文档介绍：The structure of lexical meaning: Why semantics really matters
John Beavers
Language, Volume 86, Number 4, December 2010, pp. 821-864 (Article)
Published by Linguistic Society of America
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THE STRUCTURE OF LEXICAL MEANING:
WHY SEMANTICS REALLY MATTERS
John Beavers
The University of Texas at Austin
This article explores the architecture of the interface between morphosyntax and lexical seman-
tics, in particular the semantic underpinnings of argument realization. Many theories of lexical
meaning assume that argument realization is derived from underlying event structure: the relative
prominence of coarguments in a clause follows from their relative semantic prominence in how
the event unfolds. I show that event structure is not sufficient to capture certain generalizations
about argument realization, however, focusing on arguments that alternate between direct and
oblique realization. I show that for these alternations the relevant semantic contrast is in strength
of truth conditions: direct realization encodes a monotonically stronger set of truth conditions as-
sociated with the alternating argument than oblique realization. This, I suggest, follows if word
meanings are built from basic units that are related to one another implicationally, and the relative
implicational strength of ponents figures into argument realization. I use as a case study
English locative and conative alternations, which, I argue, reflect stronger and weaker degrees of
affectedness along an independently motivated AFFECTEDNESS HIERARCHY. I also show that similar
contrasts are found with other alternations on other hierarchies. I conclude by suggesting that a
theory of weakening truth conditions is not patible with event-structural analyses of verb
meaning, and in fact the two