Abstract
This paper studies the interpretive properties of emphatic possessives in Spanish (e.g., El apartamento tiene su cocina y todo ‘The flat has its own kitchen and all’), focusing on a feature that distinguishes this type of possessives from canonical prenominal possessives: their reflexive status. It is first claimed that emphatic possessives are consistently used in order to confirm and reinforce a pre-existent possession relation. Certain cases that prima facie might cast doubts on the characterization of emphatic possessives as reflexives are further addressed, showing that possessives with an emphatic meaning always behave like anaphors. The role reflexivity plays in the expression of emphasis is finally discussed, arguing that emphatic possessives belong to a group of optional non-core reflexive pronouns with an emphatic import, which also includes emphatic pronouns and the aspectual dative.
Acknowledgments
I thank two anonymous reviewers for their comments on the content of this work, which has been supported by a grant to the project FFI2017-87140-C4-4-P.
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorials
- Remembering SHLL Associate Editor Kimberly Geeslin
- A Thank You and a Welcome
- Research Articles
- Cognitive Status and Subject Reference in Spanish Written Discourse
- El efecto del refuerzo de /b d ɡ/ en la percepción de acento extranjero en español
- The Temporal Relationships between the Pluscuamperfecto and mientras + Imperfecto
- Spanish Emphatic Possessives and Reflexivity
- Linguistic Contact in Perspective: Lateral Coda in Principense Portuguese
- Las vocales glotalizadas en el español guatemalteco: Un análisis sociofonético entre los hablantes bilingües (español-kaqchikel) y monolingües
- How Do You Say Madrid? Final /d/ Variation and the Indexicality of Madrilenian Localness
- Phonetic Context, Task Formality, Learner Level, and Orthographic Effects in L2 Spanish Palatal Obstruents
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorials
- Remembering SHLL Associate Editor Kimberly Geeslin
- A Thank You and a Welcome
- Research Articles
- Cognitive Status and Subject Reference in Spanish Written Discourse
- El efecto del refuerzo de /b d ɡ/ en la percepción de acento extranjero en español
- The Temporal Relationships between the Pluscuamperfecto and mientras + Imperfecto
- Spanish Emphatic Possessives and Reflexivity
- Linguistic Contact in Perspective: Lateral Coda in Principense Portuguese
- Las vocales glotalizadas en el español guatemalteco: Un análisis sociofonético entre los hablantes bilingües (español-kaqchikel) y monolingües
- How Do You Say Madrid? Final /d/ Variation and the Indexicality of Madrilenian Localness
- Phonetic Context, Task Formality, Learner Level, and Orthographic Effects in L2 Spanish Palatal Obstruents