Lecture Note
The Role of Pseudo-objects in (de)transitivization
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University:
Boston University -
Course:
CAS LX 110 | Say What? Accents, Dialects, and Society Academic year:
2023
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Views:
323
Pages:
20
Author:
StellarSymphony
Structure
I.
State of the art
II.
Status of dummy it
III.
Imperatives and dummy it
IV.
Does dummy it enhance the verbal territory of a V?
V.
The role of pseudo-objects in (de)transitivization
VI.
Conclusion
24 Theoretical Prerequisites: Transitivity
Hopper/Thompson’s theory of transitivity: moves beyond
the single criterion of the presence or absence of a Od
10 criteria:
measure the extent to which a clause is transitive
Transitivity1 = “the effectiveness with which an action takes
place (...)” [Hopper/Thompson 1980: 251]
Transitivity2 = effectiveness with which an action is
transferred to a patient
25 10 Criteria for measuring transitivity
[Hopper/Thompson 1980]
High Transitivity
Low Transitivity
A Participant
2 or more participants
1 participant
B Kinesis
action
non-action
C Aspect
D Punctuality
telic (completed)
atelic (in progress)
punctual
non-punctual
E Volitionality
volitional
non-volitional
F Affirmation
affirmative
negative
G Mode
realis
irrealis
H Agency
agent high in potency
agent low in potency
I
Affectedness of
the object
object totally affected
object not affected
J
Individuation
of the object
object highly individuated
object non-individuated
26 Criterion A: Participants
A high degree of transitivity implies 2 or more participants:
(1) A moved B.
highly transitive
Verbal action move is ‘effectively transferred to a patient’
Reflexives, however, are co-referential with the subject
1
participant:
(2) A moved himself.
A moved it.
semi-transitive
Why can we argue that “effectiveness with which an action takes
place” is lower with reflexives? After all A is also moved.
• patient is semantically the agent, can stop the movement
(control).
• With dummy it, there is no semantic patient.
(3) A moved Ø.
intransitive
No patient. ‘Effectiveness with which an action is transferred
to a patient’ cannot even be assessed.
27 Criterion B: Kinesis
•
Actions are more strongly associated with transitivity than
non-actions.
•
A high degree of kinesis also seems to be required if Vs take
the pseudo-object it:
bike it, bus it, floor it, frog it, hike it, hoove it, leg it, move it,
shift it, shove it, walk it, wing it
… are highly dynamic
But: *stay it, *wait it
dummy it occurs with dynamic Vs.
28 Transitivity and pseudo-objects
Pseudo-objects are semantically light, i.e. they do not carry a
significant semantic load. The effect the V can have on the
object is thus restricted.
she legged it/snuffed it/moved it
S is affected, not the Od
Semantically this is a reflexive structure
Hopper/Thompson [1980: 277]:
“reflexives in many languages have properties which can
be explained by appealing to their intermediate status
between one-argument and two-argument clauses”.
The same goes for other pseudo-objects, such as dummy it.
29 Typological considerations: ambitransitivity
in English and German
Ambitransitive = V that can be used transitively or intransitively
without having to undergo a formal change.
(43) John walks Ø home.
intransitive
(44) John walks Mary home.
transitive
Contrastive data
(45) John geht Ø nach Hause.
(46) *John geht Mary nach Hause.
no transitive counterpart
German:
herrschen (intr.) ‘rule over’ – beherrschen (trans.) ‘master sth.’
wachen (intr.) ‘be awake’
– bewachen (trans.) ‘guard sth.’
30 German and English Vs according to valency for a
randomly selected sample of 84 V [based on Schiefke 2009: 16]
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
transitive
intransitive
English
Engl: remarkably few intr. Vs
Engl: few reflexive Vs
Engl: many ambitransitive Vs
reflexive
ambitransitive
German
31 More ambitransitive Vs in English than in German
Kilby [1984: 37]: categorization between trans. and intr. Vs is less
clear-cut in English.
Dixon/Aikhenvald [2000: 4]: languages that have many
ambitransitive V also have few valency changing morphemes.
with the erosion of morphological marking (be-), markers of
transitivity might have been lost
32 Reflexives are on the decline in English
• Reflexives become obsolete in a wide range of environments [cf.
Kirchner 1951:158; Jespersen 1961: 325-331; Strang 1970:153, Peitsara 1997: 321;
Rissanen 1999: 256; König & Siemund 2000: 48; Rohdenburg 2009, Mondorf 2011:
406]
OE
I washed me
ME
>
I washed myself
I overslept myself
LModE
>
>
I washed
I overslept
Rohdenburg [2009]: shows that reflexive self is contracting its range
of application in terms of V types and frequency. Spearheaded by
AmE.
Indicative of a more general decline of reflexive self in English
33 Contrastive Data
German
reflexive structures of the following type are still fairly
common:
(1) Er hat sich hochgearbeitet.
‘He has worked himself to the top’.
English
highly productive competitor in the form of the wayconstruction:
(2) a. (...) he worked his way down the steep bank toward the
stream [FROWN]
b. Worked himself into a frenzy and gave himself
indigestion. [BNC wridom1]
34 Fig. 1. Diachronic Development of One's Way vs.
Oneself (N = 1146) [based on Mondorf 2011: 405]
100%
358
80%
48
71
284
60%
way
self
40%
57
20%
206
27
95
0%
1460-1699
1700-1799
1800-1869
1960-1993
10 Verbs: cut, drink, eat, fight, grope, hit, wind, work, worm, wriggle
35 Erosion of causative BRING
Early Modern English:
(1)
She brought him to laugh.
Present-day English:
(3)
?She brought him to laugh.
36 Causative BRING +/- detransitivizing strategy (BrE) (N=1785)
[Mondorf 2010b]
without detransitivizing strategy
no reflexive but other detransitivizing strategy
reflexive
100%
80%
189
528
358
60%
197
40%
115
20%
93
197
43
14
39
0%
10
2
1460-1699
1700-1799
1800-1869
1960-1993
Causative BRING is generally on the decline. If used at all, it is
almost exclusively used with the reflexive.
37
The decline is delayed when reflexives are present Revisiting the 7 pseudo-objects illustrated for the
V MOVE
POSS way
Reflexive self
dummy it
Ø
Cognate objects
Particle
Particle + Reflexive self
38 Another reason for the decline of the reflexive:
The competition between reflexives vs. particles
(1) Brace yourself for the impact.
(2)
(...) he said, in tones of mock-comfort,
Brace up, Merrill. [BNC wridom1]
Reflexive
Particle
39 Diachronic Development of the Competition between Reflexives and
Particles (out, up) (N = 3619) [based on Mondorf 2010: 229]
100%
229
562
1061
80%
Particle
1026
60%
40%
20%
535
Reflexive
22
38
0%
1460-1700
1700-1800
146
1800-1900
1960-1993
27 Verbs: boost, bow, brace, burn, coil, curl, dress, ease, empty, fit, freshen, gear,
heave, hire, jerk, launch, lock, open, prop, psyche, raise, rouse, smarten, straighten,
The particle is replacing reflexive self
40 Let‘ speculate …
41 Thinking out aloud: The role of pseudo objects in (de)transitivization
or “How does it fit into the larger picture“?
before PDE:
PDE:
Future:
snore (Vintr)
snore one's way through a meeting
Ø
George W. Bush one's way to ...
snuff (primary sense) New V senses: snuff it (secondary ‘die’)
move it! (primary)
move it! ‘hurry’
leg it ‘walk on foot’ leg it ‘run away’ (snake)
Transitivization
INTRANSITIVE
SEMI-TRANSITIVE
TRANSITIVE
Detransitivization
Future:
brace up
PDE:
I brought myself to believe
brace oneself for the impact
Before PDE:
I brought Pat to laugh
Pseudo objects might be the incipient stages of (de-)transitivization
processes. They seem to usher out Vtrans which decrease their verbal
territory and usher in Vintr which enhance their verbal territory. Conclusion
1. Dummy it can be related to a series of (de-)transitivization
processes
2. 7 pseudo-objects occur in semi-transitive environments with
some degree of functional overlap
• way-constructions
• Reflexives
• particles
• dummy it
3. Is the function of dummy it to modulate transitivity in
accordance with the changing entrenchment of the V (or V
sense) with which it is used?
4. it-support to increase the transitivity of weakly established Vs
or V senses?
50
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