Directed Motion and the Syntax fo the Spanish Gerund Construction

LUIS PARÍS

Applying and Expanding Role and Reference Grammar

NIHI-Universidad de Freiburg

Lugar: Freiburg; Año: 2016; p. 69 - 88

The directed motion subtype (DM) of the Spanish Gerund Construction (SGC) consists of a directedmotion matrix verb adverbially modified by a gerund phrase (GP) without the mediation of any explicitlinking marker. I drew evidence from different distribution patterns to conclude that DMcomprises anad-nuclear subordination linkage. The analysis of DM hints towards two broader hypotheses that wouldneed further explorations. First, it supports a non-categorical division between arguments and adjunctssince GP is a non-lexically required constituent that behaves like an argument. Second, DM shows thatthe interclausal relations hierarchy is also sensitive to the meaning type of the matrix verb in additionto the semantic relation between events.