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Joe left the office
.
Leave
profiles a temporal relation.
Leave
combines with
the
office
, which inherits the profile of
leave
. Leave
the office
combines with
Joe
, but
the resultant expression again inherits the relational profile of
leave the office
. The
expression designates an event of leaving, it does not designate Joe. The head of
the expression is
left
, both the subject
Joe
and the direct object
the office
are
complements. The proof that
Joe
also has the status of a complement is the
alternative constituency - [Joe left] [the office] which is actualized in the
following:
Joe left, but everyone else entered, the office.
The complements elaborate the schematic elements in the semantic structure of the
verb (an entity capable of motion - Joe, a schematic container – the office).In this
respect the analysis of conceptual constituents (conceptual combination), as
head қcomplement or headқmodifier, correlates with the traditional analysis of
obligatory and optional valency of the verb (subject and the direct object realize
the obligatory valency of the verb).
Consider more examples:
Father of twins
. On the one hand,
father
(the head), like
book
in the expression
book on the table,
elaborates the semantic structure of
of twins
.
Of
twins
is
therefore a modifier of
father
. On the other hand,
father
, unlike book, is a
relational noun: a father has to be the father of someone, whereas a book does not
to be a book in a certain location.
Of twins
elaborates the semantic structure of
father
and for this reason takes on features of a complement. Thus,
of twins
exhibits features of both a modifier and a complement of
father
. Cognitive
Grammar does not take the head-complement and the head-modifier relations to be
mutually exclusive, we can simply say that the expression simultaneously satisfies
the requirements of two different constructional schemas.
A p p o s i t i o n a l c o n s t r u c t i o n a l s c h e m a s
In an appositional relation, each component designates one and the same
entity, but does it in different ways. They combine to form a more elaborate
conception of the entity. In the expression
my neighbour, the butcher
one and the
same person characterized as “my neighbour” and also as “the butcher”. The
person is characterized in terms of a relation to the speaker and in terms of his
profession.
Consider more examples:
167
Now, at midnight We were amazed, stunned, by the event.
Tomorrow, Tuesday He ran – absolutely raced – up the hill.
We, the people They sent him to Coventry, refused to speak to him.
In an appositional relation each of the components profiles one and the same
entity. It is as if an apposition has two heads, each component contributes its
profile to the expression.
There are cases which exhibit, for example, both apposition and modification
as in the expression
you, the butcher
(
the butcher
can be viewed as a modifier, as it
gives additional information), or apposition and complementation as in
[The fact]
[that the earth is flat] must be
obvious to everyone ( that the earth is flat
can be
viewed as
the complement of
fact,
as it is schematically present in the semantic
structure of
fact
(a fact is necessarily a fact that something is the case).
Consider more examples:
[The question][ what to do] is still unanswered.
[The question] of [what to do] is still unanswered.
[The question] as to [what to do] is still unanswered.
Some syntactic phenomena need to be understood in terms of the apposition
relation. For example, one of the semantic values of
of.
Consider
the crime of
shoplifting
. One and the same entity is characterized, first, as a crime, and
secondly, as shoplifting.
Crime
has a rather schematic profile,
shoplifting
is more
fully specified. By virtue of apposition “the crime” is elaborated as “shoplifting”
and “shoplifting is categorized as “a crime”.
Consider more examples:
the Island of Madeira the thought of going there alone
the State of California the question of where to go
a feeling of despair the fact of his absence
A similar situation holds in the following cases, where the first constituent is a
so-called epithet. Consider
a beast of a problem
. The epithet has a highly
schematic profile, with speaker attitude towards the profiled entity very prominent
in the base. The second constituent elaborates the epithet’s profile.
Consider more examples:
an angel of a girl
that bastard of a man
P a r a t a x i s c o n s t r u c t i o n a l s c h e m a s
Parataxis relation can be viewed in linguistic expressions which are simply
lined up, one after the other, with no conceptual integration. Clauses and sentences
in the text can be lined up in this way. Consider
I came, I saw, I
conquered .
The
speaker could have chosen to overtly mark the relations between the clauses, by
means of linking elements such as
then
and
finally
. Without these overt
connectors, the relations between the clauses have to be inferred by the hearer.
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