Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-4rdpn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T02:25:55.678Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Big Mess Construction: interactions between the lexicon and constructions1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 June 2011

JONG-BOK KIM  and
PETER SELLS
JONG-BOK KIM
Affiliation:
School of English, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, 130-701, [email protected]
PETER SELLS
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, SOAS, London WC1H 0XG, United [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The so-called Big Mess Construction (BMC) (e.g. so prominent a punctuation), introduced by a limited set of degree words, places an adjectival expression in the predeterminer position. In movement approaches, such idiosyncratic properties of the BMC have been attributed to the interaction of functional projections and movement operations, whereas in surface-oriented analyses focus has been placed on the supposition of special constructions and their constructional properties. In this article, we show that neither of these two previous perspectives captures the variations and flexibility of the construction in question satisfactorily. Our approach adopts the view that degree words are functors selecting their head, and attributes the peculiarities to the interactions between the lexical properties of the degree items and the constructional constraints in question.

Type
Research Article
Information
English Language & Linguistics , Volume 15 , Issue 2: The structure of the noun phrase in English: synchronic and diachronic explorations , July 2011 , pp. 335 - 362
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abeillé, Anne, Godard, Daniele & Sag, Ivan A.. 1998. Two kinds of composition in French complex predicates. In Hinrichs, Erhard, Kathol, Andreas & Nakazawa, Tsuneko (eds.), Complex predicates in nonderivational syntax, 1–41. San Diego: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Abney, Steven. 1987. The English noun phrase in its sentential aspect. PhD dissertation, MIT.Google Scholar
Alexiadou, Artemis, Haegeman, Lilianne & Stavrou, Melita. 2007. Noun phrase in the generative perspective. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Altenberg, Bengt. 1994. On the function of such in spoken and written English. In Oostdijk, Nelleke & de Hann, Pieter (eds.), Corpus-based research into language, 223–39. Amsterdam: Rodopi.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennis, Hans, Corver, Norbert & den Dikken, Marcel. 1998. Predication in nominal phrases. Journal of Comparative Germanic Linguistics 1, 85–117.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berman, Arlene. 1974. Adjectives and adjective complement constructions in English. PhD dissertation, Harvard University.Google Scholar
Biber, Douglas, Johansson, Stig, Leech, Geoffery, Conrad, Susan & Finegan, Edward. 1999. Longman grammar of spoken and written English. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Bolinger, Dwight. 1972. Degree words. The Hague: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bresnan, Joan W. 1973. Syntax of the comparative clause construction in English. Linguistic Inquiry 4 (3), 275–343.Google Scholar
Corver, Norbert. 1990. The syntax of left branch constructions. PhD dissertation, Tilburg University.Google Scholar
Corver, Norbert. 1997. Much-support as a last resort. Linguistic Inquiry 28, 119–64.Google Scholar
Corver, Norbert. 2002. On three types of movement within the Dutch nominal domain. In Coene, Martine & D'hulst, Yves (eds.), From NP to DP, vol. 1: The syntax and semantics of noun phrases, 297–328. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Culicover, Peter & Jackendoff, Ray. 2005. Simpler syntax. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
de Mönnink, Inge. 1996. A first approach to the mobility of noun phrase constituents. In Percy, Carol E., Meyer, Charles F. & Lancashire, Ian (eds.), Synchronic corpus linguistics: Papers from the 16th International Conference on English Language Research on Computerized Corpora, 143–57. Amsterdam: Rodopi.Google Scholar
de Mönnink, Inge. 2000. A moving phrase: A multi-method approach to the mobility of constituents in the English noun phrase. In Kirk, John M. (ed.), Corpora galore: Analyses and techniques in describing English, 133–47. Amsterdam: Rodopi.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fillmore, Charles. 1999. Inversion and constructional inheritance. In Webelhuth, Gert, Koenig, Jean-Pierre & Kathol, Andreas (eds.), Lexical and constructional aspects of linguistic explanation: Studies in constraint-based lexicalism, 113–28. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Flickinger, Daniel & Nerbonne, John. 1992. Inheritance and complementation: A case study of easy adjectives and related nouns. Computational Linguistics 19 (3), 269–309.Google Scholar
Gazdar, Gerald. 1981. Unbounded dependencies and coordinate structure. Linguistic Inquiry 12, 155–84.Google Scholar
Giorgi, Alessandra & Longobardi, Giuseppe. 1991. The syntax of noun phrases. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Goldberg, Adele. 2006. Constructions at work. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
González Escribano, José Luis. 2005. Discontinuous APs in English. Linguistics 43 (3), 563–610.Google Scholar
Haegeman, Liliane & Guéron, Jacqueline. 1999. English grammar: A generative perspective. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Hendrick, Randall. 1990. Operator movement in NP. In Halpern, Aaron L. (ed.), Proceedings of the 9th West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics, 249–64. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Huddleston, Rodney & Pullum, Geoffrey et al. 2002. The Cambridge grammar of the English language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kay, Paul & Sag, Ivan A.. 2009. Not as hard a problem to solve as you might have thought. Proceedings of the HPSG-09 Conference. Stanford: CSLI Online Publications.Google Scholar
Kennedy, Christopher & Merchant, Jason. 2000. Attributive comparative deletion. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 18, 89–146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Jong-Bok & Kim, Kyeongmin. 2009. A functor treatment of such: A corpus-based approach. Korean Journal of Linguistics 33 (4), 853–70.Google Scholar
Kim, Jong-Bok & Sag, Ivan A.. 2005. Variations in English object extraposition. Proceedings of the 41st Annual Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, 192–212. Chicago: CLS.Google Scholar
Kim, Jong-Bok & Sells, Peter. 2008. English syntax: An introduction. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Lechner, Winfried. 1999. Comparatives and DP-structure. PhD dissertation, University of Massachusetts.Google Scholar
Matushansky, Ora. 2002. Movement of degree/degree of movement. PhD dissertation, MIT.Google Scholar
Merchant, Jason. 1999. The syntax of silence: Sluicing, islands, and identity in ellipsis. PhD dissertation, University of California.Google Scholar
Moro, Andrea. 1997. The raising of predicates: Predicative noun phrases and the theory of clause structure. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Müller, Stefan. 2004. Continuous or discontinuous constituents? A comparison between syntactic analyses for constituent order and their processing systems. Research on Language and Computation 2 (2), 209–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pollard, Carl & Sag, Ivan A.. 1994. Head-driven phrase structure grammar. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Quirk, Randoph, Greenbaum, Sidney, Leech, Geoffrey & Svartvik, Jan. 1985. A comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Ritter, Elizabeth. 1992. Cross-linguistic evidence for number phrase. Canadian Journal of Linguistics 37, 197–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sadler, Louisa & Arnold, Douglas J.. 1994. Prenominal adjectives and the phrasal/lexical distinction. Journal of Linguistics 30, 187–226.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sag, Ivan A. 2010. Sign-based Construction Grammar: An informal synopsis. In Boas, Hans & Sag, Ivan A. (eds.), Sign-based Construction Grammar. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Sag, Ivan A., Wasow, Tom & Bender, Emily. 2003. Syntactic theory: An introduction. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Seppänen, Aimo, Granath, Solveig & Danielsson, Lars. 2002. The construction ‘AdjP–a(n)–Noun’ in Present-day English syntax. Leuvense Bijdragen 91, 97–136.Google Scholar
Siegel, Muffy. 1994. Such: Binding and the pro-adjective. Linguistics and Philosophy 17, 481–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Spinillo, Mariangela. 2003. On such. English Language and Linguistics 7 (2), 195–210.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Troseth, Erika. 2004. Negative inversion and degree inversion in the English DP. In den Dikken, Marcel (ed.), Linguistics in the Big Apple: CUNY/NYU working papers in linguistics, 1–15.Google Scholar
Van Eynde, Frank. 2006. NP-internal agreement and the structure of the noun phrase. Journal of Linguistics 42 (1), 139–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van Eynde, Frank. 2007. The Big Mess Construction. In Müller, Stefan (ed.), The proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar, 415–33. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Vikner, Sten. 2001. Predicative adjective agreement. In Adamzik, Kirsten & Christen, Helen (eds.), Sprachkontakt, Sprachvergleich, Sprachvariation: Festschrift für Gottfried Kolde, 399–414. Tübingen: Niemeyer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Johanna. 2002. Much about such. Studia Linguistica 56 (1), 91–115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Johanna. 2003. Number phrase and fronted pre-modifiers in Middle English. Proceedings of the 32nd Western Conference on Linguistics, 305–18. Fresno, CA: Dept of Linguistics, CSU.Google Scholar
Wood, Johanna & Vikner, Sten. 2011. Noun phrase structure and movement: A cross-linguistic comparison of such/sådan/solch and so/så/so. In Sleeman, Petra & Perridon, Harry (eds.), The noun phrase in Romance and Germanic: Structure, variation, and change, 89–110. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zamparelli, Roberto. 1995. Layers in the determiner phrase. PhD dissertation, University of Rochester.Google Scholar
Zwicky, Arnold. 1994. Exceptional degree markers: A puzzle in internal and external syntax. OSU Working Papers in Linguistics 47, 111–23.Google Scholar