TROUBLES WITH LEXEMES

Bernard Fradin, UMR 7110, GDR 2220 (CNRS) Franoise Kerleroux, U Paris 10; UMR 7114, GDR 2220 (CNRS) bernard.fradin@linguist.jussieu.fr, kerlerou@u-paris10.fr

Keywords. Lexeme, WFRs, deverbal nouns, clipping, delocutive adverbs. 1. Small portrait of lexeme Our starting point will be the questions raised by Aronoff more than twenty years ago (Aronoff 1976: 46): (A) What sort of information can a WFR have access to? (B) How does it have access to this information? If we accept the arguments against morpheme-based morphology, we are left with two basic entities, the lexeme and the word (or more accurately the wordform)(Matthews 1974). By definition, the former is an abstract entity lacking inflectional marking, while the latter is a fully inflectioned entity functioning as a syntactic atom. The lexeme is the abstract version of the word-form. According to the common view, a lexeme is identified by its category, its phonological form and its semantics. The phonology of the lexeme may involve one or several forms, called root if segmentally simple and stem if segmentally complex. In the latter case, each stem is used to form a subset of the paradigmatic forms of the lexeme in question. E.g. E. HOUSE has two roots {has, haz}, the second of which is reserved for plural. Even when it exhibits several stems, the lexeme is supposed to constitute one lexical unit. This unicity is guaranteed by inflection on the one hand and by the semantic content of the lexeme, which is supposed to be unique, on the other. Although few of them address directly the question, most studies devoted to derivational morphology assume that lexemes have a unique semantic representation (Mayo et al. 1995). Such a hypothesis seems to be at odds with the facts insofar as most lexical units show lexical
To appear in Booij Geert, Janet de Cesaris, Sergio Scalie, Angela Rallis (eds). 2002. Proceedings of the Third Mediterranean Meeting on Morphology. IULA, Barcelona.

MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

polysemy. For this reason, proponents of this position commit themselves to a very abstract view of semantic representation for lexemes, the underlying assumption being that their meaning is underspecified. Table 1 sums up the distinctions between word and lexeme in the lexeme-based approaches to morphology. (1) LEXEME inflection +categorised underspecified meaning WORD +inflection +categorised fully specified meaning

Table 1. Lexeme and word Most studies subscribing to the hierarchical lexicon approach adopt the same stance on lexeme. For example, (Koenig 1999: 3) says that lexical entries may be stored stripped off all information which varies across their syntactic context of occurrence. Stored entries are abstract blue-prints. The same is true of (Miller & Sag 1997: 581-582), where lexemes are represented with a unique and little specified semantic content. According to the above mentionned view, the answer to question (A) is simple: if we leave aside the phonology, WFRs have access to the abstract semantic content and the argument structure, which are both supposed to be unique. In the next sections we will examine several arrays of data which show that this view is problematic. We will see that the lexical objects to which WFRs apply are not at all abstract but highly specified semantically. As for question (B), rules have access to the information they need through the lexeme where this information is stored. 2. Abstract deadjectival nouns Consider the following uses of French denominal adjective crbral cerebral, which is formed upon the learned root (serEbr) from the set {sErvEl, serEbr} associated with the lexeme CERVEAU brain. (2) Le lobe crbral a t atteint.

MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

(3)

The cerebral lobe has been affected Il a opt pour une peinture crbrale. He chose a cerebral way of painting

In conformity with the view according to which the lexeme has a unique abstract meaning, we would expect the WFR constructing abstract deadjectival nouns to derive crbralit corresponding to both examples (2) and (3). However it is not the case as shown in (4): (4) a b La crbralit de sa peinture. *La crbralit de ce lobe.

The contrast observed in (4) can be attributed to the difference in the status of the adjective in (2) and (3). In (2) crbral is a relational adjective whereas in (3) it is a qualifying adjective. The syntactic expression of this difference is well-known. It is summed up in (5) and illustrated in (6)-(7): (5) STRUCTURES [AP DEG A] [VP copula A] [AP A N] A[PRED] and A[PRED] a b c d (7) a b c d +PRED yes yes yes yes PRED no no no yes

(6)

Il expose une peinture trs crbrale. He shows a very cerebral painting Sa peinture est crbrale. Her painting is cerebral La trs crbrale peinture de ce jeune peintre. The very cerebral painting of this young painter Cest une peinture crbrale mais envotante. It is a cerebral but entrancing painting *Il faut enlever le lobe le plus crbral. The most cerebral lobe must be removed *Ce lobe est crbral. This lobe is cerebral *Le trop crbral lobe gauche. The too much cerebral left lobe *On voit un lobe crbral mais sain. We see a cerebral but healthy lobe

MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

The PRED feature also encodes a semantic difference linked to the above syntactic properties: when used attributively, qualifying adjectives have a simple intersective interpretation (cf. (8)). On the other hand, the interpretation of relational adjectives, although intersective, is more complex. It involves two predicates (cf. (9)), one corresponding to the base-noun (Nb) and another (denoting a relation or an event) which comes from the semantic representation of the qualified head noun (Pr). Lines (8c)-(9c) give the representation of qualifying and relational adjectives respectively. The notation x/y reads x or y and should be interpreted as meaning that the argument distinguished by the relational adjective can be the first (cf. (9b)) or the second (cf. (9b)) argument of the predicate Pr. (8) a b b c a b b c peinture crbrale ; savant anglais English scientist (x. paintingx cerebralx) (x. scientistx englishx) A lobe crbral ; palais prsidentiel presidential palace (x. y. part-of xy lobex brainy) (y. x. liveevx(iny) presidentx palacey) (Pr. x/y. Pr xy Nbx/y)

(9)

The important point is that the difference just mentioned also shows up morphologically, insofar as the WFR, which builds deadjectival abstract nouns with the meaning fact or state of being A, quality of being A by suffixing it, only selects predicative adjectives as possible bases. The sensitivity of the WFR in question to the PRED status of the base-adjective can be observed for other denominal adjectives and other suffixes as well:1 (10) (11)
1

a b a

La paroi nasale est atteinte. / *La nasalit de la paroi. La voyelle nasale disparat. / La nasalit de la voyelle disparat. La notation musicale a fait des progrs. / *La musicalit de la notation.

(Rainer 1989 : 71-76) mentions similar facts for Italian. The base-adjective need not be derived : (a) Le pauvre enfant pleurait The poor child was crying. (b) *La pauvret de lenfant.

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b (12) a b

Sa voix tait trs musicale. / La musicalit de sa voix. Les traditions populaires. / *La popularit des traditions. Une chanson trs populaire. / La popularit de cette chanson (Dell 1970)

To account for the above facts, we postulate the following schematic rule for abstract nouns in -it. Pieces of information given in columns I and O act as conditions upon input and output units respectively.2 (13) (F) (SX) (S) I a b c d INPUT () cat:a PRED:+ A O a b c d OUPUT (ite) cat:n (x. OP(Ax))

Table 2. The -it derivational rule We can make the hypothesis that the impossibility to form abstract nouns from relational adjectives stems from the fact that their semantics involves (i) a predicate (Pr) which encodes a relation, and (ii) another predicate (Nb) which is not adjectival and corresponds to one of the terms of the relation. In other words, condition (O.d) can never be satisfied. If we try to represent the lexical information associated to crbral (nasal, musical) in a hierarchical lexicon framework, which includes, among others, as classifying dimensions
LEXEME, INFLECTION

and

ARGUMENT-SCHEMA

(Miller & Sag

1997; Sag & Wasow 1999)(Bonami 1999), something like the state of affairs in (14) obtains. The general information relevant to the adjectives under discussion is factored out (under the node Adjective) in the lexical hierarchy. Under the node crbral-lxm are given the idiosyncratic properties belonging to the lexical unit
CRBRAL.

This unit

corresponds to the lexeme as conceived in lexeme-based morphology. The point is that WFRs do not apply to this object but to more specific ones, identified as crbral-1 and
2

We are unable for the moment to give a precise empirical content to the nominalising operator OP and simply note that it is a function which gives properties from properties (<<e,t>,<e,t>>).

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crbral-2 in (14), which are not abstract nor underspecified since they instantiate various potentialities.

(14) LEXEME

ADJ ARG-SCHEMA INFLECTION

crbral-lxm (F) (serebral) (SX) cat:a

+PRED REL-A

PRED

crbral-1 (F) (serebral) (SX) cat:a (S) cerebral

crbral-2 (F) (serebral) (SX) cat:a (S) (Pr. Prx brainx)

3. Clipping of deverbal nouns Clipping in French affects virtually all nominal and adjectival lexical units except verbs. Phonologically, the clipping rule requires that the phonological output of the derived unit satisfy the template of the minimal word (Plnat 1993). Semantically, the referential property remains constant (same denotatum). The only change concerns the pragmatics: the abbreviated form indicates some (shared) familiarity on the part of the speaker either towards the denotatum or towards the hearer. The lexical category of the base lexeme remains unaffected. But the WFR that produces clipped evaluative forms (15b) from (15a) must have access to more detailed pieces of information than those we have just enumerated, because it applies differentially upon polysemous lexical units. (15) a b vlocipde, mtropolitain, caftria, laboratoire, gymnastique, professeur. vlo, mtro, cafte, labo, gym, prof.

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French deverbal nouns in -(t)ion, -age, -ment are systematically ambiguous. They are interpreted as nouns denoting either events or results. These interpretations are correlated to the construction in which the noun appears (Grimshaw 1990). The clipping rule may apply to introduction as far as it denotes a resulting object, but may not when it denotes an event: (16) a b (17) a b Il soppose l(introduction+*intro) du loup Paris. He is against introducting the wolf into Paris. Il a apprci l(introduction+intro) de ton livre. He appreciated the introduction of your book La frquente (manipulation+*manip) des acides met en danger la vie des employs. Frequent manipulation of acids is a danger for the employeeslife Ma dernire (manipulation+manip) sur les acides a dur deux semaines. My last manipulation on acids lasted two weeks

The clipping rule takes into account the well-known boundary between nominal constructions with a processual interpretation from constructions with a resultative one (Grimshaw 1990; Milner 1982). The respective properties of these constructions are reminded in table (18) (temporal modifiers = frequent, constant).

(18)

RELEVANT ELEMENT Determiner Number Complement PP[of] Temporal modifiers

COMPLEX EVENT
NOMINALS

RESULT OR SIMPLE
EVENT NOMINALS

Definite article only Singular only Obligatory: argument Possible

No restriction No restriction Optional: adjunct Impossible

The clipping rule can be said to be sensitive to the distinction between argument taking and non argument taking nouns (Kerleroux 1999). Only non argument taking nouns may be clipped. Grimshaw emphasises the distinction in the following way: The flexibility exhibited by the nouns [such as introduction, manipulation, etc.] is due to a fundamental and persistent ambiguity within the nominal system: nouns do not behave uniformly; some are systematically like verbs in their argument-taking capacities. Others classes of nouns are quite different and in fact take no argument at all. This situation is obscured by the fact that

MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

many nouns are like examination in being ambiguous between the two classes. Once the ambiguity is factored out, the apparent complexity of the behavior of nouns reduces to a basic division between nouns that take arguments and nouns that do not. (Grimshaw 1990: 47) The very notion of fundamental ambiguity here goes against the hypothesis of a unique abstract meaning stored in the lexeme. 4. Agent deverbal nouns Impossibilities similar to those observed in (4), (16) and (17) also crop up with agent nouns derived from verbs. Examples (19)-(20) give us a flavour of this phenomenon: (19) (20) a b a b Gengis Khan russit rassembler les Mongols. Gengis Khan succeeded in rallying Mongolians Gengis Khan fut un grand rassembleur dhommes. Le Prado rassemble beaucoup de chefs-duvre espagnols. The Prado gathers together many Spanish masterpieces *Le Prado est le rassembleur des chefs-duvre espagnols.

But with verbs the situation is far more complicated than with adjectives, as the examination of French verb monter go up, rise will convince us soon. 4.1. Examination of monter. We can make the hypothesis that this verb occurs in five main constructions, the representation of which is tentatively given below:3 C1. Structure: NP0 V NP1 (PP[loc]) Conditions: criteria for agenthood (cf. annex) do not apply here because the verb describes an inherently directed motion. NP0 does not denote an agent nor NP1 a true patient (it only satisfies property stationary correlated to movement). The optional locative PP indicates the place where the referent of NP1 is located when the process ends (final location, lieu final). Semantics: (y. x. ev. z. (moveevxy BECOME(highery) LOCy(atz))); due to the Coherence principle (Wunderlich 1997), both conjunctions are causally interpreted: the moving causes the becoming higher of y on the one hand and its localisation at z on the other.4
3

Actually, two other constructions are worth mentioning, although they have a rather limited distribution. The first one is C6 NP0 V [PP /en N1], where N1 denotes a means of transportation e.g. monter cheval to ride, ~ vlo to ride a bicycle, ~ en voiture to get into a car. The second one is C7 NP0 V NP1, where NP0 denotes a moving entity and NP1 the path that this entity follows e.g. monter (lescalier+une rue) go upstairs, walk up a street. 4 The semantic representations given in C1-C5 aim only at providing a minimal notation for the different surface meanings observed for monter. A more precise account is beyond the scope of this paper since it

MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

Ex. Pierre a mont le tableau au grenier. Pierre brought up the painting to the attic.

C2. Structure: NP0 V (PP[loc]) Conditions: (i) criteria for agenthood do not apply either in this case for the same reasons as above. This case seems to be the intransitive counterpart of C1. The optional locative PP indicates the final location. (ii) Aux = tre. Semantics: (x. ev. z. (moveevx BECOMEhigherx LOCx(atz))) Ex. Pierre est mont (au grenier) Pierre went up (to the attic). Les bulles montent la surface. Bubbles rise to the surface. C3. Structure: NP0 V (PP[loc]) Conditions: NP0 denotes a patient rather than an agent: the movement, if there is movement at all, (i) is not related to another participant and (ii) only implies a change of position. The optional locative PP indicates the space where the eventuality described by the verb takes place (lieu scnique). Semantics: (x. ev. y. (followevxy direction-ofyx ascending-liney)) Ex. La fume monte (dans le ciel) The smoke rises (in the sky). La route monte ( travers la fort). The road goes up (across the forest). Les bulles montent dans le verre. Bubbles go up in the glass. C4 Structure: NP0 V Conditions: NP0 does not clearly denotes an agent nor a patient: the referent does not move nor change of position (fundamentally because it is not the referent of NP0 which is involved but an aspect of it). Semantics: (x. ev. y. (BECOMEev(highery) levelyx)) Ex. La rivire a beaucoup mont. The river rose a lot La temprature monte Temperature is rising. La tension monte Tension is rising. C5 Structure: NP0 V NP1 Conditions: NP0 denotes an agent, NP1 an incremental theme. NP1 denotes a device or a system constituted of several parts, which performs a specific function when completed. Semantics: (z. x. ev1. ev2. Y. (put-togetherev1xY pieces-ofYz permitev1ev2 functionev2z technical-systemz) Ex. Louvrier a mont la chaudire The worker assembled the boiler On a mont la tente en deux minutes The tent has been pitched up in two minutes. (Levin 1993) classifies monter as a verb of directed motion. (Levin & Rappaport Hovav 1995) claim that verbs of this type are unaccusative, contrary to verbs of manner of

would require both a more thorough study of the data and the introduction of formalisms specially elaborated to cope with spatial semantics (Asher & Sablayrolles 1995; Aurnague, Vieu & Borillo 1997).

MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

motion which are inergative. Various criteria indicate that this seems to be true of C2, C3 and C4, which could consequently be called unaccusative constructions. Unaccusative construction is characterised by the absence of an agent. Construction C5 differs from C1-C4 first, by the fact that it does not implies an upward change of level and second, by the fact that it shares the property of having an incremental theme with verbs of construction (build) or transformation (mow). 4.2. Proposed account. The morphological rule forming prototypical complex nouns in -eur is schematically expressed by the following pattern: (21) (F) (SX) I a b c d e f INPUT () cat:v Subj:<NP0> Arg-str <NP0, > role: NP0 = (weak) agent (x. ev. (Vevx)) O a b c d e f OUPUT (r) cat:n

(S)

(V. x. ev. (Vevx) social-activityev)

Table 3. The -eur derivational rule Condition (I.e) requires that criteria 1/6 be satisfied (cf. annex). However if NP0 denotes a human being, criterium 8 may suffice cf. ronfleur snorer, dormeur sleeper (= weak agent). social-activityev = the eventuality must denote a socially recognised activity i.e. an activity used to discriminate subsets of people in function of what they do habitually (c'est un rleur) or professionally (c'est un joueur). This condition is tied to the denominative function of -eur nouns. Condition (I.e) forbids us to build -eur deverbal nouns out of constructions C2, C3 and C4 (it also bars (20b), insofar as this use of rassembler is typically stative): (22) *Il laissait les ballons monter en lair puis tirait sur ces monteurs la carabine. (<C2).

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MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

He let the balloons rise in the air and then fire on these risers with a shotgun (23) *Le premier chemin monte travers les sapins. Il faut prendre ce monteur pendant un kilomtre. (< C3) The first path rises accross a fir forest. You have to follow this riser for one km *Au printemps, les rivires montent rapidement. Mais les torrents sont de plus rapides monteurs que les rivires. (< C4). In Spring, rivers rise fast. But brooks are faster risers than rivers a b *Pierre a mont le tableau au grenier. Cest un monteur habile. (< C1) Peter brought up the painting to the attic. He is a skilful bringer *Pierre est mont au grenier. Cest un monteur infatigable. (< C2) Peter went up to the attic. He is an undefatigable goer up

(24)

(25)

Only construction C5 can be the base of the deverbal nouns in question (cf. (26)). However condition (O.f) bars (27) because monter une tente does not denotes a socially recognised activity. (26) a Louvrier qui a mont notre chauffage central est le meilleur monteur de chaudires de lentreprise. The worker who assembled our central heating is the best boiler fitter in the firm Lentreprise recrute des monteurs en chauffage central. The firm is recruiting fitters specialised in central heating Dans lindustrie du film, les monteuses sont sous-payes. In the film industry, editors are underpaid *Celui qui a mont la tente est un pitre monteur. The one who pitched up the tent is a very poor fitter *On recrute des monteurs en tente. People are recruiting tent pitchers

b c (27)

If we sum up, the conditions imposed by agent nominal derivation in -eur are compatible with only one construction of the verb out of five. This situation can be visualised representing the lexical information associated to monter as in (28).

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(28) LEXEME monter-lxm (F) (mO^t ) (SX) cat:v C1 C2

VERB ARG-SCHEMA C3 C4 C5 INFL

monter-1 (F) (mO^t ) (SX) cat:v, <NP, NP, PP[loc]> (S)

monter-2 (F) (mO^t ) (SX) cat:v, <NP, PP[loc]> (S)

monter-3 (F) (mO^t ) (SX) cat:v, <NP, PP[loc]> (S)

monter-4 (F) (mO^t ) (SX) cat:v, <NP> (S)

monter-5 (F) (mO^t ) (SX) cat:v, <NP, NP> (S)

The complex objects referred to as C1, C2, etc. are constructions or construction-like objects: they associate a syntactic structure, information concerning semantic roles, a semantic representation and sometimes pragmatic conditions. Construction Grammar postulates that these objects are directly given by the grammar (Goldberg 1995; Kay & Fillmore 1999). In HPSG, it has been claimed that they result from the union of information brought by the dimension of lexical classification LEXEME and ARGSCHEMA (Bonami 1999). If we come back to our main point, we again see that the object the agent nominal WFR rule applies to is not the underspecified lexeme monter-lxm but instances monter1-monter-5. These instances are fully specified for what concerns argument-structure, semantic roles and semantic representation. 4.3. Generality of the phenomenon We have just shown that the nominal agent WFR does not apply to underspecified lexemes but selects the appropriate bases from several more specified lexical objects related to the lexemes. These objects are identified by their argument structure and their semantic contribution (cf. C1 to C5). This situation holds for with all verbs to which the agent nominal derivation applies. We know from lexical semantic studies (Levin 1993;

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MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

Levin & Rappaport Hovav 1995) that verbs present regular semantic alternations. In French, for instance, one can form the class of verbs alternating between a causative interpretation, linked with a transitive construction, and an unaccusative interpretation, linked with an intransitive construction (the unique argument of which cannot be interpreted as an agent). Table (29) illustrates the regular correlation between the presence of a deverbal -eur noun and the causative construction, and, conversely, shows the impossibility of a -eur noun with the unaccusative construction:5 (29) VERB TOMBER FLAMBER PASSER REPASSER ALTERNATION 1. tomberx 2. tomberxy DEVERBAL NOUN tombeur (de femmes, le ~ de Milos&evic) 1. flamberx 2. flamberxargent flambeur 1. passerx 2. passerxy passeur (dhommes) 1. repasserx 2. repasserxy repasseur (de couteaux) repasseuse (de linge)

4.4. More deverbal nouns and derived lexemes What we have observed about the selection of the base by the -eur derivational rule can also be observed with other derivational rules applying to the verb monter. Table (30) gives a sample of these rules. For the sake of completeness, we have added constructions C6 and C7 (cf. note 3) and taken into account the d- (un-) prefixation which builds deverbal verbs.6 Suffixes -e, -age and conversion are used to construct abstract deverbal nouns. On the contrary, derived nouns in -ure denote usually concrete entities. As table (30) clearly shows, the possibility vs. impossibility of such and such derived unit is function of the construction of the verb. As a consequence, the derived forms are not distributed at random but show correlations between each other.
5

Glosses : tomber to fall, tombeur thrower, ladykiller ; flamber to burn, to blaze, flambeur big time gambler ; passer pass, go past passeur ferryman, smuggler; repasser cross again, come past

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(30)

Monter C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7

-eur * * * * monteur * *

-e monte monte monte monte * * monte

-age * * * * montage * *

zero * * * * * monte *

-ure * * * * monture monture *

d* * * * dmonter * *

5. The so-called delocutive adverbs In French, a small set of nouns can be used as (secondary) interjections. Eight of them can occur at the beginning of exclamative sentences S[EXCL] that express the high degree to which a property (be dark) manifests itself or an event (to rain) happens (lets call this subset D-INTJ).7 (31) a b (Diable+fichtre+foutre+la vache) ! Ce quil fait noir ! Its devilishly dark ! (Diable+fichtre+foutre+la vache) ! Ce quil pleut ! Crikey ! How its raining !

The exclamative sentence makes explicit what leads the speaker to utter the interjection. Semantically, the interjections in question manifest the speakers incredulous surprise facing something unexpected. D-INTJs also occur at the beginning of a declarative sentence S[DECL] containing a gradable (or scalar) predicate, as in (32): (32) a b (Diable+fichtre+foutre+la vache !) ! Il faut de la force pour tordre une barre de fer. Crickey ! You need strength to bend an iron bar (Diable+fichtre+foutre+la vache !) a sent mauvais ! Hell ! It stinks

The construction as a whole expresses the high degree of what is predicated in the sentence. For instance, (32b) is pragmatically equivalent to it stinks a lot . This

again, iron, repasseur knife-grinder, ironer. 6 Verb forming prefixation in re- again works for the seven constructions. 7 We disregard here the stylistic differences existing between the various D-INTJ.

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interpretation is tied to the construction itself, since neither the semantic contribution of the interjection nor that of the declarative sentence indicates the high degree. The D-INTJs can also appear with declarative sentences that merely report an event (33a) or describe a situation (33b). (33) a b (Diable+fichtre+foutre+la vache) ! Pierre court dans le jardin. Blimey ! Peter is running in the garden ! (Diable+fichtre+foutre+la vache) ! Jai oubli mes lunettes. O heck ! I have forgotten my glasses

But in this case the high degree interpretation is no longer available. These constructions simply attest the speakers (neutral or slightly unpleasant) surprise and give the reason motivating the speakers utterance. It is possible to build a manner adverb in -ment out of each of the D-INTJs only as far as the interjection is correlated with a construction having the high degree interpretation, as shown by the contrast between (34) and (35): (34) a b c d (35) a b Il fait (diablement+fichtrement+foutrement+vachement) noir. Its devilishly dark Il pleut (diablement+fichtrement+foutrement+vachement). Its raining devilishly hard Il faut (diablement+fichtrement+foutrement+vachement) de la force pour tordre une barre de fer. You need a devilishly lot of strenght to bend an iron bar a sent (diablement+fichtrement+foutrement+vachement) mauvais. It stinks devilishly *Pierre court (diablement+fichtrement+foutrement+vachement) dans le jardin. Peter run devilishly in the garden *Jai (diablement+fichtrement+foutrement+vachement) oubli mes lunettes. I have devilishly forgotten my glasses

Sentence (34d) roughly says that it stinks to such a degree that the speaker could say diable! to express how extreme this degree is (Anscombre 1979). The interpretation of other examples follows the same model. It should be noted that the semantics of the manner adverb is not constructed out of the interpretation of the interjection but of the

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linguistic function of (the utterance of the) interjection. For instance, example (31a) does not mean it is suprisingly dark, although the semantic content of the corresponding interjection indicates the speakers surprise. The semantics of the adverb is based upon the function of the category interjection in the construction, which is to indicate that some scalar predicate is true to a high degree. The adverb expresses this high degree by making reference to the way it is expressed in the constructions INTJ S[EXCL] or INTJ S[DECL], namely through uttering an interjection. This explains why the manner adverbs such as diablement are out in sentences which do not make an assertion involving a gradable predicate (cf. (35)). This view also explains why no adverb can be derived from interjections that never result in a high degree interpretation, as peste, merde, putain, etc. (36) a b (37) a b Peste ! Vous tes svre. Good gracious ! You are harsh Merde ! Limprimante dconne encore. Hell ! The printer has gone on the blink again *Vous tes pestement svre. *Limprimante dconne encore merdement.

Contrast (34)-(35) leads to the same conclusion as before: it cannot be accounted for if WFRs have at their disposal only semantically abstract bases such as lexemes. It is not possible to give here a full-fledged formulation of the WFR rule constructing -ment manner adverbs. Suffice it to say that the semantic content of the lexical entity to which this rule applies, whenever it concerns a scalar dimension (Fauconnier 1976), specifies the degree to which another predicate is true. Adjectival modifiers expressing a polar quality such as great, rapid, tall etc. inherently possess both of these properties (Hamann 1991). As for diable and other D-INTJ, they are endowed with these properties (scalarity and degree specification) only when they are used in a particular type of construction, namely C1 of (38).

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(38) diable-lxm1 (F) (djabl) (SX) cat:n

LEXEME diable-lxm2 (F) (djabl) (SX) cat:intj (PGM) speaker is surprised

CONSTRUCTION C2 (SX) INTJ S[DECL]

C1 (SX) INTJ S[DECL] scalar predicate P (S) (i) degree P = max (ii) uttering INTJ CAUSE (i)

diable-intj-1 (F) (djabl) (SX) cat:intj (S) (i) degree P = max (ii) uttering diable CAUSE (i) (PGM) speaker is surprised

diable-intj-2 (F) (djabl) (SX) cat:intj (S) speaker is surprised

Once again, our conclusion is to claim that the WFR constructing manner adverbs applies not to a underspecified lexeme viz. diable-lxm2 but to a semantically fully specified object, in the present case diable-intj-1. As for lexeme diable-lxm1, it may be involved in other regular derivational processes, such as those that derive diabolique diabolic, diaboliquement diabolically. It is worth noting that this account does not say that WFRs rules apply to the sentence diable! S, as (Benveniste 1958) initially claimed when he coined the term drivation dlocutive. (Cornulier 1976) shows without contest, mostly on the basis of morphological arguments, that Benvenistes analysis is wrong on this point. Our account maintains that WFRs use information coming from lexeme for what regards phonology. This allows us to say that in the case of vachement, la vache! is the interjective version of vache and occurs as such only in construction C1. Consequently, the root on which the manner adverb rule suffixes -ment is (vaS), which is provided by a vache-lxm2. 6. Conclusion

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MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

6.1. Word Formation Rules. Semantically, Word Formation Rules impose fine-grained conditions on their input. This prevents us from construing the lexeme as it was defined until now as the target of these rules. And it is so because semantic content is what is important for unit building morphology (morphologie constructionnelle). That is why we modify the definition of the lexeme in accordance with the results of our four empirical observations. 6.2. Units. The lexemes are the units taken as objects by WFRs. They are underspecified for inflection, as has long been established, but semantically fully specified, if we are right. Lexemes are then lexical individuals defined by the conjunction of three properties: category, underspecification for inflection, full specification for meaning. The syntactic words retain their former definition (cf. table 1). But a third theoretical entity has to be introduced, which we propose to call inflecteme (fr. flexme). This unit lacks semantic specification since it functions as the inflectionnal stem. This correlates to the fact that no semantic constraints hang over the application of inflectional rules (Corbin 1987: 6). Table (39) shows how the just defined properties are distributed: (39) INFLECTEME [inflection] Underspecified meaning LEXEME +categorised WORD

[+inflection] Fully specified meaning

We obtain three simultaneous views of a lexical entity. None associates a unique phonetic form with a unique semantic content, contrary to the definition of sign or morpheme. 6.3. The syntax / morphology relationship. The demarcation problem has not been touched upon in this paper. Actually, our findings, if they are sound, force us to say that

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MMM3 - Troubles with lexemes

there is no interface between syntax and morphology but two other interfaces: a first one, admitted for long, between semantics and syntax and a second one, that we brought to light, between semantics and morphology. We would say that both unit building components of grammar (morphology and syntax) exploit the semantic properties of semantically identified lexical units and make them visible, each according to its program. Appendix 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

D D D D D FVV FVV FVV

ACTOR Volitional involvement Sentience of perception Causing change of state Movement (Exists independently) Controls the event Instigates/initiates the event Performs the event

D D D D D FVV

UNDERGOER Undergoes change of state Incremental theme Causally affected Stationary (Does not exist independently) Affected by the event

Figure 4. Criteria for agenthood 1-5 = Dowtys criteria (Dowty 1991). 6-8: finer grained criteria put forth by (Foley & VanValin 1984) and illustrated by (Mithun 1991) in a masterly manner. Criteria 6 and 1 are often equivalent. In (Foley & VanValin 1984) agent (resp. patient) is the unmarked interpretation for the actor (resp. the undergoer). The criteria are not relevant to verbs of inherent directed motion, precisely because the direction of the motion is indicated by the verb and hence escapes to any control by an agent.

References
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