Verb complementation in English

Mandarin Resultative Verb Compound Involves VP Complementation

Mandarin Resultative Verb Compounds (RVCs) are verbal complexes of the form V1-V2, where V1 denotes an activity and V2 the result of that activity. Previous literature either assigns to RVCs a Complex Verb structure [V V1-V2] (Li 1990, Williams 2012) or a Small Clause structure [V1P V1 [SCV2]] (Sybesma 1999). In the paper, I will propose a VP Complementation syntax for Mandarin RVC [V1P V1 [V2P...

Verb Acquisition in English and Japanese

Three decades ago, Carol Chomsky (1969) reported finding surprising differences between child and adult uses of the verbs ask, tell, look and see. A later study by Deidre Gentner (1978) showed that children often confuse the verbs mix and stir. Melissa Bowerman (1978) reported that her daughters overextended words in unusual ways, including the verbs kick and open. Despite these early observati...

Serial Verb Constructions in English and Chinese

Traditionally, the term serial verb construction refers to a sequence of verbs or verb phrases in a sentence in which there is no intervening conjunction. The English expression go eat, for example, might be considered as a kind of serial verb construction since there is no infinitive or other morphosyntactic marker present to indicate a coordinating or subordinating relationship between the tw...

English verb regularization in books and tweets

The English language has evolved dramatically throughout its lifespan, to the extent that a modern speaker of Old English would be incomprehensible without translation. One concrete indicator of this process is the movement from irregular to regular (-ed) forms for the past tense of verbs. In this study we quantify the extent of verb regularization using two vastly disparate datasets: (1) Six y...

EFL learners' learning of English verb argument structure