Alexandra Anna Spalek

217 Pages·2014·2.03 MB·English

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Verb Meaning and Combinatory
Semantics: A Corpus-Based Study of
Spanish Change of State Verbs
Alexandra Anna Spalek
TESI DOCTORAL UPF / ANY 2014
DIRECTORSDELATESI
Louise McNally i Sergi Torner Castells
Departament de Traduccio´ i Cie`ncies del Llenguatge
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ToLaetitia
Figure 1: The poet Martha Rivera Garrido illustrated the combinatorial complex-
ity of romper using the lyrics by Silvio Rodr´ıguez: No importa donde rompa mi
estacio´n, si cuando rompe esta´ rompiendo lo imposible. It doesn’t matter if it all
fallsapart,ifitshatterstheimpossiblewhenitdoes.’
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Acknowledgements
Thereareonlytwowaystoliveyourlife. Oneisasthoughnothingis
amiracle. Theotherisasthougheverythingisamiracle. Ibelievein
inthesecond.
(AlbertEinstein)
Averysimilarfeelingliesattheverybaseofthislongproject: themarvelmentof
language. And yet being marvelled by something is not enough to complete such
ademandingprojectasadissertation. MuchofthemanuscriptIholdinmyhands
today I owe to my advisors, colleagues, friends and family, whom I would like to
thankherewith.
There is my family, my parents, brothers, my uncles, cousins and grandmoth-
ers. MostofthemhavenotalwaysunderstoodwhatIwasdoingforalltheseyears
and why I would have started it to begin with. In fact my grandmother Stefa-
nia used to repeat throughout all these years one and the same sentence: ‘Biedna
dziewczyna, jak ona wybrała tak trudne studia!’ (Oh, poor girl, why did she
choose such a complicated undergraduate programme!). And yet throughout the
process all of them have become one of the most important pillars that has sup-
ported my work throughout the years. I thank all of them for their constant love,
careandprayers.
OnlynowcanIacknowledgemydeepindeptednesstomygrandfatherAnton,
who, having experienced the terror of the Second World War with its consecutive
territorialchangesinCentralEurope,usedtosay: ‘Wasduhast,kanndirjederzeit
weggenommen werden. Was du weisst, bleibt immer deins.’ (What you own can
betakenawayanytime. Whatyouknowstaysyoursforever.)
And yet, even more important than my grandfather’s wise saying was my
mother packing and organising everything for me to move just in the very last
months of the write-up. I guess this is what women mean when they claim ‘I am
aMOTHER!’. Danke,Mami,dassdudirextrafu¨rmichUrlaubgenommenhast!
The second pillar of this work were my advisors. It is thanks to their efforts
and continuous attention that I have come so far as to transform an almost naive
intuitionintoascientificwork.
I thank Paz Battaner, who was my advisor for one year before retiring. She
was definitely the person who sowed the seed of curiosity and encouraged me to
becriticalandaskquestions. Ithasalwaysbeenverycomfortingtoknowshewas
watchingmefromadistance.
I thank Sergi for always being so supportive and close, as well as having the
capacitytoletmedigressandwonder,whenIneededit. Pero,sobretodo,gracias
poraplicarentodaslassituacionestantosentidocomu´n,elmenoscomu´ndetodos
lossentidos.
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I thank Louise for teaching me how to do scientific work and not to die in the
attempt. AndyetwhatImostappreciateinherasanadvisorwerethese‘mummy-
moments’ when she understood that I was totally lost and would provide some
simpleadvice,whichconvertedamonstrousproblemintoachallengeandnothing
more! Iwouldliketolearntodothiskindofmagiconeday.
Mostimportantly,however,IhavetothankLouiseandSergiforhavinginces-
sant faith in me, even at the times when I had lost faith. After all, it is a teacher’s
faith that helps bringing out all students’ potentials. And that is actually what the
Latinverbe-ducereisallabout.
I also want to thank Malka Rappaport Hovav, my host advisor at the Hebrew
UniversityofJerusalem,forherwarmwelcomeandthetremendousstormofideas
andenergyshewasabletoprovidemewith.
During my stay at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem I also had the great
chance to have some passionate discussions with Anita Mittwoch, which brought
upsomeimportantdataobservations.
At this point I also want to thank Oriol Valent´ın Fernandez Gallart for helpful
discussionsontypetheoriesandusefuladviceontheformalisation.
Finally, I would also like to mention Chris Barker here. It was he and his
teaching style (kind of maieutic) that opened up to me the fascinating world of
semanticsattheBerkeleyLinguisticsInstitutein2009. HopefullyJohnstillloves
Maryandtheylivetogetherhappilyinoneofthepossibleworlds.
Thethirdstandingleg,andnotatalllessimportantthanalltheothers,wasall
mypostgraduateschoolcolleagues,thePhDs,thepost-docsandvisitingscholars.
A very, very special thanks to Maarten Janssen for his enormous help with the
corpusconsultinginterfaceCPA+RaswellastherepeatedhelpwithLaTexissues.
A huge hug goes out for Berit Gehrke, who has become a motivating mentor
of this project and a peer I look up to. It is precisely thanks to her that these
acknowledgementsalmosthavethelengthoftheBible. Ijustfollowedheradvice
to procrastinate productively and write on the acknowledgements whenever other
kindsofideaswouldnotflow.
But there are so many others whom I had the pleasure of sharing interesting
discussions with. Thus, many thanks go out to my dear colleague Mihajlo Ignja-
tovic. I do not think I will ever forget your enlightening opinion about lambdas.
I thank Cristina Sa´nchez Marco for some very nice chatting moments. My dad
keepsonaskingafterthatcutegirlwhomIwentwithtotheTu¨bingenconference.
ThankstoElisendaBernal. Ihadthebestlunchtimeseverwithyou,Elisenda!
Talking to you made me realise how much I still have to learn to become a mo-
tivating professor. I am already looking forward to my next class to try out your
lotusflowertrick!
Thanks to Araceli Alonso. I guess in the end I did understand some of the
features of Access, though I am not really sure I will ever need them. Thanks to
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IreneRenauforalltheilluminatingdatadiscussionaboutSpanish‘se’.
Big thanks also to Olga Borik and Maarten Janssen for all the parties at their
home. Don’ttellFerranAdria`,butMaartenisdefinitelythebetter‘saladdresser’!
A special thanks to Barbara Tomaszewicz for having me at her home in Los
AngelesandrevealingtomeallthegossipaboutRichardMontague’sprivatelife.
Iguesslinguisticsisevenmoreinterestingsincethen.
Thanks to Helena Aparicio. I had no idea one could laugh so much with
formal semantics, though I am not sure formal semantics was the real cause of
all the laughing. Actually I very much suspect it was just another of my many
moments of muddling up people and H. just happily caught up while we were
tryingtofinishoneofourfirstformallinguisticsassignments.
Thanks to Ilona Spector Shirtz for the entertaining bus trip to IATL in Haifa.
Did we actually talk linguistics at some point? In any case, remember never to
brewcoffee,Ilona. TheBiblesays: ‘HEbrew’!
Thanks to Meghan Armstrong for the wonderful Friday evenings spent pro-
crastinating in the UPF office 51.012. And, yes, people in Barcelona still use
huge umbrellas and super big rubber boots. What would they do if they were
livinginScotland?
Very special thanks go to the members of the Government and Binding Tea
Party Psychotherapy Session (GB1)! I suppose it would not be a bad idea to take
upthe‘bindingchapter’Iactuallyneverreadwiththem. Thisfactkindofreminds
me of my grandmother Ela’s observation that I have always been a bit bossy. At
leastitmightexplainwhyIwasonlyinterestedinthegovernmentpartandtotally
skippedbinding.
By now some of the members of the reading group and some other alienated
victimshaveenteredaGB4phase,whichsortofstartedoutwithGB1,butluckily
drifted far away from linguistics to more worldly issues. Keep on blogging, read-
ing, singing, dancing, hiking, cooking, knitting, yoga-ing, meditating and mar-
velling at the world out there, girls! That is to say, never stop being emotionally
intelligenttoo!
I am also very grateful to all the other GLiF members for interesting talks
and discussions (Scott Grimm, Gemma Boleda, Laia Mayol, Boban Arsenijevic,
SilviaMart´ınez-Ferreiro,ElenaCastroviejo,IsidoraStojanovic).
I would even say I am also kind of grateful to my NOISY GrEP Group office
colleagues. I guess abstract thinking would have been much too distracting with-
outalltheGrEP’sintonationexperimentsrunningrightundermynose. Eversince
I moved to ‘the GrEPs’ office’, or what they considered their territory (territorial
questionsareatrendingtopicinCataloniathesedays),Iwouldnotdareenteringa
greengrocer’sandask: ‘Hihamandarines?’. I justdon’tknowanymorewhatthe
right intonation is. So I’d rather buy oranges. Hopefully Maria del Mar Vanrell
willhelpmetorecoverfromthistraumaoneday.
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Among my colleagues, however, I owe special mention to Gemma Barbera`:
Gemma, happy woman, que` et puc explicar que encara no sa`pigues. Nome´s puc
repetir per escrit el que ja t’he dit tants cops. Em sento molt i molt afortunada
d’haver tingut la sort de trobar-te en aquest cam´ı i poder compartir amb tu tot
aquest proce´s de creixement, gaudint dels e`xits i rient de les derrotes. Pero` el
veritable regal ha estat que tu i jo compartim molt i molt mes que no pas aquesta
curiositatcient´ıfica. Seguimamblarevolucio´!
Finally, this piece of work would be remiss if I did not mention the company
andsupportfrommyclosefriends. Allofthemrememberedtoask‘Ei,¿co´mova
la tesis?’ and always had some supporting words whatever my answer would be.
Nevertheless,afewofthemdeservespecialmention:
Enprimerlugar,quierodarlasgraciasaO´scarporhabermeacompan˜adohasta
aqu´ı.
Gracias tambie´n a estos dos hombres fuertes, Octavio y Xavi, que se han
puesto al mando de mi madre para llevar a cabo mi mudanza de un tercero sin
ascensor, justo cuando yo ten´ıa ma´s necesidad de escribir. Sospecho que en el
fondo debe´is de ser lingu¨´ıstas como para haber aguantado una mudanza en po-
laco.
Renata,dziekizaciepłeprzyjecieiwszelkatroseomnieio‘naszemieszkanko’.
Sorry,fornotfixingthePolishhooks,butthisbabyhadtogetoutanddidnotwant
towaitforthehooks.
Guidi, tesoro, sai perfettamente che sei sempre stata tu la persona che ha sa-
puto comprendere meglio di chiunque altro il complicato processo che richiede
scrivere una tesi e diventare una scienziata. Non ti immagini neanche quanto mi
hanno aiutato i tuoi nervi saldi nei momento di crisi e il tuo affetto nei momento
dimelanconiaedisorientamento.
Asimismo, nunca podre´ agradecer lo sufficient la compan˜´ıa que en el u´timo
an˜o me ha brindado Gemma Gine´s, sus pequen˜as pataditas en donde la espalda
pierde su nombre, tan acertadas y tan necesarias, los ‘momentos Sue Ellen’ y las
millones de risas que nos hemos echado. Y todo ello sin hablar de su madre, una
sen˜ora de 80 an˜os, que en los momentos ma´s duros siempre ten´ıa ese plato e´xtra
e incluso un tupper ya preparado para que Alexandra no se quedar sin cenar. Si
Erich Fromm (The Art of Loving) esta´ en lo cierto y quien es capaz de dar de s´ı
es rico, vosotras debe´is estar forradas. Un millo´n de gracias a las dos por ser tan
generosas.
Inopuctancaraquestsagra¨ımentssenseesmentaralaaute`nticatietad’aquest
xiquet. Gra`cies, Ceci Jaques, per tota aquesta energia positiva que m’has estat
enviant,lafarigola,elpro`polisil’homeopatia.
Last but not least, this dissertation has become a reality thanks to two major
financial sources. On the one hand, I owe thanks to the financial support of the
Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports (MECD), which awarded me
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withtheFPUscholarship(becadeFormacio´ndeProfesoradoUniversitario)inthe
year 2008. This scholarshipwas included in the FFI2012-37654 research project.
On the other hand, I wish to thank the Department of Translation and Language
SciencesaswellastheICREAAcade`miaawardtoLouiseMcNally,bothofwhich
grantedmearesearchstaffcontractduringthelastyearattheUniversitatPompeu
Fabra.
Summing up, I just don’t think it can be said often enough that the acknowl-
edgements are certainly the most difficult part of the thesis. These feelings are
whatweoftenforgetaboutwhendoingscience. Thusthankingallthosewhohave
become an essential part of such an important stage of my life’s path reminds me
of the fact that emotions are actually at the very base of all we do, including sci-
ence! This insight leads me to slightly amend my grandfather Anton’s saying:
What you own can be taken away, what you know and what you experience stays
YOUforever!
P.D.: ThankstoFBforallowingmetospellallthesenamescorrectly.
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