3/5/2010. Li8 Lent term, week 8

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1 /5/2010 Michelle Sheehan Typology of ing forms Properties of the ing-of (gerundial noun) construction Properties of the gerund-participial constructions Categorial status of gerunds? Possible analyses Li8 Lent term, week i. the building ii. his reading of the poem iii. my reading glasses iv. I m reading a good book. v. his/him reading the poem i. the building [noun] ii. his reading of the poem [gerundial noun] iii. reading glasses [present-participial adjective] iv. I m reading a good book. [present-participial] v. his/him reading the poem [gerund-participial verb form] Types (i) and (ii) are clearly nouns Question: what category are these forms? (e.g. N, V, Adj) Type (iii) is a derived adjective Type (iv) is a verbal participial Type (iv) is more unclear in its categorial status... 4 Participle I. as equivalent to an adjective the whistling/fat duck II. after progressive be John is whistling. III. in adjunct clauses John went home, whistling a song Gerund (our focus today) I. Ing-of I disapprove of his smoking of cigars. II. Acc-ing I disapprove of him smoking cigars. III. PRO-ing I disapprove of PRO ARB smoking cigars. IV. Poss-ing I disapprove of his smoking cigars

2 /5/2010 Gerundial nouns (ing-of construction) are similar to deverbal nouns. Argument structure is expressed in deverbal nouns: (1) a. Caesar s destruction of the city AGENT PATIENT b. Mary s dislike of the play. Passivisation is possible within the noun phrase: (2) a. Caesar s destruction of the city b. the city s destruction Affectedness Condition: () a. John s knowledge of algebra b. *algebra s knowledge 7 8 Even within the class of deverbal nouns, some nouns are more verb-like and some more noun-like. destruction act of destroying vs. ruins, result of an act of destroying discovery act of discovering vs. thing discovered Process nominalisations bear a closer affinity with verbal syntax than result nominalisations do: process nominalisations may have compulsory objects: (4) The complete destruction of the city took several days. (5) *The complete destruction took several days. (6) Destruction was obvious everywhere. result nominalisations are more amenable to pluralisation (cuttings, markings etc.) only result nominalisations occur with demonstratives: (7) *That examination of the students occurred two weeks ago. (8) That examination is twenty pages long. result nominals may require a determiner in the singular: (9) *Examination was ten pages long. (10) Examination of the students took ten hours only result nominals can co-occur with of NP s: (11) the discovery of three children(* s) in the forest (12) a discovery of John s / mine ing-of is syntactically like a deverbal noun like arrival, appreciation, etc. (1) the Queen s opening of the new building (14) the Queen s unexpected(*ly) opening of the new building (15) every opening of a new building (16) all openings of new buildings (17) a non-opening (18) *a not opening (19) *the Queen s having opened of the new building (20) *the Queen s having been opening of the new building

3 /5/2010 Subject may be accusative (Acc-ing) or possessive (Poss-ing): (21) We resented his / him leaving so early. But the two types of gerunds have different distributions, and differ in their similarity to nominals: (22) a. We walked home, John(* s) whistling all the way. b. I was annoyed at the play(?? s) finishing early (i) subject alternates with null element (PRO): (iii) no overt complementiser: (2) We approve of PRO ARB studying linguistics. (25) *We approve of for him studying linguistics. (ii) subject takes narrow scope, (iv) the subject of the gerund cannot passivise: (24) a. I counted on no one coming. b. I counted on no one to come. (26) *John was hated having to leave so soon. (vi) Subject anaphors ok: (27) We anticipated each other winning the race (i) poss-ing and acc-ing appear where clauses are banned: (a) the object of a preposition (28) a. I learned about John s fondness for cigars. b. I learned about his smoking cigars. c. I learned about him smoking cigars. d. *I learned about that John smokes cigars. (b) the subject of an sentence with subject/auxiliary inversion (29) a. Would my fondness for cigars bother you? b. Would my smoking cigars bother you? c.?would me smoking cigars bother you? d. *Does that John smokes bother you? 17 18

4 /5/2010 (c) poss-ing can be the subject of an embedded clause, acc-ing is more marginal: (0) I believe that his fondness of cigars would bother you. (1) I believe that his smoking cigars would bother you. (2)?I believe that him smoking cigars would bother you. () *I believe that that he smokes cigars would bother you. (ii) poss-ing bears agreement features, acc-ing does not: (4) *That John came and that Mary came bother me. (5) *John coming so often and Mary leaving so often bother me. (6) John s coming so often and Mary s leaving so often bother me. (i) subject is in possessive (genitive) form in DPs and poss-ing (ii) inanimate nouns sometimes make poor possessors of DP and poss-ing, but OK clausal and acc-ing subjects (7)??the bridge s surface (8)??We were upset at the bridge s falling down. (9) We were upset at the bridge falling down. (40) We were upset that the bridge has fallen down (v) extraction is not possible from poss-ing, but is OK from clauses and acc-ing: (41) the city Opi that we remember him describing ti (42) *the city Opi that we remember his describing ti (vi) This can be assimilated to the contrast between: (4) Whoi did you see a picture of ti? (44) *Whoi did you see his picture of ti? Both gerunds assign accusative to their object, like verbs and unlike nouns: (45) John( s) discovering a thesis-writing algorithm (46) *John s discovery a thesis-writing algorithm gerunds can be modified by adverbs, like VPs and unlike NPs: (47) Horace( s) carefully describing the bank vault to Max (48) *Horace s carefully description of the bank vault to Max gerunds can bear tense and aspect auxiliaries: (49) Guinovere( s) having presented a golden cup to Arthur (50) *Guinovere s have(ing) presentation of a golden cup to Arthur (i) in non-argument position only accusative ( participle construction) is possible, cf. also I caught him (*his) reading my mail. (ii) Register - Poss-ing is more formal than Acc-ing (iii) some types of subject disallow or disfavour Poss-ing: (51) I hate it (*its) raining when I m walking home. (52) I hate this (*this s) happening. (5) I hate there (*there s) always being some problem. (v) subject position favours Poss-ing as compared to object position (vi) matrix verb influences the choice: appreciate, mind like, hate stop - favourable to Poss-ing - unfavourable to Poss-ing (iv) longer subjects tend to favour Acc-ing in formal style

5 /5/2010 Huddleston & Pullum (2002) - both are clauses historically gerunds are changing from nouns to verbs Acc-ing gerunds have gone a step further in adapting to verbal syntax Abney (1987) - Poss-ing gerunds are externally noun phrases, but verb phrases internally Acc-ing gerunds are full clauses Hudson (200) gerunds are both nouns and verbs He is looking at things from the perspective of a different model of syntax, which allows a projection to be of more than one category. In other syntactic approaches the basic V/N distinction is crucial. TP DP T 4 John T VP V DP smoking 4 cigars DP DP D 4 John D VP s V DP smoking 4 cigars Abney, Steven Paul The English noun phrase in its sentential aspect. MIT doctoral dissertation, esp. chapter Gerunds. Hudson, Richard Gerunds without phrase structure. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 21: Huddleston, Rodney, and Pullum, Geoffrey K The Cambridge grammar of the English language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, chapter 14, sections 1.5 and 1.6 The structure of gerund-participials, , Pullum, Geoffrey K English nominal gerund phrases as noun phrases with verb-phrase heads. Linguistics 29: