Volume 18, Issue 2

This special issue of Cognitive Linguistics explores the linguistic encoding of events of cutting and breaking. In this article we first introduce the project on which it is based by motivating the selection of this conceptual domain, presenting the methods of data collection used by all the investigators, and characterizing the language sample. We then present a new approach to examining crosslinguistic similarities and differences in semantic categorization. Applying statistical modeling to the descriptions of cutting and breaking events elicited from speakers of all the languages, we show that although there is crosslinguistic variation in the number of distinctions made and in the placement of category boundaries, these differences take place within a strongly constrained semantic space: across languages, there is a surprising degree of consensus on the partitioning of events in this domain. In closing, we compare our statistical approach with more conventional semantic analyses, and show how an extensional semantic typological approach like the one illustrated here can help illuminate the intensional distinctions made by languages.

Guerssel et al.'s (1985) generalizations regarding the argument structure of verbs of cutting and breaking (C&B, hereafter) are reanalyzed based on the principles of Morpholexical Transparency and Complete Linking. A working hypothesis according to which the C&B domain is universally exhaustively partitioned into argument structure classes of C&B verbs is proposed and tested against a corpus of data from 17 languages. Counterevidence to the hypothesis includes bipolar verbs that are semantically specific both on the state change and its cause and a language that lacks cut verbs, framing severance as state change. The survey suggests that universals of argument structure include the principles of Morpholexical Transparency and Complete Linking, but not specific verb classes.

Are the semantic categories of very closely related languages the same? We present a new methodology for addressing this question. Speakers of English, German, Dutch and Swedish described a set of video clips depicting cutting and breaking events. The verbs elicited were then subjected to cluster analysis, which groups scenes together based on similarity (determined by shared verbs). Using this technique, we find that there are surprising differences among the languages in the number of categories, their exact boundaries, and the relationship of the terms to one another—all of which is circumscribed by a common semantic space.

Tamil and Hindi verbs of cutting, breaking, and tearing are shown to have a high degree of overlap in their extensions. However, there are also differences in the lexicalization patterns of these verbs in the two languages with regard to their category boundaries, and the number of verb types that are available to make finer-grained distinctions. Moreover, differences in the extensional ranges of corresponding verbs in the two languages can be motivated in terms of the properties of the instrument and the theme object.

The paper explores verbs of cutting and breaking (C&B, hereafter) in Yélî Dnye, the Papuan language of Rossel Island. The Yélî Dnye verbs covering the C&B domain do not divide it in the expected way, with verbs focusing on special instruments and manners of action on the one hand, and verbs focusing on the resultant state on the other. Instead, just three transitive verbs and their intransitive counterparts cover most of the domain, and they are all based on ‘exotic’ distinctions in mode of severance—coherent severance with the grain vs. against the grain, and incoherent severance (regardless of grain).

Typological descriptions of understudied languages reveal intriguing crosslinguistic variation in descriptions of events of object separation and destruction. In Lowland Chontal of Oaxaca, verbs of cutting and breaking lexicalize event perspectives that range from the common to the quite unusual, from the tearing of cloth to the snapping apart on the cross-grain of yarn. This paper describes the semantic and syntactic criteria that characterize three verb classes in this semantic domain, examines patterns of event construal, and takes a look at likely changes in these event descriptions from the perspective of endangered language recovery.

Guerssel et al. (1985) propose that crosslinguistically, separation verbs group into cut verbs and break verbs based on their meaning. This meaning supposedly affects the constructions in which the verbs occur, e.g., only break verbs are expected to participate in the causative/inchoative alternation. In Sranan, a verb that superficially looks like ‘cut’ in English is actually a break verb. Also, not only break verbs participate in the causative/inchoative alternation, as expected, but cut verbs do also. I argue that the intransitive use of cut verbs does not yield a passive construction as proposed by some; instead, it is inchoative.

Ewe verbs covering the cutting and breaking domain divide into four morpho-syntactic classes that can be ranked according to agentivity . We demonstrate that the highly non-agentive break verbs participate in the causative-inchoative alternation while the highly agentive cut verbs do not, as expected from Guerssel et al.'s (1985) hypothesis. However, four verbs tso ‘cut with precision’, ‘cut’, ‘snap-off’, and dze ‘split’, are used transitively when an instrument is required for the severance to be effected, and intransitively when not. We reject a lexicalist analysis that would postulate polysemy for these verbs and argue for a construction approach.

This paper investigates the semantic and syntactic properties of cutting and breaking verbs in Jalonke. Semantic features relevant for these Jalonke verbs are control of the effector over the locus of impact, subcategorization for specific manners/instruments, and the theme being a whole vs. already detached from an entity. The latter distinction is unattested in other languages. Syntactically, the verbs fall into two classes: cut verbs with a transitive argument structure, and break verbs with causative and inchoative argument structure options. The existence of a class of exclusively transitive break verbs, despite the existence of the causative/inchoative alternation in Jalonke, is not expected in recent theories of argument structure.

This paper presents the key Thaayorre verbs associated with events of cutting and breaking. It examines their intensional and extensional ranges; comparing prototypical usages with non-prototypical extensions. Although these Thaayorre verbs categorize the C&B semantic domain largely in accordance with the crosslinguistic patterns reported by Majid et al. (this issue), there are several interesting points of divergence. These include the union of breaking and opening events encoded by thuuth ‘pull (apart)’, and the various changes in argument structure that Thaayorre C&B verbs may undergo.

Mandarin categorizes cutting and breaking events on the basis of fine semantic distinctions in the causal action and the caused result. I demonstrate the semantics of Mandarin C&B verbs from the perspective of event encoding and categorization as well as argument structure alternations. Three semantically different types of predicates can be identified: verbs denoting the C&B action subevent, verbs encoding the C&B result subevent, and resultative verb compounds (RVC) that encode both the action and the result subevents. The first verb of an RVC is basically dyadic, whereas the second is monadic. RVCs as a whole are also basically dyadic, and do not undergo detransitivization.

While there are infinite conceivable events of material separation, those actually encoded in the conventions of a given language's verb semantics number only a few. Furthermore, there appear to be crosslinguistic parallels in the native verbal analysis of this conceptual domain. What are the operative distinctions, and why these? This article analyses a key subset of the bivalent (transitive) verbs of cutting and breaking in Lao. I present a decompositional analysis of the verbs glossed ‘cut (off)’, ‘cut.into.with.placed.blade’, ‘cut.into.with.moving.blade’, and ‘snap’, pursuing the idea that the attested combinations of sub-events have a natural logic to them. Consideration of the nature of linguistic categories, as distinct from categories in general, suggests that the attested distinctions must have ethnographic and social interactional significance, raising new lines of research for cognitive semantics.

This article discusses the semantics of verbs of separation in Tidore. Tidore is particularly rich in this domain, with many verbs cross-classifying different aspects of separation events. An empirical investigation into this domain showed that the domain of cutting and breaking verbs as distinct from other verbs of separation (open) is not straightforward in Tidore. In their morphosyntactic behavior the verbs turned out to be unusual because morphological causatives were found with unaccusative as well as with transitive and labile verbs. Furthermore, the labile verbs were shown to express both cutting and breaking semantics.

In this article, I show that Otomi (Otopamean; Otomanguean) is a language with a high degree of lexical specification and a lack of generic verbs. This phenomenon is illustrated with the study of verbs denoting cutting and breaking events.

This paper describes the lexical resources for expressing events of cutting and breaking (C&B hereafter) in the Mayan language Tzeltal. This notional set of verbs is not a class in any grammatical sense; C&B verbs are formally undistinguishable from many other transitive state-change verbs. But they nicely reveal the characteristic specificity of Tzeltal verb semantics: C&B actions are finely differentiated according to the spatial and textural properties of the theme object, with no superordinate term meaning ‘either cut in general’ or ‘break in general’. The paper characterizes the semantics of these verbs and shows that in the great majority of cases it does not predict their argument structure.

The studies reported in this special issue exemplify two approaches to semantic typology and to the study of word meaning more generally. One is an extensional approach, which relates verbs of cutting and breaking to the scenes which they are used to describe. The other focuses on the argument structure of the verbs, the relevant data being the verbs' participation in argument structure alternations. It is encouraging that these very different approaches partition the verbs of material separation in roughly compatible ways. This roundup to the special issue also addresses the interpretation of the naming data, with respect to the notions of prototype and basic level. Attention is drawn to the fact that in general the cut and break verbs seem not to display much taxonomic depth, a finding which is in stark contrast to the often elaborate taxonomies exhibited by nominal concepts.