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(De)constructing relations among agentivity, cause and morphology in change of state verbs in brazilian portuguese

ABSTRACT

This paper proposes an empirical classification and analysis of 136 change of state verbs into six event types (Incoative, Causative, Causative underspecified for [ag], Totally underspecified, Strictilly Agentive Causative, and Strictilly Causative with voice) based on their behavior in face of the following tests: formation of transitive sentences with agents as external arguments, transitives with cause as external arguments, intransitives and passives. Departing from this classification, we propose a syntatic decomposition analysis of the event which regards at the same time the roots semantics typology, the verbal morphology and its possible relations to the external argument. In order to achieve that, a Distributed Morphology approach is assumed.

Key-words:
Change of state verbs; Cause; Agentivity; Distributed Morphology

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