How a Construction Grammar account solves the auxiliary controversy
The English auxiliaries have been a matter of dispute for decades with two
opposing views: one analysis treats them as main verbs that take a VP
complement; the other considers them as feature carriers. Proponents of both
approaches have convincingly pointed out each other’s weaknesses without however
settling the debate and without accounting for the fact that the English VP is
still evolving today. The goal of this paper is to show that Construction
Grammar offers a way out of the current status quo. This claim is substantiated
by a computational formalization of the English verb phrase in Fluid
Construction Grammar that includes a bi-directional processing model for
formulation and comprehension available for online testing.
Article outline
- 1.The auxiliary controversy
- 1.1The main-verb analysis and its problems
- 1.2The feature-carrier analysis and its problems
- 1.3Coping with language change
- 1.4Construction Grammar makes a synthesis possible
- 2.Modeling the English verb phrase
-
2.1Overview of the analysis
-
2.2Verbal lexical constructions
- Meaning
- SEM-VALENCE
- SEM-CAT
- SYN-CAT
- LEX-ID
- 2.3Verb Phrase Construction
-
2.4Present- and Past-Tense-Indicative Constructions
- Present-Tense-Indicative Construction
- Past-Tense-Indicative Construction
- 2.5Perfect and Non-Perfect Constructions
- 2.6Progressive and Non-Progressive Constructions
-
2.7Modal Constructions
- Modal-Will Construction
- Marked-Modality Construction
- 3.Conclusions
-
Acknowledgements
-
Notes
-
References