10. ‘Hit’ semantics and physical sensations: on the development of spontaneous event constructions with Spanish dar ‘give’
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Chantal Melis
Abstract
Complex predicates built with dar ‘give’ and a noun carrying the primary eventive information are common in Spanish. Our focus in the present chapter rests on a specific subclass of such predicates, used to refer to physiological experiences and characterized by the presence of a sentence-initial human participant coded in the dative case (cf. Me dio hambre ‘I felt hungry’, lit. ‘To me gave hunger’). The literature on oblique subject experiencers contains many examples of parallel structures featuring a variety of light verbs. The objective of our corpus-based study is to shed light on the diachronic process by which Spanish literal ‘give’ developed its supporting function in the physiological expressions under analysis. We locate the source of the historical development in one of the polysemous senses of dar (‘hit, strike’), product of the entrenchment of an old collocational pattern (give + blow), and we trace the evolutionary path leading from the source meaning to the experiential domain, drawing special attention to a sequence of analogical extensions guided by similarities with extant forms and templates. The outlined history accounts for the fact that the experiential predicates with dar do not exhibit the reflexive marker which had to be expected if a passive or anticausative type of derivation, with an original ‘giver’ suppressed, had been involved.
Abstract
Complex predicates built with dar ‘give’ and a noun carrying the primary eventive information are common in Spanish. Our focus in the present chapter rests on a specific subclass of such predicates, used to refer to physiological experiences and characterized by the presence of a sentence-initial human participant coded in the dative case (cf. Me dio hambre ‘I felt hungry’, lit. ‘To me gave hunger’). The literature on oblique subject experiencers contains many examples of parallel structures featuring a variety of light verbs. The objective of our corpus-based study is to shed light on the diachronic process by which Spanish literal ‘give’ developed its supporting function in the physiological expressions under analysis. We locate the source of the historical development in one of the polysemous senses of dar (‘hit, strike’), product of the entrenchment of an old collocational pattern (give + blow), and we trace the evolutionary path leading from the source meaning to the experiential domain, drawing special attention to a sequence of analogical extensions guided by similarities with extant forms and templates. The outlined history accounts for the fact that the experiential predicates with dar do not exhibit the reflexive marker which had to be expected if a passive or anticausative type of derivation, with an original ‘giver’ suppressed, had been involved.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Preface V
- Contents VII
- List of abbreviations IX
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Part 1: The nature of ditransitive arguments: the contribution of diachrony
- 1. How do ditransitives change? 1
- 2. Roles and grammatical relations in synchrony and diachrony: the case of the indirect object 19
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Part 2: Ditransitive verbs and construction alternation
- 3. The spread of the ad construction in Merovingian Latin: identifying semantic paths in the domain of ditransitives 61
- 4. Old Italian ditransitive constructions: between alternation and change 97
- 5. The emergence of the dative alternation in Dutch: towards the establishment of a horizontal link 137
- 6. Attraction and differentiation in the history of the English dative and benefactive alternations 169
- 7. The ditransitive alternation in the history of German: the case of verkaufen (‘sell’) 197
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Part 3: Ditransitives between stability and further developments
- 8. The diachrony of ditransitives in Vedic Sanskrit 231
- 9. Passives of ditransitives: the gradual rise of a Recipient passive in Italian 259
- 10. ‘Hit’ semantics and physical sensations: on the development of spontaneous event constructions with Spanish dar ‘give’ 285
- Subject Index 313
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Preface V
- Contents VII
- List of abbreviations IX
-
Part 1: The nature of ditransitive arguments: the contribution of diachrony
- 1. How do ditransitives change? 1
- 2. Roles and grammatical relations in synchrony and diachrony: the case of the indirect object 19
-
Part 2: Ditransitive verbs and construction alternation
- 3. The spread of the ad construction in Merovingian Latin: identifying semantic paths in the domain of ditransitives 61
- 4. Old Italian ditransitive constructions: between alternation and change 97
- 5. The emergence of the dative alternation in Dutch: towards the establishment of a horizontal link 137
- 6. Attraction and differentiation in the history of the English dative and benefactive alternations 169
- 7. The ditransitive alternation in the history of German: the case of verkaufen (‘sell’) 197
-
Part 3: Ditransitives between stability and further developments
- 8. The diachrony of ditransitives in Vedic Sanskrit 231
- 9. Passives of ditransitives: the gradual rise of a Recipient passive in Italian 259
- 10. ‘Hit’ semantics and physical sensations: on the development of spontaneous event constructions with Spanish dar ‘give’ 285
- Subject Index 313
