grammatical instances as seen in (17) andadding to to the ungrammatical example (18) repairs the resultative. This further supports theidea that an implied path is required since the lexical item to has, as the principle part of itssemantics, the implication of path.

(17)Topicalized and it-clefted PP-path resultativesa. It was out of the park (that) I threw the ball.b. It was outside the park (that) I threw the ball.c. It was out of the park (that) I smashed the ball.d. #It was outside the park (that) I smashed the ball. (for resultative).

(18)Repaired topicalized resultativesa. It was outside the park (that) I smashed the ball to.b. It was to the outside of the park (that) I smashed the ball.

This aspects of the caused motion construction that either the verb or the prepositionalphrase must imply path also accounts for why to is acceptable in either location in (18). In a),

Park

ball initial

Park

ballfinal ball

out of the park outside the park


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the verb + object is supplied with a path through the addition ofto and in (b), the locativeprepositional phrase becomes a path with to.

In this sense the account described above is explanatory it explains the otherwise challengingpuzzle of why a preposition can show up in one of two places in the resultative. The reason

suggested here is that a raised resultative requires that one of its components implies path butthat it doesnt matter which.

In the upcoming sections this hypothesis will be tested on the other three types of resultatives,property-PP resultative, path-AP resultative and property-AP resultatives.

3.4.ADJECTIVAL PHRASE PROPERTY RESULTATIVESAdjectival phrase resultatives are the most commonly cited in the literature and include exampleslike those seen in (19).Resultatives of this type can not be topicalized or it-clefted or even WH-questioned (20).

(19)Some adjectival phrase property resultativesa. Mel wiped the table clean.b. Conan hammered the metal flat.c. Maia drove the tires bald.

(20)Dislocated resultative phrase in adjectival property resultativesa. *It was clean that/how Mel wiped the table.b. *Clean Mel wiped the table.c. A: How did Mel wipe the table?

B: #Mel wiped the table clean.

To fully understand the generalizations in (20), it is useful to compare this data to the dislocationof depictives and secondary predicates in (21):

(21)Dislocated AP in depictivesa. Jeremy painted the house naked. (AP describes subject)b.Naked Jeremy painted the house.c. *It was naked that/how Jeremy painted the house.d. A: How did Jeremy paint the house?

B: Jeremy painted the house naked.

e. Mari ate the carrots raw. (AP describes object)f. ??Raw Mari ate the carrots.g. *It was raw that/how Mari ate the carrots.h. Raw carrots I eat.

The depictive in (21)b) shows that there is no direct prohibition on topicalizing an adjectivalphrase, so the explanation for the ungrammaticality of (20)b, must come from elsewhere.


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The first interesting property of the depictive is the difference in grammaticality between (21b)and (21c). In (21)b) the modifying adjective phrase appears adjacent to the subject so thisadjacency can provide the syntactic relationship necessary for adjective-noun modification. In(21)c), on the other hand, this adjacency is eliminated, resulting in ungrammaticality. This showsthat topicalizing an adjectival phrase is not A-bar raising in the same sense that it-clefting is.

Looking at the secondary predicates, the adjacency requirement for topicalizing an AP explainswhy (21)f), where the adjective isnt adjacent to the noun it modifies the object is alsoungrammatical. This contrasts with the grammaticality of (21)h) where both the adjective andmodified noun are adjacent in the topicalized phrase, so modification is possible.

So, topicalizing and it-clefting depictives and secondary predicates reveals a constraint requiringthat the modifier stay adjacent to the modified NP. While this constraint is violated in the frontedresultative examples in (20), the examples in (22) show that this isnt the whole story. Simpleadjacency isnt enough as seen in (22)a-c). Instead, the constraint must be that the resultativephrase must come somewhere after the verb.9

(22)Topicalized unaccusative resultativesa. #Solid the pond froze. (For the resultative interpretation)b. #Flat the board fell. (For the resultative interpretation)c. #Loose the door broke. (For the resultative interpretation)

To this point, weve seen two types of constraints on the modification or secondary predicationof nouns: for path-PP resultatives, an implication of path is required. For property-APresultatives, there is a constraint on word-order where the AP must appear after the verb aconstraint more stringent that the adjacency requirement of basic depictives.

The next two sections look at property-PP resultative and path-AP resultatives and compareshow they pattern with the two resultatives already discussed.

3.5. PREPOSITIONAL PHRASE PROPERTY RESULTATIVESIn PP-Property resultatives, most verbs require that the prepositional phrase express an endpointto a path rather than just a location:

(23)Property-PP resultatives w/ path PPs:a. The ogre bludgeoned the mouse to death.b. Joni sang us to sleep.c. The bull broke the china into/*in pieces.d. Jason pounded the metal into/*in shape.

9 Examples like (i) and (ii) show that the constraint isnt simply that the RP appear after the subject:(i) Froze solid, the pond did in December.

(ii) Wiping the table clean is something Mel cant do.


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It is only when the verb expressly includes path as part of its semantics verbs like putand send can the prepositional phrase be purely locative (24). This parallels the path requirement for PP-path resultatives in section 3.3 where an implication of path is required.

(24)Property-PP resultatives w/ locative PPs

a. Her death put him into/in a depression.

10

b. Winchester sent revelers in a frenzy. (www.ttgapers.com/Article107.html)c. Ortizs homerun sent the fans in a frenzy.

Recalling that the resultative interpretation the interpretation that allows for a change of state -stems from a metaphoric extension via the CAUSAL PATH metaphor, the reason why thisrequirement exists becomes apparent. The important mappings that are part of the extension ofthe interpretation are in (9) and (10), repeated here:

(25)CAUSAL PATH and EVENT STRUCTURE metaphora. STATES are LOCATIONS

b. CAUSES are FORCESc. CAUSATION is FORCED MOVEMENTd. DIRECTION OF CHANGE is DIRECTIONe. ACTION is SELF-PROPELLED MOTIONf. RESULTS IN is LEADING TOg. RESULTING STATE is END OF PATH

The resulting state in the EVENT STRUCTURE metaphor is mapped from the end-of-path in theCAUSAL PATH metaphor, and so if the source domain lacks a path, the resulting state isntmapped from anything, so the resultative interpretation is lost.

Returning to the diagnostic used for the previous two resultatives, (26) shows that unlike the PP-path resultative, which can be topicalized (Into the room I ran), the prepositional phrase ofproperty-PP resultatives can not appear at the beginning of the sentence. These data even includeexamples where path is expressed on the verb (26)a,b), one of the constraints on topicalizing theresultative phrase in PP-path resultatives in section 3.3.

10

Grammaticality of these examples was verified with Google:(i) I then fellinadepression and lost my job, moved back to my parents and am dependent on anti depressive

medication. (forum.freeadvice.com/archive/index.php/t-227522.html)(ii) The life he led eventually threwhiminadepression... (www.un.md/mdg/human_stories/children_who_

do_not_attend_school_have_abusive_or_criminal_parents.doc)(iii) but this illness took him away of his work, leaving him almost without friends and plungedhimina

depression (www.jacksonaction.com/?page=text/vitiligo.htm)(iv) Winchester, who sings with Traffik, sentrevellersinafrenzy (www.ttgapers.com/Article107.html)


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(26)Dislocation of property-PP resultatives:a. *Into a rage the trail sent Bolton.b. *Into a depression I pushed him. 11c. *To death I shot the man.d. ??Into pieces the bull broke the china.

e. *To sleep Joni sang us.

12

Instead, the PP pattern like the property adjectival phrases (*Clean Mel wiped the table)insection 3.4, where the adjectival resultative phrase can not be fronted. This behavior contradictsany analysis that attempts to explain topicalization restrictions purely in syntactic terms. Sincethe two property resultatives (both AP and PP) pattern together, the appropriate generalization isthat the resultative phrase of resultative constructions expressing a change of state can not betopicalized a generalization about syntactic ordering that is based on semantics.

3.6.ADJECTIVAL PHRASE LOCATION RESULTATIVESThe final set of resultatives are those where a path is denoted by an adjectival phrase. These arerare because there are not too many instances of adjectival phrases that can represent location,but some examples are shown in (27).

(27)Adjectival Phrase Location Resultatives13a. The tugboat pulled the skiff free of the moorings.b. He pulled the passengers clear of the rubble.c. The pirate ran the ship aground.

Furthermore, there is a class of resultatives that have been largely ignored in the literature - theclass of adverbial resultatives:

(28)Adverbial path resultativesa. The ghost scared us away.b. Pedro threw the ball there.

These will be treated the same as the adjectival phrase resultatives because the syntacticliterature treats adverbials of this sort as being dominated by an adjective phrase and moreimportantly, because they pattern the same as adjectives in this construction.

AP-path resultatives have the same syntactic structure as the property AP-property resultativessuch asMel wiped the table clean and several different syntactic structures have been suggested

11 This is an instance where argument structure seems to have an impact (see footnote 8) as Into a depression I fellis fine.12 This example is particularly bad because the PP seems to be an actually argument of the verb sing in this sentence.As compared toI shot the man and The Bull broke the china,both of which are grammatical, *Joni sang us is quiteungrammatical.13 While it may be argued that these adjectival phrases are, in fact, indicating a property, I offer the simplediagnostic that these are all directly questionable via the WH-word where. For example:

(i) A: Where did he pull the passengers?B: He pulled the passengers clear of the rubble.


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Syntactic Category of the RP

PP AP

Cause Locationinto the room

X kicked the ballaground

X ran the shipSemanticsof the RP

Cause Property *into a rageX goaded him*clean X

wiped the table

Figure 7: Patterning of the four different types of resultative w/ respect to topicalization

3.7.RADIAL CATEGORIESThis section deals with formalizing the above findings in the ECG formalism. The distributionalproperties of the resultative phrase for the different types of resultative constructions provides aframework for integrating them into a radial category and while there are disparate properties ineach construction, the semantics are unified such that they can all be considered resultativeconstructions.

Taking a representative sample from each of the four types of resultatives examined, we see thatthe semantics of all two-argument resultatives involves a causative schema:

(31)4 types of resultativesa. Ortiz smashed the ball out of Fenway.

SEM: Ortiz caused the ball to go out of Fenway by smashing the ballb. Pedro smashed the ball to pieces

SEM: Pedro caused the ball to be in pieces by smashing the ballc. Fiona smashed the ball flat.

SEM: Fiona caused the ball to be flat by smashing the balld. Cabrera smashed the ball clear of the tee

SEM: Cabrera caused the ball to go clear of the tree by smashing the ball.

The causation schema has, as its primary roles, an agent of causation orcauser, a patient orcausee, a means of causation, and a caused event, and effect is a combination of both causee andevent. There are many other components of the conceptual structure of causation (Lakoff &Johnson 1999), but for the purposes of the resultative, the schema in Figure 8 is adequate.Because the schema involves an agent acting on a patient, it can be construed as a subcase oftransitive action.

Figure 8: Causitive Predication

schema CAUSATION

subcase of: transitive actionroles

causer trn.agentcausee trn.patientmeans

event


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The caused motion schema has as its roles an actor, undergoer, goal location and means. Thisschema is linked to the causation schema in the mapping block in Figure 9 where the CM actor ismapped to the causation causer, the CM undergoer to the causee and the means of CM is mappedto the means of causation.

Also, a key component of the resultative uncovered in section 3.3-3.6 is its evocation of thesource-path-goal schema. The actual event of the causation schema the event that is caused tohappen is the source-path-goal schema and the location is mapped to the goal. This is alsoshown in Figure 9.

Figure 9: Path Resultative Schema

On the form side of the resultative, it is possible to establish basic transitive resultatives14 as anextension of basic transitive clauses. This captures the generalization that the affected entity inthe resultative has the same semantic and syntactic properties as the undergoer in a transitivepredication. Both, for example can be passivized and it-clefted (32).

(32)Passivized transitive, resultativea. He hammered the metal.b. The metal was hammered.c. It was the metal that he hammered.

d. He hammered the metal flat.e. The metal was hammered flat.f. It was the metal that he hammered flat.

14 As opposed to selected transitive resultative where the RP is a required part of the argument structure as in (i-ii):(i) The GSI talked us into a stupor (*The GSI talked us.)

(ii) Marc drank the pub dry. (*Marc drank the pub.)

schema TRANSITIVE PATH RESULTATIVEPREDICATIONA.K.A. CAUSED MOTION

subcase of: predicationevokes: Causationevokes: Source-Path-Goal (SPG)roles

actor

undergoerlocationmeans

mappingsactor causation.causerundergoer causation.causeeundergoer SPG.Ent it ylocation SPG.Goalmeans causati on.meanscausation.event SPG

schema SOURCE-PATH-GOALrolesentitySourcePath

Goal


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The transitive resultative can be passivized, omitting the actor, so the construction inherits fromthe transitive construction, having only a single undergoer argument instead of the activetransitive. Because the construction is a subcase of the transitive construction, it inherits itsclassification as an argument structure construction. This enables the transitive resultativeconstruction to be a constituent of the active-transitive and passive-transitive constructions,

obviating the need to define specific constructions for passivizing the resultative. The resultativeinherits the verb and undergoer from the transitive construction and adds only the resultativephrase as a constituent, as shown in Figure 10.

Figure 10: Transitive PP resultative.

Within path resultatives, two related prepositional phrase constructions are needed to account forthe fact that either a verb implying path or a PP implying path is required for resultativeinterpretation (3.3). In each sub-construction (Figure 11) the additional constraint is indicated in one construction, the resultative phrase is required to be a path PP and in another the verb isrequired to be a transitive motion verb.

Figure 11: Transitive PP-Path Resultatives sub-constructions

The adjectival phrase path resultatives were shown (3.5) to pattern with the PP path resultativesand so in the radial structure of the resultative, this construction inherits from the generic pathresultative; however, the resultative phrase is in the form of a prepositional phrase:

Figure 12: AP Path Resultative

construction Transitive Path RESULTATIVEsubcase of transitiveconstituents

verb: Transit iveVERBNP : NPResult ati ve Phrase: Path

meaningtransitive resultative predication:

NP Trn Pred.undergoer

Resultat ive Phrase locationverb means

construction TRANSITIVEsubcase of Arg St ruct ureconstituents


meaningTransit ive Predicati on:


construction PP-Res. Path PP const raintsubcase of Transitive Path RESULTATIVEconstituents

verb

Result ative Phrase : Path PP

construction PP-Res. Path Verb constraintsubcase of Transit ive Path RESULTATIVEconstituents

verb: Transitive motion VERB

Resultat ive Phrase: PP

construction AP-Path Resultat ivesubcase of Transit ive Path RESULTATIVEconstituents

Result ati ve Phrase : Adject ival Phrase


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To formalize the two sets of property resultatives, the caused-motion schema needs to bemetaphorically extended to event structure because the property resultatives makes reference tochanges of state and not changes of location. The metaphoric extension was described in detail insection 3.2 and is formalized in Figure 13.

Figure 13: Metaphoric Extension of Caused-Motion to Event Structure

Property prepositional phrase resultatives share with path-PP resultative the formal element ofthe prepositional phrase. In addition, property PP resultatives were shown to have a formconstraint requiring the RP to appear after the verb. This is shown in Figure 14.

Figure 14: Property PP Resultatives

Finally, the adjective-phrase property resultatives share the same event structure schema with thePP-property resultative as well as the same form constraint, requiring the RP appear after the

verb. Therefore, the AP-property resultative can be said to inherit from the property-PPresultative with the only difference being an override of the form of the resultative phrase.

schema TRANSITIVE PATH RESULTATIVEPREDICATIONA.K.A. CAUSEDMOTION

subcase of: predicationevokes: Causat ionevokes: Source-Path-Goalroles

actorundergoerlocationmeans

mappingsactor causation.causerundergoer causation.causeeundergoer SPG.Ent it y

location SPG.Goalmeans causation.means

causation.event SPG

schema TRANSITIVE PROPERTY RESULTATIVEPREDICATION

subcase of: Caused Mot ionevokes:Causat ion

rolesactorundergoerresult statecausation

mappingsactor causation.causerundergoer causation.causeecausation causation.means

causation.event BE/ BECOME

construction Propert y PP Result ati ves

subcase of PP-Res. Path PP constraint constituentsform

Result ati ve Phrase: Property PPVerb


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Figure 15: Property AP Resultatives

Figure 16 summarizes the inheritance hierarchy developed. Items in italics indicate inheritedroles, solid lines indicate inheritance and dashed lines indicate construction-schema mappings.Individual role-role or role-constituent mappings are left out for clarity.

Figure 16: Resultative Inheritance Hierarchy

Given the radial category and constructional definition of the resultative construction laid out

above, it is necessary to have a theory of how constructions namely topicalization and theresultative compose. This is addressed in the following section.

4.CONSTRUCTIONAL COMPOSITIONALITYConstructions vary along a cline of abstractness and productivity (Tomasello 2003, Croft 2001).Abstract constructions include examples like the pairing of a verb and its arguments in thetransitive construction, as shown above, or the modification of a noun by an adjective. Abstract

Path PP Resultat ives

construction Propert y AP Result ati vessubcase of Propert y PP Result ati vesconstituentsform

Result ati ve Phrase: Propert y APVerb


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constructions, where the pieces of the construction are essentially categories15, are productive inthat there is a wide range of options for filling any of the constituents with other constructions. Inthe argument structure constructions, for example, each of the arguments can be an NP of almostany kind, ranging from individual lexical constructions of a single phonological word to acomplex NP with a relative clause. Conversely, less abstract constructions include expressions

like how do you do? or idioms like kick the bucketwhere there are few, if any, abstractconstituents. These less abstract constructions are less productive in that there is little variationfound from one instance of the construction to another.How do you do? can never vary (*Howdoes she do?, *How do I do?); in the case ofkick the bucket, the NP actor is abstract in the sensethat any animate, living NP can kick the bucket, or die,but the other elements of the constructionkick, the and bucket are specified to a much greater degree; kick the buckets, kick a bucketorpunt the bucketare all infelicitous ways of saying die.

This cline of productivity plays an important part in how constructions are composed; thesuggestion here is that there is also a cline of composition from dynamically composed tostatically composed constructions which correlates to the constructions abstractness. Section 4.1

presents examples of each in order to more clearly differentiates the two extremes. A theory ofcomposition will necessarily inform both a theory of production and comprehension with theimplications for each discussed in 4.2. Finally, in section 4.3, the resultative constructions arecomposed with the topicalization construction previously defined.

4.1.DYNAMIC VS.STATIC COMPOSITIONThis section surveys how an idiom like hit the hay compares to a syntactic construction, such asthe transitive argument structures combination of a verb and an undergoer NP, in terms of itscompositionality.

An expression like hit the hay is made up of lexical items that are part of the English languageand also matches the common syntactic pattern captured by the active transitive argumentstructure construction, SVO. Aside from the compositional meaning of actually hitting hay, thisexpression also has the idiosyncratic meaning of going to sleep. Because this idiomatic meaningis idiosyncratic and not predictable from its component parts, the expression must be explicitlypart of the grammar of an English speaker in the form a construction. However, simplyidentifying it as an independent construction devoid of any relationship to other constructionsmisses a number of important generalizations since the idiomatic construction incorporatesaspects of meaning and form from other parts of the grammar. First, and most obviously, themeaning of the idiom shares its meaning component, or image schema, with any otherconstructions meaning going to sleep. Second, the phonological form of each of the lexicalcomponents comes from existing lexical constructions: the words hit, the and hay. If, forexample one of lexical item constructions changes it phonological realization in certain contexts,so too does the realization of that part of the form of the construction; just as a speaker may use[d] in place of [D] in certain situations, so too will there be variation between [hIt D hej] and

[hIt d hej]. Third, the verb hitin the idiom is inflected as if it were a regular verb in a transitive

15 Following Croft (2001), a separate set of categories as a linguistic construct existing outside of constructions isnot whats being suggested. This is discussed in more detail below.


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construction, so the correct form for a third-person singular subject is hits the hay, the futuretense is will hit the hay, and so on. Finally, although the expression is not generally able to bepassivized, or otherwise altered, the expressions the hay was hitorhe hit the big ol hay cancertainly be used humorously or ironically and still trigger the idiomatic interpretation. Therefore,some aspect of transitive argument structure must be encoded into the idiom. An inheritance

hierarchy like that shown in Figure 17 is able to capture these generalizations. Each of thecomponent lexical items inherits from the form of the corresponding lexical constructions whichties the phonological form of the idiom to the phonological form of the lexical items, and theconstruction as a whole inherits from the transitive predication construction categorizing the verbas one that can receive inflection with some degree of syntactic flexibility and can be passivized,albeit with a different set of pragmatic inferences.

Figure 17: Inheritance schema forhit the hay

There are several reasons why the idiom must be fully specified in the grammar, however. Itsidiosyncratic meaning is not something a speaker of the language would compose spontaneouslywithout having heard the idiom prior and the restrictions concerning its ability to be combinedwith other syntactic constructions needs to be captured at some level in the grammar. For

example, while the going to sleep reading forthe hay was hitcan conceivably be retrieved, thegoing to sleep reading doesnt seem reasonable as the answer to the question What was hit?Because of these idiosyncratic properties, this idiom can be said to be minimally dynamicallycomposed in that the composition of the different pieces, minus the phonology of the particularlexical items and the nominal amount of online syntactic processing, must have already takenplace for this construction prior to utterance time.

A construction that is not dynamically composed will, over time, develop further idiosyncrasiesincluding changes in phonological form (Bybee 1985) and pragmatic implications (Hopper andTraugott 1993); to wit, an expression likeIm am going to changes into [amIn] and weakens itsinheritance from the other constructions, including the form and meaning component of the

individual lexical constructions.

Contrasting with constructions of this sort are constructions like the combination of a verballexical construction with a syntactic argument structure construction. Recalling that lexical itemsare themselves constructions allows us to also consider the insertion of verbs into the constituentslots of the argument structure construction as a type of constructional composition. Thedynamic nature of this sort of constructional compositionality is very different, however, fromthe type discussed above. While a specific hit the hay construction is needed in the grammar, it

schema: go to sleep

form: [hIt ]meaning: hit

form: SUBJ [hIt ] [D] [hej ]

meanin : slee

form: SUBJ TrVerb Objmeaning: Transitive predication

form: [D]

meaning: DEF

form: [hej]meaning: hay


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is extremely unlikely that every verb + argument structure construction exists in a speakersgrammar prior to the time of the utterance. In this sense, the composition of verb and argumentstructure constructions is dynamic.

Figure 18: Composition of Verb + Argument Structure

Several verbs are shown, along with the transitive argument structure, in Figure 18. When aspeaker wants to combine hitwith a set of arguments, she does so according to principles ofunification where certain constituents can fill constituent slots as long as no constraints areviolated. In the case ofhitand the argument structure construction, because the lexicalconstruction hitinherits from the transitive-verb construction, it can fill any constituent slotrequiring a transitive verb. The transitive argument structure construction requires, in the verbslot, a transitive verb, so hitis an acceptable constituent filler in this situation and will compose

with Patfilling the role of NP as shown in Figure 19. Additional constraints that are part of theconstructions must be considered as well, including, for example, a constraint used below thatthe verb slot of one of the resultative constructions be a verb with a path as part of its semantics.

Figure 19: Composition ofhit andtransitive argument structure

Even though the resulting construction, the Pat-Hit-Trns-Arg-Structure construction, is in aninheritance relationship with the Transitive Argument Structure construction in that its a specificcase of the construction, positing that the Pat-Hit-Trns-Arg-Structure construction is anenumerated constructions that make up the grammar of an English speaker would introduce a

construction HITsubcase of transitive verbform: [hIt ]meaning

schema: hit

construction SEEsubcase of transitive verbform: [si]meaning

schema: see

construction LIKEsubcase of transitive verbform: [lajk]meaning

schema: like

construction TRANSITIVEsubcase of Arg Structureconstituents


meaningTransit ive Predication:


form: [hIt ]subcase of transitive verbmeanin schema: hit

construction TRANSITIVE Arg St ruct ureconstituents

NP : NPverb: Transit ive VERB

meaningTransit ive Predication


construction Pat-HIT TRNSArg St ruct ureconstituents

PAT: undergoerhit: verb

meaningschema: t ransit ive predicationtr pred.event hit schematr pred.undergoer Pat

hit.hittee Pat

form: [pht]subcase of NP

meaning Ref: Pat


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number of significant problems. It would create an intractable, implausible number ofconstructions, such as the Pat-See-Trns-Arg-Strucutre, the Pat-Like-Trns-Arg-Structure and soon, that a speaker would need to store to be a competent speaker of English and would alsoobviate any possibility for the creative, productive use of language. Therefore, it is moreappropriate to posit that this construction and its inheritance relationships are dynamically

composed as the speaker combines the two constructions ad hoc in an effort to communicate theidea of a transitive predication where the action is one of hitting. In this sense, it is dynamic ascompared to the composition of an idiom or oft used collocation. This results in this particularcombination being less likely to develop idiosyncratic phonological or pragmatic propertiesbecause there is no construction in the grammar in which to incorporate these properties noplace for them to hang their hat.

The composition of any two given constructions for example the active transitive constructionwith topicalization, a WH-question with an it-cleft, or the resultative with the transitiveargument structure to name a few will lie somewhere along this continuum. On one end of thescale will be combinations that yield any idiosyncrasies in phonology, syntax, semantics or

pragmatics which will have static, enumerated representations in the grammar as individualconstructions. This is not the same as saying that the constructions are independent of any otherconstructions in the grammar, only that the inheritance hierarchy is defined prior to utterancetime and is considered a pieces of the knowledge a speaker need to speak the language. On theother end, combinations that are extraordinarily regular, predictable and productive are likely tobe dynamically composed by rules of unification.

When there are no idiosyncratic properties to define the construction as static, it is ultimately anempirical issue as to whether the composed construction exists as a distinct unit of grammar orwhether it is dynamically composed. Theoretically, this can be tested by assessing whichconstructions are most strongly primed by composed constructions. If, for example, we wantedto determine whether the WH-question-transitive construction existed as a unit of grammar orwhether it was dynamically composed, we could compare how much the WH-questionconstruction primed the composed WH-q-Trans construction. If there are significant primingeffects as compared to a control that we know was not dynamically composed, then we would beable to say that the WH-question construction and transitive construction are dynamicallycomposed.16

4.2.IMPLICATIONS FOR PROCESSING AND PRODUCTIONThe question of how constructions should be composed has significant implications for both theproduction and processing of linguistic utterances. There are too many issues to investigate indetail here, but this section suggests how dynamic composition facilitates a theory of productionthat is essentially generative and also discusses how dynamic composition complicatesprocessing models in (Embodied) Construction Grammar.

16 This supposes that partial inheritance does not prime a construction the same way dynamic composition does.Controlling for this supposition would be difficult, but not impossible. The control would be the priming effects aninherited construction on a construction that we know for certain is a distinct unit in the grammar because of otheridiosyncratic properties.


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4.2.1.PRODUCING COMPOSED CONSTRUCTIONSDynamic composition is what allows Construction Grammar to account for the productive,creative use of language. Instances of dynamic composition allow for novel constructs to beformed that arent pre-specified as part of the grammar. While not generative in the same

mathematical sense that Generative Grammars are, this property allows Construction Grammarto be generative in the sense that all possible utterances in the language are generated throughsome valid unification or composition of constructions. If there is no possible combination ofconstructions that would yield a particular utterance, then the utterance can be consideredungrammatical.

Another important example of how dynamic composition allows Construction Grammar to beproductive is its ability to account for recursion. A grammar with only statically inheritedconstructions would not be able to account for recursion because an infinite number ofconstructions would be needed to capture the infinite embeddings possible in grammar. A simpleexample is basic noun modification where an infinite number of adjectives are able to modify a

noun. If adjectival modification is defined constructionally as an adjective plus a noun phrasewith the resulting construction inheriting from a noun phrase itself, then the output of a modifiednoun phrase can be the input to the adjectival modification construction. This process can easilyextend to other, more complex, recursive phenomena like tough-raising, relative clauseembedding, and recursive center embedding within particle verbs. In this sense, ECG alsosupports the notion of a head; a construction that inherits from and has as a constituent the sametype of construction can be considered headed by that consituent.

Similarly, dynamic composition of image schemas, the semantic half of the constructional coin,is what gives rise to scenes more complicated than basic image schema primitives and novelblends and new metaphoric extensions. One example is the into schema discussed above wherethe source-path-goal schema and containment schemas are combined together into a morecomplex Into schema. Another is the invention of novel metaphors. Whereas conventionalizedmetaphors and their mapping are part of the grammar, for example the THEORIES areBUILDINGS (Lakoff & Johnson 1980) metaphor, a novel extension to THEORIES are OILRIGS could also come from the dynamic combination of primary metaphors (Grady 1997)ABSTRACT STRUCTURE is PHYSICAL STRUCTURE and PERSISTING is REMAININGERECT. Any schemas having the salient characteristics of physical structure and erectnesswould satisfy the requirement, including the image schema for oil rigs. This would allow a novelmetaphor to be created out of existing schemas.

4.2.2.PROCESSING COMPOSED CONSTRUCTIONS5.The implications of dynamic composition on processing are even more complex becauseunlike the generativity problem, which has been a central component of recent grammaticaltheory (Harris 1949, Chomsky 1957, 1965 to name but a few), solutions to the problems agenerative linguistic model presents for processing have been less promising. The central issue isthe Inverse Problem (Kubovy & Epstein 2001, Myung, Pitt & Narvarro 2005, Shepard 1994)which elucidates a common and fundamental problem facing the cognitive sciences of trying toascertain the underlying structure that produced the surface realization the mind is presented with.


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In almost every case, the surface form underdetermines the underlying structure of whatproduced it. In vision, for example, the shadow inFIGURE 20 could have been generated by any number of combinations of shapes, three of whichare shown. Significant progress has been made in vision science (Kubovy & Epstein 2001,Shepard 1994) by examining the heuristics used to guide the selection of models from the myriad

possible for a given visual stimulus. In the example shown, heuristics based on basic shapeprimitives guide the viewer to input 1 as the most likely structure for generating the surface formseen.

Output

Input 1 Input 2 Input 3

Figure 20: Multiple Underlying Structures Giving Rise to the Same Surface Structure

In linguistics, it has been more of a challenge to figure out how to undo the transformations thatgenerated a given surface structure. A derivational theory of complexity (Miller & Chomsky1963) has long since been disproved (Slobin 1966, Fodor & Garrett 1967, Bever 1968, Brown &Hanlon 1970) along with it any hope that a transformational system could inform a processingtheory based on correlating processing time with the number and complexity of transformationsin a derivation.

Within the Construction Grammar framework the inverse problem manifests as the intractabilityof trying every possible combination of constructions when attempting to process an utterance.Given an inventory of tens-of-thousands lexical constructions and thousands of syntacticconstructions, the factorial combination of the possibilities to try is neither neurally nor

computational feasible. There are several ways to ameliorate this problem.One is through a system of composition that fixes many of the possible combinations as staticconstructions that would have otherwise been reduced into component parts for the sake of amore efficient description of language. Explicitly enumerating as distinct constructions all of thevalid combinations of information structure and arguments structure constructions (such asneutral-active-transitive, topicalized-active-transitive, it-cleft-active-transitive, etc) in thegrammar obviates the need to unify them every time an utterance is processed. This provides a


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useful counterbalance to the theoretical tendency towards a reductionist model of grammarwhere as much as possible is reduced to minimal component part and therefore as much isdynamically composed as is possible.

Another alternative is to develop heuristics, in the spirit of recent developments in vision science,

which guides the system on how constructions can be composed. One possible heuristic thatwould assist in reducing the number of possible constructional combinations would be to limiteach verb to a single argument structure construction, a single information structure constructionand a single voice construction. This particular proposal is problematic and would have to belimited to argument structure and voice constructions because in some cases, certain informationstructure constructions can be combined with each other in different ways and multiple times asshown in (33).

(33)Multiple Information Structure Constructionsa. Sienna saw Maia.b. It was Sienna that saw Maia. (It-Cleft)

c. Who was it that saw Maia. (It-cleft + WH-question)d. It was who that saw Maia (WH-q + It-cleft)

Tough Movement (Ross 1967, Jackendoff and Cullicover 2005)e. This construction is tough to analyze in terms of movement.

(Tough-movement)f. This constructions is tough to expect anyone to analyze in terms of movement.

(Tough movement twice)g. This construction is tough to expect anyone to be convinced that they should analyze

in terms of movement, (Tough movement three times.)h. Etc

In addition to heuristics of this type, others may prove useful in cutting down the number ofpossible constructional combinations possible.

Having a cline of compositionality from completely dynamic to mostly static provides atheoretical framework on which to correlate processing times for different types of utterances.Dynamic composition, which requires the unification of multiple constraints as well as the accessof multiple constructions, would require more resources and more time than simply picked anenumerated construction that statically inherits from other constructions with one set ofconstraints. Because we are relying on psycholinguistic data to determine whether a constructionis explicitly enumerated or dynamically composed, the theory of composition will, in turn,inform a theory of processing by providing a correlation between actual processing difficulty andtheoretical processes involved in the processing of an utterance.

5.1.COMPOSITION OF THE RESULTATIVEThis, the final portion of this paper, takes the theory of composition discussed in sections 4.1-4.3and applies it to the resultative construction explicated in section 3. The main diagnostic used forthe syntax of the resultative phrase and its corresponding radial structure was whether the


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resultative construction could begin with the resultative phrase, often know as topicalizationwhen it is the bare RP and it-clefting when accompanies by it was RP that. In many cases, theconstraints of the resultative, all of which are detailed in section 3, and the constraints ontopicalization, detailed in section 2, combine together to determine the grammaticality ofpossible sentences. In other cases, however, an additional construction is needed because of

certain idiosyncratic properties of the topicalized-resultative constructions.

In all cases, the semantics is the same: there is a resultative construction conveying either changeof state or change of location, and the speaker wishes to make the resultative phrase eitherprepositional phrase or adjectival the topic of the sentence. The detailed semantics andpragmatics of the preposed directional phrase involves a number of information structureconsideration; Green (1976) shows that these sentences emphasize and in some sense assert thecontent of the [] clause (393).

The sentences that will be derived are shown in (34).

(34)Composed Resultative Constructionsa. Into the room I pushed the broom.b. It was outside the park (that) I smashed the ball toc. *Clean I wiped the table.

Into the room, I pushed the broom, is the combination of the Path-PP-Tr-Path-resultativeconstruction and the active construction with the adjunct-topicalization as shown in Figure 21.

Figure 21: Composition of the Topicalized Active Resultative

The adjunct-topic construction requires the adjunct to appear somewhere before the verb, whilethe active-construction requires that the actor appear directly before the verb, followed by theundergoer. Combining these constraints results in the word order in (34)a), Path PP < Actor

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Ettlinger - Constructional Compositionality and the English Resultative