Phy-inside-psych adjectives

Contrary to adjectives like amusing and touching, certain Ving/ant adjectives have a psych reading without originating from a psych verb, such as jaw-dropping 'surprising' in English and marrant 'amusing' in French. It is a fact that emotions trigger certain characteristic physic...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Isabelle Haïk
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Cercle linguistique du Centre et de l'Ouest - CerLICO 2020-11-01
Series:Corela
Subjects:
Online Access:https://journals.openedition.org/corela/12723
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Summary:Contrary to adjectives like amusing and touching, certain Ving/ant adjectives have a psych reading without originating from a psych verb, such as jaw-dropping 'surprising' in English and marrant 'amusing' in French. It is a fact that emotions trigger certain characteristic physical effects. The verbs of such adjectives name that physical effect. This article claims that languages can, provided that independent grammatical conditions are respected, display constructs of that phy-inside-psych form, namely, a psych construct with an embedded V naming the physical effect triggered by the psych cause. This articles deals with such adjectives in two different languages, showing similarities and differences due to their particular grammar, and it offers an original analysis of effing adjectives along those lines.
ISSN:1638-573X