Cover not available

In:Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 12: Selected papers from the 45th Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages (LSRL), Campinas, Brazil
Edited by Ruth E.V. Lopes, Juanito Ornelas de Avelar and Sonia M. L. Cyrino
[Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 12] 2017
► pp. 29–48

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload Book PDF
authorization required

Chapter 3
What’s up with dative experiencers?

 | Institutt for Språk og Kultur | UiT-Norges Arktiske Universitet
 | University of Seville
 | Western Michigan University
Published online: 19 October 2017
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/rllt.12.03fab
Abstract
In this paper we discuss the argument structure of psych verbs in connection with information structure, particularly object experiencer psych verbs (OEPVs), which select an accusative and/or dative argument. We propose that the natural order available in all-focus sentences for dative OEPVs is OVS, whereas the order for accusative OEPVs is SVO. Any rearrangement of these two patterns is caused by a different information structure interpretation.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Ordering facts with and without datives
    • 2.1The contrasts
    • 2.2This is not a lexical property: Alternations with the same verb
    • 2.3An aspectual contrast
    • 2.4Argument restrictions
  • 3.The two vP structures
    • 3.1The structure of dative experiencer verbs
    • 3.2An intervention effect
    • 3.3The structure of the accusative construal
  • 4.Movement without information structure consequences
    • 4.1Dative experiencers are not quirky
    • 4.2Only high datives are potential interveners
    • 4.3Theoretical consequences
  • 5.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
References (27)
References
Belletti, Adriana, and Luiggi Rizzi. 1988. “Psych verbs and θ-theory”. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 6 (3): 291–352. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Campos, Héctor. 1999. “Transitividad e intranstividad”. In Gramática Descriptiva de la Lengua Española ed. by Ignacio Bosque and Violeta Demonte, 1519–1574. Madrid: Espasa-Calpe.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 2000. “Minimalist inquiries: the framework”. In Step by step ed. by Roger Martin, David Michaels, and Juan Uriagereka, 89–155. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008. “On Phases”. In Foundational Issues in Linguistic Theory. Essays in Honor of Jean-Roger Vergnaud ed by Robert Freidin, Carlos Peregrín Otero, and María Luisa Zubizarreta, 133–166. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cuervo, M. Cristina. 2003. Datives at large. Doctoral dissertation, MIT.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2010. “Some dative subjects are born, some are made”. In Selected Proceedings of the 12th Hispanic Linguistics Symposium, ed. by Claudia Borgonovo, Manuel Español-Echevarría, and Philippe Prévost, 26–37. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dowty, David. 1979. Word meaning and Montague grammar. Dordrecht: Reidel. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gutiérrez-Bravo, Rodrigo. 2006. “A reinterpretation of quirky-subjects and related phenomena in Spanish”. In New Perspectives in Romance Linguistics ed. by Jean-Pierre Y. Montreuil, and Chiyo Nishida, 127–142. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fábregas, Antonio, and Rafael Marín. 2015. “Deriving individual-level and stage-level psych verbs in Spanish”. The Linguistic Review 32 (2): 227–275. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fernández-Soriano, Olga. 1999. “Two types of impersonal sentences in Spanish: locatives and dative subjects”. Syntax 2 (2): 101–140. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Folli, Raffaella. 2001. Constructing telicity in English and Italian. Doctoral dissertation, University of Oxford.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jiménez-Fernández, Ángel L. 2009. “The low periphery of double object constructions in English and Spanish”. Philologia Hispalensis 23: 179–200.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jiménez-Fernández, Ángel L., and Shigeru Miyagawa. 2014. “A feature-inheritance approach to root phenomena and parametric variation”. Lingua 145: 275–302. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jiménez-Fernández, Ángel L., and Bozena Rozwadowska. In press. “The information structure of dative experiencer psych verbs”. In Various Dimensions of Contrastive Studies”, ed. by Bozena Cetnarowska, Marcin Kuczok and M. Zabawa. University of Silesia Press.
Lakoff, George. 1966. “Stative adjectives and verbs in English”. Mathematical linguistics and automatic translation; report to the National Science Foundation 17, Computational Laboratory, Harvard University.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Landau, Idan. 2010. The Locative Syntax of Experiencers. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Levin, Beth. 1993. English Verb Alternations. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Levin, Beth, and Malka Rappaport Hovav. 2005. Argument Realization. Cambridge: CUP. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Masullo, Pascual. 1992. “Two types of quirky subjects: Spanish vs. Icelandic”. NELS 23: 303–317.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Marín, Rafael. 2011. “Casi todos los predicados psicológicos son estativos”. In Sobre Estados y Estatividad ed. by Ángeles Carrasco, 26–44. Munich: Lincom.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Marín, Rafael, and Louise McNally. 2011. “Inchoativity, change of state, and telicity: Evidence from Spanish reflexive psychological verbs”. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 29: 467–502. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pesetsky, David. 1995. Zero syntax. Cambridge (Mass.): MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pylkkänen, Liina. 2002. Introducing arguments. Doctoral dissertation, MIT.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ramchand, Gillian. 2008. First Phase Syntax. Cambridge: CUP. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Romeu Fernández, Juan. 2015. Cartografía mínima de las construcciones espaciales. Doctoral Dissertation, Universidad Complutense de Madrid.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tubino, Mercedes. 2007. “Preverbal datives are not quirky subjects”. Ms., University of Arizona.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Uriagereka, Juan. 1995. “Aspects of the theory of clitic placement in Western Romance”. Linguistic Inquiry 26: 79–123.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (8)

Cited by eight other publications

Fritz-Huechante, Paola & Elisabeth Verhoeven
2024. Spanish lower and upper bounded change of state verbs: focusing on transitive experiencer object verbs. Linguistics 62:4 ► pp. 977 ff. DOI logo
Rott, Julian Andrej, Elisabeth Verhoeven & Paola Fritz-Huechante
2024. Directionality in the psych alternation: a quantitative cross-linguistic study. Linguistic Typology 28:1 ► pp. 147 ff. DOI logo
Vélez Avilés, Jessica
2023. Los puertorriqueños se les está cayendo la “a”. Spanish in Context 20:3 ► pp. 438 ff. DOI logo
Suárez-Palma, Imanol
2022. Middle formation and inalienability in Asturian. In Sound, Syntax and Contact in the Languages of Asturias [Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics, 36], ► pp. 131 ff. DOI logo
Bondaruk, Anna
2020.  The syntax of accusative and dative Experiencers in Polish. In Beyond Emotions in Language [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 263], ► pp. 141 ff. DOI logo
Jiménez-Fernández, Ángel L.
2020.  The information structure of high and low datives and their psychological import. In Beyond Emotions in Language [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 263], ► pp. 213 ff. DOI logo
Rozwadowska, Bożena, Arkadiusz Nowak & Anna Bondaruk
2020.  Psych verbs. In Beyond Emotions in Language [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 263], ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Willim, Ewa
2020.  Polish impersonal middles with a dative as syntactically derived experience events. In Beyond Emotions in Language [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 263], ► pp. 245 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 30 november 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue