New semantic primes and new syntactic frames: "Specificational BE" and "abstract THIS/IT"

Title
New semantic primes and new syntactic frames: "Specificational BE" and "abstract THIS/IT"
Publication Date
2008
Author(s)
Goddard, Cliff
Wierzbicka, Anna
Editor
Editor(s): Cliff Goddard
Type of document
Book Chapter
Language
en
Entity Type
Publication
Publisher
John Benjamins Publishing Company
Place of publication
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Edition
1
Series
Studies in Language Companion Series (SLCS)
UNE publication id
une:2332
Abstract
In this chapter we first propose a new semantic prime: specificational BE, i.e. BE (SOMEONE/SOMETHING). We then show how the new prime can be used to analyse some classic problems in the semantics of naming and reference, and make some initial observations about its cross-linguistic realisations. In the second part of the chapter, we explore a newly recognised syntactic option of the prime This, here termed "abstract THIS/IT", which is of particular importance to discourse anaphora. The third and final part of the chapter shows how using these new possibilities together enables improved analyses of certain English grammatical constructions, such as presentational "it-constructions", clefts, and specificational sentences.
Link
Citation
Cross-Linguistic Semantics, p. 35-57
ISBN
9789027205698
Start page
35
End page
57

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