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Split intransitivity in English

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 February 2018

JAMES BAKER
JAMES BAKER*
Affiliation:
Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 1TJ, [email protected]
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Abstract

This article proposes a hierarchy of functional heads encoding the features [±control], [±initiation], [±state], [±change] and [±telic] (see Ramchand 2008). It is argued that this allows for a superior analysis of split intransitivity in English than the traditional notion of ‘unaccusativity’ – the idea that there are two classes of intransitive verbs which differ in relation to the underlying status/positions of their arguments. Rather, it is shown – on the basis of a systematic consideration of a wide range of English verbs – that the proposed diagnostics for unaccusativity in English identify multiple classes, whose behaviour can be captured in terms of the proposed hierarchy. Good correlation is found between the classes identified by the English diagnostics and Sorace's (2000) Auxiliary Selection Hierarchy (ASH), providing further support for the cross-linguistic applicability of the ASH to split intransitive patterns.

Keywords

syntaxsplit intransitivityunaccusativityargument structure
Type
Research Article
Information
English Language & Linguistics , Volume 23 , Issue 3 , September 2019 , pp. 557 - 589
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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