Semantics and Pragmatics of Argument Alternations

After setting out the challenges posed by argument alternations for linguistic theory, this paper reviews the development of accounts of argument alternations over the last fifty years, documenting a shift from accounts that are primarily syntactic in nature to accounts with semantic and pragmatic components. The remainder of the paper consists of case studies of the developing understanding of the semantics and pragmatics of the dative alternation and the causative alternation. Each case study stresses the interplay of semantic and contextual factors in characterizing the relation between the two variants that make up the alternation and in the determination of the choice of variant in a given context.