A Linguist's Linguist: Studies in South Slavic Linguistics in Honor of E. Wayles Brown

Applicative Constructions in Siovenian

Applicative Constructions in Siovenian Tatjana Marvin 1. Introduction Applicative constructions have received quite a lot of attention in the recent linguistic literature. This revival of the previous research on the subject (Baker 1988, Bresnan and Moshi 1993, Marantz 1984, 1993, Pesetsky 1995) is largely due to the extensive research in terms of treating applicative constructions as a result of an applicative head attachment in the syntax, where the applicative argument is introduced by this applicative head (Pylkkanen 2000, 2002, 2008, McGinnis 2001, Cuervo 2003, Diaconescu 2004, Jeong 2007, Diaconescu and Rivero 2007, Slavkov 2007) rather than resulting from licensing the construction through the verb, where the applicative argument is treated as one of the arguments of the verb. Also, all the recent works cited treat double object constructions in the languages under investigation as applicative constructions, some of them also proposing the same applicative structure for possessor dative constructions. In this paper, I discuss the applicative construction in Slovenian, showing that Slovenian data is to some extent compatible with Pylkkanen 2002 and her approach taken in subsequent work, though also poses some problems for her proposal.1 The applicative head attachment in syntax is confirmed by the meanings displayed by Slovenian applicative structures, while at the same time the availability of these applicative meanings in Slovenian depends on the inherent semantics of the verb as well, which should not be the case if the applicative meaning is derivable from the structure with the pertaining ap1 Pylkkanen 2008 is a monograph that agrees with Pylkkanen 2002 on all main points. Given that all related subsequent work by other authors is based on Pylkkiinen 2002 I mostly refer here to the latter when analyzing Slovenian data in terms of a Pylkkiinen-like approach. Steven Franks, Vrinda Chidambaram, and Brian Joseph, eds. A Linguist's Linguist: Studies in South Slavic Linguistics in Honor of E. Wa yles Browne. Bloomington, IN: Siavica, 297315 . 298 T ATJANA MARVIN plicative semantics exclusively. What is more, the diagnostics used to establish applicative meanings in Pylkkanen 2002 and subsequent work fail to work for Slovenian, which calls for a reexamination of the treatment of applicatives in the recent literature. The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 contains a brief general description of applicative constructions, with special emphasis on the lexical semantic approach found in Pylkkanen's and subsequent work. Section 3 deals with the main characteristics of Slovenian applicative constructions and the implications they have for the lexical semantic approach. Section 4 concludes this paper. 2. High and low Applicatives In its narrow meaning, the term applicative is understood as a construction in which a verb bears a specific morpheme licensing an oblique (non-core) argument. This argument appears in addition to those arguments inherently selected by the verb. Such arguments are typically assumed to be interpreted as benefactive or instrumental (Baker 1988, Bresnan and Moshi 1990, Alsina and Mchombo 1993), though the applicative construction can be associated with the thematic roles such as malefactive, goal, locative, and source as well. Here are some common examples from Chaga found in the literature on applicatives; the affected object wife is added to the argument structure of the transitive verb eat in (lb). (1) a. N -a- 'i-lyl-a k-elya. FOC-lSUB-PR-eat-FV 7-food 'He/She is eating food.' b. N - a - 'i - lyl - i-a m-kil k-elya. FOC-lSUB-PR-eat-APPL-FV I-wife 7-food 'He is eating food for his wife.' (Bresnan and Moshi 1990) If the applicative morpheme appears on a transitive verb, it produces a double object construction such as (lb). If attached to an intransitive verb, it makes the verb transitive, as in the example (2) from Chaga. ApPLICATIVE CONSTRUCTIONS IN SLOVENIAN 299 (2) N - a-'1 - Zr1C - i-a mbuyiL FOC-lSUB-PR-run-APPL-FV 9-friend 'He is running for a friend.' (Bresnan and Moshi 1990) In its broad meaning, the term applicative is also used for oblique (indirect) objects of the verb that appear together with the direct object in languages even without an overt applicative marker. For example, Marantz (1993) proposes that the English double object constructions such as in (3) and constructions with dative/accusative affected arguments in a wide variety of languages are in fact applicative constructions , but do not show phonologically overt applicative morphology on the verb. In this paper, the term applicative construction is...