Overview
This book considers the syntax and semantics of non-verbal predicates (i.e., nominal, adjectival and prepositional predicates) in copular sentences. Isabelle Roy explores how a single structure for predication can account for the different interpretations of non-verbal predicates. The book departs from earlier studies by arguing in favor of a ternary distinction between defining / characterizing / situation-descriptive predicates rather than the more common stage-level/individual distinction. The distinction is based on two semantic criteria, namely maximality (i.e., whether the predicate describes an eventuality that has spatio-temporal properties or not) and density (i.e. whether the spatio-temporal properties are perceived as atomic or not). The author argues in favor of a strong correlation between the semantics properties of predicates and their internal syntactic structure. Her analysis accounts for seemingly unrelated cross-linguistic data: the indefinite article in
French, the distribution of the two copulas 'ser'/'estar' in Spanish, and case marking on Russian predicates.
This item is Non-Returnable
Customers Also Bought
Details
- ISBN-13: 9780199543540
- ISBN-10: 0199543542
- Publisher: Oxford University Press (UK)
- Publish Date: June 2013
- Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.14 pounds
- Page Count: 230
Related Categories
