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Applicative Arguments A Syntactic
Applicative Arguments A Syntactic
93 BERKELEY
INSIGHTS
Bosse
IN LINGUISTICS
Applicative Arguments: A Syntactic and Semantic Investiga- AND SEMIOTICS
tion of German and English presents formal semantic and
syntactic analyses of German and English applicative argu- 93
ments. These arguments are nominal elements that are not
obligatory parts of a sentence. Both German and English
Applicative Arguments
have several types of applicative arguments, including so-
called benefactive and malefactive constructions. More
specifically, the research relies on tests to differentiate the
different types of applicative arguments based on this contri-
bution to meaning: Some applicatives contribute only not-at-
issue meaning, whereas others contribute only at-issue
meaning, and still others contribute both types of meaning.
These tests are applied to both German and English to
uniquely identify the applicative arguments in each language.
Formal analyses of the identified type of applicative argu-
ments are presented that provide an account for each type of
applicative identified for each language, explaining the
applicatives’ differences and similarities.
Investigation OF
German AND English
93 BERKELEY
INSIGHTS
Bosse
IN LINGUISTICS
Applicative Arguments: A Syntactic and Semantic Investiga- AND SEMIOTICS
tion of German and English presents formal semantic and
syntactic analyses of German and English applicative argu- 93
ments. These arguments are nominal elements that are not
obligatory parts of a sentence. Both German and English
Applicative Arguments
have several types of applicative arguments, including so-
called benefactive and malefactive constructions. More
specifically, the research relies on tests to differentiate the
different types of applicative arguments based on this contri-
bution to meaning: Some applicatives contribute only not-at-
issue meaning, whereas others contribute only at-issue
meaning, and still others contribute both types of meaning.
These tests are applied to both German and English to
uniquely identify the applicative arguments in each language.
Formal analyses of the identified type of applicative argu-
ments are presented that provide an account for each type of
applicative identified for each language, explaining the
applicatives’ differences and similarities.
Investigation OF
German AND English
Irmengard Rauch
General Editor
Vol. 93
PETER LANG
New York Bern Frankfurt Berlin
Brussels Vienna Oxford Warsaw
SOLVEIG BOSSE
APPLICATIVE
ARGUMENTS
PETER LANG
New York Bern Frankfurt Berlin
Brussels Vienna Oxford Warsaw
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bosse, Solveig.
Applicative arguments: a syntactic and semantic investigation
of German and English / Solveig Bosse.
pages cm. — (Berkeley insights in linguistics and semiotics; v. 93)
Originally published as author’s dissertation entitled
“The syntax and semantics of applicative arguments in German and English”, 2011.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Grammar, Comparative and general—Applicative constructions.
2. German language—Syntax. 3. German language—Semantics.
4. English language—Syntax. 5. English language—Semantics. I. Title.
P291.25.B67 425—dc 3 2014010339
ISBN 978-1-4331-2726-7 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4539-1354-3 (e-book)
ISSN 0893-6935
Contents
1 Introduction 11
1.1 Defining Applicative Arguments 13
1.2 Goals and Structure of this Book 17
2 Preliminaries 19
2.1 Introduction 19
2.2 Not-At-Issue Meaning 19
2.3 Event Semantics 23
2.4 Pylkkänen (2002, 2008) 26
3 Affected Experiencers 29
3.1 Introduction 29
3.2 Distinguishing Affected Experiencers 30
3.2.1 Benefactives (Chapter 5) 31
3.2.2 Part-Whole Applicative Arguments (Chapter 6) & Pertinence
Datives 32
3.2.3 Other German Applicatives 35
3.3 At-Issue and Not-At-Issue Meaning 36
3.3.1 Affected Experiencers 36
3.3.2 Pertinence Dative 38
3.4 Analysis 40
3.5 Consequences 44
3.5.1 Bi-Eventivity 44
3.5.2 Again-Modification 46
3.5.3 Negation 48
3.6 Pertinence Dative 49
3.6.1 Analysis 50
3.6.2 Previous Analyses 56
3.6.3 Conclusion 65
3.7 Verbal Restrictions 65
3.7.1 Valency 65
3.7.2 Semantic Licensing 67
3.8 Affected Experiencers following Potts (2005) 72
3.9 Digression: Parametric Variation of Aff 73
3.9.1 Japanese: Attachment Height Variation 73
3.9.2 Not-At-Issue Affected Experiencers 78
3.9.3 Parametric Variation 86
3.10Conclusion 87
4 Not-At-Issue Applicative Arguments 89
4.1 Introduction 89
4.2 Ethical Dative 89
4.2.1 Description 90
8
9
1 Introduction
This book is concerned with detailed formal semantic and syntactic analyses of
applicative arguments in German and English. These arguments are typically
defined as nominal constituents not selected by the lexical verb or a preposition
of the sentence they appear in. In other words, they seemingly increase (or re-
flect an increase of) the verb's valency. One of my goals is to provide an over-
view of different types of applicative arguments found in German and English
and to provide formal tests and characteristics that differentiate the types. In (1),
an example of each identified type is given: part-whole applicatives (1a, Ger-
man), true benefactives (1b, German), recipient benefactives (1c, English), af-
fected experiencers (1d, German and English), ethical applicatives (1e, Ger-
man), subject co-referential applicatives (1f, German and English), and Datives
of Inaction (1g, German).
1. a. Jan zerbeulte dem Auto die Tür.
Jan dented the.Dat car the.Acc door
'Jan dented the door of the car.'
b. Jan buk ihm einen Kuchen.
Jan baked him.Dat a cake
'Jan baked a cake for him.'
c. John brought him a cake.
d. Alex zerbrach Chris Bens Vase.
Alex broke Chris.Dat Ben.Gen vase
'Alex broke Ben's vase on Chris.'
e. Du sollst mir pünktlich nach Hause kommen.
you shall me.Dat on.time to house come
'You shall be home on time (and I want that to happen).'
f. John1 killed him1 a bear.
g. Der Oma zerbrach die Vase.
the.Dat grandma broke the.Nom vase
'The vase broke on grandma's watch.'
Each of these types will be described in detail to unambiguously identify and
characterize that type. This is important because the different types often seem
identical on first glance, especially in German.
Applicative arguments are not a new phenomenon. Abraham (1973) was one
of the first researchers who tried to differentiate German applicative arguments
based on their syntactic behavior. Before that, they were typically classified
based on their meaning alone. Given the framework Abraham was working in,
12
his classifications are not adequate anymore. A re-evaluation of the types of ap-
plicative arguments in German is necessary.
English applicatives have also been studied before: the recipient benefactive
has extensively been discussed, especially in combination with the structure of
ditransitive verbs, which they resemble. The other two types have received less
attention. I provide formal analyses of all types, showing why previous analyses
need to be revised.
The main dimension that I use to differentiate and analyze applicative argu-
ments is the type of meaning that each applicative argument contributes: at-issue
(roughly "asserted") meaning or not-at-issue (roughly "implied") meaning (Kart-
tunen and Peters 1979, Potts 2005). Elements contributing not-at-issue meaning
behave syntactically different than those that contribute at-issue meaning. I use
the family of sentence tests to distinguish at-issue applicatives from not-at-issue
applicatives. The tests are discussed in detail in Chapter 2. German and English
applicative argument constructions have never been systematically analyzed
with respect to this dimension. Both languages have applicative arguments that
contribute only at-issue meaning or only not-at-issue meaning. In addition, I
show that both languages also have one applicative argument that contributes
meaning to both tiers of meaning (Bosse et al. 2012).
A few other researchers have investigated applicative arguments that carry
not-at-issue meaning in other languages and/or in German and English (Lamiroy
and Delbecque 1998, O'Connor 2007, Halevy 2007, Gutzmann 2007, Horn
2008). These studies often lack formal analyses and do not set the discussed ap-
plicative argument in relation to other applicatives in that language. To do that is
another goal of this book.
Besides the meaning contribution, applicative arguments can be divided into
low and high applicatives, with the former involving a transfer of possession and
the latter relating an individual to an event (Pylkkänen 2002). Similarly to the
analysis by Cuervo (2003) for Spanish applicative arguments, I show that the
occurrences of applicative arguments in English and German are more varied
than expected under Pylkkänen's categorization of only high and low applicative
arguments.
The remainder of the introduction is dedicated to defining what applicative
arguments are. I develop my definition of applicative arguments based on Hole
(2008). He developed a definition for German applicative arguments which I
adapt to a more general notion of applicative arguments. It will be shown
throughout the book that this definition is too stringent, and that it cannot easily
be adapted to cover only the appropriate cases in a cross-linguistic setting. Thus,
it will remain a working definition.
13
14
15
In (1c), the applicative argument denotes a(n intended) recipient. Again, this
referent is not entailed in the sentence without the applicative argument (7). Fur-
thermore, (7) shows that the applicative argument is not selected by the verb be-
cause it is not required for the sentence to be grammatical.
7. Jan brought a cake.
(1d) is also grammatical without the applicative argument (8). This shows
that the applicative argument is not an obligatory constituent. (8) also does not
entail that there is anyone who is affected by the event.
8. Alex zerbrach Bens Vase.
Alex broke Ben.Gen vase.Acc
'Alex broke Ben's vase.'
The ethical dative of (1e) is not selected by the verb; it can be omitted from
the sentence without causing ungrammaticality (9). Furthermore, the involve-
ment of the referent of the ethical dative in (1e) is not entailed in (9).
9. Du sollst pünktlich nach Hause kommen.
you shall on.time to home come
'You shall be home on time.'
In (1f), the applicative argument is not required for the sentence to be
grammatical (10). Also, the applicative argument is not entailed (despite the
presence of the co-referential subject).
10. John killed a bear.
Finally, (1g) does not require the applicative argument to be present (11).
The involvement of an individual is also not entailed in (11) showing that der
Oma in (1g) is an applicative argument.
11. Die Vase zerbrach.
the vase broke
'The vase broke.'
The definition in (4) rules out implicit and cognate arguments as being ap-
plicative arguments. Such arguments, underlined in (12), are not governed by
prepositions. They are not necessary and may be omitted from the sentence.
12. a. He ate food.
b. She danced a dance.
However, these arguments are entailed in the sentences that lack them (13) and
are therefore not applicative arguments in (12).
13. a. He ate.
b. She danced.
While the definition of applicative arguments as given in (4) covers all of
the cases discussed so far, it is only a working definition. It rules out for instance
that the underlined argument in (14) is an applicative argument because it is in-
troduced by a preposition.
16
17
18
2 Preliminaries
2.1 Introduction
In this chapter, I discuss some background assumptions and concepts that should
be kept in mind for the following chapters in which the applicative arguments
are analyzed. The first issue concerns the diagnostic tools to differentiate at-
issue and not-at-issue meaning. This is one of the dimensions that I use to show
that the various types of applicative arguments need different analyses. Here, I
introduce the tests used to distinguish these two tiers of meaning based on the
behavior of the elements on each. This also includes a discussion of the system
for at-issue and not-at-issue meaning proposed by Potts (2005). The second is-
sue discussed in this chapter concerns the semantic framework used throughout
this book, namely Neo-Davidsonian event semantics. I give a brief overview of
this approach in section 2.3. Lastly, in section 2.4, I summarize Pylkkänen's
(2002, 2008) work on differentiating applicative arguments into low and high
applicatives. This is the background to my analyses. It will be shown throughout
the book that Pylkkänen's analysis is too coarse to handle all details of the dif-
ferent types of applicative arguments. A reader familiar with the tests for (not-)
at-issue meaning, Neo-Davidsonian event semantics and Pylkkänen's work may
skip this chapter entirely.
2.2 Not-At-Issue Meaning
One major difference from many previous analyses of applicative arguments is
that I argue that in some applicative constructions, some or all of the meaning of
the applicative is not-at-issue ("implied") meaning. This means that in addition
to the asserted, truth-conditional proposition of the verbal event, there is mean-
ing contributed to a second tier of meaning. This second tier of meaning encodes
not-at-issue meaning. This idea of having two tiers of meaning has been argued
for by Karttunen and Peters (1979) as well as Potts (2005). Potts contends that
the not-at-issue content is independent of the asserted at-issue content that is
conveyed in a sentence. He shows that not-at-issue content is different from at-
issue material and presuppositions. According to him, Conventional Implica-
tures (CIs) contribute only to the not-at-issue tier of meaning. These CIs share
the following characteristics:
20. Features of Conventional Implicatures (CIs):
1. CIs are part of the conventional meaning of words;
2. CIs are commitments, and thus give rise to entailments;
3. These commitments are made by the speaker of the utterance 'by vir-
tue of the meaning of' the words he chooses;
20
4 Roberts et al. (2009) cite Chierchia and McConnell-Ginet (1990) for this name.
21
22
b. If Louis, the very haughty king of France, actually does visit you, I'll
give you a hundred dollars.
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 10)
Next, meaning on the not-at-issue tier cannot be questioned using wh-
questions. This means that (elements of) appositives cannot undergo wh-
movement or even be part of multiple wh-questions (where the wh-word stays
in-situ).
26. a. *Which country did you invite Louis, the king of?
b. *Who invited Louis, the king of which country?
(Bosse et al. 2012, examples 4c, 5)
Finally, variable binding only works if the quantifier is on the at-issue tier,
binding a variable which is on the not-at-issue tier (and not vice versa). Thus,
binding a variable in an appositive is possible (27a), but it is not possible for a
quantifier in an appositive to bind a variable on the at-issue tier (27b).
27. a. Each girl1 tried to ditch Miss Marple, her1 chaperone.
b. *Miss Marple, each girl1's chaperone, berated her1.
(Bosse et al. 2012, examples footnote 5 i, 9b)
These different environments (yes/no-question, negation, conditional, wh-
question, and quantifier binding) are the tests that I use below to diagnose
whether an applicative argument has at-issue or not-at-issue meaning. In short,
not-at-issue elements are expected to project past yes/no-questions, to not be
negatable, to not be available for wh-questioning, to be irrelevant for the truth
conditions of a conditional clause, and to be unable to bind at-issue content. At-
issue elements are expected to project past yes/no-questions, to be negatable, to
be able to be wh-questioned, to be relevant for the truth-conditions of if-clauses,
and to be able to bind not-at-issue content.
Roberts et al. (2009) argue that a variety of not-at-issue meaning can be de-
tected by these tests (e.g. presuppositions, implicatures). Consequently, not all
applicatives that contribute not-at-issue meaning are CIs. I will address the sta-
tus (in Potts's system) for each not-at-issue applicative individually.
According to Potts (2005), it is not expected that an element can contribute
to the at-issue tier and the not-at-issue tier at the same time. However, McCrea-
dy (2009) shows that elements with this kind of mixed contribution exist. He
discusses the Japanese adverb sekkaku as such an element. The predictions for
these elements with respect to the family of sentences tests are not straightfor-
ward: it is not clear which tests an element with mixed contribution should pass
(i.e. the not-at-issue meaning is still present) and which ones it should fail (i.e.
the not-at-issue meaning does not project). I will come back to this in Chapter 3.
23
5 The basic types are: e (individuals), t (truth-values), v (events). Sometimes s is alterna-
tively used for events. I do not consistently include the types (as subscripts) in the syn-
tactic trees and semantic derivations but only as necessary.
24
b. VP<v,t>
3
V<e,vt> NP<e>
kiss 5
Mary
c. [[VP]] = [[kiss]] ([[Mary]])
= λe. KISS(e) & Thm(e)(Mary)
The NP Mary that the verb combines with is of type e and can thus become the
theme. The verb is then satisfied and does not require any other element. By
combining the verb and the NP, the VP denotes a kissing event with Mary as the
theme (30c). (The event variable λe will later be closed.)
As Kratzer (1996) argues, the external argument is not an argument of the
verb. Rather, it is introduced by a syntactic head, Voice, as defined in (31a). It is
combined with the VP by event identification (31b): event identification com-
bines two functions (each with an event variable) into a single function (with
one event variable). (31c-d) show the syntactic structure of the whole VoiceP
p
and its semantic interpretation.
31. a. [[Voice]]]] = λx. λe. Agt(e)(x)
b. Event Identification: <e,<v,t>> <v,t> → <e,<v,t>>
c. VoiceP<v,t>
3
NPe Voice'<e,vt>
5 3
John Voice<e,vt> VP<v,t>
6
kiss Mary
d. [[VoiceP]] = λe. KISS(e) & Thm(e)(Mary) & Agt(e)(John)6
The open event variable (λe) is eventually existentially bound (with scope as
narrow as possible) unless there is another source of event quantification.
Modifiers can be added to the sentence and correspond to separate conjuncts
in the semantic derivation. This is exemplified in (32).
32. a. John kissed Mary in the park.
b. λe. KISS(e) & Thm(e)(Mary) & Agt(e)(John) & Location(e)(park)
Each event can have each thematic role assigned only once. Thus, it is not
possible to have an event with, for instance, the agent role assigned twice (Par-
sons 1990).7
6 An alternative, yet equivalent, way of writing this is:
[[VoiceP]] = λe. KISS(e) & Thm(e, Mary) & Agt(e, John)
7 However, it is possible for one referent to have two (or more) thematic roles associated
25
One verb can involve one or more events, and each event can have sub-
events. Modifiers like again can target these subevents. For instance, again can
receive a restitutive reading when it modifies the transition from a process to a
state (33).
33. (Context: John has bought brand new glasses that have never been
dirty. Then he dropped them in some mud.)
John cleaned his glasses again.
. . . his glasses were clean before.
Again can receive a repetitive reading when it modifies a state or process (34).
34. (Context: John has had glasses for years. They get dirty every day.)
John cleaned his glasses again.
. . . John has cleaned his glasses before.
Causatives (derived from intransitive verbs) involve two events. The follow-
ing example illustrates this. (Cul stands for Culmination.)
35. a. Mary flew the kite.
b. (e) [Agent(e, Mary) & Cul(e) & (e') [Flying(e') & Cul(e') &
Theme(e', kite) & CAUSE(e, e')]]
(Parsons 1990, p. 109)
The derivation states that there is an event (which cumulates). Mary is the agent
of this event, and this event is the cause for a second event, which is a flying
event. The kite is the theme of this flying event.
Modifiers can apply to any event (36). The blank in the derivation in (36b)
can either be filled with e or e'. In the latter case, the resulting meaning is that
the flying takes place behind the museum; in the former case, Mary does some-
thing behind the museum (which causes the kite to fly).
36. a. Mary flew the kite behind the museum.
b. (e) [Agent(e,Mary) & Cul(e) & (e') [Flying(e') & Cul(e') &
Theme(e', kite) & Behind(_, museum) & CAUSE(e, e')]]
(Parsons 1990, p. 118)
While Neo-Davidsonian event semantics was developed as a purely seman-
tic framework, it has consequences for my syntactic analyses. First, the thematic
roles that the applicative arguments receive are often introduced by phonologi-
cally null (functional) heads. Second, the surface structure of the sentences will
not be addressed here (unless where necessary). As a matter of fact, I abstract
away from all higher projections (including tense) for the sake of simplicity (un-
less where necessary). This means that the provided syntactic structures are in-
complete and the semantic analyses do not include time intervals and cumula-
tion points. For German, this abstraction from surface structure is also advanta-
with it in one event according to Parsons.
26
geous because it allows me to disregard the order of the constituents, which de-
pends on many constraints. Vogel and Steinbach (1998) cite Lenerz (1977) (and
Cooper (1994) for the translation) for the following ordering constraints that ap-
ply to German:
37. German Constituent Order
"a. Theme/Rheme Condition: the theme tends to precede the rheme; b. Definiteness
condition: definite tends to precede indefinite; c. Law of Growing Constituents (Ge-
setz der wachsenden Glieder, following Behagel (1932)): heavier constituents tend
to follow lighter ones; d. Sentence Bracket Condition: the tendency, not to end a
sentence on a light constituent if the sentence bracket is open, i.e. if the clause does
not end with a verb; e. Subject/Agent condition: subject/agent tends to precede other
constituents." (Vogel and Steinbach 1998, p. 68)
As this quote shows, the surface order in German is influenced by many differ-
ent factors and abstracting from lets me focus solely on the applicative argu-
ments and their analyses.
2.4 Pylkkänen (2002, 2008)
Pylkkänen (2002; 2008) claims that there are two basic types of applicative ar-
guments: a high applicative which is introduced by a head attaching outside of
VP and relating an individual to an event as well as a low applicative argument
which is introduced by a head attaching below VP and relating two individuals
involved in a transfer of possession, either to or from someone. The high appli-
catives are responsible for adding an additional participant to the event whereas
low applicatives are only responsible for the transfer of possession, independent
of the event denoted by the verb. Pylkkänen gives the following examples for
each type.
38. a. High Applicative (in Chaga)
N- ã- ï- lyí- ì- á m- ká k-èlà
Foc- 1sg- Pres- eat- Appl- FV 1- wife 7-food
'He is eating food for his wife.'8
(Pylkkänen 2002, example 2a)
8 In the original source Bresnan and Moshi (1990, example 2), the translation is given as
'... for/on his wife.' In my categorization, the preposition for indicates a benefactive ap-
plicative while on is used for affected experiencers. The fact that Pylkkänen glosses
over this can be taken as a first indication that her classification is too coarse.
27
VoiceP
3
he 3
Voice 3
wife 3
ApplBen 3
eat food
(Pylkkänen 2002, example 16a)
b. Low Applicative: 'I baked him a cake.'
VoiceP
3
I 3
Voice 3
bake 3
him 3
Appl cake
(Pylkkänen 2002, example 16b)
As shown in (39), the high applicative covers different interpretations for the
applicative argument, e.g. benefactive, malefactive. It simply adds the corre-
sponding thematic role to the semantic derivation as a conjunct.
39. High Applicative
λx. λe. APPL(e,x)
(collapsing APPLBEN, APPLINST, APPLLOC and so forth)
(Pylkkänen 2002, example 23)
In contrast, the low applicative head takes the two NPs and then the verb as
its arguments. By doing so, it can relate the two individuals involved in the
transfer of possession to each other before relating the transfer to the verbal
event. Pylkkänen distinguishes two types of low applicatives depending on the
direction of the transfer (to/from).9 Their semantic denotation is given in (40).
40. Low Applicative
Low-APPL-TO (Recipient applicative):
λx. λy. λf<e<s,t>>. λe. f(e,x) & to-the-possession(x,y)
Low-APPL-FROM (Source applicative):
λx. λy. λf<e<s,t>>. λe. f(e,x) & from-the-possession(x,y)
(Pylkkänen 2002, example 25)
As I show throughout this book, this distinction between high and low ap-
plicatives is not sufficient to account for the types of applicative arguments that
are found within a language or across languages. What Pylkkänen (2002) de-
9 Larson (2010) points out several problems with these denotations.
28
fines as high applicatives is not a uniform category. The examples in (1), with
the exception of (1c), all pass Pylkkänen's tests for high applicatives. First, they
relate an individual (or entity) to an event. In (1a), the car is added to the event
of denting the door. In (1b), he is added as a beneficiary of the cake baking. In
(1d), Chris is added as a psychologically affected individual. In (1e), the speaker
includes himself/herself and his/her interest in the situation. In (1f), the applica-
tive argument indicates that this is a special or remarkable event. Finally, in
(1g), the grandma is responsible for the broken vase (although she did not ac-
tively break it). In none of these examples is there a transfer of possession. Re-
gardless, these types are as different from each other as they are from low ap-
plicatives and must consequently be distinguished.
Pylkkänen (2002) shows that high applicative arguments can also be differ-
entiated from low applicatives by the type of verbs they can occur with. High
applicatives attach outside of VP and should be allowed to appear with unerga-
tive and stative verbs. In contrast, low applicatives require the presence of an
object NP and therefore cannot occur with unergative and stative verbs. This is
not a helpful diagnostic for German because most applicatives that relate an in-
dividual to an event in German are licensed only by certain verbs (or VPs) and
thus are not as unselective as predicted by Pylkkänen.10 The occurrence with
unergative and stative verbs is not a reliable diagnostic of types for German ap-
plicative arguments, as shown throughout this book.
As for the semantics proposed by Pylkkänen (2002), I show that the high
applicative is only suitable for two types of applicatives found in German,
namely the true benefactive applicative arguments (Chapter 5) and the Dative of
Inaction (Chapter 7). All other applicatives require analyses different from Pyl-
kkänen's proposal.
10 Wegener (1983) consequently argues that many applicatives of German are not truly
free arguments but rather verb-specific arguments. I disagree that this makes the argu-
ments verb-specific. Rather, I argue that some applicative heads select only certain VPs,
for instance resultative VPs. This does not make the applicatives arguments of the verb.
3 Affected Experiencers
3.1 Introduction
In this chapter, I discuss affected experiencer applicative arguments in German
and English, as exemplified in (41).11
41. a. Alex zerbrach Chris Bens Vase.
Alex.Nom broke Chris.Dat Ben.Gen vase.Acc
'Alex broke Ben's vase on Chris.'
= Alex broke Ben's vase, and this matters to Chris.
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 1a)
b. Gerald broke the vase on me.
Affected experiencer applicative arguments denote an individual who is not di-
rectly involved in the event, but the event affects the individual. In the German
example (41a), it is Chris who is affected by Alex breaking Ben's vase while in
the English example (41b) I am affected by Gerald breaking the vase.
This English example might be surprising because the affected experiencer
applicative argument is included in a PP (and consequently does not meet my
definition of an applicative argument (4)). Due to the striking similarities be-
tween German and English affected experiencers (explained below), I analyze
them similarly despite the English affected experiencers being PPs. I argue be-
low that the preposition on is the overt applicative head for affected experiencers
in English.
Before I analyze the affected experiencer arguments in detail in section 3.4,
note that these affected experiencer applicative arguments should be classified
as high applicatives because an individual is related to an event (Pylkkänen
2002). Being high applicatives, first it is expected that they can occur with uner-
gative and stative verbs. As mentioned in Chapter 2, this is not a good diagnostic
for German because of other verbal restrictions (see also section 3.7). As shown
in (42), unergative and stative verbs are allowed in English with the affected ex-
periencer.
42. a. John cried on Mary.
b. He held on to the bag on Mary.
Second, high applicatives do not denote a possessive relation. This is also true
for affected experiencers. In fact, it is possible to have overt possessors in addi-
tion to the affected experiencer (41) (Isacenko 1965). Thus, affected experiencer
applicative arguments should receive the same analysis as other high applica-
11 This analysis of affected experiencers presented in this chapter is our analysis as given
in Bosse, Bruening and Yamada (2012).
30
tives according to Pylkkänen (2002, 2008). As I show below, this does not do
them justice, in part because they involve not-at-issue meaning (see Chapter 2
and section 3.3), which is not included in Pylkkänen's analysis.
I distinguish the affected experiencers from other applicative arguments in
section 3.2. The German pertinence dative is addressed in section 3.2.2 an 3.6.
This applicative argument has often been argued to constitute its own type of
applicative. I show that it is identical to the affected experiencer construction but
includes an additional conversational implicature. Therefore, it does not require
a different formal analysis than the affected experiencer.
Following the discussion of the pertinence dative, I address the verbal re-
strictions on affected experiencers and pertinence datives (section 3.7). Semantic
and valency restrictions are used to characterize the verbs that license the affect-
ed experiencer construction. I take a look at affected experiencer applicative ar-
guments as elements in Potts' system of not-at-issue elements in section 3.8.
Lastly, I digress from the German and English applicative arguments in section
3.9 where I investigate some cross-linguistic parametric variation with respect to
affected experiencers. In particular, I show how the analysis of German and
English affected experiencers can be extended to Japanese, Hebrew and French.
I conclude this chapter in section 3.10.
3.2 Distinguishing Affected Experiencers
In this section, I distinguish affected experiencers (41) from applicatives dis-
cussed in other chapters. Differentiating English affected experiencers from oth-
er English applicatives is straightforward, as the former are part of a on-PP,
whereas the latter are not:
43. a. Gerald broke the vase on me. (affected experiencer)
b. John baked Mary a cake. (recipient benefactive)
c. John1 killed him1 a bear. (subject co-referential)
Furthermore, the affected experiencer construction can be distinguished
from other English on-PPs (e.g. locatives) based on the contributed meaning,
namely a psychological affectedness. This goes along with a sentience require-
ment for the affected experiencer (44).
44. Gerald broke the vase on his dead grandfather.
The non-sentient individual denoted by the argument his dead grandfather in
(44) cannot be interpreted as an affected experiencer but rather must be under-
stood as a location or as a personification of the dead grandfather, for instance
the grandfather's ghost who could be psychologically affected. Other uses of on-
PPs, for instance the locative one, do not have this requirement (45).
45. John broke the vase on the beach.
31
The affected experiencer cannot refer to entities that are not sentient because its
semantic contribution is that of a psychological experience. Thus, English af-
fected experiencers can easily be identified because of the required preposition
on marking psychological affectedness.
At first glance, German affected experiencer applicative arguments (41a)
can be mistaken for other types of applicative arguments. Many sentences are
ambiguous between the different types (see among others Rosengren 1975, Hole
2008, Colleman 2010). However, they need to be distinguished and can be, as
shown in the following subsections.
32
This shows that affected experiencer applicative arguments have to refer to sen-
tient beings. This does not hold for benefactives. In the benefactive example
(46), the father is the beneficiary even though he has already died. These exam-
ples show that the referent of the affected experiencer must be able to perceive
the event (and therefore be in a sentient state of mind) whereas the referent of
the benefactive applicative argument does not necessarily have to (be able to)
perceive the event.
The third difference is that, unlike benefactives, German affected experi-
encer applicative arguments do not alternate with a prepositional variant (see
also Chapter 5). (48a) is largely synonymous with (46), whereas no grammatical
example of a prepositional affected experiencer (48b) exists.
48. a. Dennis malte das Bild
Dennis.Nom painted the.Acc picture
für seinen toten Vater.
for his.Acc dead father
'Dennis painted the picture for his dead father.'
b. *Lisa lobte gegen/ auf/ wider
Lisa.Nom praised against/ on/ against
ihren Mann den Anzug.
her.Acc man the.Acc suit
(Bosse and Bruening 2011, example 8)
These three characteristics (meaning, sentience, PP-variant) distinguish af-
fected experiencers from benefactives in German (in addition to the benefactive
contributing only at-issue meaning whereas the affected experiencer contributes
some not-at-issue meaning (see section 3.3)).
33
Thus, in (49a) the door is interpreted as being a part of the car and not as being
(psychologically) affected. In contrast, in (49b), Chris is psychologically af-
fected and Ben's vase is not a (material) part of him. This should make differen-
tiating the two types easy. However, a complication is the existence of the so-
called pertinence dative (see also section 3.6). The pertinence dative shares
characteristics of both the part-whole and the affected experiencer constructions.
Some examples of the pertinence dative are provided in (50).
50. a. Der Stein fällt dem Mann auf den Kopf.
the.Nom brick falls the.Dat man on the.Acc head
(Neumann 1995, example 1)
b. Mir schmerzt der Rücken.
me.Dat hurts the.Nom back
'My back hurts.'
(Abraham 1973, example 26, my translation)
c. Der Regen tropft mir auf die Schuhe.
the.Nom rain drips me.Dat on the.Acc shoes
'The rain is dripping on my shoes.'
(von Polenz 1969, example 23, my translation)
The dative constituent in each of these examples is said to encode that the de-
noted individual is the possessor of the body part/ piece of clothing mentioned in
the sentence and is also affected by the event. In other words, the pertinence da-
tive involves affectedness (like the affected experiencer) as well as a part-whole/
possessive relationship to another entity (like the part-whole applicative argu-
ment).12
Typically, the German pertinence dative (50) has been described as having
the characteristics given in (51) (according to von Polenz (1969), unless other-
wise indicated).
51. Characteristics of the Pertinence Dative
a. The applicative argument is not selected by the verb.
b. The sentences are transformable into possessive/genitive construc-
tions (though not with exactly the same meaning (Hole 2008)). Fur-
thermore, the reverse does not hold: not all possessive/ genitive con-
structions can alternatively be expressed as a pertinence dative (Isacen-
ko 1965, Wegener 1983).
c. The pertinence construction is permissible with different types of
verbs.
d. The referent of the pertinence dative must be animate.
12 Lamiroy and Delbecque (1998) argue that the interpretation oscillates between a posses-
sor interpretation and an affected interpretation.
34
35
13 Isacenko (1965) does not follow through on his discussion of this observation but rather
leaves it to future research.
36
37
38
b. i. If the CEO has a breakdown on us in the next two weeks, we'll all
quit.
ii. If the CEO has a breakdown in the next two weeks, we'll all quit.
Having the affected experiencer in the if-clause influences the conditions of the
clause. In (57a), Jan will only receive the money if the husband is affected by
the praising. If the affected experiencer argument were not included in the
clause, he would get the money as long as Lisa praised the suit (regardless of an
effect on the husband). Similarly, in (57b-ii) any breakdown of the CEO will
make us quit, whereas in (57b-i) the breakdown must have an effect on us to
quit. The if-clause test thus shows that the affected experiencer contributes at-
issue meaning.
Furthermore, the affected experiencer argument can be a quantificational
expression which can bind a variable that carries at-issue meaning (58).
58. a. Ich habe jedem Jungen1 seine1 Vase zerbrochen.
I.Nom have every.Dat boy his.Acc vase broken
'I broke his1 vase on every boy1.'
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 33)
b. I passed out on every one of my friends1 on his1 birthday.
As explained in Chapter 2, this binding pattern is also indicative of the element
binding the pronoun being on the at-issue tier of meaning.
In summary, these tests support the contention that the affected experiencer
construction involves both at-issue and not-at-issue meaning in both German
and English.
39
can be brought about by assuming that it is a dead man's body onto which bricks
are dropped. In that case, the part-whole interpretation is available (while the
pertinence dative/ affected experiencer interpretation is not possible because the
referent is not sentient).
59. Der Stein fällt dem Mann auf den Kopf.
the.Nom brick falls the.Dat man on the head
1. The brick is falling on the man1's head on him1. (possessor & affect-
ed)
2. The brick is falling on the man's head. (part-whole)
Applying the not-at-issue tests (Chapter 2) to pertinence datives shows that
on the "possessor and affected" interpretation, the pertinence dative behaves like
affected experiencers. In contrast, on the (pure) part-whole interpretation, it be-
haves like a part-whole applicative argument.
The pertinence dative can be negated (60).
60. Der Stein fiel dem Mann nicht auf den Kopf.
the.Nom brick fell the.Dat man Neg on the.Acc head
1. The brick did not fall onto the (man's) head, but if it had, if would
have mattered.
*The brick fell onto the (man's) head but it didn't matter.
(possessor & affected)
2. The brick did not fall onto the man's head. (part-whole)
The negation test shows that on the "possessor and affected" interpretation the
affected meaning survives under negation. It is only the event that can be negat-
ed and not the affectedness itself. This is just like the affected meaning in a "typ-
ical" affected experiencer construction (54a). In contrast, on the pure part-whole
interpretation, negation indicates that the event did not happen. No meaning is
present that cannot be the target of negation.
Yes/no-questions also show that the pertinence dative construction behaves
just like the affected experiencer construction (55a) on the "possessor and af-
fected" interpretation, namely by contributing some not-at-issue meaning. On
the pure part-whole interpretation, it behaves like a part-whole applicative ar-
gument, contributing only at-issue meaning.
61. Fiel dem Mann der Stein auf den Kopf?
fell the.Dat man the.Nom brick on the.Acc head
1. Did the brick fall onto the (man's) head on the man?
(possessor & affected)
2. Did the brick fall onto the man's head? (part-whole)
The yes/no-question can be answered with "no". On the "possessor and affected"
interpretation, it means that the brick did not fall on the man's head but if it had,
it would have mattered to the man. It cannot mean that the brick actually hit the
40
man in the head, but he was not affected. To get this meaning, a longer explana-
tion is needed. In contrast, on the part-whole interpretation the negative answer
would indicate that the event did not happen (either because the brick missed or
because the person was actually a woman or because it hit the man's shoulder).
Thus, the "possessor and affected" interpretation of the pertinence dative be-
haves just like the (typical) affected experiencer (55a) and the part-whole inter-
pretation like the part-whole applicative argument.
This is also true for if-clauses and wh-questions. In these constructions, on
both interpretations the pertinence dative contributes at-issue meaning.
62. Falls der Stein dem Mann auf
if the.Nom brick the.Dat man on
den Kopf fällt, ist es deine Schuld.
the.Acc head falls is it your fault
1. If the brick falls onto the (man's) head on him, it's your fault. (pos-
sessor & affected)
2. If the brick falls onto the man's head, it's your fault. (part-whole)
As (62) shows, the applicative argument contributes to the conditions of the if-
clause on both readings. In the "possessor and affected" case, the man must be
hit in the head by the brick and be affected by that, for it to be your fault. In the
part-whole case, the stone must actually hit the man's head. Again, on both in-
terpretations the pertinence dative behaves like the corresponding applicative
arguments.
Also, on both readings it is possible to ask a wh-question about the applica-
tive argument, showing again that at-issue meaning is contributed.
63. Wem ist der Stein auf den Kopf gefallen?
who.Dat is the.Nom brick on the head fallen
1. Whose head did the brick fall on (and affected that person)? (posses-
sor & affected)
2. Whose head did the brick fall on? (part-whole)
Thus, the pertinence dative has two interpretations (for speakers that allow
the part-whole applicative): that of the part-whole applicative and that of the af-
fected experiencer. Each interpretation behaves like the corresponding applica-
tive argument. In other words, the pertinence dative with the "possessor and af-
fected" interpretation is an affected experiencer. Its possessive interpretation is
addressed in section 3.6.
3.4 Analysis
As discussed in the previous section, affected experiencer applicative arguments
involve both at-issue and not-at-issue meaning. In that, the analysis given here
differs from all previous analyses (e.g. Abraham 1973, Neumann 1995, Pyl-
41
kkänen 2002, Hole 200814). Before discussing the formal aspects of the analysis,
I determine the syntactic position of the affected experiencer.
In both German (64) and English (65), the subject c-commands the affected
experiencer and can consequently bind into the affected experiencer argument,
whereas the affected experiencer argument cannot bind into the subject. This
indicates that the affected experiencer attaches below the subject.
64. German
a. Alle1 haben [ihren1 Vorgesetzten]Aff den
everyone.Nom have their.Dat superiors the
Dienst quittiert.
service quit
'Everyone1 has quit the service on their1 superiors.'
b. *[Ihre1 Arbeiter] haben allen1 den
their.Nom workers have everyone.Dat the.Acc
Dienst quittiert.
service quit
'Their1workers have quit the service on everyone1.'
65. English
a. Every company1 downsized on its1workers.
b. *Its1 workers quit their jobs on every company1.
Furthermore, the affected experiencer can cause a Condition C violation
with respect to the subject (66). This again shows that the affected experiencer
should attach below the subject in the syntactic derivation.
66. *Er1 zerbrach Martins1 Bruder die Vase.
he.Nom broke Martin.Gen brother.Dat the vase
'He1 broke the vase on Martin's1 brother.'
67. *He1 broke the vase on Gerald's1 brother.
These examples indicate that in both German and English the affected experi-
encer is c-commanded by the subject.
Due to the obligatory preposition introducing the affected experiencer in
English, German and English require slightly different analyses. Both analyses
are presented in the following.
For German, I argue that the affected experiencer is introduced by the syn-
tactic head Aff(ect). This head is located outside of VP and below Voice to re-
flect that the subject c-commands the applicative argument. The denotation of
this head (68a) includes both at-issue and not-at-issue material (following the
colon). Semantically, Aff introduces an experiencing event and the experiencer.
It takes the event property denoted by its sister constituent to be the source of
14 Hole includes some not-at-issue meaning, but does not have an experiencing event.
42
43
44
b. VoiceP
3
Gerald Voice'
3
Voice VP1
3
VP PPAff
3 3
V NP PAff NP
broke 5 on 4
the vase me
c. [[VoiceP]] = λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(the vase) & Agt(e)(Gerald) &
e'(EXPER(e') & Exp(e')(me)): e''(BREAK(e'') & Thm(e'')(the
vase) → Source(e'')(e'))
Consequently, German and English affected experiencer constructions yield
the same meaning but differ in how they achieve this. English needs an adjoined
PP with an "affective" preposition whereas German has a phonetically null Af-
fect head which selects VP.
3.5 Consequences
The analysis of affected experiencer applicative arguments as presented in sec-
tion 3.4 has several consequences. The first one is that Aff introduces a second
event (in addition to the verbal event). I present evidence for the necessity of
this in section 3.5.1. Related to this bi-eventivity is the availability of these
events for modification, such as again-modification and negation which are dis-
cussed in section 3.5.2 and 3.5.3, respectively.
3.5.1 Bi-Eventivity
One major difference between the analysis presented in section 3.4 and previous
analyses (for instance, the one by Pylkkänen (2002)) is that the affected experi-
encer applicative construction involves a second event, namely the experiencing
event in addition to the verbal event. In Pylkkänen's analysis, the applicative
head only adds a new role (but not event) to the structure (73).
73. λx. λe. APPL(e,x)
(collapsing APPLBEN, APPLINST, APPLLOC and so forth)
(Pylkkänen 2002, example 23)
In contrast, Aff contributes the experiencer role and also an experiencing event.
74. [[Aff]] = λPvt.λx.λe. P(e) & (e')(EXPER(e') & Exp(x)(e')): e'' (P(e'')
→ Source(e'')(e'))
45
46
3.5.2 Again-Modification
VP adverbs provide further support for my analysis. Assuming that adverbs typ-
ically attach to nodes of type <v,t>, there are three such nodes in the derivation
for German (69), namely VoiceP, AffP and VP, as well as three in English (72),
namely VP, VP1, and VoiceP. None of these nodes include the experiencing
event without including the verbal event. This explains why the PP in the fol-
lowing example cannot modify just the experiencing event.
77. In Berlin starb der Mann Jan.
in Berlin died the.Nom man Jan.Dat
'The man died on Jan and that happened in Berlin.'
*'The man died (somewhere) and it affected Jan in Berlin.'
Again-modification further supports the proposed analysis. As von Stechow
(1996), Bale (2007) and Beck and Johnson (2004) have argued, again can detect
nodes of type <v,t>. Depending on the attachment site, the presupposition of
again (as stated in (78)) will differ.
78. [[again]] = λPvt.λe. P(e): e'[P(e') & the run time of e' preceded that of
e]
In a simple transitive clause, again can attach to either VP or VoiceP, yielding
two different readings (79).
79. I closed the door again.
a. This door was built closed, and has never been opened. One day an
earthquake jarred it open, so I had to go close it again. (VP modifica-
tion: only [door closed] held previously)
b. I've closed this door about ten times already today. Someone just left
it open again, so I had to go close it again. (VoiceP modification: [I
closed door] happened previously)
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 76)
The derivation for German affected experiencers (69) includes three nodes of
type <v,t>: VoiceP, AffP and VP. The following three readings of an affected
experiencer construction modified with again should therefore be possible:
80. 1. VP attachment: a reading where the VP event has taken place be-
fore, without an affected experiencer and not necessarily with the same
agent;
2. AffP attachment: a reading where the AffP event has taken place be-
fore with the same affected experiencer and same VP event, but not
necessarily with the same agent;
47
3. VoiceP attachment: a reading where the whole VoiceP event has ta-
ken place before with the same VP event, the same affected experi-
encer, and the same agent.
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 77)
There should not be a reading with the same verbal event and the same agent but
a different affected experiencer. This prediction is borne out:
81. Lisa zerbrach Martin das Puzzle wieder.
Lisa.Nom broke Martin.Dat the.Acc puzzle again
'Lisa broke the puzzle on Martin again.'
1. The puzzle is broken again. (repeated VP event)
2. Someone broke the puzzle on Martin before and now Lisa broke it
on him again. (repeated AffP)
3. Lisa had broken the puzzle on Martin before and now she did it
again. (repeated VoiceP)
4. *Lisa had broken the puzzle before and now she broke it again but
for the first time on Martin (experiencer-less repeated VoiceP).18
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 78)
English should allow (and disallow) the same readings as German because the
nodes of type <v,t> in the derivation for English (72) correspond to the ones in
German (69). This prediction is also borne out.
82. My daughter broke the vase again on me.
1. My new vase arrived broken. I glued it together, but then my daugh-
ter broke it on me again. (repeated VP)
2. My dog broke this vase on me yesterday. I put it back together, but
then my daughter broke it on me again. (repeated VP1)
3. My daughter broke this vase on me yesterday, and then she broke it
on me again today. (repeated VoiceP)
4. *My daughter broke this vase yesterday, then today she broke it on
me again. (experiencer-less repeated VoiceP)
These examples show that again cannot be used to only modify the experi-
encing event: for instance, (81) cannot mean 'Martin had some experience before
and now he had another one (because Lisa broke the puzzle).' This is expected
because there is no node of type <v,t> which includes only the experiencing
event (and excludes the verbal event). Thus, the proposed analysis is supported
18 It is possible to stress Martin to seemingly make this reading available. However, in that
case, the stress causes contrastive focus which contrasts Martin with some other indi-
vidual on whom Lisa broke the puzzle before. In other words, even in this case there is a
repetition of the experiencing event.
48
3.5.3 Negation
As shown in section 3.3, negation cannot target just the experiencing event in
German or English. Thus in sentence (54a), repeated below, negation cannot be
used to negate that Chris was the experiencer of an experiencing event even
though the experiencing event is semantically represented as a conjunct (see
(83b) for the non-negated denotation).
83. a. Alex zerbrach Chris Bens Vase nicht.
Alex.Nom broke Chris.Dat Ben.Gen vase Neg
'Alex didn't break Ben's vase on Chris.'
1. Alex didn't break Ben's vase (but if he had, it would have mat-
tered to Chris.)
2. *Alex broke Ben's vase, but it didn't matter to Chris.
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 30a)
b. [[VoiceP]] = λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(Ben's vase) & Agt(e)(Alex)
& e'(EXPER(e') & Exp(e')(Chris) : e'' ((BREAK(e'') &
Thm(e'')(Ben's vase)) → Source(e'')(e'))
As can be seen from the denotation, the event variable of the experiencing event
is existentially quantified. Existentially quantified variables in general do not
seem to be available as a target of negation. For instance, causatives require that
one event causes another event: thus, in (84), the event of John doing something
caused the ice cream to melt.
84. John melted the ice cream.
Semantically, sentence (84) can be described with the following denotation (be-
low tense).
85. [[(84)]] = λe. DO(e) & Agt(e)(John) & e'. MELT(e') & Pat(e')(ice
cream) & CAUSE(e)(e')
The denotation states that John did something which caused a melting event
with the ice cream undergoing that melting event. The representation of the
melting event includes an existentially quantified event variable. Just like the
experiencing event in the affected experiencer construction, negation cannot tar-
get the caused event in causative sentences. Sentence (86) is ungrammatical on
the reading that John did something that caused the ice cream not to melt. This
sentence can only be used to negate the existence of the causing event.
86. John didn't melt the ice cream.
Thus, the fact that the experiencing event in the affected experiencer construc-
tion cannot be targeted by negation can be linked to the existentially quantified
event variable (for this event).
49
This unavailability of the experiencing event for negation contrasts with the
fact that the experiencer itself can be negated, namely when that constituent is
focused.
87. Alex didn't break Ben's vase on CHRIS (but on HIS FATHER).
Thus, the experiencer is available for contrastive focus (and by extension for
negation). It is only the existentially quantified experiencing event itself which
cannot be targeted by negation.
This discussion calls into question the reliability of negation as a not-at-
issue diagnostic (Chapter 2). It seems that for bi-eventive (monoclausal) struc-
tures, negation may not be reliable because existentially quantified events can-
not be negated (regardless of the tier of meaning they contribute to). This shall
not concern us here further because yes/no-questions also detected some not-at-
issue meaning of affected experiencer applicative arguments (55).
Another issue related to negation is that the denotation of Aff states that the
referent of the affected experiencer argument experienced something if any
event of that particular kind did happen. It is not ensured that the event has to
happen in the real world for the affected experiencer to be affected (in the real
world). This problem can be solved by adding a counterfactual meaning to the
denotation of Aff (88).
88. [[Aff]]w= λPvt.λx.λe.λw. P(e)(w) & e'(EXPER(e')(w) & Exp(x)(e')(w))
: e'' (P(e'')(w) → Source(e'')(e')(w)) & w'. P(e) = 0 in w' → e'. EX-
PER(e')(w) & Exp(x)(e')(w) = 0
(w' is maximally similar to w)
This counterfactual denotation ensures that the event must happen in the real
world for it to be the source of the experiencing event. If the event does not hap-
pen in the real world, then there is no experiencing event. I assume this version
of Aff below but use the simplified (non-counterfactual) version in the deriva-
tions because this modification does not have a direct effect on other aspects of
my analysis.
3.6 Pertinence Dative
In this section, I discuss the German pertinence dative (89) as a subtype of the
affected experiencer applicative argument. I argue that pertinence datives are
affected experiencer constructions which induce a conversational implicature
concerning (inalienable) possession. I have already shown that the pertinence
dative patterns with the affected experiencer in terms of (not-)at-issue meaning
(section 3.3.2). Below, I first show how my analysis of affected experiencers
works for pertinence datives (section 3.6.1) before addressing previous analyses
(section 3.6.2).
50
3.6.1 Analysis
I argue that it is not necessary to include a thematic possessor role in the analy-
sis of the pertinence dative. Rather, its possessive meaning is the result of a con-
versational implicature. This is in the spirit of Shibatani (1994), who discusses
the difference in interpretation between the pertinence dative and affected expe-
riencers in terms of pragmatically constructed affectedness, which means that it
is easier to be affected if the affected entity can easily be integrated into the
event (for instance, because it is a body part of an individual participating in the
event).
The first piece of evidence for the idea that the pertinence dative is not a
separate type of applicative argument (but rather the affected experiencer con-
struction) comes from the fact that the possession relation is not always neces-
sary. With relational nouns, body parts, and clothes (that are being worn), the
possessor relation is typically present but with other nouns it is possible (or like-
ly) (90) but by no means necessary.
90. Er ruinierte mir die Wohnung.
he.Nom ruined me.Dat the apartment
'He ruined my apartment.'
(Lee-Schoenfeld 2006, example 42)
The salient interpretation of (90) is that it is my apartment but that, in fact, is not
necessary; for instance, it could just as well be my parents' or my friend's apart-
ment or some other apartment (which I care enough about to be affected when it
is ruined). Thus, a possessive relation between the applicative argument and an-
other entity is only one possible interpretation of the sentence.
Furthermore, von Polenz (1969) observes that relational nouns used with the
pertinence dative behave unexpectedly in that deleting the possessor from the
sentence can impact the grammaticality of the sentence (91). This is unexpected
because applicative arguments are not selected but rather freely added to a sen-
tence and should consequently not impact the grammaticality (Chapter 1).
91. a. Er klopfte seinem Freund auf
he.Nom tapped his.Dat friend on
die Schulter.
the.Acc shoulder
'He tapped his friend on the shoulder.'
(von Polenz 1969, example 1, my translation)
51
52
53
54
19 This can also be used to differentiate part-whole applicatives from pertinence datives.
Part-whole applicatives are restricted in which NP can denote the part to the whole (de-
noted by the applicative), as explained in detail in section 6.2.3. The possessor in a per-
tinence dative can be the direct object in the presence of a goal PP. This is not the case
for the part NP in a part-whole applicative construction (see i. and ii. below).
i. *Jan legte dem Auto das Rad auf den Tisch.
Jan laid the.Dat car the.Acc tire onto the table
'Jan put the car's tire onto the table.' (part-whole)
ii.Jan legte dem Patienten das Bein auf das Bett.
Jan laid the.Dat patient the.Acc leg onto the bed
'Jan put the patient's leg onto the bed (on the patient).' (pertinence dative)
55
(100a) cannot be interpreted as "my car" (but possibly as "my child"). This is
due to the fact that it is clear that I am not driving the car. Consequently, it is not
likely that it is my car. To convey this meaning, it needed to be overtly encoded
that it is my car (100b). Also, if the context supports that is it my car, the impli-
cation of the possessive relationship used in (100a) is possible:
101. Ich fuhr um die Kurve und sah
I.Nom drove around the corner and saw
gerade noch, wie mir das Kind
just Prt how me.Dat the.Nom child
vors Auto lief.
in.front.the car ran
'I was driving around the corner and saw how the child ran in front of
(the/my) car (on me) just at that moment.'
Thus, rather than being hard-wired into the semantic denotation of the sentence,
the possessor relationship is heavily influenced by the context.
In summary, the pertinence dative is not a separate type of applicative ar-
gument but rather the affected experiencer construction with an additional con-
versational implicature. This conversational implicature is virtually required
with relational nouns, whereas it is optional with sortal nouns ("typical affected
experiencer").
Consequently, the derivation of (59a), repeated below, proceeds as fol-
lows.20
102. a. Der Stein fällt dem Mann auf den Kopf.
the.Nom brick falls the.Dat man on the.Acc head
'The brick falls on the man's head.'
b. VoiceP
3
der Stein Voice'
3
Voice AffP
3
dem Mann Aff'
3
Aff VP
6
fällt auf den Kopf
20 The full semantic derivation is guven in Appendix 1, #3.
56
c. [[VoiceP]] = λe. FALL(e) & Goal(e)(the head) & Agt(e)(the stone) &
e' (EXPER(e') & EXP(e')(him)) : e'' (FALL(e) & Goal(e)(the
head) → Source(e'')(e'))
d. Conversational Implicature: The man was affected because his head
was hit.
This approach of the possession being conversationally implicated might al-
so explain why the possessive interpretation can be found in configurations oth-
er than the affected experiencer construction (cf. Neumann (1995)). Two such
examples are given in (103).
103. a. Der Hund hebt das Bein.
the.Nom dog lifts the.Acc leg
'The dog lifts its leg.'
(Neumann 1995, example 34)
b. Die alte Frau wackelt mit dem Kopf.
the.Nom old woman is.wobbling with the.Dat head
'The old woman's head is wobbling.'
(Neumann 1995, example 37)
In these examples, a possessive relation between two entities is understood but
this relation is not overtly encoded. If the possessor of a relational noun can be
satisfied by a conversational implicature, these examples can straightforwardly
be explained.
57
58
(98), repeated below. The salient reading of the first clause is that of a perti-
nence dative: the child is the possessor of the arm. The second sentence cancels
this relation in order to establish that the arm belongs to the teddy instead.
108. Jan verletzte dem Kind den Arm. Es
Jan.Nom hurt the.Dat child the.Acc arm it
war der Arm des Teddys.
was the.Nom arm the.Gen teddy.Gen
'Jan hurt the arm on the child. It was the arm of the teddy.'
Due to the canceling of the possessive relation, dem Kind should not bind into
den Arm because it is the teddy's arm and not the child's arm. Thus, there is
nothing for dem Kind to bind. Hole (p.c.) claims that the teddy must belong to
the child in this case. Consequently there is a silent pronoun bound by dem Kind.
It is indeed one possible interpretation that the teddy belongs to the child. How-
ever, this approach becomes problematic in the case when the teddy does not
belong to the child, which is also a possible interpretation of the sentence. For
instance, the child could be watching TV and adoring the teddy who is part of
the program. In that case, Jan could be the mean kid who hurt the teddy's arm on
the program (to the detriment of the child). It seems farfetched to say that the
child is the possessor of the teddy. For Hole, the dative-marked constituent
could bind some silent purpose/ beneficiary variable which in this case must be
something along the lines of "for the child to become upset/ sad". In this case,
the possessive relation would be reduced to a beneficiary. Hole's binding ac-
count is then essentially saying that every sentence has a silent purpose variable
available to be bound by an applicative. The interpretation of that silent purpose
clause is then contextually specified (possession, benefit, affectedness). In other
words, the cancelability of the possessive relation of the pertinence dative leads
in Hole's system to the pertinence dative being reduced to a beneficiary (with a
silent purpose clause).
This problem also arises in cases where there is an overt possessor that dif-
fers in its referent from the applicative argument (94).
109. Tim1 hat der Nachbarin2 sein1/*2
Tim.Nom has the.Dat neighbor.Fem his.Acc.Masc
Auto gewaschen.
car washed
'Tim has washed his car on the neighbor.'
In this example, the applicative must also bind into a silent purpose clause on
Hole's approach because the possessor of the vase is specified. The applicative
cannot bind into the possessive pronoun because that would lead to a gender
mismatch. Thus, it is necessary to assume a silent purpose clause for the applica-
59
21 Hole assumes that binding into (bridging) definites and prepositions including definite
determiners is possible.
60
61
62
22 Lee-Schoenfeld (2006) defines the non-core datives for which her analysis should hold
as those "which involve both affectedness and a possessor relation." (p. 107). This is the
hallmark of pertinence datives. It differs from other definitions in not requiring body
parts/ pieces of clothing as possessed items. Lee-Schoenfeld first explicitly excludes
ethical datives, judgment datives and "ficiaries" (benefactives, malefactives; including
my affected experiencers) though she then extends her analysis to these ficiaries and
judgment datives.
63
vP
3
DP v'
Er 3
vP vAgent
3 ACC
DP v' ruinierte
DAT 3
mir VP vMale/Benefactive
3 <arg>
V DAT
3 tv
DP VTheme/Patient
3 <arg>
tPD D' tV
3
DPossessor NP
6
ACC N
die Wohnung
(Lee-Schoenfeld 2006, example 42)
In Lee-Schoenfeld's analysis of (115), the applicative argument mir is generated
inside of the theme-DP where it receives the possessor θ-role. D is assumed to
be defective so that the pronoun cannot receive case there. The pronoun moves
to the specifier of vP where it receives dative case and the male-/benefactive θ-
role from v. Consequently, mir 'me' receives an interpretation of being affected
as well as the possessor of the theme.
Lee-Schoenfeld extends her analysis to sentences with overt possessors ("fi-
ciaries"). She argues that in (116), the (affected experiencer) applicative argu-
ment der Mama is generated in the specifier of vP and the possessor Omas is
generated inside the theme-DP.
116. Du hast der Mama doch hoffentlich nicht
you have the mom.Dat but hopefully not
Omas Geschirr kaputt gemacht.
grandma.Gen dishes.Acc broken made
'I sure hope you did not ruin Grandma's dishes on mom.'
(Lee-Schoenfeld 2006, example 43a)
In this case, the theme-DP requires a non-defective D which can license genitive
case for the possessor. In other words, affected experiencers and pertinence da-
tives have basically the same structure according to Lee-Schoenfeld. The differ-
64
ence is whether D (of the theme) is defective. It must be for the pertinence da-
tive to surface.
On this approach, it is unclear how to allow defective D only in pertinence
datives/ possessor-raising constructions. For instance, it is unclear why raised
possessors cannot appear in ditransitive constructions (117, also see below).
117. *Jan gab Sabine der Mutter das Buch.
Jan.Nom gave Sabine.Dat the.Dat mother the.Acc book
'Jan gave the book to Sabine's mother (on Sabine).'
'Jan gave Sabine's book to the mother (on Sabine).'
It is impossible to raise a possessor either out of the direct or the indirect object
of a ditransitive structure. The possessor raising approach does not explain why
this movement is prohibited. In other words, the possessor raising approach is
not restricted enough to limit the raising to occur only in pertinence dative con-
structions.
Another issue is the cancelability of the possessor relation (98), repeated be-
low.
118. Jan verletzte dem Kind den Arm. Es
Jan.Nom hurt the.Dat child the.Acc arm it
war der Arm des Teddys.
was the.Nom arm the.Gen teddy.Gen
'Jan hurt the arm on the child. It was the arm of the teddy.'
It is unclear how this is handled in a possessor raising analysis because the first
clause would assert that the arm belongs to the child while the second one would
assert that the arm belongs to the teddy. This contradiction cannot straightfor-
wardly be resolved.
Hole (2008) points out further problems with a possessor raising analysis.
He discusses, for instance, coordination. In the following example, there is one
pertinence dative but its referent is understood to be the possessor of two entities
which participate in different events.
119. Paul hat seiner Tochter die Haare
Paul.Nom has his.Dat daughter the.Acc hairs
gewaschen und die Nägel saubergemacht.
washed and the.Acc nails cleaned
'Paul has washed his daughter's hair and cleaned her nails.'
(Hole 2008, example 13.3, my translation)
As Hole explains, possessor raising requires two traces here, one for die Haare
and one for die Nägel. However, there is only one antecedent (seine Tochter).
To resolve this problem, it must be stipulated that one antecedent is unpro-
nounced (or two identical ones are phonologically merged). My analysis does
not have this problem because the two VPs can be coordinated and Aff can at-
65
tach outside of this constituent. The conversational implicature can then be es-
tablished between the affected experiencer and each relational noun individual-
ly.
Overall it can be concluded that the possessor raising analysis cannot ade-
quately explain the phenomenon of the German pertinence dative.
3.6.3 Conclusion
In this section, I have argued that the pertinence dative is an affected experiencer
construction with an additional conversational implicature. Previous analyses in
which the possessive meaning of the pertinence dative is explicitly included in
the analysis cannot explain why this meaning only surfaces in some cases.
3.7 Verbal Restrictions
Besides the animacy requirement for the referent of the applicative argument
(section 3.2), the verb also plays an important role in licensing the affected ex-
periencer construction. Affected experiencers (including the pertinence dative)
are only possible with some verbs in German. This speaks against the claim
made by Roberge and Troberg (2007) that only languages in which applicatives
are clitics have verbal restrictions: German allows full NP applicatives and has
verbal restrictions. The restriction is not related to the valency of the verb but
rather to the meaning of the verbs (Wegener 1983, Hole 2008, among others).
First, I discuss why valency restrictions are not good enough to describe the li-
censing conditions of affected experiencers (section 3.7.1). I then discuss the
semantic licensing conditions of the affected experiencer applicative argument
(section 3.7.2).
3.7.1 Valency
Affected experiencers can appear with transitive and intransitive verbs, but not
with ditransitives (120).
120. *Jan gab ihr Maria einen Kuss.
Jan.Nom gave her.Dat Maria.Dat a.Acc kiss
'Jan gave her a kiss on Maria.'
This is expected on my approach because Aff selects a VP of type <v,t>: in ac-
cordance with the analysis of ditransitives proposed by Bruening (2010), I as-
sume that Aff cannot attach between the projections introducing the two objects.
Lamiroy and Delbecque (1998) as well as Neumann (1995) show that the
possessed entity in a pertinence dative can be the subject of an intransitive verb
(121a), the object of a transitive verb (121b) or part of a PP with either intransi-
tive (121c) or transitive verbs (121d).
66
67
68
cense the affected experiencer/ pertinence dative; for instance, perception verbs
of non-physical contact (126).
126. Er schaut ihr in die Augen.
he.Nom looks her.Dat in the.Acc eyes
'He looks into her eyes (on her).'
(Wegener 1983, example page 151, my translation)
Wegener explains that (127) is degraded compared to (126) because looking at
the back of someone does not have a (positive or negative) effect on that person
but looking into someone's eyes does.
127. ?Er schaut ihr auf den Rücken.
he.Nom looks her.Dat on the back
'He looks at her back (on her).'
(Wegener 1983, example page 151, my translation)
However, the native speakers I consulted agree that this sentence is not degrad-
ed. Consequently, psychological affectedness cannot be the right characteristic
semantically for delimiting affected experiencers either. (Although it is possible
that these native speakers would state that looking at someone's back involves
psychological affectedness for the person being looked at.)
Wegener (1983), Lamiroy and Delbecque (1998), Hole (2008) all discuss re-
sultativity as the important characteristic of VPs that license affected experi-
encers. Looking at intransitive verbs first, their categorization by Sorace (2000)
supports the tendency towards resultative verbs licensing affected experiencers.
Change of state verbs license affected experiencers (and the new state is the re-
sult).23
128. Der Baum ist mir verrottet.
the.Nom tree is me.Dat rotten
'The tree rotted on me.'
In contrast, continuation of condition verbs only marginally allow affected expe-
riencers.24
129. ??Der Hund hat mir überlebt.
the.Nom dog has me.Dat survived
'The dog survived on me.'
Continuation of condition verbs such as in (129) do not yield a new result (but
maintain the old state) and therefore allow the affected experiencer applicative
only marginally. Context can make these sentences slightly better. For instance,
if I was severely annoyed by my neighbors' dog, and fed it poisonous dog cook-
ies, and the dog survives, I could utter (129). While the sentence would carry the
23 The example is ambiguous with the Dative of Inaction.
24 A Dative of Inaction interpretation of this example is salient.
69
70
71
Wegener (1983) also shows that resultative verbs that require non-
intentional experiencer subjects do not allow applicative arguments. Examples
of these verbs are finden 'find', erhalten 'receive', and verlieren lose'.25
135. *Er verlor mir meine Brille.
he.Nom lost me.Dat my glasses
'He lost my glasses on me.'
It is not expected if resultativity is the crucial characteristic that the intentionali-
ty of the agent can also have an influence on the licensing of affected experi-
encers.
However, this characterization of the verbal restrictions might also explain
why some static verbs are possible with applicative arguments while others are
not.
136. Er hielt Maria die Tasche.
he.Nom held Maria.Dat the.Acc bag
'He held the bag for/on Maria.'
137. *Der Korb enthielt mir zwei Schlangen.
the.Nom basket contained me.Dat two snakes.
'The basket contained two snakes on me.'
It could be argued that holding the bag is an intentional actions with a result (the
bag not being on the ground), whereas containing is not intentional.
As a rule of thumb, resultativity of the verb phrase is the necessary (but not
sufficient) characteristic for the licensing of affected experiencers in German.
This resultativity does not entail that a stative passive can be formed. The re-
sultative requirement is not reflected in the analysis here but I assume that this is
a selectional restriction between Aff and VP. The restriction might be related to
the fact that the VP provides the source event for the experiencing event and re-
sultative/ bounded sources make for better source events than atelic, unbounded
events. However, this restriction holds only for German and not for English (or
Albanian which has otherwise the same features for affected experiencers as
German does (Bosse et al. 2012)). This problem of which verbs/verb phrases
exactly license affected experiencer constructions needs further investigation.
Hole (2008) argues for a change of state operator which ensures that applicatives
occur only with certain verb phrases. In contrast, Beck and Snyder (2001) argue
that goal PPs (in English) carry resultative meaning. The interaction with the
other factors needs more investigation to see if either approach is on the right
track to restrict the German affected experiencer applicative argument correctly.
25 As Wegener points out, in contexts in which these verbs involve intentionality, they
allow applicatives. (135) can be used grammatically if he intentionally left my glasses
somewhere but tried to make it look like he unintentionally lost them.
72
73
74
will discuss how these similarities and differences follow from allowing for para-
metric variation in the attachment height of Aff.
140. Sachi-ga Masa-ni Aiko-no kabin-o kowas-are-ta.
Sachi-Nom Masa-by Aiko-Gen vase-Acc break-Aff-Past
'Masa broke Aiko's vase on Sachi.'
= Masa broke Aiko's vase, and ths matters to Sachi.
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 1c)
This Japanese construction, often called an “adversity passive”, patterns with
German and English in terms of at-issue and not-at-issue meaning. The affect-
ed experiencer is syntactically accessible and can be questioned (compare (141)
to (56)).
141. Dare-ga Masa-ni Aiko-no kabin-o kowas-are-ta no?
who-Nom Masa-Dat Aiko-Gen vase-Acc break-Add-Past Q
'On whom did Masa break Aiko's vase?'
(Bosse et al. 2012, example 32c)
This shows the at-issue contribution of the affected experiencer. This can also
be seen from if-clauses. Compare (142a, b) and (57).
142. a. Moshi Hanako-ga Taroo-no odor-are-tara,
if Hanako-Nom Taro-Dat dance-Aff-Cond
sekai-ga owar-u.
world-Nom end-NonPast
'If Hanako is affected by Taro's dancing, the world ends.'
b. Moshi Taroo-ga odot-tara, sekai-ga
if Taro-Nom dance-Cond world-Nom
owar-u.
end-NonPast
'If Taro dances, the world ends.'
According to (142a), Hanako must be affected by Taro’s dancing for the
world to end. In contrast, the world ends according to (142b) as long as Taro
dances (regardless of Hanako being affected or not). Thus, the affected expe-
riencer makes a difference in the truth conditions of the conditional. This is
expected for at-issue meaning.
The not-at-issue contribution can be seen from negation (143) in which the
affectedness survives (just like in German and English (54)).
75
76
For the formal analysis, this means that the agent must be included in the source
event of the experiencing event.
C-command tests indicate that the subject is c-commanded by the affected
experiencer in Japanese. The affected experiencer c-commands the agent and
can bind it (147a). Binding from the agent into the affected experiencer argu-
ment is not possible (147b).
147. a. [Go-non-ijoo-no kodomo]1 -gaAff [sono1-ko-tachi-no
five-CL-more.than-Gen child Nom it-child-PL-Gen
hahaoya-ni odor-are-ta.
mother-Dat dance-Aff-Past
'More than five children1 has his/her1 mother dance on him/her1'
(Literally: His/her1 mother danced on more than five children1.)
b. *[Sono1-ko-tachi-no hahaoya]-gaAff
it-child-PL-Gen mother-Nom
[go-nin-ijoo-no kodomo]-ni odor-are-ta.
five-CL-more.than-Gen child-Dat dance-Aff-Past
'His/her1 mother had more than five children1 dance on her.'
(Intended: 'More than five children1 danced on his/her1 mother.')
Syntactically, this means that Aff must attach outside VoiceP in Japanese. As a
consequence, it will also automatically include the agent in the source event,
as shown in the following derivation.27
27 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 1, #4.
77
78
79
80
81
82
The two denotations for Aff differ solely in on which tier of meaning the ex-
periencing event and the experiencer are projected (as reflected in the position
of the colon).
In section 3.9.1, it was also shown that Aff could either attach between
VP and Voice (German/ English) or above Voice (Japanese). This could be seen
from different c-command relations between the external argument and the ap-
plicative argument. This parameter of attachment height is independent of the
type of meaning (at-issue or not-at-issue) contributed. However, in Hebrew
and French, it is not possible to check c-command relations between the ex-
ternal argument and the applicative argument because the applicative argument
may not be a full NP (156).28
156. a. i. hem kol ha-zma mitxatnim li
they all the-time marry to-me
‘They are getting married on me all the time (and it bothers
me).’
(Borer and Grodzinsky 1986, examples 9a)
ii. *hem mitxatnim lə-Rani kol ha-zman
they marry to-Rani all the-time
'They are getting married all the time on Rani.'
(Borer and Grodzinsky 1986, examples 10a)
b. i. Les gosses lui ont gribouillé sur tous
the kids her.Dat have scribbled on all
les murs
the walls
'The kids scribbled all over the walls on her.'
ii. *Les gosses ont gribouillé sur tous les
the kids have scribbled on all the
murs à Marie.
walls to Marie
'The kids scribbled all over the walls on Marie.'
(Authier and Reed 1992, example 3)
Consequently, it is impossible to obtain c-command data to decide the attach-
ment height of the Aff head in these languages. Yet, we can take native speaker
intuitions of what is part of the source event as an indicator for the attachment
height (cf. German / English (70) and Japanese (146)). In Hebrew, this test
yields that Aff must attach outside of VoiceP since the external argument can
be the source of the experiencing event (157).
28
There is also no prepositional variant in which a full NP could be acceptable
(cf. Authier and Reed 1992).
83
84
85
verbal event with the same agent but a different affected experiencer. These
predictions are borne out.31
160. Les gosses lui ont enore gribouillé tous les murs.
the kids her.Dat have again scribbled on the walls
'The kids have scribbled on the walls again on her.'
1. VoiceP: The kids had scribbled on the walls on her before and now
they did it again.
2. AffP: First, the neighbors had scribbled on the walls on her and now
the kids scribbled on the wall on her again.
3. VP: The walls were scribbled on when the family moved in, they
were renovated and now the kids scribbled on the walls again.
4. unavailable: First, the kids had scribbled on the walls on their father
and now the kids scribbled on the walls again, this time on her.
As expected, encore 'again' cannot be used to modify just the experiencing
event either.
161. Les invités lui ont mangé tout
the guests her.Dat have eaten all
ce qu'il y avait dans le frigo et les gosses
that there was in the fridge and the kids
lui ont encore gribouillé tous les murs.
her.Dat have again scribbled all the walls
'The guests ate everything on her and the kids scribbled all over the
walls on her again.'
This sentence cannot be used to indicate that she was affected twice, first by
the eating of everything and then by the scribbling on the wall. Rather, it is
only acceptable if the scribbling on the wall has happened before (affecting
her) and now it happened again.
The predictions of again-modification for Hebrew are the same as for Ja-
panese (149), repeated below. Again should be able to modify the VP, VoiceP,
and AffP.
162. Again-Modification Predictions
1. VP attachment: a reading where the VP event has taken place be-
fore, without an affected experiencer and not necessarily with the
same agent;
2. VoiceP attachment: a reading where the VoiceP event has taken
place before with the same VP event and the same agent, but without
an affected experiencer;
31 Thanks to Joelle Malou for these judgments!
86
3. AffP attachment: a reading where the whole AffP event has taken
place before with the same VP event, the same agent, and the same
affected experiencer.
The reading that should not be available is where the event happens again
with the same affected experiencer and a different agent. These predictions
are essentially borne out. However, Hebrew shuv 'again' does not allow the
the VP attachment (regardless of the presence of the affected experiencer).32
163. Rina shuv lavsha li simla megunderet.
Rina again put.on to.me dress fancy
'Rina put on a fancy dress on me again.'
1. VP attachment: * Yesterday Rachel put on a fancy dress, and no-
body cared. Today, Rina put on a fancy dress on me again.
2. VoiceP attachment: Yesterday Rina put on a fancy dress, but that didn’t
bother me. Today, Rina put on a fancy dress on me again.
3. AffP attachment: Yesterday Rina put on a fancy dress and it both-
ered me. Today, Rina put on a fancy dress on me again.
4. unavailable: Yesterday, Rachel put on a fancy dress on me. Today,
Rina put on a fancy dress on me.
While the VoiceP attachment reading of shuv 'again' is not easily available, it
is not ruled out and therefore provides weak support for the high attachment of
Aff in Hebrew.
In summary, the discussion of Hebrew and French affected experiencer ap-
plicative arguments has shown that in these languages the relevant applicative
behaves just like the equivalent in German, English and Japanese, except that all
of the meaning is projected on the not-at-issue tier of meaning.
32 Thanks to Idan Landau for these judgments.
87
The difference between German and English is that English requires a preposi-
tion as an overt Aff head. This causes a minor variation of the semantic type of
Aff.
So far, there is no affected experiencer applicative argument that contributes
only at-issue meaning. However, if that is a possible variation for affected expe-
riencers, it is expected to also have a variation in attachment height. The predic-
tions for such an affected experiencer applicative argument are very clear based
on this chapter: the affected experiencer should be syntactically accessible (as
all at-issue elements are) and should follow the prediction for again-
modification depending on the attachment height, as explained above.
3.10 Conclusion
In this chapter, I have discussed affected experiencer applicative arguments
which are characterized as denoting a sentient individual who is psychologically
affected by an event. I have shown how they can be distinguished from other
applicative arguments in English and German. In both languages, the affected
experiencer applicative argument contributes to both the at-issue tier and the
not-at-issue tier of meaning. This conclusion is reflected in the denotation of the
Aff head. It contributes meaning to both tiers. In German, this is a phonological-
ly null head; in English, it is realized as the preposition on (164).
164. a. [[Aff]] = λPvt. λx. λe. P(e) & e'(EXPER(e') & Exp(x)(e')): e"
(P(e") → Source(e'')(e'))
b. [[on]] = λx. λPvt. λe. P(e) & e'(EXPER(e') & Exp(x)(e')):
e"(P(e") → Source(e'')(e'))
In both languages, this head is attached between VP and Voice. Support for the
proposed analysis comes from again-modification and adverbials. These two
also support that the analysis includes two event variables. Cross-linguistic vari-
ations of Aff with respect to the meaning contribution and attachment height
were discussed in this chapter.
The German pertinence dative was shown to be the affected experiencer
construction with a conversational implicature. The latter contributes the posses-
sion interpretation of the pertinence dative. This interpretation is more easily
88
available with relational nouns, but can also be found with sortal nouns. Apart
from this conversational implicature, pertinence datives and affected experi-
encers are identical.
In the next chapter, I discuss those applicative arguments of German and
English that contribute only not-at-issue meaning.
4 Not-At-Issue Applicative Arguments
4.1 Introduction
As shown in section 3.9.2, Hebrew and French have applicative arguments that
contribute only not-at-issue meaning. In this chapter, I discuss such applicative
arguments with only not-at-issue for German and English. Both of these lan-
guages have subject co-referential applicative arguments (166) that contribute
only not-at-issue meaning. In addition, German has a so-called ethical dative
not-at-issue applicative (165). These constructions share their not-at-issue con-
tribution and their form: they are all weak pronouns. After investigating each of
these types of applicative arguments individually, I will briefly explore the rela-
tionship of being an applicative argument with only not-at-issue meaning and
being a weak pronoun in section 4.4. This also includes a discussion of their sta-
tus in the system of CIs presented by Potts (2005).
165. Komm mir pünktlich nach Hause!
come me.Dat on.time to home
'Come home on time and I want this to happen!'
166. a. I'm gonna eat me some apple pie.
b. Ich trinke mir jetzt einen Kaffee.
I drink me.Dat now a.Acc coffee
'I'm gonna drink me some coffee now.'
(Horn 2009, example 31a)
First, I discuss German ethical datives (165) in section 4.2. Gutzmann
(2007) argues that these contribute only not-at-issue meaning. While I agree
with this, I will provide a different analysis than Gutzmann by taking their re-
stricted occurrence into account. Second, I analyze subject co-referential appli-
cative arguments of English (166a) and German (166b) in section 4.3. Horn
(2009) proposes that these applicatives contribute not-at-issue meaning. I pro-
vide a formal analysis of them, which is missing from his account. My investi-
gation of not-at-issue applicative arguments is concluded in section 4.5.
4.2 Ethical Dative
In this section, I discuss a German applicative argument that contributes only
not-at-issue meaning, namely the ethical dative ("Dativus Ethicus") (167).
167. Du sollst mir dem Papa die Schuhe putzen.
you shall me.Dat the.Dat dad the.Acc shoes clean
'You shall clean the shoes for dad and I want this to happen.'
As the translation indicates, the dative-marked pronoun denotes that the referent
of the applicative argument has a special interest in the proposition to come true.
90
In other words, the individual referred to by the ethical dative wants the event to
take place but the individual is not otherwise involved in the actual event (see
Abraham (1973), Wegener (1989), Gutzmann (2007) and references cited there-
in).33
I describe the ethical dative including its occurrences and status as an ap-
plicative argument in section 4.2.1 before discussing the analysis of ethical da-
tives as not-at-issue elements provided by Gutzmann (2007) in section 4.2.2. In
that section, I also provide my analysis which builds on Gutzmann's and We-
gener's (1989) insights.
4.2.1 Description
In this section, I describe the characteristics of the ethical dative in detail. I limit
myself to the type that Wegener (1989) discusses as Aufforderungs-Ethicus
'order ethical dative' (167) because, as Wegener and Gutzmann (2007) state, it is
possible that the second type, the Ausrufe-Ethicus 'exclamation ethical dative'
(168), is just a variation of the former one.
168. Wie besoffen der dir war!
how drunk that.one.Nom you.Dat was
'That one was so extremely drunk (you know)!'
(Wegener 1989, example 22d, my translation)
Furthermore, the exclamation ethical dative is rarely used in contemporary
German and is not accepted by all speakers (Gutzmann 2007).
The ethical dative mir 'me' in (167) meets my definition of an applicative ar-
gument as given in (4): it is an optional element which is not selected by the lex-
ical verb or a preposition. The sentence is grammatical without it, as (169)
shows.
169. Du sollst dem Papa die Schuhe putzen.
you.Nom shall the.Dat dad the.Acc shoes clean
'You shall clean the shoes for dad.'
Also, (169) does not entail that there is another individual involved in the event.
Thus, the requirements for an applicative argument (4) are met.
The ethical dative is easily distinguishable from other applicative arguments
of German because of its form: it must be a first person singular pronoun in-
flected for dative case: mir 'me'. The following example shows that replacing the
pronoun of (169) with a full (dative) NP or other pronouns results in ungram-
maticality (cf. Wegener 1989, Gutzmann 2007).
33 English does not have an applicative argument with a similar meaning. Consequently,
"and I want this to happen" is used in the translation.
91
34 (171c) and (171d) are grammatical as e.g. benefactives.
92
35 Gutzmann (2007) (contrary to (Wegener 1989)) accepts the ethical dative in (depend-
ent) verb-final sentences. I agree with his judgment.
93
36 This sample sentence is acceptable on a benefactive interpretation "You shall be home
on time, not for me but for dad."
94
37 The sample sentence is grammatical on a benefactive reading "Only I want that my wife
comes home on time for me".
95
38 Since ethical datives can only occur in directive sentences, they cannot appear in what
would technically be an if-clause. Consequently, a semantic approximation to an if-
clause is used here.
96
Further support that the ethical dative contributes only not-at-issue meaning
comes from negated sentences. In the negated sentence (183), the meaning of
the special interest by the speaker survives.
183. Du sollst mir jetzt nicht einschlafen.
you.Nom shall me.Dat now Neg fall.asleep
'You shall not fall asleep now, and that is what I want.'
*'You shall fall asleep now, and that is not what I want.'
As expected for not-at-issue meaning, the meaning contributed by the ethical
dative cannot be negated by itself.
This projection of not-at-issue meaning is also expected in yes/no-questions.
However, they cannot be used as a test for ethical datives because the ethical
dative requires that the sentence be a directive sentence. Thus, it cannot occur in
yes/no-questions (171d) or in wh-questions (171c). Regardless, the results of
negation (182) and the semantic equivalent to an if-clause (181) indicate that the
ethical dative contributes not-at-issue meaning. This is also Gutzmann's (2007)
conclusion (see section 4.2.2).
4.2.2 Analysis
In this section, I briefly explain the analyses of the ethical dative by Wegener
(1989) and by Gutzmann (2007) before presenting my analysis which combines
the strong points of both of these analyses.
4.2.2.1 Previous Analyses
The analysis by Wegener (1989) focuses on the ethical dative as being limited to
certain sentence types and its invariant form. Because of this, she argues that the
ethical dative is a (modal) particle rather than a (typical) pronoun. She claims
that the primary function of the ethical dative is illocutive but that it does not
change the illocutionary force of the sentence it is added to.39 Rather, the ethical
dative is used to make the speaker's interest in the event explicit.
In contrast, Gutzmann (2007) focuses on the ethical dative being a pronoun.
He argues that the German ethical dative is a not-at-issue pronoun. He shows
that ethical datives have all the features of CIs that Potts discusses (20). First,
the ethical dative is detachable. By replacing the ethical dative, its meaning is
not preserved (184). (184b) cannot be interpreted as an ethical dative (but only
as a benefactive).
39 Also see Abraham (1973) who claims that the (exclamation) ethical dative indicates a
"dialogue situation" (p. 12).
97
98
Consequently, Gutzmann provides the denotation (187) for the ethical dative
(in Potts's (2005) system; DE stands for 'dativus ethicus'). The ethical dative is a
pronoun that carries the meaning of the speaker's interest in the proposition.
187. meDE→ λp. meDE (p) =def λp. want(speaker)(p): <ta,tc>
(Gutzmann 2007, example 31, my translation)
Gutzmann discusses how the not-at-issue contribution of the ethical dative pro-
noun can explain its syntactic behavior. The semantic type of this element dif-
fers from the type that Potts proposed for CIs. This allows Gutzmann to explain
why the ethical dative cannot head a relative clause or be modified (177, 178)
but Potts's CI elements can.
4.2.2.2 Analysis
The problem with the analyses by Wegener (1989) and Gutzmann (2005) is that
each neglects the main focus of the other. Wegener makes it seem like it is acci-
dental that the ethical dative has the form of a pronoun. Gutzmann requires
German to have an "ethical pronoun" ("meDE") in addition to regular pronouns.
The ethical pronoun can "accidentally" only occur in directive sentences. In my
analysis below, I combine the two approaches which allows me to explain why
neither the form of the ethical dative nor the sentences it occurs in are acci-
dental.
I rely on the approach to imperatives and subjunctives proposed by Han
(1998). In his analysis, subjunctives have an [IRREALIS] feature. This feature is
used to encode a modality of unrealized interpretation. Combined with the pro-
position p of a sentence (irrealis(p)), it denotes a set of possible worlds in which
p is satisfied. "The speaker is agnostic to whether the real world is included in
this set" (Han 1998, p. 151).
In Han's approach, imperatives have an additional [DIRECTIVE] feature. This
feature reflects the directive mood (i.e. that the addressee is ordered/ asked to do
something by the speaker). Since the addressee is asked to do something in the
future, the directive feature also carries a future orientation explaining why im-
peratives cannot be used for past events (cf. Portner 2007). In imperatives, the
[IRREALIS] feature and the [DIRECTIVE] feature co-occur (directive (irrealis (p)))
which leads to the interpretation that the speaker orders the addressee to bring
about the (at the moment) unrealized situation described by the proposition p.
In my analysis, the ethical dative is introduced by an applicative head AppED
which attaches between the two projections hosting the two features [IRREALIS]
and [DIRECTIVE]. In other words, I propose the following (partial) structure for
an ethical dative construction.
99
188.
3
AppEDP
DIRECTIVE
3
ethical dative AppED'
3
AppED 3
IRREALIS IP
Semantically, AppED takes a set of possible worlds in which the proposition is
realized as its argument and carries the not-at-issue meaning that the referent of
the ethical dative wants one world from this set to become the real world (189).
(In other words, the denotation can be thought of as a not-at-issue version of
WANT.40)
189. [[AppED]]= λP. λx. P : x wants one world from the set P to come true
The semantic denotation of (165), repeated below, with the assumed syntactic
structure of (188) is shown in (190).41
190. Komm mir pünktlich nach Hause!
come me.Dat on.time to home
'Come home on time and I want this to happen!'
[[AppEDP]] = w. e in w. COME(e) & Goal(home)(e) & On time(e) :
I want one world from the set (w. e in w. COME(e) &
Goal(home)(e) & On time(e)) to come true
AppEDP carries the at-issue meaning that there is a set of possible worlds that
have a ‘coming home on time’ event. This is identical to the meaning of the pro-
jection hosting [IRREALIS]. AppEDP also carries the not-at-issue meaning that the
speaker wants one of these possible worlds to become realized. Once the denota-
tion of AppEDP is combined with the directive force, the order that the speaker
wants the addressee to be home one time (and the not-at-issue meaning that the
speaker wants this) is derived for this sample sentence. Thus, [DIRECTIVE] acts
like a speech act operator. The ethical dative emphasizes the speaker's interest in
an as-yet unrealized situation being realized.
The form and reference of the ethical dative follow from the selectional re-
quirement that only the projection hosting [DIRECTIVE] can select AppED. Conse-
quently, the ethical dative has to denote the person who has an interest in the
proposition coming true as well as the person who has the authority to use di-
rective force. This is the speaker and, consequently, the ethical dative must be a
first person pronoun. Unlike in Gutzmann's approach (187), the reference to the
speaker is not directly encoded in the denotation of AppED in my analysis.
40 Thanks to Masahiro Yamada for pointing this out!
41 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 2, #1.
100
Given my analysis, it also follows that the ethical dative is a pronoun and
not a particle with an invariant form. Like Gutzmann argued, its invariant form
follows from its semantics. However, in my analysis it is a regular (weak) pro-
noun and not a special not-at-issue pronoun (as Gutzmann proposed (187)). Its
restriction to certain sentence types is due to the fact that it requires the [IRREAL-
IS] and the [DIRECTIVE] features which are not present in all sentences but AppED
can only select projections with [IRREALIS] (it requires a set of possible worlds)
and can only be selected by projections hosting [DIRECTIVE]. As a consequence,
ethical datives can only appear in sentences with directive force.42
The required presence of [DIRECTIVE] explains why the ethical dative is un-
acceptable in the past tense.
191. *Ich will/ wollte, dass du mir
I.Nom want/ wanted that you.Nom me.Dat
pünktlich nach Hause kamst.
on.time to home came
'I want/ wanted that you came home on me and I want that to happen.'
Yet, the ethical dative is compatible with future tense (192). This is expected
because neither the [DIRECTIVE] feature nor the [IRREALIS] feature rule out this
tense.
192. Du wirst mir zur Schule gehen!
you.Nom will me.Dat to.the school go
'You will go to school and I want that to happen!'
I assume that the presence of the [DIRECTIVE] feature is also responsible for
the second person subject of the imperatives and the declarative sentences with
directive force. Though the addressee must be physically present when the ethi-
cal dative is used felicitously (Wegener 1989), I refrain from encoding it syntac-
tically, as, for instance, Zanuttini (2008) did because it does not seem to be nec-
essary for the addressee to be syntactically encoded in an analysis of the ethical
dative.
4.2.3 Summary
The ethical dative is a (first person pronoun) pronoun. It is introduced by an ap-
plicative head, AppED, which contributes an identity function for the proposition
on the at-issue tier of meaning and a not-at-issue version of WANT. The re-
strictions on the form and occurrence of the ethical dative stem from the fact that
42 This approach loses the explanation for why the ethical dative cannot be modified by an
appositive (178) or head a relative clause (177). This might be related to its position
outside of IP.
101
the features [IRREALIS] and [DIRECTIVE] are required for the ethical dative to be
used grammatically.
4.3 Subject Co-Referential Applicative Arguments
Another type of not-at-issue applicative argument discussed in this chapter is the
subject co-referential applicative43 of English (193a)44 and of (dialects of) Ger-
man (193b).
193. a. John1 is gonna kill him1 a bear.
b. Ich trinke mir jetzt einen Kaffee.
I.Nom drink me.Dat now a.Acc coffee
'I'm gonna drink me some coffee now.'
(Horn 2009, example 31a, my translation)
The use of the subject co-referential pronoun in these sentences indicates a spe-
cial involvement of the subject in the event, e.g. in (193b) that I was going to
leisurely drink a cup of coffee.
The subject co-referential applicative argument has frequently been dis-
cussed for English (see Horn 2008; 2009, Webelhuth and Dannenberg 2006,
Christian 1991, Conroy 2007, among others) but, to my knowledge, Horn (2009)
is the only one who mentions it for German.
Below, I describe the subject co-referential applicative including its status as
an applicative argument and its contribution of only not-at-issue meaning (sec-
tions 4.3.1-4.3.5). I provide a semantic and syntactic analysis in section 4.3.6
and discuss its consequences (section 4.3.7) before presenting previous analyses
of this construction in section 4.3.8.
4.3.1 Description
The subject co-referential applicative argument meets my definition of an ap-
plicative argument (4). It is optional in the sentences in (193), as (194) shows.
194. a. John is gonna kill a bear.
b. Ich trinke jetzt einen Kaffee.
I drink now a.Acc coffee
'I'm gonna drink some coffee now.'
The special involvement of the individual denoted by the applicative argument
in (193) is not entailed by these sentences. The subject co-referential argument
43 The name is taken from Halevy (2007) who discusses a similar type for (biblical) He-
brew.
44 This construction seems to be prevalent in informal registers (Horn 2008) as well as in
Southern and Appalachian American English (Horn 2008, Webelhuth and Dannenberg
2006).
102
4.3.2 Features
As the name indicates, the subject co-referential applicative argument must be
co-referential with the subject. If this is not the case, the subject co-referential
applicative is not possible (195).
195. a. i. Mary1 would love her1 some flowers.
ii. *Mary1 would love her2 some flowers.
iii. *Mary1 would love Sue2 some flowers.
(Webelhuth and Dannenberg 2006, example 31a, b, d)
b. i. Ich trinke mir einen Kaffee.
I.Nom drink me.Dat a.Acc coffee
'I'm gonna drink me some coffee.'
ii. *Ich trinke Dennis einen Kaffee.
I.Nom drink Dennis.Dat a.Acc coffee
'I'm gonna drink some coffee for Dennis's pleasure.'
103
45 Often, these are difficult to judge because of their ambiguity with other applicative ar-
guments, esp. benefactives.
104
4.3.3 Form
The subject co-referential applicative must be a weak pronoun for its meaning to
surface (Webelhuth and Dannenberg 2006, Horn 2009). Other elements, espe-
cially the reflexive pronoun in English, may be grammatical in its verb-adjacent
position but do not carry the meaning of highlighting the subject's involvement
in the event. This can be seen from the following examples.
200. a. I'm gonna buy me some flowers. (subject co-referential)
b. I'm gonna buy myself some flowers. (recipient benefactive)
Whereas the subject co-referential applicative in (200a) indicates that the subject
buys flowers for his/her pleasure (but not necessarily to keep them), the recipi-
105
ent benefactive (indicated by the reflexive) indicates that the subject bought the
flowers with the intention of passing them on to the individual denoted by the
applicative argument, here him-/herself. In other words, the difference between
(200a) and (200b) is that in (200a) the subject is intensely involved in the act of
buying flowers, and in (200b) the subject bought the flowers with the intention
of keeping them. Although the subject co-referential and the recipient benefac-
tive can occur in the same position, the subject co-referential one must be a
weak pronoun46 co-referring with the subject while the recipient benefactive
cannot be a weak pronoun co-referring with the subject (but it might be a reflex-
ive (200b)). In other words, subject co-referential applicatives seem to be blatant
violations of binding principle B (Webelhuth and Dannenberg 2006, Conroy
2007, Haddad 2011).
Furthermore, the subject co-referential applicative argument and the reflex-
ive cannot always occur in the same position (201) (Conroy 2007, Horn 2009).
201. a. He needs {*himself/ him} just a little more sense.
(Horn 2009, example 20b)
b. *I hurt me.
I hurt myself.
(Conroy 2007, example 2)
c. I'm gonna write me a letter to the president.
*I'm gonna write myself a letter to the president.
(Conroy 2007, example 12)
Consequently, the subject co-referential applicative argument cannot be seen as
an alternative to the reflexive (Conroy 2007).
Conroy (2007) argues that the English subject co-referential applicative is a
SE-anaphor. She shows that under ellipsis only a sloppy interpretation is availa-
ble (202) (see also Horn (2009)).
202. I got me a shotgun and so did Billy Bob.
sloppy identity reading only: we both got one
(Horn 2009, Example 26a)
This is only expected if the subject co-referential applicative is a bound variable.
Furthermore, like other SE-anaphors, the subject co-referential applicative ar-
gument requires a de re-interpretation: the identity of its referent and the referent
of the antecedent must be exactly the same; imagine an architect seeing a statue
of himself in an empty square. He decides to build an opera house behind it. In
that case, uttering I'm building me an opera house is not felicitous with me refer-
ring to the statue because he is going to build it behind the statue and not his
own body. Only I'm building myself an opera house is felicitous in this case.
46 See also section 4.4.
106
Thus, I agree with Conroy's proposal that English subject co-referential applica-
tives are SE-anaphors and not (Principle B-violating) pronouns.
Further support for this contention comes from German in which the SE-
anaphor is used as the subject co-referential applicative. This can clearly be seen
in the third person (196b-iii, b-vi) where sich must be used. Just like in English
(201a), the self-anaphor (203) and the pronoun (196b-iii, b-vi) cannot be used as
a subject co-referential applicative argument in German.
203. a. *Ich trank mir selber/ selbst einen Kaffee.
I drank me.Dat self/ self a.Acc coffee
'I drank me a coffee.'
b. *Er trank sich selber/ selbst einen Kaffee.
he drank self.Dat self self a.Acc coffee
'He drank him a coffee.'
In summary, the subject co-referential applicative is a SE-anaphor. Like all
SE-anaphors, it co-refers with the subject (Heim and Kratzer 1998). The subject
co-referential applicative is used to indicate a special (positive) involvement of
the referent in the event. The subject co-referential applicative argument is not
an alternative for the reflexive pronoun.
107
47 German sentential negation nicht is not possible in this case due to the strong preference
for indefinite direct objects. Even with biclausal negation, the special involvement can
only be negated if that is explicitly stated. Otherwise the whole event is negated:
i. Es stimmt nicht, dass ich mir noch einen Kaffee getrunken hab.
it be.true Neg that I me.Dat still a.Acc coffee drunk have
'It is not true that I drank me some coffee.'
108
a positive experience projects past the question and is on the not-at-issue tier of
meaning.
This can also be seen in if-clauses in which the subject co-referential pro-
noun does not make any difference for the truth conditions.
208. a. i. If John1 kills him1 a bear, I'll buy him some beer.
ii. If John kills a bear, I'll buy him some beer.
b. i. Wenn du dir (hier) einen Kaffee
if you.Nom you.Dat here a.Acc coffee
trinkst, dann bring ich dir ein Stück Kuchen.
drink then bring I you a slice cake
'If you drink you some coffee (here), I'll bring you a slice of cake.'
ii. Wenn du (hier) einen Kaffee trinkst,
if you here a.Acc coffee drink
dann bring ich dir ein Stück Kuchen.
then bring I you a slice cake
'If you drink a coffee (here), I'll bring you a slice of cake.'
Both sentences in (208a) require John to kill a bear for me to buy him beer. The
subject co-referential pronoun in (208a-i) does not add another condition to this.
The same is true for (208b). The addition of the subject co-referential applica-
tive argument does not alter the conditions of the if-clause. This is the expected
behavior for elements that contribute only not-at-issue meaning.
In summary, all of the tests discussed in Chapter 2 show that the meaning
contribution of the subject co-referential applicative argument is to the not-at-
issue tier of meaning. This is also the conclusion drawn by Horn (2008; 2009)
who argues that they are conversational implicatures (defined slightly differently
from Potts (2005)).
4.3.6 Analysis
I provide my formal semantic analysis of the subject co-referential applicative in
this section. Previous approaches to these applicatives are discussed in section
4.3.8. I propose that the subject co-referential applicative argument is introduced
by an applicative head, AppSCR, that attaches between Voice and VP. Semanti-
cally, the AppSCR head passes up the verbal event (as at-issue content) and com-
bines it with Voice later on. Voice serves as the third semantic argument of
AppSCR. The applicative head also introduces on the not-at-issue tier that the
event was intense/ extraordinary48 for a participant of the event. This denotation
of AppSCR is given in (209b). Since the subject co-referential applicative is an
SE-anaphor, it is generated as a variable with an index (a1) (Heim and Kratzer
48 This is identical to "remarkable" in Bosse (2013b).
109
1998). The variable shares the index of the subject. In order for the subject to
bind the variable, it needs to move to a higher projection than the index binder.
Thus, the derivation of (193), repeated below, proceeds as follows:49
209. a. John1 killed him1 a bear.
b. [[AppSCR]] = λPv,t. λx. λQe,vt. λy. λe. P(e) & Q(e)(y): Intense(e)(x) &
x =y
Intense(e)(x) → The event e is intense for the individual x iff x is ex-
traordinarily involved in e.
c. VoiceP
3
John1 Voice2'
3
1 Voice1'
3
t1 Voice'
3
Voice AppSCRP
3
a1 AppSCR'
3
AppSCR VP
6
kill a bear
d. [[VoiceP]] = λe. KILL(e) & Thm(e)(a bear) & Agt(e)(John) : In-
tense(e)(John) & John = John
Thus, VoiceP denotes a killing event of a bear of which John is the agent. It also
carries the not-at-issue meaning that John is extraordinarily involved in this
event.
4.3.7 Consequences
Due to the requirement "x=y" included in the denotation (209b), it is ensured
that the individual in the specifier of VoiceP will be the one being extraordinari-
ly involved in the event. This reflects the co-reference requirement between the
subject and the subject co-referential applicative argument. It also explains why
the subject co-referential applicative is grammatical with unergative verbs (210)
(contrary to Christian (1991) who claims that they can only occur with transitive
49 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 2, #2.
110
verbs).50 The subject of the unergative verb can bind the anaphor (and share its
index).
210. I'm gonna sit me down.
My analysis can also explain some of the semantic verbal restrictions ob-
served with the subject co-referential applicative argument. In English, there are
preferences for the subject co-referential applicative arguments to appear with
certain verbs over others. Horn (2009) characterizes these preferred verbs as
"down-home verbs", e.g. buy, build, shoot, get. He argues that other (transitive)
verbs may produce a register clash. In addition, the subject co-referential applic-
ative is more readily accepted with intentional actions (211) and verbs indicating
(future) possession (Horn 2008).
211. a. She caught her a catfish.
b. #She caught her a cold/ case of the clap.
(Horn 2008, example 26)
According to Horn, sentences like (211b) are marked because they do not in-
volve an intentional agent. Alternatively, they might be ruled out for pragmatic
reasons as it is difficult to see how the special (positive) involvement in these
events is justified.
In order to limit the subject co-referential applicative to certain verbs of
English and verbs of consumption/ creation in German, I assume a selectional
restriction between AppSCR and VP. Since AppSCR attaches outside of VP, it can
enforce its selectional restrictions.
There are several unresolved issues with this analysis. One problem is that
this analysis does not explain the ungrammaticality of passives (see also We-
belhuth and Dannenberg (2006), Christian (1991)).51
212. a. *A bear1 was killed it1 (by John).
b. *A bear was killed him1 by John1.
c. *Ein Kaffee wurde ihm1 von Jan1
a coffee was him.Dat by Jan
getrunken.
drunk
'Some coffee was drunk him by Jan.'
For my analysis, it is unclear what prevents the underlying object from moving
into the subject position to bind the anaphor (212a). This is a more general prob-
50 This point is not relevant for German because it only allows verbs of consumption and
creation with the subject co-referential applicative (198).
51 Sentences in which the anaphor is promoted to the subject are correctly ruled out by the
analysis because the SE-anaphor must be bound by the subject. It cannot be used as a
subject (and bind itself) (see Isacenko (1965) for German passives of constituents co-
referring with the subject (of the corresponding active sentence)).
111
lem, namely that a derived subject cannot bind the subject co-referential applica-
tive, as unaccusative verbs do not license the subject co-referential applicative.52
213. *The captain1 sank him1 down under the sea.
This problem is similar to the chain condition discussed by Rizzi (1986) which
bans reflexive clitics with derived subjects in Italian.
214. *NP1 … [si1 … e1 …]
However, this observation still does not explain the ungrammaticality of (212b).
This problem of derived subjects not being able to bind the subject co-referential
applicative is left for future research.
Another open question for my analysis of the subject co-referential applica-
tive is that it predicts the following two readings with again (cf. section 3.5.2):
215. VP: the event happens again but for the first time with special involve-
ment
VoiceP: the event happens again with special involvement of the same
individual
The first predicted reading is not available.
216. a. Yesterday, there was a window open in here. Today, they're all
closed. I'm hot, so #I'm going to open me a window again.
b. Yesterday, there was a window open in here. Today, they're all
closed. I'm hot, so I'm going to open a window again.
This could indicate an attachment of AppSCR lower than VP. This problem re-
quires further research because a lower attachment requires a different mecha-
nism to establish the co-reference between the applicative and the external ar-
gument (see the next section).
112
ject to binding condition B (and thus does not surface as a reflexive pronoun).
Haddad assumes that the subject co-referential applicative is a head (and not a
phrase). Therefore, he treats it as a clitic (rather than a SE-anaphor). This clitic
is merged outside of vP (which is the projection of the subject, just as my
VoiceP). This is schematized in (0).
217. John sold him a dozen toothbrushes.
IP
3
John I'
3
I ApplP
3
him vP
3 3
sold 'em John v'
6
sold a dozen toothbrushes
The structure in (0) includes two movement steps: (a) the verb head-moves to
the applicative clitic which cliticizes onto the verb, and (b) the subject moves
from vP to a higher position (in IP).
This analysis explains that the subject co-referential applicative surfaces as a
weak pronoun by having it attach to the head-moved verb. Furthermore, this ex-
plains why the applicative must occur in a verb-adjacent position (in English).
However, there is one major flaw with this analysis, namely the fact that the ap-
plicative is required to be a head. As Haddad himself points out, this is highly
questionable because the subject co-referential applicative argument can be
camouflaged with the colloquial phrase X's ass (218), see also Horn (2008).
218. I want my ass some quesadillas.
(Horn 2008, example 23b)
In this example, the phrase my ass functions as the subject co-referential pro-
noun and camouflages the pronoun me. Collins et al. (2008) argue that the ca-
mouflage X's ass should be analyzed as a phrase (rather than a head). Thus, by
assuming that the subject co-referential applicative is a head, Haddad cannot
account for camouflage constructions such as (218) whereas they can be ex-
plained by my analysis (209) which has a phrasal position available for the ap-
plicative argument as well as its camouflage.
There are a few other issues with this approach. First, Haddad did not spell
out a formal semantic derivation for his analysis. It is unclear how it proceeds
with the applicative being a head only. This is even more crucial as his analysis
predicts that both vP and VP should be of type <v,t> and therefore be available
113
54 Hutchinson and Armstrong (2013) exclude sentences in which the subject co-referential
argument occurs with intransitive verbs from their analysis. These occurrences are at-
tributed to a "complex structure" (footnote 5).
114
220. VoiceP
3
DP Voice'
John 3
Voice VP
3
V ApplP
bake 3
DP Appl'
him 3
ApplSAT DP
a cake
(Hutchinson and Armstrong 2013, example 38)
[[VoiceP]] = λe. Agent(e, John) & BAKE(e) & Theme(e, a cake):
(e')[Satisfaction(e') & Experiencer(e', him) & (e'')[BAKE(e'') &
Theme(e'', a cake) Source(e'',e')]]
(Hutchinson and Armstrong 2013, example 39)
This analysis has one advantage over my analysis (209), namely that it can
account for the again-modification facts (see the discussion of example (216)).
However, this analysis also has problems. First, Hutchinson and Armstrong ex-
plicitly state that this low applicative is syntactically identical to the English
double object construction. However, the two constructions do not behave alike
syntactically in all respects. For instance, the double object construction can be
passivized while the subject co-referential applicative may not be passivized
(221).
221. a. Mark was given a cake (by John).
b. *He1 was shot a bear (by John1).
Hutchinson and Armstrong cannot explain this difference between the double
object construction and the applicative argument. The analysis might be sal-
vaged by arguing for different phase boundaries in the two constructions resul-
ting in different movement possibilities. However, that would lose the proposed
syntactic similarity between the two.
Another problem with Hutchinson and Armstrong's analysis is the proposed
semantic denotation of the phonologically null head. This head takes the direct
object and the applicative argument as its first two semantic arguments. It relates
these two via an event and not directly, as would be expected for a low applica-
tive. The semantic denotation of the head is, in fact, that of a high applicative
denotation because it relates an individual to an event. In this, the analysis by
Hutchinson and Armstrong is similar to my analysis. In addition, the proposed
semantic denotation of ApplSAT is bi-eventive as both the verbal event and "Sat-
115
4.3.9 Summary
I have shown that the subject co-referential applicative argument is a SE-
anaphor which contributes only not-at-issue meaning. The SE-anaphor can be
observed directly in German. Further support for this comes from the sloppy in-
terpretation under ellipsis. I argue that the anaphor is introduced by an App
head, AppSCR, which attaches outside VP and introduces the applicative argu-
ment, the SE-anaphor. Some syntactic behavior of the subject co-referential ap-
plicative follows from the fact that it is a SE-anaphor on the not-at-issue tier of
meaning. However, not all syntactic behaviors of the subject co-referential con-
struction could be explained. Certain preferences for the occurrence of the sub-
ject co-referential applicative seem to be related to its pragmatic licensing condi-
tions (register, possession/consumption contexts) rather than to the syntactic
structure.
4.4 Not-At-Issue Applicatives
The types of not-at-issue applicative arguments discussed in this chapter (Ger-
man ethical datives, subject co-referential pronouns in English and German)
share a property that goes beyond their contribution of not-at-issue meaning,
namely their form: all of them are weak/clitic pronouns. Even more, the not-at-
issue affected experiencers of Hebrew and French (section 3.9.2) also share this
characteristic.55
All these not-at-issue applicatives display features that Cardinaletti and
Starke (1999) have identified for weak pronouns: first, weak pronouns cannot be
stressed. This is also true for all the discussed not-at-issue applicatives discussed
here (Borer and Grodzinsky 1986, Wegener 1989, Christian 1991, Gutzmann
2007).
222. a. *li, hem mitxatnim kol ha-zman
to.me they marry all the-time
'They marry all the time on me.'
(Borer and Grodzinsky 1986, examples 10b)
55 Thanks to Benjamin Bruening for pointing this out!
116
117
French and Hebrew) could not be new to the discourse. Thus, this approach can-
not straightforwardly explain the relation between form and function either.
However, the three types of not-at-issue applicative arguments are not uni-
fied in one dimension, namely in their status in the system proposed by Potts
(2005). Gutzmann (2007) shows that ethical datives meet all the requirements of
Conventional Implicatures (as presented by Potts (2005)). The other two not-at-
issue applicatives are merely multi-dimensional, meaning that they are not
speaker-oriented but meet other requirements that Potts (2005) identified for CIs
(20). Both can be embedded without projecting to the highest level.
226. a. Juliette pense de facon erronée que les
Juliette believes wrongfully that the
enfants leurs ont gribouills tous les murs.
children them.Dat have scribbled all the walls
‘Juliette wrongfully believes that the children scribbled all over the
walls on them.’
b. Jan glaubt fälschlicherweise, dass du dir
Jan believes wrongfully that you you.Dat
noch einen Kaffee getrunken hast.
still a coffee drunk have.
‘Jan wrongfully believes that you drunk you another cup of coffee.’
In neither of these examples is the contribution by the not-at-issue applicative
attributed to the speaker. Roberts et al. (2009) do not address a similar category
of not-at-issue meaning. The discussion here can be taken as an indication that
one is needed.
This shows that the relation between being a not-at-issue applicative and be-
ing a weak pronoun is not straightforward. Some applicative have a referent sa-
lient in the discourse, others do not. Some are speaker-oriented, others are not.
While the discourse saliency of subject co-referential applicatives and the ethical
dative might explain their form, the not-at-issue affected experiencers remain
puzzling. From the data analyzed here, however, it seems to be a strong cross-
linguistic generalization that applicative arguments that contribute only not-at-
issue meaning take the form of a weak pronoun. Yet, further research is required
to see if this correlation really holds.
4.5 Conclusion
In this chapter, I have provided analyses of two types of applicative arguments.
They contribute only not-at-issue meaning and are similar in form and behavior
but differ in their meaning. The German ethical dative is an applicative that is
the not-at-issue variant of WANT. In combination with the features [IRREALIS]
and [DIRECTIVE], its restricted occurrence can be explained. The subject co-
118
5 Benefactives
5.1 Introduction
In this chapter, I discuss the semantic and syntactic structure of benefactive ap-
plicative constructions in German and English as exemplified in (227).
227. a. John baked him a cake.
b. Jan buk ihm einen Kuchen.
Jan.Nom baked him.Dat a.Acc cake
'Jan baked a cake for him.'
As the name "benefactive" indicates, these applicative arguments denote who
benefits from the described event. As Kittilä and Zuniga (2010) put it: "The
beneficiary is a participant that is advantageously affected by an event without
being its obligatory participant (either agent or primary target, i.e. patient)" (p.
2). This describes the meaning of the benefactive applicatives well.
In section 5.2, I distinguish benefactives from other applicatives, discuss dif-
ferent types of benefactives and show which benefactives are applicative argu-
ments according to my definition (4). It is shown that in English, only those
benefactives that receive a recipient or intended possessor interpretation are ap-
plicative arguments. In German, benefactive applicatives can receive either a
plain, deputative, or possessor interpretation. In section 5.3, I show that benefac-
tive applicative arguments contribute only at-issue meaning. Following that, I
provide the analyses for the observed types of benefactive applicative argu-
ments. The analysis for German true benefactives is based on Pylkkänen (2002)
(section 5.4) and that of English recipient benefactives on Bruening (2010) (sec-
tion 5.5). In section 5.6, I address the prepositional paraphrase of the benefactive
applicative arguments before concluding this chapter in section 5.7.
5.2 Description
Before describing benefactives in detail, I need to distinguish them from other
applicatives. As I show in detail in section 5.3, benefactives contribute only at-
issue meaning. In this, German benefactives differ from affected experiencers
(Chapter 3), subject co-referential applicatives and ethical datives (Chapter 4).
Also, unlike affected experiencers, benefactives do not require the referent to be
sentient (228) (cf. Bosse and Bruening (2011)).56
228. a. The old lady baked her dead dog some cookies.
56 Yet, the beneficiary is often sentient.
120
57 Smith (2010) discusses a different possibility of categorizing benefactives, namely
whether the benefit stems from the agent's action or from the event in general. I leave it
to future research to investigate if this calls for a further (or different) distinction of
benefactive applicatives in German and English.
121
5.2.1 English
In English, the three types of benefactives are maximally distinct. First, the
recipient benefactive can be distinguished from the other two types based on its
form. The recipient benefactive (230b) can be surface-identical to the ditransi-
tive structure (230a). In contrast, plain and deputative benefactives require the
preposition for (230c, 230d).
230. a. S/he gave me the book. ditransitive
b. S/he baked me a cake. recipient benefactive
c. *S/he went me to the market. plain/deputative
d. S/he went to the market for me. plain/deputative
(Kittilä 2005, example 5b, d-f)
The recipient benefactive can also alternatively be expressed as a for-PP (and
therefore look identical to plain and deputative benefactives).
231. S/he baked a cake for me. recipient benefactive (PP)
(Kittilä 2005, example 5c)
As Kittilä (2005) points out, the preposition for is how recipient benefactives
can be distinguished from ditransitives (230a) which take the preposition to in
their prepositional variant (232a).
232. a. S/he gave the book to me. ditransitive
(Kittilä 2005, example 5a)
b. *S/he gave the book for me. ditransitive
In general, the plain and the deputative benefactives are surface-identical in
English. However, the deputative reading can be distinguished from the plain
benefactive by fronting the for-PP. The deputative reading does not survive in
this case (233).
233. For me, she went to the market. plain, *deputative
It is unclear what causes this, and it seems to point to the necessity of distin-
guishing the plain and the deputative benefactive in English (see also Van Valin
and LaPolla (1997)). However, I will ignore this difference between deputative
and plain benefactives from here on because it has no obvious connection to ap-
plicative arguments.
In English, only the recipient benefactive meets my definition of applicative
arguments (4), repeated below, because it does not require a preposition (230c).
234. Applicative Argument
An NP Y of a simple, non-negated declarative sentence that is not gov-
erned by a preposition is an applicative argument iff the sentence with-
out Y does not entail that there is at least one individual that is involved
in the asserted event and could be referred to by Y.
122
The omission test shows that the recipient benefactives of English arguments do
not have to be realized for the sentences to be grammatical (235).
235. John baked a cake.
This sentence does not entail the involvement of another individual. Conse-
quently, the pronoun in (227a) is an applicative argument according to my defi-
nition. This is not the case for English plain and deputative benefactives which
require the presence of for (230c). Thus, they are not applicatives according to
my definition.58 However, the definition for applicative arguments given in
Chapter 1 is only a working definition. It was shown in Chapter 3 that English
affected experiencer applicatives require the presence of the preposition on. Re-
gardless, they were analyzed in analogy to German affected experiencer applica-
tive arguments. Similarly, I provide a brief discussion of the benefactive for-PPs
(and the German equivalent) in section 5.6 because these PPs resemble benefac-
tive applicative arguments.
5.2.2 German
In German, all three types of benefactives (plain, deputative, recipient) can be
expressed as dative-marked constituents (Colleman 2010).
236. a. Jan brachte mir einen Kuchen. recipient
Jan.Nom brought me.Dat a.Acc cake
'Jan brought me a cake.'
b. Jan malte mir ein Bild. plain
Jan.Nom painted me.Dat a.Acc picture
'Jan painted a picture for me.'
c. Jan schnitt mir die Hecke. deputative
Jan. Nom cut me.Dat the hedge
'Jan cut the hedge for me.'
Many sentences are consequently ambiguous between the three types and are
disambiguated by the context (cf. Kittilä (2005), Kittilä and Zuniga (2010)). For
instance, (236b) can alternatively be used as a recipient benefactive (if I re-
ceived the picture) or as a deputative benefactive (if I was supposed to paint a
picture).
58 Colleman (2010) discusses that some dialects of English allow benefactives without
"for", citing examples like:
i. Sam promised to move/crush his lover a mountain.
(Colleman 2010, example 10b, citing Green (1974))
ii. All you have to do to gain my confidence is rob me a couple of banks.
(Colleman 2010, example 10bc, citing Oehrle (1976))
I will not discuss these separately but assume that they can be analyzed like the (equiva-
lent) German benefactives.
123
59 Some further examples are sagen 'say', erzählen 'tell', and schicken 'send'.
60 See Schmidtke-Bode (2009) for the details on the relation of benefactives and purpose.
He claims that "benefactive NP-arguments can substitute for an entire purpose clause"
(p. 1).
61 Alternatively, this can be viewed as an instance of the probable/expected participation
of the beneficiary (Kittilä and Zuniga 2010). With these verbs, it is expected that the da-
tive marks a recipient and no other (benefactive) function.
124
125
5.4.1 Analysis
As discussed in Chapter 2, Pylkkänen (2002) proposes an analysis of high ap-
plicatives with an applicative head that attaches between VP and Voice and adds
the argument as a participant to the event. I use a Benefactive (Ben) head (in-
stead of Pylkkänen's general Applicative head). It assigns the thematic role of
Beneficiary. This is taken to cover the plain, deputative and recipient interpreta-
126
tion by marking a vague notion of benefit. Thus, the derivation for (244a) pro-
ceeds as follows.63
244. a. Jan öffnete der Frau die Tür.
Jan opened the woman the door
'Jan opened the door for the woman.'
b. VoiceP<v,t>
3
Jan Voice'<e,vt>
3
Voice<e,vt> BenP<v,t>
3
NP Ben'<e,vt>
der Frau 3
Ben<e,vt> VP<v,t>
3
öffnete NP
die Tür
c. [[VoiceP]] = λe. OPEN(e) & Thm(e)(the door) & Ben(e)(the woman)
& Agt(e)(Jan)
VoiceP denotes a set of opening events with the agent Jan, the theme the door
and the benefaciary the woman. This analysis involves only at-issue content to
capture that nothing projects past negation and yes/no-questions, and that every
element counts for the truth conditions of conditional sentences (section 5.3).
The precise interpretation of "beneficiary" is then provided by the context. For
this sentence, the plain benefactive interpretation is most salient without context;
the deputative one can be made available, while the recipient one is blocked by
world knowledge (opening a door does not lead to a change of possession of the
door).
5.4.2 Consequences
True benefactive applicative arguments do not interfere with other syntactic pro-
cesses, but rather participate in them as expected. For instance, true benefactives
can occur in passivized sentences.
245. Die Tür wurde der Frau (von Jan)
the.Nom door became the.Dat woman by Jan.Dat
geöffnet.
opened
'The door was opened for the woman (by Jan).'
63 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 3, #1.
127
This behavior is expected given the analysis. The main differences between the
active and the passive is at the level of the Voice projection (and the resulting
projection of the agent). This is not expected to interfere with the projection of
the benefactive applicative below Voice.
It is also possible to passivize the benefactive sentence so that the benefi-
ciary is the subject. In this case, the verb bekommen (or colloquially kriegen)
'get, receive' is required instead of werden 'become'.
246. Die Frau bekam/kriegte (von Jan) die
the.Nom woman got by Jan the.Acc
Tür geöffnet.
door opened
'The woman was opened the door by Jan.'
This possibility is remarkable in two ways. First, this distinguishes the be-
nefactive applicative from other applicatives. Affected experiencer applicative
arguments cannot be passivized in this way (247).
247. Chris bekam/kriegte Bens Vase von Alex
Chris got Ben.Gen vase by Alex
zerbrochen.
broken
*'Chris1 was broken Ben's vase on him1 by Alex.'
'Chris1 got Ben's vase broken by Alex for him1.'
The same is true for the Dative of Inaction (248, cf. Chapter 7).
248. Die Oma bekam die Vase zerbrochen.
the.Nom grandma got the.Acc vase broken
*'The vase was broken on grandma's watch.'
'The vase was broken for grandma.'
Neither the subject co-referential applicative argument (249, Chapter 4) nor the
ethical dative (205, Chapter 4) can be passivized.64
249. *Du bekamst einen Kaffee getrunken.
you.Nom got a.Acc coffee drank
'You were drunk you a cup of coffee.'
250. *Ich bekomme von dir pünktlich zur Schule
I.Nom get by you on.time to.the.Acc school
gegangen.
gone
'I was gone to school on time by you.'
The part-whole applicative (Chapter 6) can only marginally be passivized (251).
64 There is a general constraint on the passivization of subject co-referential constituents
that rule these out (Isacenko 1965, Bierwisch 1966).
128
129
c. repeated VP: the same event with different beneficiary and agent has
happened before
This prediction is borne out.
255. Jan öffnete der Frau die Tür wieder.
Jan.Nom opened the.Dat woman the door again
'Jan opened the door for the woman again.'
(255) can have all of the expected interpretations (although the repeated VoiceP
is preferred and more salient with wieder 'again' in the sentence-initial position).
Also, as expected, the sentence cannot mean that the woman had benefitted from
a different event before and now benefitted from the opening of the door.
Thus, this analysis of true benefactives as high applicatives finds support in
the again-modification and passivization facts.
130
131
132
possessor but a purpose to be bound by the applicative. He explains this with the
following example.
261. Popeye hat Olive Oylx einen Steinx sauber gewischt.
Popeye has Olive Oyl.Dat a.Acc stone clean wiped
'Popeye wiped off a stone for Olive Oyl.'
(Hole 2005, example 43b)
Since it is not immediately obvious from this example what the benefit or pur-
pose of wiping off a stone is, the listener is forced to accommodate the scenario
by inventing a purpose; for instance, Popeye wiped the stone clean so Olive Oyl
could sit down. The applicative argument Olive Oyl then binds a variable in the
constituent einen Stein which represents the purpose. Hole further supports this
view of benefactive applicatives binding a purpose with the following example
which includes an overt purpose phrase.
262. Olive Oyl komponiert ihrem Babyx ein
Olive Oyl composes her.Dat baby a.Acc
Lied zum Vorsingenx bei Omas Geburtstag.
song to.the perform at granny's birthday.Dat
'Olive Oyl is composing a song for her baby to perfom at granny's
birthday.'
(Hole 2005, example 44)
The salient reading of this sentence is that the baby is supposed to perform the
song at the birthday party, regardless of the world knowledge that babies cannot
sing. Alternatively, the sentence can be interpreted as the song to be performed
by someone else and be, for instance, dedicated to the baby. From this, Hole
concludes that benefactive applicatives always bind a variable of a purpose
phrase because on either interpretation the applicative ihrem Baby binds a varia-
ble, either the overt purpose "perform" (262) or an unpronounced, accommoda-
ted purpose of the song (261).
I agree with Hole that the benefit in (261) is not immediately obvious (with-
out context). However, I attribute that to the general notion of benefit that is in-
cluded in the Ben head. The benefit can be anything, including the deputative
interpretation that Olive Oyl was supposed to do it but Popeye did it for her. I
contend that there is no purpose to be bound (but without context the exact na-
ture of the benefit cannot be determined).
In contrast to Hole, I argue that the salient reading of (262) (in which the
baby is supposed to perform) does not include an applicative argument. It does
not meet my definition of an applicative argument (4), which is based on Hole
(2008). The dative constituent in (262) is not governed by a preposition, and the
sentence is grammatical without the dative constituent (263).
133
134
i. J.R. mixte Sue-Ellen einen Drink zu seiner (eigenen)
J.R fixed Sue-Ellen.Dat a.Acc drink for his own
Entspannung, und seiner Mutter auch.
relaxation and his.Dat mother too
'J.R. fixed Sue-Ellen a drink so that he could relax, and J.R. fixed his mother a drink
so that he could relax.'
71 The same pattern holds for a similar sentence in English:
i. J.R. fixed a drink for Sue Ellen so that she could relax, and he did for his mother, too.
This sentence only has the sloppy interpretation; it cannot mean that he fixed the drink
for his mother so that Sue Ellen can relax. If Hole's analysis can be extended to English,
he must assume that Sue Ellen binds into the purpose clause.
135
5.4.5 Summary
I have shown that true benefactive applicative arguments contribute only at-
issue meaning. They are introduced by a Ben(efactive) head which attaches be-
tween VP and Voice and provides the thematic role Beneficiary. This is the for-
mal structure proposed for high applicatives by Pylkkänen (2002). Many beha-
viors of this structure predicted by my analysis can be observed, such as again-
modification and the passive formation. However, it does not fully reflect the
verbal restrictions that true benefactive applicative arguments face.
5.5 Recipient Benefactives
In this section, I discuss English recipient benefactive applicative arguments
(228a), repeated below. These are low applicatives for Pylkkänen (2002). Reci-
pient benefactives and ditransitives (267) share their surface structure and be-
have alike in many respects.
266. Recipient Benefactive:
John baked him a cake.
267. Ditransitive:
John gave Mary a book.
I argue that this similarity is due to the fact that ditransitives and recipient bene-
factives have the same structure. The difference is that ditransitive verbs obliga-
torily project this structure while recipient benefactives are optionally added to a
transitive verb, which results in the ditransitive structure. Before presenting my
analysis, I discuss the meaning of the recipient benefactive and some of its ver-
bal constraints (section 5.5.1). I also show how ditransitives and recipient bene-
factives resemble each other (section 5.5.2) before presenting my analysis (sec-
tion 5.5.3) and its consequences (section 5.5.4).
5.5.1 Meaning
The recipient benefactive is similar in its interpretation to that of an indirect ob-
ject of a ditransitive verb; both involve the (intended) transfer of possession
(Pylkkänen 2002). In general, a recipient does not always have to benefit (e.g.
John gave Mary poisonous cookies) and a beneficiary does not always receive
anything (cf. the definition in section 5.1 where receiving is not listed as a fea-
ture of benefactives). Yet, a typical recipient benefactive involves the recipient
receiving something and therefore being assumed to benefit. This type of bene-
factive can consequently most often be observed with verbs of transfer, verbs of
communication, and verbs of prevention (Colleman 2010). This generalization
rules out, for instance, sentence (268).
136
137
Due to the similar behavior and their similar meaning, I argue in the following
section that recipient benefactives and ditransitives have the same structure.
5.5.3 Analysis
I use the analysis of ditransitives by Bruening (2010) as my analysis of recipient
benefactives. It relies on an unpronounced head that I call Rec(ipient). Its deno-
tation is given in (273). It provides only at-issue meaning.
273. [[Rec]] = λx.λy.λe. HAVE(e) & Thm(e)(x) & Recipient(e)(y)
The syntactic structure and the semantic derivation for the recipient benefac-
tive (274a) are given in (274b) and (274c) and are explained in the following.72
274. a. Mary baked him a cake.
b. VoiceP
3
Mary Voice'
3
Voice vP1
3 2
v Voice him1 vP2
3 2
Rec v a cake v'
2 2
V Rec v RecP
2 2
Rec v t1 Rec'
2 2
V Rec Rec VP
2 6
V Rec bake a cake
c. [[VoiceP]] = λe. BAKE(e) & Thm(e)(a cake) & Agt(e)(Mary) &
(e') [HAVE(e') & Thm(e')(a cake) & Recipient(e')(him) &
CAUSE(e')(e)]
The Recipient head attaches outside of the VP. In this way, the recipient bene-
factive is not different from the true benefactive construction. However, the re-
cipient benefactive construction differs from the true benefactive in other ways.
Syntactically, there are three main movement processes going on: (a) the lexical
verb undergoes head movement to the Rec head, v, and Voice; (b) the direct ob-
ject moves from its base position to the specifier of v; (c) the applicative argu-
72 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 3, #2.
138
ment moves from its base position as the specifier of Rec to an adjoined vP posi-
tion. This structure reflects the c-command relations (272).
Semantically, the challenge is to encode the transfer of possession. The Rec
head carries this meaning but it requires functional composition73 for computing
the semantic derivation. The verb is not interpreted in its base position. This al-
lows the Rec head to have semantic access to the direct object, which is its first
semantic argument (273). The second argument is the recipient benefactive ar-
gument in the specifier position of Rec. Next, v is merged and, by head move-
ment, the lexical verb (together with Rec) moves there. This is where the lexical
verb is interpreted. The moved direct object is then interpreted (again) in the
specifier of vP position. The trace of the recipient benefactive is interpreted
next, before Voice introduces the agent. This finally yields the correct denota-
tion of the sentence (274c) which includes the possessive relationship between
the direct and the indirect objects. It states that there is a cake baking event of
which Mary is the agent. This event causes him to have (and be the recipient of)
a cake.
5.5.4 Consequences
This analysis reflects the fact that the recipient benefactive applicative argument
is not an argument of the verb and is consequently optional (235). Furthermore,
it explains the restricted occurrence of the recipient benefactive. Due to the fact
that recipient benefactives require the denoted entity to be the intended posses-
sor of the direct object, they cannot appear with unergative verbs because a di-
rect object must be present (cf. McGinnis 2001).
275. *John ran him.
However, my analysis does not explain why recipient benefactives cannot
occur with unaccusative verbs. Example (276) cannot mean that the ice melted
into his possession.
276. *The ice melted him.
It is not clear what rules out that Rec attaches outside an unaccusative VP. It
should be possible for the object to move through vP to VoiceP and to become
the subject. Rec (head-)moves along with V. It is possible that it is a semantic
clash that rules this out, namely that the referent of the direct object is the agent
who causes him-/her-/itself to come into possession of someone else in this con-
figuration (cf. Bruening 2011).
73 Functional Composition allows for the semantic computation to look ahead in the struc-
ture to ensure that the derivation will not crash due to type mismatches later on in the
computation. It allows certain operations to be postponed in order to salvage the deriva-
tion.
139
140
Particles can change a verb's argument structure. In this case, it changes the
ditransitive geben 'give' to a recipient benefactive structure in which the recipi-
ent is only optionally specified (281).
281. a. Jan gab *(Maria) eine Vase.
Jan.Nom gave Maria.Dat a.Acc vase
'Jan gave Maria a vase.'
b. Jan gab (Maria) eine Vase heraus.
Jan.Nom gave Maria.Dat a.Acc vase out
'Jan gave out a vase to Maria.'
Thus, the fact that only the true ditransitive geben 'give' cannot be passivized
remains puzzling.
5.5.5 Summary
Recipient benefactive applicatives are structurally different from true benefac-
tives but akin to ditransitives. They are introduced by a Rec(ipient) head which
selects VP. Functional composition ensures the interpretation of the direct object
as coming into possession of the entity referred to by the recipient benefactive.
Due to the fact that recipient benefactive applicatives and ditransitives are given
the same structure, their similarities are expected.
5.6 Prepositional Alternation
In this section, I address the prepositional alternative to the applicative benefac-
tives. I argue that for and its German equivalent für are vague benefactive pre-
positions which can be used for plain, deputative, and recipient benefactives (cf.
Parsons (1990) on the ambiguity of prepositions in general). I disregard other
uses of these prepositions such as introducing a purpose (Schmidtke-Bode
2009). The analysis provided here is similar to the cross-linguistic variation of
the applicative affected experiencer in German and its prepositional variant in
English (Chapter 3). While discussing the similarities of the applicative and the
prepositional benefactives, I also show that a PP-shell analysis of the true bene-
factive dative is not sufficient (section 5.6.3). This supports my contention that
the benefactive applicative arguments and their prepositional variants can re-
ceive similar, though not identical, analyses.
5.6.1 Analysis
The prepositional variant of the benefactive differs from its corresponding ap-
plicative in two major ways. First, the presence of the preposition is obligatory
(and consequently it forms a prepositional phrase in which the beneficiary is in-
cluded). Second, the PP is an adjunct of the sentence. In other respects, the
prepositional variant is exactly like the corresponding applicative, e.g. in the
141
74 I use German examples for true benefactives and English ones for recipient benefac-
tives, but the facts hold for both languages.
142
the cake. Thus, in terms of meaning contribution the applicative (243) and the
PP behave alike.
I propose that the preposition for/ für takes the beneficiary as its first seman-
tic argument. It assigns the thematic role of Ben(eficiary) and adjoins to the VP:
286. [[for/für]] = λx.λP<v,t>.λe. Ben(e)(x) & P(e)
The denotation of the preposition is akin to the German true benefactive in that
it can be interpreted as deputative, plain or recipient depending on the context
(244, see below for some restrictions on the interpretation).75 A sample deriva-
tion for German is given in (287).76
287. a. Jan öffnete die Tür für die Frau.
Jan.Nom opened the.Acc door for the.Acc woman
b. VoiceP<v,t>
3
Jan Voice'
3
Voice VP<v,t>
3
PP VP1
3 6
P NP öffnete die Tür
für die Frau
c. [[VoiceP]] = λe. Ben(e)(the woman) & OPEN(e) & Thm(e)(the door)
& Agt(e)(Jan)
The benefactive PP is adjoined to VP. The benefactive preposition takes the
beneficiary as its first argument and the VP as its second argument. The result-
ing derivation is that there was an opening event of which Jan is the agent, the
door is the theme, and the woman is the beneficiary.
The English prepositional benefactive works in the same way.
288. a. Mary baked a cake for John.
75 English for can also mark plain and deputative benefactives (see section 5.2.1). Thus,
for and für are alike in their underspecification for a particular type of benefactive.
76 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 3, #3.
143
b. VoiceP<v,t>
3
Mary Voice'
3
Voice VP<v,t>
3
PP VP1
3 6
P NP bake a cake
for John
c. [[VoiceP]] = λe. Ben(e)(John) & BAKE(e) & Thm(e)(a cake) &
Agt(e)(Mary)
There is a baking event with the agent Mary, the theme a cake and the benefi-
ciary John. The context will provide the correct interpretation of whether it is a
plain benefactive, a deputative benefactive, or a recipient benefactive.
5.6.2 Consequences
This analysis of prepositional benefactives has some welcome consequences.
First, it explains why the German verbs that entail a possessor cannot have a für
-PP denoting a(n intended) recipient (289).
289. Jan brachte Maria einen Kuchen nach
Jan.Nom brought Maria.Dat a.Acc cake to
Dortmund für seine Mutter.
Dortmund for his mother.
'Jan brought Maria a cake for his mother's benefit to Dortmund.'
*'Jan brought his mother a cake for Maria's benefit to Dortmund.'
The für-PP is an adjunct. In this case, it adjoins outside RecP (which has to be
present for German verbs that entail a recipient). The unique theta role assign-
ment requirement will rule out the recipient interpretation of the prepositional
phrase because there is already a recipient present, namely the applicative. Fur-
thermore, the applicative in this case cannot receive an interpretation other than
that of a recipient because of the verb's predisposition for a recipient. The PP für
seine Mutter must be interpreted as a plain or a deputative benefactive because
the dative constituent provides a recipient. Consequently, the recipient benefac-
tive is ruled out. In contrast, any für-PP can attach outside the VP of other verbs,
allowing all interpretations (290).
290. Jan buk für Maria einen Kuchen.
Jan.Nom baked for Maria a.Acc cake
'Jan baked a cake for Maria.' (plain, recipient, deputative)
144
5.6.3 PP-shells
An alternative approach to analyzing the prepositional and true benefactives
would be to argue that the true benefactive has, in fact, the same structure as the
prepositional one. That is, both are PPs but that the preposition of the true bene-
factive is unpronounced.78
In fact, Rezac (2008) argues that all NPs have a PP-shell, i.e. an unpro-
nounced preposition heading a PP, if they are assigned theta-related case. This is
schematized in (294).
77 The full syntactic and semantic derivations are given in Appendix 3, #4.
78 This section is a short version of Bosse (2013a). There, I characterize applicative argu-
ments as DPs but describe them as NPs here. Nothing hinges on the classification.
145
294. PP
2
P NP
Following Woolford (2006), theta-related case is defined as non-structural
case that is preserved in A-movement. That the true benefactive receives theta-
related case can be seen from example (295) in which the dative case of the true
benefactive is preserved in the passivized sentence.
295. a. Susi malte ihrer Mutter ein Bild.
Susi.Nom painted her.Dat mother a.Acc picture
'Susi painted a picture for her mother.'
b. *Ein Bild wurde ihrer Mutter (von
a.Nom picture was her.Dat mother by
Susi) gemalt.
Susi painted
'A picture was painted (by Susi) for her mother.'
(Bosse 2013a, examples 2, 5)
Assuming Rezac (2008) is correct, it is expected for the true benefactive to be
included in a PP-shell. It should follow then that both the true benefactive and
the prepositional benefactive are PPs, differing only in whether the preposition
is pronounced.
The simplest hypothesis is that these two PPs (the true benefactive and the
prepositional benefactive) are syntactically alike: they attach in the same posi-
tion and are available for the same syntactic transformations. Unfortunately, this
hypothesis cannot be maintained because the two types of benefactives behave
differently with respect to extraposition. While it is possible to extrapose a pre-
positional benefactive (296b), a true benefactive cannot be extraposed (296a).
296. a. *Susi hat Bilder gemalt ihrer Mutter.
Susi had pictures painted her.Dat mother
b. Susi hat Bilder gemalt für ihre Mutter.
Susi had pictures painted for her mother
'Susi had painted pictures for her mother.'
(Bosse 2013a, examples 12, 13)
In short, (296) shows that the true benefactive and the prepositional benefactive
do not behave alike syntactically. This points to them requiring different ana-
lyses.
Since it cannot be maintained that the true benefactive and the prepositional
benefactive are syntactically alike, there are two possible alternative hypotheses:
first, both types of benefactives could be PPs but they are generated in different
syntactic positions resulting in different extraposition possibilities, or, second,
146
they are not both PPs and the extraposition facts follow from their different syn-
tactic status. Before I explore these hypotheses below, I present an analysis of
extraposition proposed by Kasai (2008) which will help to decide between these
two hypotheses.
Kasai (2008) argues that extraposition (in English79) involves the following
steps: first, the constituent to be extraposed is included in a focus projection
(FocP) headed by a phonologically null Foc(us) head. This phrase moves to the
edge of vP (due to an uninterpretable Foc-feature). After moving, the FocP pro-
jects again, resulting in vP being the specifer of the newly-projected FocP. The
relevant tree is given in (297).
297. FocP
3
FocP1 vP
2 2
Foc DP DP v'
3
v VP
2
t1 V'
2
V PP
(Kasai 2008, example 15c)
The result of projecting FocP is apparent rightward movement because the spe-
cifier (vP) will be linearized as preceding the complement.
If we assume that true benefactives and prepositional benefactives are PPs
but they attach at different points in the derivation, it seems reasonable to pro-
pose that the true benefactive attaches below the subject while the prepositional
attaches above the subject, given the again-modification facts of true benefac-
tives (254, 255). This hypothesis is not supported by the extraposition facts ei-
ther. Both types of benefactives are generated in the same phase, namely vP, and
should be able move to the edge of vP for extraposition (following the analysis
proposed by Kasai (2008)). Yet, as (297) shows, the two structures are not
equally available for extraposition. Thus, the hypothesis that the true benefactive
and the prepositional benefactive are both structurally PPs cannot be maintained.
As a result, the hypothesis that receives the most support is the one stating
that the true benefactive is an applicative argument and by that a nominal pro-
jection included in an applicative projection with an unpronounced head (as
proposed in section 5.4.1), and the prepositional benefactive is an adjoined PP
79 I assume that this analysis of English extraposition extends to German.
147
6 Part-Whole Applicatives
6.1 Introduction
In this chapter, I provide an analysis of German applicative arguments that re-
ceive a part-whole interpretation (298).
298. Jan zerbeulte dem Auto die Tür.
Jan.Nom dented the.Dat car the.Acc door
'Jan dented the door of the car.'
To be precise, the applicative argument denotes an entity of which an entity de-
noted by another NP is a material part; in this example, the door is understood to
be a part of the car. These applicative arguments are not found in English; I use
a possessive construction in the translation.80
The part-whole applicative argument has first been extensively discussed as
a separate type of German applicatives by Hole (2006; 2008). He claims that this
type is only accepted by some native speakers of German, which might explain
why they have been described as being ungrammatical by other authors (see sec-
tion 6.2.1). I discuss these applicative arguments here because they conform to
my general definition of applicative arguments (4), repeated below, and all of
my informants (most of them from Lower Saxony) accept sentences such as
(298).
299. Applicative Argument
An NP Y of a simple, non-negated declarative sentence that is not
governed by a preposition is an applicative argument iff the sentence
without Y does not entail that there is at least one individual that is in-
volved in the asserted event and could be referred to by Y.
Part-whole applicative arguments are not required for the sentence to be
grammatical, are not governed by a preposition and the denoted entity is not en-
tailed as being involved in the event. (300) shows that sentence (298) is still
grammatical without the applicative argument; the applicative argument is not
selected by the verb.
300. Jan zerbeulte die Tür.
Jan.Nom dented the.Acc door
'Jan dented the door.'
This sentence does not entail the involvement of the car (beyond the specificity
supplied by the definite determiner which may indicate that the door is that of
80 External possessor constructions of English like John kicked Jim in the stomach are not
investigated here.
149
150
6.2 Description
In this section, I differentiate the part-whole applicative argument from other
German applicative arguments (section 6.2.1). In this discussion as well as the
following subsection (6.2.2), the main characteristics of the part-whole applica-
tive argument are introduced. The restrictions on the part-whole applicative ar-
gument construction are addressed in section 6.2.3.
81 There are also some authors that address a "possessor" dative with animate reference
without addressing the affectedness that is expected for a pertinence dative, e.g. Müller
(1995).
151
(as well as other authors) and their consulted native speakers speak dialects of
German that do not allow the part-whole applicative argument construction.
The similarities and differences of the pertinence dative and the part-whole
applicative argument are discussed in Chapter 3. It was concluded in that chap-
ter that the pertinence dative is an affected experiencer construction which con-
tributes some not-at-issue meaning. This is not the case for the part-whole ap-
plicative argument (see Chapter 3 and section 6.3). The part-whole applicative
argument has no animacy requirement. This distinguishes the part-whole appli-
cative argument from the affected experiencer/ pertinence dative.82 Furthermore,
the contribution of at-issue meaning also distinguishes the part-whole applica-
tive from the subject co-referential applicative and the ethical dative as both
contribute not-at-issue meaning (Chapter 4).
The part-whole applicative argument construction can be distinguished from
the benefactive (Chapter 5) by the availability of the für-paraphrase for the bene-
factive. The part-whole applicative argument cannot be paraphrased in that way
(304).
304. Jan zerbeulte die Tür für das Auto.
Jan.Nom dented the.Acc door for the car
'Jan dented the door for the car.'
*'Jan dented the door of the car.'
In this sample sentence, there is no requirement that the door is a material part of
the car. As shown below, this is an essential requirement for the part-whole con-
struction. No other preposition is available for a paraphrase either.
Finally, differentiating the part-whole applicative argument from the Dative
of Inaction (Chapter 7) is impossible without context, if the requirements for
both are met (305).
305. Der Frau ist der Arm abgefault.
the.Dat woman is the.Nom arm rotted.off
'The woman's arm rotted off.'
'The arm rotted off on the woman's watch.'
This sample sentence can be used to either describe what happened to a woman
(part-whole applicative argument) or what happened to someone else while it
was the woman's responsibility to prevent this (DI interpretation). The context
must be used to differentiate the two.83
82 To avoid ambiguity of the part-whole applicative argument and the pertinence dative, I
use sentences with inanimate referents for the part-whole applicatives.
83 This sentence can also be interpreted as an affected experiencer/ pertinence dative. In
that case, it includes not-at-issue meaning and can be differentiated accordingly.
152
6.2.2 Characteristics
The part-whole construction requires that there is a material part-whole relation-
ship between two NPs. Sentences in which this relationship is not provided are
ungrammatical. For instance, (306) is ungrammatical because the two entities
Fahrrad 'bike' and Tür 'door' are not in a part-whole relation.
306. *Jan zerbeulte dem Fahrrad die Tür.
Jan.Nom dented the.Dat bike the door
'Jan dented the door of the bike.'
Also, a subset-superset relation cannot be expressed in this way.84
307. *Jan zerstörte den Zigaretten nur die
Jan.Nom destroyed the.Dat cigarettes only the.Acc
Marlboros.
Marlboros
'Jan destroyed of the cigarettes on the Marlboros.'
Similarly, abstract entities and kinship nouns cannot be used in this construction
because a material part-whole relationship is required.
308. a. *Jan zerstörte der Idee den Kern.
Jan destroyed the.Dat idea the core
'Jan destroyed the core of the idea.'
b. *Jan zerkratzte Sabrina den Vater.
Jan scratched Sabrina.Dat the father
'Jan scratched Sabrina's father.'
Due to this required part-whole relationship between two entities encoded in the
sentence, I prefer the term "part-whole applicatives" over "landmarks" (Hole
2008).
There are sentence structures which can express a very similar meaning to
the part-whole applicative argument construction (309). I discuss these here
briefly to show what the part-whole applicative argument accomplishes in con-
trast to those other structures.
309. a. Jan zerbeulte dem Auto die Tür.
Jan.Nom dented the.Dat car the.Acc door
'Jan dented the door of the car.'
b. Jan zerbeulte [die Tür des Autos].
Jan.Nom dented the.Acc door the.Gen car.Gen
'Jan dented the door of the car'
84 In this, the German part-whole construction differs, for instance, from the Korean
"zooming in" construction (Sim 2005).
153
154
155
156
157
87 Ethical datives and subject co-referential applicative arguments are less flexible in their
position because they must be pronouns which have their unmarked position in the left
midfield.
158
159
160
ing the word order and contrastively focusing Auto makes the reading available
(327).
327. a. Jan zerbeulte nicht [dem Auto]F die
Jan dented Neg the.Dat car the.Acc
Tür (sondern dem Bus).
door but the.Dat bus
'Jan dented the door not of the car (but of the bus).'
b. Jan zerbeulte nicht die Tür [des Autos]F
Jan dented Neg the.Acc door the.Gen car.Gen
(sondern des Buses).
but the.Gen bus.Gen
'Jan dented the door not of the car but of the bus.'
It seems that the special semantic relation between the two NPs in sentences
(325) and (326) prevents negation from targeting the genitive and applicative
argument, respectively. I contend that the negation test in (325) does not provide
support for part-whole applicative argument contributing not-at-issue meaning.
Rather, it may be the material part-whole requirement that stops negation from
being able to targeting this (see below).
Wh-questioning of inanimate part-whole applicative arguments is possible.
328. Was für einem/ welchem Auto hat er
what for a.Dat which.Dat car has he.Nom
die Tür zerbeult?
the door dented
'Which (kind of) car did he dent the door on?
This shows that the part-whole applicative argument is syntactically accessi-
ble.88
The last piece of evidence for the part-whole applicative argument having
only at-issue meaning comes from binding. The applicative argument can bind
into other constituents (329).
329. Jan zerbeulte jedem Auto1 seine1 Tür.
Jan.Nom dented every.Dat car its.Acc door
'Jan dented the door of every car.'
It was shown in Chapter 2 that this pattern of binding is not possible for not-at-
issue elements.
88 Non-D-linked questions with wem 'who.Dat' are only marginally possible because this
wh-word refers more readily to a (sentient) individual. The salient reading of the wh-
question i. is that of asking about an affected experiencer applicative argument.
i. Wem zerbeulte Jan die Tür?
who.Dat dented Jan the door
'Whose door did Jan dent?' 'On who did Jan dent the door?'
161
162
163
true, (331b) is not necessarily true. This applies especially to change of state
verbs (Neumann 1995): when the state of the part changes, the state of the whole
does not necessarily change (or not in the same way).
331. a. Jan knickt dem Baum die Blätter ab.
Jan snaps the.Dat tree the leaves off
'Jan snaps the leaves off the tree.'
b. Jan knickt den Baum ab.
Jan snaps the.Acc tree off
'Jan snaps off the tree.'
This example shows that the referent of the applicative argument is not undergo-
ing the same event as the part. The denotation in (330c) does not reflect this. All
entities are participants of the denting event. This could be avoided by defining
Poss as not participating in the event but that it is the possessor of an entity
which participates in that event. However, by doing that, the essence of Pyl-
kkänen's approach is lost, namely not all high applicatives would receive the
same analysis. In other words, Pylkkänen's original analysis of high applicatives
is not well-suited for the part-whole applicatives because it cannot ensure that
the material part-whole relation holds between the right entities. Consequently,
some of Pylkkänen's assumptions have to be given up. By doing that, her unified
approach to all high applicatives is lost.
Overall, the additional thematic role provided by Pylkkänen's analysis is not
suited to explain the part-whole applicative argument construction because it
cannot ensure that the material part-whole relation holds between the correct
entities. In order to include that in the analysis, part-whole applicatives must be
treated differently from other high applicatives.
164
165
tive (section 5.4.4) and the pertinence dative (section 3.6)). First, he addresses
sloppy identity readings under ellipsis (335). He argues that the applicative must
bind because a strict reading is not possible.
335. Dem Patienteni platzte ein Stück Gips
the.Dat patient cracked a piece cast
(vomi/ von seinemi) Arm ab, und dem
of.the of his arm off and the.Dat
Arzt auch.
doctor too
'It happened to the patienti that part of the cast on hisi arm came off,
and it happened to the doctorj that part of hisj came off, too.'
*'It happened to the patienti that part of the cast on hisi arm came off,
and it happened to the doctorj that part of hisi came off, too.'
(Hole 201X, example 11)
As shown in Chapter 3, this is not true. The strict reading is available for this
example. For the part-whole applicative, this cannot be shown because of the
required material part-whole relation. However, in the following example, the
salient reading is that there are two doors, one belonging to a bus and one be-
longing to a Mercedes.
336. Jan zerbeulte dem Bus die Tür und dem
Jan.Nom dented the.Dat bus the door and the.Dat
Mercedes auch.
Mercedes too
'Jan dented the door of the bus and the one of the Mercedes, too.'
On Hole's approach, dem Bus should bind die Tür and dem Mercedes should
bind an unpronounced die Tür included in the elided part.91 On my approach
(which does not require binding), it should be possible for the Mercedes to be a
whole to the door which is part of the bus. In other words, if there is a Mercedes
bus and Jan dented that bus's door, (336) should be able to describe that situa-
tion, and it does. However, in that case it cannot be distinguished from the bind-
ing approach because the door of the bus and the door of the Mercedes are iden-
tical, i.e. dem Mercedes might be binding into the elided part.
The second type of support for Hole's binding analysis comes from the ac-
commodation of possessors when there is no pronounced pronoun. Hole (201X)
does not provide a landmark example (337b) but the reasoning should be the
same as for possessors (which he discusses) (337a).
91 Hole assumes indices on all elements with anaphoric use including (bridging) definites
to be available for binding.
166
167
92 This verb is not to be confused with the Affect head of affected experiencers (Chapter 3)
but rather means "impact". It does not have to be a psychological impact.
93 Tomioka and Sim (2007) use a modified event composition compared to Brisson (1998)
to combine VP2 and affect. It is described in their example 32.
168
340. a. VoiceP<s,t>
3
NP<e> Voice'<e,<s,t>>
3
VP1<s,t> Voice<e,<s,t>>
3
NP1<e> V1'
3
VP2<s,t> affect<e,<s,t>>
3
NP2<e> V2<e,<s,t>>
(Tomioka and Sim 2007, example 31)
b. [[VoiceP]] = λe. [AFFECT(e) & Agt(e)(y) & Thm(e)(Youngmee) &
e'. [e' e & PULL OUT(e) & Thm(e)(the hair)]]
The part-whole relationship holds between the two events (affect and lexical
verb) instead of two entities, as shown by e' e. First, this ensures that the ver-
bal event is a subevent of the affecting event. Second, this relation between the
events means that the verbal event does not have to hold for the possessor. Thus,
pulling out Youngmee's hair does not mean pulling out Youngmee (cf. (331)).
Third, the part-whole relationship between the events means that the possessive
relation is not part of the semantics but rather "it is the most natural to interpret"
(Tomioka and Sim 2007, p. 16) the relation as a possessive relation because the
events are connected. Finally, this material part-whole relation between two
events means that the analysis is mono-eventive because one is a part of the oth-
er (despite the two event variables).
Furthermore, Tomioka and Sim (2007) argue that the eventualities of the
VP1 form a set of minimal eventualities so all and only those entities that are
relevant are included. Thus, in the affecting event the applicative argument is the
only entity and the verbal event includes only the Theme entity. In other words,
the sentence is only acceptable if the affecting event includes the possessor to an
entity included in the verbal event. This ensures that no entity can be affected
that is not relevant (341).
341. *Mary-ka John-ul Bill-euy tali-lul cha-ss-ta.
Mary-Nom John-Acc Bill-Gen leg-Acc kick-Past-Decl
'Mary affected John by kicking Bill's leg.'
(Tomioka and Sim 2007, example 38a)
Also, stipulating that this minimality condition is computed locally at VP1 en-
sures that the subject cannot be the possessor (as it has not yet been introduced)
(342, cf. 313).
169
170
6.4.5 Analysis
The requirements for the part-whole applicative argument construction can be
summarized as follows: syntactically, the part NP and the applicative argument
do not form one constituent. Semantically, a material part-whole relation be-
tween the two NPs must be established. I argue that the applicative argument is
introduced by a phonologically null head, AppPW, which attaches outside of VP
(346).
346. VoiceP
3
Voice'
3
Voice AppPWP
3
Applicative NP AppPW'
3
AppPW VP
3
V NP
The semantic denotation of the AppPW head encodes the material part-whole rela-
tion between the two entities (347).94
347. [[AppPW]] = λf<e,vt>. λx. λy. λe. f(e)(s) & xy for the duration of e95
This denotation for AppPW works as follows: I assume that it attaches to VP and
prevents the constituents used to form this projection from combining semanti-
94 Thanks to Benjamin Bruening for the initial idea for this denotation!
95 "xy" means that x is a material part of y. "For the duration of e" reflects the fact that
the two entities do not have to be in the part-whole relation eternally but only
when/while the event is taking place.
171
cally. This is due to functional composition; the semantic computation can look
ahead and prevent certain operations to ensure that the derivation converges.
ApplPW takes the two constituents forming the VP as its first and second seman-
tic arguments. The verbal event is passed up by ApplPW and the complement of
V is applied to it. At the same time, this entity becomes the material part to the
referent of the third semantic argument of AppPW, namely the applicative argu-
ment.
The derivation for (298), repeated below, is given in (348).96
348. a. Jan zerbeulte dem Auto die Tür.
Jan dented the.Dat car the.Acc door
'Jan dented the door of the car.'
b. VoiceP
3
Jan Voice'
3
Voice AppPWP
3
dem Auto AppPW'
3
AppPW VP
3
zerbeulte die Tür
c. [[VoiceP]] = λe. DENT(e) & Thm(e)(the door) & Agt(e)(Jan) & the
door the car for the duration of e
This denotation states that there was a denting event of which Jan is the agent
and the door is the theme. Furthermore, the door is a material part of the car (for
the duration of the denting event).
This analysis respects both the syntactic and the semantic requirements of
the part-whole applicative construction. First, the applicative argument and the
direct object do not form a constituent. Nevertheless, the material part-whole
relation between the two is established. Since the part-whole relation is explicit-
ly encoded in the semantics, it is required to hold between the specified entities
and cannot hold between any other event participants (such as the agent, see
(313)).
Tomioka and Sim (2007) have observed that again-modification cannot tar-
get the smallest VP (in Korean) (349).
96 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 4, #1.
172
97 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 4, #2.
173
b. VoiceP
3
Jan Voice'
3
Voice AppPWP
3
dem Auto AppPW'
3
AppPW VP1
3
VP PP
3 3
legte<e,evt> etwas in den Kofferraum
c. [[VoiceP]] = λe. PUT(e) & Thm(e)(something) & Goal(e)(the trunk)
& Agt(e)(Jan) & the trunk the car for the duration of e
Due to the fact that the PP is an argument of the verb, the VP is of type <e,vt>
after the verb and the direct object have combined. VP1 is formed syntactically
by VP and PP but is not computed semantically. AppPW takes these two elements
as its arguments. The entity provided by the PP then ends up as the material part
of the applicative argument. The direct object is not available (cf. (312a)) be-
cause it satisfies the first semantic argument of the verb. There is no delay in
combining the verb and the direct object because functional composition does
not require the delay. Consequently, they combine. The reason that only argu-
ment PPs are available for this is that they fill the position of the individual re-
quired by the verb. Adjunct PPs do not have this function and consequently do
not attach between AppPW and V (also see Ramchand (2008) for the different
attachment sites of PPs with varied functions).
This analysis is also supported by again-modification. There are two nodes
of type <v,t> in (351), namely AppPW and VoiceP. Thus, the expected readings
are that the event happened before with the same part-whole relation but a dif-
ferent agent or with the same part-whole relation and the same agent. These pre-
dictions are borne out.
352. Jan legte dem Auto wieder etwas in
Jan.Nom laid the.Dat car again something into
den Kofferraum.
the.Acc trunk
'Jan put something into the trunk of the car again.'
This sentence can be used if someone put something into the car's trunk before
and now Jan put something there too, or if Jan had done it before and did it
again now. The sentence cannot be used if Jan put something into the trunk of a
174
truck before and now put something into the trunk of the car. Thus, again-
modification supports my analysis of part-whole applicatives.
The analysis can also be applied to unergative verbs (353).98 However, it
does not work exactly the same way because of the semantic type of the unerga-
tive verb, which is <v,t>. To resolve the type mismatch of AppPW, V and Voice,
I assume that V headmoves through AppPW to Voice, as shown in (353b). There,
V combines with Voice by event identification. The result of this becomes the
first argument of AppPW. The specifier of Voice becomes the second semantic
argument of AppPW. The specifier of App is adjoined outside of VoiceP where it
becomes the third semantic argument of AppPW. (It cannot stay in its base posi-
tion because it cannot combine with anything there.)
353. a. Dem Baum haben die Blätter geleuchtet.
the.Dat tree have the.Nom leaves glowed
'The leaves of the tree were glowing.'
b. VoiceP2
3
dem Baum2 VoiceP1
3
die Blätter Voice'
3
Voice2 AppP
3 3
App1 Voice1 t2 App'
3 3
App V t1 VP
6
leuchten
c. [[VoiceP2]] = λe. GLOW(e) & Agt(e)(the leaves) & the leaves the
tree for the duration of e
Thus, (353a) denotes a glowing event of the leaves which are a material part of
the tree. This is the correct denotation.
The head movement that is available here can again be attributed to func-
tional composition. It is available because the composition can diverge in this
way. This derivation is only available for unergative verbs because of their se-
mantic type. AppPW does not move in transitive sentence because this movement
is a last resort movement. It is unnecessary with transitives and therefore may
not take place.
98 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 4, #3.
175
176
The genitive and the applicative argument are not competing for the same posi-
tion or function. Both are licensed independently.
Another advantage of this analysis is that the referent of the part-whole ap-
plicative argument is not an event participant. Consequently, it does not undergo
the same event as the part NP (cf. (331)). At the same time, the encoded part-
whole relation guarantees that the whole entity must be available for the event to
take place.
To explain the fact that a full NP denoting the part cannot scramble within
the midfield, I suggest that the part-whole applicative argument moves to a mid-
field focus position (independently argued for by Frey (2000)). Since the high-
lighting of the whole NP is one characteristic which distinguishes this construc-
tion from similar constructions (309), this seems reasonable. The part NP is pre-
vented from scrambling over the applicative because the midfield focus position
is assumed to be the left-most position for full NPs in the midfield. A partial
structure is shown in (357). XP is assumed to be a projection that is optionally
available for pronouns to respect the left-most position requirement for pronouns
in the midfield.
357. CP
3
C'
3
C XP
3
FocusP
3
Focus'
3
Focus …
6
VoiceP
6.6 Conclusion
In this chapter, I have discussed the part-whole applicative argument construc-
tion. This applicative argument contributes only at-issue meaning. The part-
whole applicative argument can only occur with resultative VPs and is restricted
to NPs whose referents can be in a material part-whole relation. I have argued
that a phonologically null head, AppPW, introduces the applicative argument.
Furthermore, this head prevents its sister from combining semantically and takes
the elements of the sister node as its arguments. This allows the material part-
177
7 Dative of Inaction
7.1 Introduction
In this chapter, I discuss the last type of German applicative arguments, namely
the Dative of Inaction (DI):99
358. Der Oma zerbrach eine Vase.
the.Dat grandma broke a.Nom vase
'The vase broke on grandma.'
(Hens 1997, example 2)
Though Hens gives the translation of the DI with "on grandma" in (358), a better
translation would be "on grandma's watch" or "Grandma let the vase break".
This translation avoids ambiguity with the affected experiencer in the English
translation, and it reflects the meaning of the DI better because it indicates that
the grandma was in some way in charge of the vase and could have prevented its
breaking. This is the meaning of the DI in (358).100 Following Hens (1997) and
Rosengren (1975), I argue that the Dative of Inaction needs to be distinguished
from other applicative arguments because of its semantic contribution and its
limited occurrence.
The DI is an applicative argument according to my definition (4). It is not
governed by a preposition (358), and it is not selected by the verb (359).
359. Eine Vase zerbrach.
A.Nom vase broke
'A vase broke.'
In (359), the involvement of another entity is not entailed (compared to (358)).
Thus, the DI meets all requirements of an applicative argument.
In terms of the classification of applicatives by Pylkkänen (2002), the DI
should be a high applicative argument because no transfer of possession is in-
volved. In fact, no possession requirement exists for the DI. In (358), it is not
necessarily the grandma's vase that broke (Hens 1995). Yet, as described below,
the DI cannot occur with unergative or stative verbs as would be expected for
high applicatives (Chapter 2). Nevertheless, Pylkkänen's high applicative analy-
sis is essentially the correct analysis for the DI, as I show in section 7.4.
I describe the features of the DI and how it can be distinguished from other
applicative arguments of German in section 7.2. In section 7.3, I address the at-
issue meaning contribution of the DI. In section 7.4, I present my analysis of the
99 The material presented here is also discussed in Bosse (2012).
100 Consequently, I use on X's watch in the translations below whenever no translation was
given in the original source.
179
180
context, tones can be prevented from fading away, (362) would be acceptable (if
it was my responsibility to prevent the tone from fading away and I failed).
Thus, the semantic requirement on the verb is twofold: the verb (phrase) must
denote a bounded event and the event must be preventable.
In terms of categories of intransitive verbs presented by Sorace (2000), the
boundedness requirement of the verb means that change of state verbs (363a),
inchoatives (363b) as well as verbs denoting controlled, telic motion processes
(363c) license the DI.
363. a. Der Baum ist mir verrottet.
the.Nom tree is me.Dat rotten
'The tree rotted on my watch.'
b. Der Hund ist mir ertrunken.
the.Nom dog is me.Dat drowned
'The dog drowned on my watch.'
c. Das Paar ist mir in den Raum
the.Nom couple is me.Dat in the room
getanzt.
danced
'The couple danced into the room on my watch.'
Continuation of condition verbs are very marginally acceptable.
364. ??Der Hund hat mir überlebt.
the.Nom dog has me.Dat survived
'The dog survived on my watch.'
Sentences with these verbs can be made more acceptable by context. For in-
stance, (364) could be used in a case the dog survived and I was responsible for
preventing that from happening (e.g. I should have let it drown or tried to active-
ly kill it).
Verbs that are unacceptable with the DI are controlled non-motional unaf-
fecting processes (365a), uncontrolled processes (365b, c), change of location
(365d), and controlled affecting processes (365e).
365. a. *Das Kind hat mir gearbeitet.
the.Nom child has me.Dat worked
'The child has worked on my watch.'
b. *Das Kind hat mir gehustet.
the.Nom child has me.Dat coughed
'The child coughed on my watch.'
c. *Es hat mir auf die Schuhe geregnet.
it has me.Dat onto the shoes rained
'It rained onto my shoes on my watch.'
181
182
101 Abraham (1973) argues that there is a construction with lassen 'let' that the DI is related
to. However, Rosengren (1975) shows that the lassen-paraphrase is not always available
for the DI.
183
This sentence indicates that the flowers did not wither or did not wither on the
gardener's watch (but they may have withered on someone else's watch). This,
again, indicates that the applicative argument contributes only at-issue meaning
because no not-at-issue meaning is detected.
It is also possible to form a wh-question asking about the applicative argu-
ment (370), showing that it is syntactically accessible.
370. Wem verwelkten die Blumen?
who.Dat withered the flowers?
'Who is responsible for the flowers withering?' (or 'Who let the with-
er?', 'Who was in charge of the flowers when they withered?')
This accessibility of the applicative argument for wh-questions indicates that it
does not contribute any not-at-issue meaning. This can also be seen in an if-
clause where the applicative argument contributes its meaning to the conditional
(371).
371. Wenn dem Gärtner die Blumen verwelken
if the.Dat gardener the flowers wither
dann feuer ich ihn.
then fire I him
'If the flowers wither on the gardener's watch, then I will fire him.'
According to (371), the gardener will get fired if the flowers wither while he is
in charge of them. In contrast, if the applicative argument were not present in
(371), I would fire him as soon as/if the flowers wither. In that case, the garden-
er is not responsible for keeping the flowers from withering, but his fate is tied
to that of the flowers. This shows that the DI contributes at-issue meaning.
In summary, the DI contributes only at-issue meaning. The tests for not-at-
issue meaning did not detect any such meaning. This shows clearly that the DI is
not just a variant of the affected experiencer applicative argument although these
two applicatives share other features (such as the sentience requirement).
7.4 Analysis
Rosengren (1975) does not provide a formal analysis of the Dative of Inaction
but rather focuses on a description. Hens (1995) provides an analysis of these
datives in the framework of constructional semantics. Thus, no formal previous
analysis with a similar theoretical framework can be discussed.
In the system of low and high applicatives by Pylkkänen (2002), the Dative
of Inaction should be high because it relates an individual to an event and does
not involve a transfer of possession. Before modifying Pylkkänen's analysis to
account for the DI, I briefly discuss a Japanese construction seemingly similar to
the German Dative of Inaction, namely the Japanese adversity causative (372)
which has a nominative-marked element whose referent is affected by the event.
184
102 Thanks to Satoshi Tomioka for putting my unorganized thoughts into the appropriate
words!
103 The full semantic derivation is given in Appendix 5.
185
b.
3
Voice[-agentive] RespP
3
der Oma Resp'
3
Resp VP
3
zerbrach eine Vase
c. [[RespP]] = λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(a vase) & Responsi-
ble(e)(grandma)
Thus, the sentence denotes a breaking event of the vase for which the grandma
is responsible (in the sense that she had the potential to prevent this). Voice is
non-agentive because only non-agentive verbs license DIs. In other words, I as-
sume that only non-agentive Voice can select RespP.
7.5 Consequences
One problem with my analysis as it stands is that it does not rule out the passive
of transitive verbs to appear with the DI. Yet, this configuration is impossible
(375).
375. Der Oma wurde die Vase zerbrochen.
the.Dat grandma became the.Nom vase broken
'The vase was broken for/on grandma.'
*'The vase was broken on grandma's watch.'
The unavailability of the DI interpretation of this sentence can be explained in
one of two ways. First, it could be argued that unaccusative verbs are fundamen-
tally different from transitives. For example, it could be said that the VP in
(374b) is not the same as a V plus Theme of a transitive verb; possibly the unac-
cusative has an InchoativeP rather than a VP. Second, it could be that passives
do not have a non-agentive Voice head, but that Voice head is agentive since the
agent is semantically still present in passives. The agent is then syntactically
suppressed by some other mechanism (cf. Bruening 2011). I assume this latter
option. Thus, (375) can be ruled out as a DI construction because the passive
requires the projection of agentive Voice but agentive Voice cannot select
RespP. Only non-agentive Voice can select ResP. This also rules out the DI oc-
curring with unergative (361a) and transitive verbs (360).
This analysis is further supported by adverbial modification patterns. As ex-
plained previously (Chapter 3), again can detect nodes of type <v,t>. According
186
to the analysis in (374), there are two nodes of type <v,t>, namely RespP and
VP.104 Thus, the following two readings should be possible:
376. a. VP: The event happened before with someone else or no one in
charge.
b. RespP: The event happened before with the same person in charge.
These predictions are borne out (377).
377. Dem Verkäufer ist das Eis wieder
the.Dat salesman is the ice.cream again
geschmolzen.
melted
'The ice cream melted again on the salesman's watch.'
i. The ice cream was melted before and now it melted again while the
salesman was in charge of it.
ii. The ice cream melted before on the salesman's watch and now it
melted on his watch again.
As expected, it is not possible to have a repetition only of the salesman being in
charge by using wieder 'again' (378).
378. Dem Verkäufer ist eine Blume verrottet und
the.Dat salesman is a.Nom flower rotted and
dann ist ihm wieder ein Eis
then is him.Dat again a ice.cream
geschmolzen.
melted
'A flower rotted on the salesman's watch and then ice cream melted on
his watch again.'
This sentence can only mean that the ice cream had melted before. It cannot be
used to convey that the salesman was in charge of the flower rotting and then
was again in charge of the ice cream melting (for the first time). This is expected
on my analysis because there is no <v,t> node representing only the being in
charge. Thus, again-modification supports my analysis of part-whole applica-
tives as high applicatives with non-agentive Voice.
7.6 Conclusion
In this chapter, I have discussed the Dative of Inaction. It occurs with non-
agentive, bounded intransitive verbs. It denotes that the referent of the DI was in
charge of that event (in the sense that s/he was not actively bringing it about but
it happened on that person's watch). That individual could have acted in a way
104 Non-agentive VoiceP is also of type <v,t> but it would have the same interpretation as
when again modifies RespP because Voice is vacuous.
187
that would have stopped the event from occurring. The DI construction has only
at-issue meaning and is mono-eventive. Consequently, it is best explained with
the approach to high applicatives by Pylkkänen (2002). A causative analysis is
not suitable (or necessary). In addition to the high applicative structure, the Resp
head that introduces the DI selects VP and is selected by non-agentive Voice.
This explains the restricted occurrence of the DI.
This analysis is rather ad hoc as it stands. Further research will show whe-
ther this mono-eventive counterpart to the Japanese adversity causative is avail-
able in other languages as well. Yet, as I show in the next chapter, my analysis
of the DI fits well into the system of German applicatives because all the ex-
pected co-occurrence restrictions of applicatives are observed with this analysis
of the DI.
8 Co-Occurrence of Applicatives
8.1 Introduction
In this chapter, I discuss the co-occurrence possibilities of applicative argu-
ments. Vogel and Steinbach (1998) speculate that the co-occurrence of multiple
(dative-marked) applicatives in German is "restricted only semantically (i.e.
each dative needs a different interpretation)" (p. 27). It follows from this that no
applicative should be recursive because the applicative head would assign the
same thematic role twice.105 It also follows that, if Vogel and Steinbach (1998)
are right, all applicatives should be allowed to appear together because each of
them is associated with a different thematic role. I show below that this is true
for English (section 8.3) and German (section 8.2) as long as the individual se-
lectional and verbal requirements for each applicative are met.
8.2 German
In German, no applicative head is recursive (379). This supports the contention
by Vogel and Steinbach (1998) that a different interpretation for each applica-
tive argument is a necessary requirement for the co-occurrence of applicatives.
379. Recursivity of Applicatives
a. *Der Mann zerbrach dem Kind den
the.Nom man broke the.Dat child the.Dat
Eltern das Rad.
parents the.Acc bike
'The man broke the bike on the child on the parents.'
(Affected Experiencer)
b. *Der Oma zerbrach dem Mann die
the.Dat grandma broke the.Dat man the.Acc
Vase.
vase
'The grandma was responsible for preventing the man who was re-
sponsible for the vase from breaking it.'
(Dative of Inaction)
105 Parsons (1990) also disallows having the same event participant twice per event (see
Chapter 2).
189
106 The table only shows the co-occurrence possibilities of two applicatives. The possibili-
ties for three applicatives are discussed in section 8.2.7. + marks grammatical combina-
tions, * marks ungrammatical combinations, ? marks marginal combinations.
190
As can be seen from the table, there are only a few options for applicatives to
co-occur. I explain this pattern in the following subsections.
191
force required for the ethical dative. The addressee is ordered to enjoy some-
thing but it is not really possible to order enjoyment. Typically, phrases like
"Enjoy yourself!" and "Have fun!" (and their German equivalents) are wishes
rather than orders (and, thus, they do not have directive force). However, while
this sentence is semantically marked, it indicates what the subject wants to hap-
pen and therefore is not completely unacceptable.
The grammaticality of the ethical dative co-occurring with the affected ex-
periencer (380c), the true benefactive (380d), and the part-whole applicative
(380e) is explained because all of these applicatives attach outside of VP while
the ethical dative is higher up in the syntactic structure. Consequently, each of
them is licensed as long as its individual requirements are met. This is schema-
tized in (381). (Here, App stands for the different applicative heads of affected
experiencers, true benefactives, and part-whole applicatives.)
381. 3
[DIRECTIVE] AppEDP
3
Ethical Dative AppED'
3
AppED 3
[IRREALIS] …
3
AppP
3
Applicative App'
3
App VP
Unlike many other applicatives, the ethical dative can also occur with se-
lected datives (Wegener 1983, Vogel and Steinbach 1998) and ditransitives
(382).
382. a. Hilf mir jetzt dem Kind!
help me.Dat now the.Dat child
'Help the child now and I want that to happen!'
b. Gib mir dem Jungen das Buch!
give me.Dat the.Dat boy the.Acc book
'Give the boy the book and I want that to happen!'
This can also be attributed to the fact that the ethical dative attaches so high in
the syntactic structure that it cannot impose any restrictions on the VP (cf. We-
gener 1983).
192
193
384. 3
Voice[-agentive] RespP
3
DI Resp'
3
Resp VP
3
V NP
Consequently, no applicative can interfere in this structure because Resp can
only occur between Voice and VP. The higher attaching ethical dative is marked
when co-occurring with the DI because of different verbal requirements (section
8.2.1).
194
386. 3
Subject1 3
1 3
t1 Voice'
3
Voice ApplSCRP
3
a1 ApplSCR'
3
ApplSCR VP
There is no place for any other applicative argument to attach in this structure.
The higher attaching ethical dative is only marginally available to co-occur with
the subject co-referential applicative argument for semantic reasons (section
8.2.1).
195
388. 3
Voice AffP
3
Affected Experiencer Aff'
3
Aff VP
The same pattern of co-occurrence also holds for the pertinence dative. This
is expected because I propose in Chapter 3 that the pertinence dative has the
same structure as the affected experiencer.
389. a. *Die Katze zerkratzt dir Maria gestern
the.Nom cat scratched you.Dat Maria.Dat yesterday
den Finger.
the.Acc finger
'The cat scratched Maria's finger on you yesterday.' of 'The cat
scratched your finger on Maria yesterday.'
(Affected Experiencer + Pertinence Dative)
b. *Gott erschuf Eva Adam den Arm.
God.Nom created Eva.Dat Adam.Dat the.Acc arm
'God created Eve's arm for Adam.' or God created Adam's arm for
Eve.'
(True Benefactive + Pertinence Dative)
c. *Der Finger erfror dem Arzt Maria
the.Nom finger froze the.Dat doctor Maria.Dat
'Maria's finger froze on the doctor's watch.' or 'The doctor's finger
froze on Maria's watch.'
(DI + Pertinence Dative)
d. *Ich esse mir dem Mann das Bein.
I.Nom eat me.Dat the.Dat man the.Acc leg
'I'm gonna eat me the man's leg.'
(Subject Co-Referential + Pertinence Dative)
e. Tritt mir Maria auf den Mantel!
step me.Dat Maria.Dat onto the.Acc coat
'Step onto Maria's coat and I want that to happen!'
(Ethical Dative + Pertinence Dative.)
196
(379e). However, they can occur with ethical datives (380d) or part-whole ap-
plicatives (390).
390. Ich zerbeule dir dem Auto die Tür.
I.Nom dent you.Dat the.Dat car the.Acc door
'I'm denting the car's door for you.'
(Part-Whole + True Benefactive)
Since the part-whole applicative must select VP (Chapter 6, 8.2.6), this indi-
cates that the true benefactive can either select VP or a part-whole applicative. It
cannot occur with the DI because the DI must be selected by non-agentive Voice
and select VP. The same is true for the subject co-referential applicative argu-
ment (except that Voice is agentive). Aff is also hypothesized to require Voice
and VP as its surrounding projections (see section 8.2.4) and therefore the true
benefactive cannot interfere. Part-whole applicatives are the only applicatives
that do not have to be selected by Voice. The AppPWP projection is therefore
free to be selected by another applicative, such as the true benefactive (391).107
391. VoiceP
3
Subject Voice'
3
Voice BenP
3
True Benefactive Ben'
3
Ben VP/AppPW
As discussed in Chapter 5, the true benefactive can alternatively be ex-
pressed as a für 'for'-PP. If this PP is used, the true benefactive can appear with
all applicatives, except the Dative of Inaction (392a) and another true benefac-
tive (392b).
392. a. *Der Oma zerbrach die Vase für Sarah.
the.Dat grandma broke the.Nom vase for Sarah
'The vase broke on grandma's watch for Sarah.'
(DI + für-PP)
b. #Für seine Mutter malt Jan seinem Vater ein Bild.
for his mother draws Jan his.Dat father a picture
'For his mother, Jan is drawing a picture for his dad.'
(True Benefactive + für-PP)
107 Not requiring the true benefactive to select VP results in losing the explanation of why
they can only appear with transitive verbs.
197
108 The sentence is acceptable if the dative and the PP receive different thematic roles.
109 This structure makes specific predictions for again-modification which I do not further
investigate here.
198
393. VoiceP
3
Subject Voice'
3
Voice VP
3
App VP
3
PP VP1
3
für NP
The availability of the für-PP also demonstrates that the ungrammatical occur-
rences of the true benefactive with other applicatives are due to syntactic re-
strictions and not semantic restrictions (except possibly the DI) because the
thematic role assigned by the für-PP and the true benefactive are the same, but
the two cannot co-occur with the same applicatives.
199
The DI cannot appear with the affected experiencer (387b), Dative of Inac-
tion (383c), subject co-referential (385c), or itself (379f).
8.2.7 Summary
Vogel and Steinbach (1998) are right that the co-occurrence possibilities of ap-
plicatives are semantically restricted. No applicative is recursive. Furthermore,
most German applicatives select VP and are consequently restricted in their co-
occurrence options since only one VP is available. The exceptions are the ethical
dative and the true benefactive. The former attaches outside of IP, selecting the
projection including [IRREALIS] and does not impose verbal restrictions (beyond
the ones carried by directive force, e.g. no stative verbs are possible). The latter
can select VP directly or attach outside of the part-whole applicative.
The affected experiencer applicative, the part-whole applicative, the Dative
of Inaction and the subject co-referential applicative must select VP. The DI,
furthermore, must be selected by non-agentive Voice. Consequently, these ap-
plicatives are restricted in their co-occurrence options.
Given these selectional requirements, it should be possible to have the fol-
lowing three applicatives co-occurring: part-whole applicative, true benefactive
and ethical dative. Yet, this combination is only marginally possible (395).
395. ?Zerbeul mir dem Boss (noch) dem
dent me.Dat the.Dat boss Prt the.Dat
Auto die Tür!
car the.Acc door
'Dent the car's door for the boss and I want that to happen!'
(Part-Whole, True Benefactive, Ethical Dative)
I contend that this marginal grammaticality of three applicatives co-occurring is
due to the availability of the für-PP for the true benefactive. The acceptability of
sentence (395) is improved if this PP is used (396).
396. Zerbeul mir für den Boss (noch) dem
dent me.Dat for the boss Prt the.Dat
Auto die Tür!
car the.Acc door
'Dent the car's door for the boss and I want that to happen!'
(Part-whole applicative, für –PP, Ethical Dative)
(396) shows that the sentence in (395) should be semantically acceptable. Thus,
there must be some other reason for its marginality. I contend that it is the se-
mantically equivalent für-PP which must be present to avoid a higher processing
load imposed the three dative-marked applicatives in (395).
200
8.3 English
For English, it should also be true that no applicative is recursive because it
would lead to having one thematic role used twice for the same event. Indeed,
none of the three English applicatives can co-occur with itself (397).
397. a. *Gerald broke the vase on his son on his wife.
(Affected Experiencer)
b. *Gerald bought her Mike a car.
(Recipient Benefactive)
c. *Gerald1 bought him1 him1 a car.
(Subject Co-referential Applicative)
Thus, the contention of Vogel and Steinbach (1998) that the co-occurrence of
applicative arguments is semantically restricted also holds for English.
The affected experiencer may co-occur with the recipient benefactive (398).
398. Gerald bought her a car on his father.
This shows that the affected experiencer can adjoin regardless of the presence of
Rec. This is schematized in (399).
399. VoiceP
3
Subject Voice'
3
Voice vP
3
PP vP
3 3
on NP NP1 vP
3
NP2 v'
3
v RecP
3
t1 Rec'
3
Rec VP
The affected experiencer is marginally acceptable with the subject co-
referential applicative (400).
400. ?Gerald1 bought him1 a motorcycle on his wife.
This again supports the affected experiencer PP's adjunct status. It can adjoin to
VP without interfering with the subject co-referential applicative, as schema-
tized in (401).
201
401. VoiceP
3
Subject1 3
1 3
t1 Voice'
3
Voice ApplP
3
a1 Appl'
3
Appl VP
3
PP VP
3
on NP
The recipient benefactive and the subject co-referential applicative cannot
co-occur (402) (Christian 1991):
402. *Gerald1 bought him1 her a car.
This is due to the fact that both of them select VP, and there is only one VP.
Thus, it is expected that they cannot co-occur.
It is possible to have an applicative co-occur with a PP that expresses the
semantic function of another applicative. For instance, even though the subject
co-referential applicative and the recipient benefactive cannot co-occur (402),
the subject co-referential applicative can occur with a for-PP expressing the re-
cipient (403).
403. a. He's gonna buy (*him) his son a pick-up.
b. He's gonna buy {him/ *himself} a pick-up for his son.
(Horn 2009, examples 22a, b)
This shows that this co-occurrence restriction is syntactic and not semantic. As
in German (section 8.2), selectional requirements of the applicatives can explain
this. The following tables sums up the co-occurrence patterns of English ap-
plicative arguments.
Aff Exp * + ?
Recipient + * *
Sub Co-Ref ? * *
202
8.4 Conclusion
In this chapter, I have discussed the possibilities of different applicative argu-
ments co-occurring. No applicative head is recursive. Furthermore, in German
and English some applicative heads must select VP. This limits the co-
occurrence possibilities of different applicatives. It was shown that as long as
each applicative obeys its individual selectional and verbal restrictions, different
applicatives can co-occur.
Overall this discussion has shown that the system of applicative arguments
that I have presented in this book for German and English, respectively, is con-
sistent because the different types of applicative arguments can occur together in
a way that is predicted by the analyses I have proposed for the different types of
applicative arguments.
9 Conclusion
Throughout this book, I have discussed the applicative arguments of German
and English. For both languages, I have distinguish the different types based on
their syntactic behavior, their meaning, and whether the meaning is contributed
to the not-at-issue tier or the at-issue tier of meaning. German has three types of
applicative arguments that contribute only at-issue meaning: true benefactives,
Datives of Inaction, part-whole applicative arguments. It has two types of not-at-
issue applicatives: ethical datives and subject co-referential applicatives. Finally,
it has one type of applicative argument that contributes both at-issue and not-at-
issue meaning: affected experiencers. English has one applicative for each type
of meaning contribution: the affected experiencer contributes both at-issue and
not-at-issue meaning, the recipient benefactive contributes only at-issue mean-
ing, and the subject co-referential applicative contributes only not-at-issue
meaning. The existence of the affected experiencer applicative arguments with
both at-issue and not-at-issue meaning has shown that the system of two tiers of
meaning proposed by Potts (2005) needs to be adjusted to allow for such ele-
ments.
The fact that each type of applicative argument displays unique behaviors
and restrictions supports my contention that the broad categorization of applica-
tive arguments proposed by Pylkkänen (2002) is not sufficient. She differenti-
ates only two basic types of applicative argument: high and low. As I have
shown, the ones that she bundles as high applicatives do not behave alike and
cannot all be given the same analysis. Furthermore, the discussion of the Ger-
man ethical datives has shown that there are applicative arguments that attach
outside of VoiceP. Because of that, they do not fit Pylkkänen's system at all.
All of my analyses have relied on a functional head (more often than not
phonologically null) to introduce the applicative argument. Some of these heads
were simple heads in the sense that they only assign a thematic role to the argu-
ment. Others are more complex in that they either require functional composi-
tion or are bi-eventive. These phonologically null functional heads may be con-
sidered a flaw of these analyses, as there is at least one approach to the analysis
of applicative structures that does not require phonologically null functional
heads, namely the approach taken by Schöffer (1992) who argues that the dative
in German has one of the following three functions: recipient, benefactive or
experiencer. He claims that there are no different types of datives but rather that
the perceived types are actually inferences made based on the essential functions
of the dative. There is something to be said about the dative case and why all
German applicatives are dative-marked (but not only applicatives are dative-
204
marked). However, the differences between the types of applicatives that I have
argued for here cannot be captured by the approach by Schöffer (1992): the part-
whole applicative argument as well as the existence of both the Dative of Inac-
tion and the affected experiencer speak against his approach. The part-whole
applicative argument does not have any of the dative interpretations he considers
essential; it does not denote an experiencer in any way, nor does the entity bene-
fit or receive anything. It is a far stretch to infer the part-whole relation and dis-
regard other possibilities such as a benefactive interpretation. The latter should
be more easily available if the dative typically carries this interpretation. The
existence of both the Dative of Inaction and the affected experiencer results in a
similar problem: many sentences are ambiguous between the two interpretation
but it is unclear where the "responsibility"-interpretation of the DI comes from
in Schöffer's approach if the affect experiencer is also available. However, it is
true that the case-marking for applicatives in German needs to be discussed.
Saying that all applicatives receive dative case in German is a good observation
but it is not an explanation. Also, it does not explain why only the ethical dative
can appear with verbs that assign dative case to their complements (e.g. helfen
'help', folgen 'follow', danken 'thank', gleichen 'be like'). No other German ap-
plicative can appear with lexical datives. Further research has to explain this in-
teraction of dative-marked applicatives and verbs assigning dative case lexically.
Further support for analyzing German and English applicatives as involving
phonologically null heads could come from languages that have overt mor-
phemes marking the presence of applicative arguments such as many Bantu and
Native American language. The correspondence of the applicatives discussed
here and the ones in those languages requires further investigation. All the ap-
plicatives that I have posited for German and English have equivalent (or at least
very similar) counterparts in other languages. The one head found in English
that is not found in German is the recipient benefactive. However, the posited
structure can also be found (as a non-applicative structure) in German (as well
as in other languages as an applicative). The German applicatives not found in
English also have cross-linguistic counterparts. True benefactives have been dis-
cussed for many languages (Kittilä and Zuniga 2010). The Dative of Inaction
has a similar Japanese structure, the ethical dative has an analogy in the French
ethical dative (which has a slightly different meaning (cf. Authier and Reed
1992, Jouitteau and Rezac 2008)), the part-whole applicative can be viewed as
being similar to the Korean inalienable possessor construction (although it does
not have exactly the same requirements and meaning). Thus, no posited applica-
tive is unique when put in a cross-linguistic perspective. The cross-linguistic
perspective might help justifying the phonological null functional heads.
205
Appendix 1: Affected Experiencers
1) German Affected Experiencer (69)
a. Alex zerbrach Chris Bens Vase.
Alex.Nom broke Chris.Dat Ben.Gen vase.Acc
'Alex broke Ben's vase on Chris.'
b. VoiceP<v,t>
3
Alex Voice'
3
Voice AffP<v,t>
3
Chris Aff'
3
Aff<vt,evt> VP<v,t>
6
zerbrach Bens Vase
c. (AffP and Voice combine by Event Identification.)
[[VP]] = λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(Ben's vase)
[[Aff]] = λPvt.λx.λe. P(e) & e'(EXPER(e') & Exp(e')(x)) : e'' (P(e'') →
Source(e'')(e'))
[[Aff']] = λx.λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(Ben's vase) & e'(EXPER(e') &
Exp(e')(x)) : e'' (BREAK(e'') & Thm(e'')(Ben's vase) → Source(e'')(e'))
[[AffP]] = λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(Ben's vase) & e'(EXPER(e') &
Exp(e')(Chris)) : e'' (BREAK(e'') & Thm(e'')(Ben's vase) →
Source(e'')(e'))
[[Voice]] = λx. λe. Agt(e)(x)
[[VoiceP]] = λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(Ben's vase) & Agt(e)(Alex) &
e'(EXPER(e') & Exp(e')(Chris) : e''((BREAK(e'') & Thm(e'')(Ben's
vase)) → Source(e'')(e'))
(Bosse et al. 2012, modified examples 67, 68)
208
209
210
211
212
Appendix 2: Not-At-Issue Applicatives
1) German Ethical Dative (190)
a. Komm mir pünktlich nach Hause!
come me.Dat on.time to home
'Come home on time and I want this to happen!'
b.
3
DIRECTIVE AppEDP
3
ethical dative AppED'
3
AppED IRREALISP
3
110
IRREALIS IP
w
c. [[IP]] = λw. e in w. COME(e) & Goal(e)(home) & On time(e)
[[IRREALISP]] = w. e in w. COME(e) & Goal(e)(home) & On time (e)
[[AppED]] = λP. λx. P : x wants one world from the set P to come true
[[AppED']] = λx. w. e in w. COME(e) & Goal(e)(home) & On time (e) : x
wants one world from the set (w. e in w. COME(e) & Goal(e)(home) &
On time (e)) to come true
[[AppEDP]] = w. e in w. COME(e) & Goal(e)(home) & On time (e) : I want
one world from the set (w. e in w. COME(e) & Goal(e)(home) & On
time (e)) to come true
110 Han (1998) does not provide formal semantic denotations for [IRREALIS] and [DI-
RECTIVE].
214
Appendix 3: Benefactives
1) True Benefactive (244)
a. Jan öffnete der Frau die Tür.
Jan opened the woman the door
'Jan opened the door for the woman.'
b. VoiceP<v,t>
3
Jan Voice'<e,vt>
3
Voice<e,vt> BenP<v,t>
3
NP Ben'<e,vt>
der Frau 3
Ben<e,vt> VP<v,t>
3
öffnete NP
die Tür
c. (Ben and VP, Voice and BenP combine by Event Identification.)
[[öffnete]] = λx. λe. OPEN(e) & Thm(e)(x)
[[VP]] = λe. OPEN(e) & Thm(e)(the door)
[[Ben]] = λx. λe. Ben(e)(x)
[[Ben']] = λx. λe. OPEN(e) & Thm(e)(the door) & Ben(e)(x)
[[BenP]] = λe. OPEN(e) & Thm(e)(the door) & Ben(e)(the woman)
[[Voice]] = λx. λe. Agt(e)(x)
[[VoiceP]] = λe. OPEN(e) & Thm(e)(the door) & Ben(e)(the woman) &
Agt(e)(Jan)
216
217
218
219
[[Voice']] = λx. λe. BAKE(e) & Thm(e)(a cake) & Ben(e)(his mother) &
Agt(e)(x) & (e') [HAVE(e') & Thm(e')(a cake) & Recipient(e')(him) &
CAUSE(e')(e)]
[[VoiceP]] = λe. BAKE(e) & Thm(e)(a cake) & Ben(e)(his mother) &
Agt(e)(Mary) & (e') [HAVE(e') & Thm(e')(a cake) & Recipient(e')(him)
& CAUSE(e')(e)]
Appendix 4: Part-Whole Applicative
1) Part-Whole Applicative (348)
a. Jan zerbeulte dem Auto die Tür.
Jan dented the.Dat car the.Acc door
'Jan dented the door of the car.'
b. VoiceP
3
Jan Voice'
3
Voice AppPWP
3
dem Auto AppPW'
3
AppPW VP
3
zerbeulte die Tür
c. (AppPWP and Voice combine by Event Identification.)
[[zerbeulte]] = λx.λe. DENT(e) & Thm(e)(x)
[[VP]] does not compute due to functional composition
[[AppPW]] = λf<e,vt>. λx. λy. λe. f(e)(x) & xy for the duration of e
[[AppPW']] = λy. λe. DENT(e) & Thm(e)(the door)& the door y for the dura-
tion of e
[[AppPWP]] = λe. DENT(e) & Thm(e)(the door)& the door the car for the
duration of e
[[Voice]] = λx. λe. Agt(e)(x)
[[Voice']] = λx. λe. DENT(e) & Thm(e)(the door) & Agt(e)(x) & the door
the car for the duration of e
[[VoiceP]] = λe. DENT(e) & Thm(e)(the door) & Agt(e)(Jan) & the door
the car for the duration of e
222
223
Appendix 5: Dative of Inaction
Dative of Inaction (374)
a. Der Oma zerbrach eine Vase.
the.Dat grandma broke a.Nom vase
'The vase broke on grandma.'
(Hens 1997, example 2)
b.
3
Voice[-agentive] RespP
3
der Oma Resp'
3
Resp VP
3
zerbrach eine Vase
c. (Resp and VP combine by Event Identification.)
[[zerbrach]] = λx. λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(x)
[[VP]] = λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(a vase)
[[Resp]] = λx. λe. Responsible(e)(x)
[[Resp']] = λx. λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(a vase) & Responsible(e)(x)
[[RespP]] = λe. BREAK(e) & Thm(e)(a vase) & Responsible(e)(grandma)
Glossary
Affected Experiencer: a type of applicative argument that is interpreted as psy-
chologically affected; the referent must be sentient
Affectedness: psychological or mental impact on a person
Animacy requirement: the referent must be animate
Applicative Argument: a (nominal) constituent that is not entailed by the sen-
tence and not required for the sentence to be grammatical
At-issue meaning: meaning that is asserted
Benefactive: a nominal constituent that denotes who is benefitting from an
event; can be an applicative argument or a selected argument
Bi-eventive: a denotation that includes two event variables (of semantic type v)
Condition B: a binding condition that requires pronouns to be free (not bound)
in their binding domain
Condition C: a binding condition that states that referential expressions, such as
proper names, cannot be bound
Conventional Implicature (CI): according to Potts (2005), elements that con-
tribute only not-at-issue meaning, are added to the common ground, are made
by the speaker, and are independent of the at-issue meaning of the sentence
Conversational Implicature: meaning that is conveyed by an utterance without
being explicitly stated; the meaning can be inferred by the conversational
partners
Dative of Inaction (DI): a type of (German) applicative argument that an event
happened while the referent of the DI should have acted to prevent the event
Deputative Benefactive: a benefactive that denotes someone did something in-
stead of another person (who was supposed to do it); contrasts with plain and
recipient benefactives
de re-interpretation: a pronoun must be interpreted as referring to a specific
(identical) entity
Ethical dative: a type of applicative argument that expresses a speaker's attitude
towards a proposition; in German, the speaker wants the proposition to come
true
Event Identification: a semantic way of combing two functions, each with an
event variable, into one function with one event variable
Family of Sentence Test: applying syntactic transformations to a declarative
sentence to see which meaning of the declarative is maintained; used here to
distinguish at-issue meaning from not-at-issue meaning
228
229
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Index
vs. pertinence datives, 30, 33–35,
Affected experiencers, 11, 15, 29–88 38–40
adverbial modification test of, 45 on-PP variant of, 30–31, 43–44,
again-modification of, 46–48, 77, 47
85–86 quantifier binding test of, 38
agent and, 75–76 vs. recipient benefactive, 30
analysis of, 40–44, 81–86, 207–12 resultative VP and, 68, 69–71
atelic motion verbs and, 69 semantic licensing of, 67–71
at-issue meaning and, 37–38 sentience requirement of, 30–32
vs. benefactives, 31–32, 119–20, subject c-command of, 41, 42, 76
127 vs. subject co-referential applica-
bi-eventivity and, 44–46 tives, 35–36
clausal modifier test of, 45 transitive verbs and, 65–67
Condition C violation of, 41 verbal restrictions on, 30, 65–71
continuation of condition verbs verbs of physical affectedness
and, 68–69 and, 67
Conventional Implicatures and, verbs of psychological affected-
72–73 ness and, 67–68
co-occurrences of, 189, 194–95, wh-question test of, 37, 74, 180
200–201 yes/no-question test of, 36–37, 75,
vs. Dative of Inaction, 36, 182 79–80
directional PP and, 69 See also Pertinence datives
vs. ethical datives, 35 Aff head, 41–44
existence of state verbs and, 69 attachment height variation in,
in French, 78–86, 212 73–78, 82–83
in Hebrew, 78–86, 116, 211 counterfactual denotation of, 49
as high applicative, 29–30 in French, 83–85, 87
if-clause test of, 37–38, 74, 80–81 in Hebrew, 83, 84–85, 87
intransitive verbs and, 65–67 in Japanese, 73–78, 87
in Japanese, 73–78, 210 parametric variation in, 73–87
location modifiers for, 45–46 on-PP variant of, 43–44
locative PPs and, 69 again-modification, 25
negation test of, 36, 48–49, 74– of affected experiencers, 46–48
75, 79 of benefactives, 128–29
not-at-issue meaning and, 36–37, in French, 84–85
48–49, 72, 73, 78–86 in Hebrew, 85–86
particle verbs and, 69–70 in Japanese, 77
vs. part-whole applicatives, 32– of part-whole applicatives, 171–
35, 151, 157 72, 175
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
Yes/no-question test, 21
of affected experiencers, 36–37,
75, 79–80
of benefactives, 124
of Dative of Inaction, 182
of part-whole applicatives, 158
of pertinence datives, 39–40
of PP-alternative benefactive, 141
of prepositional benefactives, 141
of subject co-referential applica-
tives, 107–8
B E R K E L E Y
I N S I G H T S
IN LINGUISTICS
AND SEMIOTICS
Irmengard Rauch
General Editor