The Interplay of Synonymy and Polysemy

echar
. Inchoative phrases also occur with 
lanzar
, 
though each verb prefers a specific type of structure. 
Echar 
usually combines with infinitival 
verbs, while 
lanzar 
usually combines with nouns.
Arrojar
combines with aspectual phrases, 
but not to form inchoative meanings. 
Arrojar
usually expresses motion into a time period. 
Tirar
differs from all the other verbs in dispreferring aspectual 
DIRECTIONALS
: it does not 
participate in inchoative phrases, nor does it normally express motion to a time period.
Finally, I propose a semantic analysis for the verb 
tirar
in its meaning of ‘to pull’. 
Sentences with this meaning show interesting semantic and syntactic behavior. I argue that 
this behavior could be explained by viewing the 
de 
phrase in the sentences as both 
MOVANTS 
and 
DIRECTIONALS
. This example illustrates the difficulty in the semantic analysis of some 
meaning extensions. A researcher could propose that these sentences include a 
MOVANT
, as I 
did in §4.2 and as in ADESSE, or a researcher could posit that those same phrases are 
DIRECTIONALS
. And neither would be incorrect. Multiple analyses are possible, and each can 
capture certain characteristics of the data.

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137 | 
Chapter 5. Constructional Schemas
Up to this point, the schemas that have been discussed have been fairly specific. The 
schemas posited describe the semantics and participant roles associated with certain 
meanings that appear with a verb. For example, I posit a 
PRODUCING DATA 
schema for 
arrojar
, a 
BLAME 
schema for 
echar
and a 
HITS
schema for 
lanzar 
and 
tirar
. In each case, there 
is a highly specific meaning associated with the schema. Additionally, some schemas are 
lexically filled (the 
BLAME 
schema uses 
echar 
and the noun 
culpa 
‘blame’) while others have 
restricted the class of nouns that can appear (the 
MOVANT 
in the 
PRODUCING DATA 
is normally 
a noun that refers to information).
There exist, though, patterns at higher levels of abstraction. For example, the 
BLAME
,
HITS
,
LOOKS 
and 
SOUNDS
schemas are all described as light verb constructions (LVC, §4.2.4). 
LVCs have different characteristics from the schemas discussed thus far. First of all, LVCs 
appear not only with the 
throw-
verbs but with a wide variety of Spanish verbs. Secondly, 
LVCs allow a wide semantic variation in the types of participants that fill the roles. For 
example, there seems to be little in common semantically between 
blame
, 
hits
, 
looks
or 
sounds 
(although there may be general concept of human interaction, see §4.2.4)
. 
Despite 
this, there are certainly characteristics associated with LVCs. In order to recognize a specific 
sentence as a case of an LVC, we must find certain traits and qualities that LVCs share.
I use the term constructional schema (Langacker 2008) to label the constructions that 
discussed in this chapter. Specifically, I describe the patterns for assembling light verb 
constructions (§5.1) and for a certain type of idiomatic expression that I term semantically-
schematic idioms (§5.2). LVCs and idioms are grammatical patterns for building sentences. 
Constructional schemas are in fact constructions (as Goldberg 1995 would label them), but 
they explicitly show the process of compositionality: how the component parts come together 
to form a composite structure (see §2.3.3). They are also more schematic: they do not have 
any lexically filled slots. Instead, the slots can refer to semantic classes (such as nouns that 
refer to hits) or even very abstract categories (such as any noun). This schematicity usually 
implies that the schemas apply to a larger set of words. So, where the 
HITS
 
schema applies to 
only 
lanzar 
and 
tirar
(and maybe even a few other verbs), a constructional schema for 
creating compound nouns in English applies to a large variety of nouns.
By describing the semantic characteristics and motivation for these two constructional 
schemas I can give a fuller picture of the behavior of the 
throw
-verbs. 
Lanzar
appears with a 

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138 | 
somewhat large set of nonphysical nouns that refer to hits, speech, sounds, looks and various 
facial expressions. But this behavior can be understood if we notice that 
lanzar
has a general 
attraction to appearing in LVCs. It is not the case that LVCs are fully productive with this 
verb (i.e. 
lanzar
does not appear with just any noun in an LVC), but this verb exhibits an 
increased productivity compared to the other 
throw
-verbs. Similarly, the constructional 
schema for semantically-schematic idioms helps to motivate several of the idiomatic phrases 
with the verb 
echar
. This means that instead of simply listing a series of idioms as part of the 
behavior of the verb with seemingly no connection between them, we can at least partially 
motivate the appearance of 
echar
in these idioms by noting this verb’s increased preference 
for appearing in semantically-schematic idioms.
Other constructional schemas are definitely possible. For example, I mentioned 
already the existence of a (verbal) inchoative construction for creating verbal periphrasis in 
Spanish, associated with 
echar
and many other verbs. It might also be conceivable to posit a 
constructional schema for caused motion sentences in Spanish. By describing the two 
constructional schemas in this chapter I wish to show that it is feasible to give a semantic 
analysis of some grammatical patterns seen with the 
throw
-verbs, and that the existence of 
these constructional schemas helps to motivate the behavior of these verbs.