Adjunct Roles and External Predication

0. Introduction This paper addresses one of the linking problems involving prepositional phrases (PPs) especially those involving beneficiary for, and argues that such PPs are best analyzed as adjunct PPs. In this paper I propose that external predication is more appropriate for these PPs than Wechsler's (1995) argument-annexing approach. The argument and analysis put forth in this paper assume a constraint-based grammatical framework called Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar and related semantic theories. The argument of this paper crucially hinges on a semantic analysis of PPs as proposed by Gawron (1986) who provides a three-way distinction among PPs: argument PPs, co-predicators and adjuncts. On the basis of Gawron's analysis of PPs and other basic principles of semantics, I will propose that verbal categories should be assigned the attribute INDEX and that (some subdomain of) the CONTENT value of the verbal signs should be set-valued instead of matrix-valued. Section 1 reviews the main points of Gawron's analysis and identify an adverbial PPs as distinct from either co-predicational PPs or argument PPs. Section 2 reviews an HPSG approach as suggested in Wechsler's treatment of PPs and its problems. Section 3 examines problems related to modification structures and predication, adopting Parsons' approach. Section 4 provide an HPSG approach to external predication and modification structures.