earticle

영어

This paper investigates some properties of middles which seriously challenge the previous syntactic analyses of middles. First, it makes an account for the middles with an indirect thematic argument subject or a non-argument subject: Any non-Agent argument or a non-argument of the middle verb is realized in the subject position if it is ascribed a dispositional property. Second, middle formation is restricted to certain types of verbs because verbs that satisfy the two meaning components of the middle construction are limited, i.e., the responsibility reading of the subject referent and the possibility or doability of the action facilitated by the subject referent. Third, cross-linguistic variation of middles in their syntactic forms and properties is not problematic in the dispositional analysis of middles since middles are defined not in syntactic, but in semantic terms.