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In:Argument Realisation in Complex Predicates and Complex Events: Verb-verb constructions at the syntax-semantic interface
Edited by Brian Nolan and Elke Diedrichsen
[Studies in Language Companion Series 180] 2017
► pp. 347–372

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Chapter 12
Feelings as emotion, attitude, and viewpoints

 | IIFL-Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
 | Dirección de Educación Superior, Instituto Politécnico Nacional
Published online: 26 January 2017
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https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.180.12gue
Abstract
This chapter examines the syntax and semantics of sentir ‘to feel’ in simple and complex structures. Based on data from Mexican Spanish, we corroborate the polysemy of this verb, and we point out that different complement types (and verb forms) denote particular subjective connotations (emotions, attitudes, thoughts, evaluations, viewpoints). We propose that nominal complements correlate with an unmediated physical and emotional perception of an object, while clausal complements report a thought towards a proposition. What we called predicative elements (mainly adjectives and past participles) describe the state, quality, or property of the perceived object. In the last structure, the verb form is sentirse, and both the verb and the perceived state form a complex predicate.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The semantics of sentir ‘to feel’
  • 3.The corpus under analysis
  • 4. Sentir taking nominal complements
  • 5. Sentir taking clausal complements
  • 6. Sentir taking predicative elements
  • 7.Final discussion
  • Notes
  • References
References (45)
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