Anticausative derivations (and other valency alternations) in French
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Marie Labelle
Abstract
It is proposed to derive the two distinct French anticausative constructions from the interplay of two functional heads, Voice and v, where non-active Voice dominates the morpheme se, and v is the verbal head introducing a dynamic subevent and assigning the Agent role. The middle anticausative derivation (Le vase se casse ‘The vase breaks’) results from the insertion of se under non-active Voice, coupled with the absence of a vP projection. By contrast, the active anticausative derivation (Le vase casse ‘The vase breaks’) results from the use of active Voice with a v projection lacking a specifier. It is shown how these hypotheses account for the derivation of change of state verbs, verbs of movement, as well as the middle anticausative construction with a typically agentive verb, construire ‘to build’.
©Walter de Gruyter
Articles in the same Issue
- On the lexicon–syntax interface in Romance languages
- Against ditransitivity
- Parametric change in the grammatical encoding of indirect objects in Brazilian Portuguese
- The locative alternation: On the symmetry between verbal and prepositional locative paradigms
- Verb-particle constructions in Romance: A lexical-syntactic account
- The se clitic and its relationship to paths
- Anticausative derivations (and other valency alternations) in French
- Language index
- Subject index
Articles in the same Issue
- On the lexicon–syntax interface in Romance languages
- Against ditransitivity
- Parametric change in the grammatical encoding of indirect objects in Brazilian Portuguese
- The locative alternation: On the symmetry between verbal and prepositional locative paradigms
- Verb-particle constructions in Romance: A lexical-syntactic account
- The se clitic and its relationship to paths
- Anticausative derivations (and other valency alternations) in French
- Language index
- Subject index
