Home Linguistics & Semiotics Non-verbal Predication in the World’s Languages
book: Non-verbal Predication in the World’s Languages
Book
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

Non-verbal Predication in the World’s Languages

A Typological Survey Volume 2: Africa, Austronesia, Papunesia, Australia
  • Edited by: Pier Marco Bertinetto , Luca Ciucci and Denis Creissels
Language: English
Published/Copyright: 2026
Become an author with De Gruyter Brill

About this book

The notion of predication is usually associated with the lexical class of verbs. However, the predicate function may also be expressed by Noun / Adjective / Adverb / Quantifier Phrases:

a. John is a doctor. b. The man is old. c. The boys are in the garden. d. Sam's friends are many.

Natural languages do, with respect to non-verbal predication, what they are expected to do in any compartment of grammar: they sharply diverge in their behavior.
This book offers a wide typological overview of how languages deal with non-verbal predication (henceforth: NVP). After the pioneering works by Hengeveld (1992) and Stassen (1997), no other work has attempted to provide a comprehensive overview of this pervasive syntactic phenomenon. Hence, the need for this book.
The introductory chapter highlights the main features to be considered:

  • the lexical and morphosyntactic nature of the predicate.
  • the morphological expression of NVP.
  • the semantic types of NVP.

The bulk of the book consists of a collection of papers, written by well-known specialists, targeting different languages or language families, thus offering a rich array of typological data.
This book will be of interest to typologists, syntacticians of any theoretical creed, and students of linguistics at large.

Author / Editor information

Pier Marco Bertinetto, Pisa, Italy; Luca Ciucci, Passau, Germany; Denis Creissels, Lyon, France.

Supplementary Materials


Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
I

Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
V

Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF

Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
IX

Denis Creissels, Pier Marco Bertinetto and Luca Ciucci
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
785
Part II: Case studies

Martine Vanhove
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
789

Gerrit J. Dimmendaal
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
829

Mauro Tosco
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
865

Denis Creissels
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
915

Rozenn Guérois
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
955

Tom Güldemann and Lee J. Pratchett
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
993
Austronesia, Papunesia, Australia

Alexandre François
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
1021

Elizabeth Zeitoun
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
1067

Marian Klamer
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
1103

Hannah S. Sarvasy
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
1143

Tom Ennever and Alice Gaby
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
1169
Part III: Conclusion and prospects

Pier Marco Bertinetto, Luca Ciucci and Denis Creissels
Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
1213

Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
1275

Requires Authentication Unlicensed

Licensed
Download PDF
1283

Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
November 3, 2025
eBook ISBN:
9783112209677
Hardcover planned publication:
November 3, 2025
Hardcover ISBN:
9783112209660
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
Front matter:
14
Main content:
510
Downloaded on 5.10.2025 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783112209677/html?licenseType=restricted
Scroll to top button