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Part of
A0 – The Lexical Status of Adjectives
Edited by Phoevos Panagiotidis and Moreno Mitrović
[Language Faculty and Beyond 17] 2022
► pp. 121–152

Adjectives as a lexical category

A story of striving for extension

| University of Graz
I argue that prepositions and adjectives form one lexical category (labeled for convenience PAd), such that prepositions are its light members in the way light verbs (be, become, cause) are members of the verbal and taxonomic nouns (place, person, event) of the nominal category. While the opposition between nouns and verbs is based on an ontological restriction, modelled as the value of the classifier feature, PAd is characterized by the inability to establish reference, i.e. by an unvalued classifier feature. Surface asymmetries between traditional adjectives and prepositions are discussed and either refuted or explained away in terms of the proposed differences in the richness of lexical semantics and the underlying structural differences.
Keywords: adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, classifier feature, intension, extension, light verbs, taxonomic nouns, lexical categories, semantic ontology, grammatical construct
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Open and closed classes, conceptually rich and light members
  • 3.Adjectives and adverbs spell out underlying PPs
  • 4.Lexical categories and reference
  • 5.Differences between adjectives and prepositions
  • 6.Explanations, predictions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 24 November 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lfab.17.04ars
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