Reflexive Verbs in a Valency Lexicon: The Case of Czech Reflexive Morphemes

In this paper, we deal with Czech reflexive verbs from the lexicographic point of view. We show that the Czech reflexive morphemes se and si constitute different linguistic meanings: either they are formal means of the word formation process of the so called reflexivization, or they are associated with the syntactic phenomena of reflexivity, reciprocity, and diatheses. All of these processes are associated with changes in the valency structure of verbs. We formulate a proposal for their lexicographic representation for the valency lexicon of Czech verbs, VALLEX. We make use of the division of the lexicon into a data component and a grammar component which represents a part of the overall Czech grammar. The data component stores information on valency structure of verbs in unmarked (active) structures. The grammar component consists of formal rules describing regular changes in the valency structure of verbs; these rules allow for the derivation of valency frames underlying the usages of verbs in marked structures (reflexive, reciprocal, deagentive and dispositional) from the valency frames corresponding to unmarked structures (non-reflexive, unreciprocal, and active). Czech reflexive verbs thus represent an illustrative example of the lexical-grammar interplay: we demonstrate that a close interaction between the lexicon and the grammar is necessary for a representation of these verbs and they both are indispensable if such a representation is to be adequate and economical.