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2.5.4. Summary of related phenomena
This section has discussed phenomena connected to adverbs in various ways. First, we looked at adjectives and their relation to manner adverbs, as both are property words used as modifiers. This was followed by a description of depictives and resultatives, which are closely connected to adverbs in that they commonly predicate a property of a participant in an event, whereas adverbs ascribe a property to an event as such. The encoding patterns of depictives, resultatives, and manner adverbs often coincide, and manner adverbs are commonly treated as either closely related or belonging to the same domain of secondary predication as the other two. This matter will be further discussed in the next chapter. Finally, an account was given of converbs as verb forms used adverbially. This is one of many encoding patterns in the adverbial function. Other phenomena that would have been appropriate to include in this chapter, but that have been excluded due to scope limitations, are serial verb constructions, adpositional phrases, ideophones, and manner affixation, incorporation, and compounding. All these phenomena are nonetheless exemplified in the first chapter on the results of the study (chapter 5).
2.6. Summary and discussion
This chapter started with a general introduction to adverbs and the difficulty of classify- ing subtypes among their heterogeneous members. Several different types of criteria for such classifications were discussed: morphological, semantic, and syntactic. Four different theoretical approaches that all make important contributions to the study of adverbs were then treated. The contribution of Role and Reference Grammar is the layered structure of the clause, which elucidates the roles of different types of adverbs. The treatment of manner and pace adverbs as modifiers of both the predicate and its arguments is partic- ularly important. In the discussion of Geuder (2000), it became clear that semantically, adverbs can relate to events in various ways. Moreover, only a subset of manner adverbs denote pure manner. The Functional Grammar approach includes manner adverbs as the fourth major part of speech, and makes the important point that the nature of verbs is to be predicative only and the nature of English adverbs, at least, is to be non-predicative only. Within the works of Croft (1991, 2001, 2003), adverbs are only very briefly dis- cussed, but they complement Croft’s typological approach to parts of speech as property words that modify within predicating expressions. In the terms of Role and Reference Grammar, the adverbs that are the focus of the present dissertation are located within the periphery of the core. By Geuder’s semantic definition, these adverbs are (primarily) pure manner adverbs. Within Functional Grammar, only manner adverbs are included, equivalent to the adverbs in focus here. In Croft’s approach, they are property modifiers within predicates. All these frameworks are, in some way, useful for the discussion of adverbs. However, different perspectives must be combined, and frameworks expanded,
for a full account of property-denoting adverbs. In particular, Croft’s approach requires expansion in order to include adverbs, as will be done in section 3.2.
Section 2.4 of this chapter described earlier typological studies of adverbs. Although there have been attempts to analyze all items labeled as adverbs as members of one large category (Ramat & Ricca 1994) and typological studies of certain subtypes of adverbs (van der Auwera & Baoill 1998; Kortmann 1997) as well as of manner expressions (Loeb- Diehl 2005), there are only a few cases where manner adverbs have been examined from a typological perspective. In these works, manner adverbs have either been outside of the main focus (Schultze-Berndt & Himmelmann 2004) or figured as one among the major parts of speech discussed (Hengeveld 1992; Hengeveld & Rijkhoff 2005; Hengeveld 2013; van Lier 2009; Rijkhoff & van Lier 2013). Thus, adverbs that denote properties and modify within predicating expressions have, so far, not received due attention as a phenomenon in its own right.
Section 2.5 was devoted to phenomena that are closely connected to adverbs. Adjectives, as parallel to adverbs in their role as property modifiers, were discussed primarily based on the works of Dixon (1982 [1977], 2004) and his semantic types. Already Dixon (1982 [1977]) found that speed is often attested among adverbs. As will be discussed in chapter 8, it is a major result of this thesis that speed is a core semantic type for adverbs, and that there are also other peripheral types for adverbs. Depictives and resultatives were also examined, since they have a function close to that of adverbs and are commonly encoded in a similar or identical way cross-linguistically. Finally, converbs were discussed, as verb forms that are used adverbially, parallel to participles as verb forms that are used adjectivally. Also for converbs and adverbs, identical encoding is attested in some languages.
In conclusion, adverbs are situated in a rich context, theoretically as well as empirically. There is thus a wealth of studies on phenomena closely connected to adverbs, and theoret- ical accounts, as illustrated in this chapter. However, adverbs that are property modifiers within predicating expressions have not yet figured prominently within typology. More- over, much can be gained from bringing frameworks together and from expanding the approaches of Dixon (1982 [1977], 2004) and Croft (1991, 2001, 2003) in order to account for adverbs. As illustrated throughout this chapter, many accounts define adverbs as a kind of modifier, or as performing the function of modification. But it has not become fully clear yet what modification really is, and how adverbial modification is related to predication. It is to a discussion of this matter that the next chapter is devoted.
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