Cover not available
Article published In:
Languages in Contrast
Vol. 19:2 (2019) ► pp.232–255

English presentative semantic patterns as seen through a parallel translation corpus

ORCID logo | Charles University, Prague (Czech Republic)
 | Charles University, Prague (Czech Republic)
The present paper studies the English presentative semantic pattern whose function is to introduce a new phenomenon into the discourse, relating it to an already established location. A contrastive (English-Czech) cross-linguistic corpus-assisted approach is applied to explore syntactically diverse forms which represent the same presentative semantic pattern: ‘location – presentation verb – new phenomenon’. We focus on English sentences in which the location is expressed syntactically as the subject. The English constructions with a locative subject were detected as translation counterparts of Czech sentence-initial locative adverbials realized by prepositional phrases. Our study demonstrates that the potential of the sentence to introduce a new phenomenon in discourse is primarily based on the semantics of the verb.
Keywords: presentative semantic pattern, presentation verb, locative subject, local grammar, Czech/English
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.English presentative constructions
  • 3.Czech translation correspondences of English presentative constructions
  • 4.Material and method
  • 5.Analysis
    • 5.1Step one: From Czech to English
      • 5.1.1The transitive verb pattern (SVO)
      • 5.1.2The intransitive verb pattern (SVA)
      • 5.1.3The passive verb pattern (SVpassA)
      • 5.1.4The copular verb pattern (SVCs (+comp))
      • 5.1.5Semantics of presentation verbs
    • 5.2Step two: English original texts
      • 5.2.1Verbs of ‘light/sound/smell emission or movement’
      • 5.2.2‘Contain / be covered’ and ‘manifestation’ verbs
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
  • Primary source
Published online: 4 May 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lic.17007.mal
References (38)
References
Adam, M. 2013. Presentation Sentences (Syntax, Semantics and FSP). Brno: Masaryk University.Google Scholar
Altenberg, B. and Granger, S. (eds). 2002. Lexis in Contrast. Corpus-based Approaches. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins PC. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Anderson, S. R. 1971. On the Role of Deep Structure in Semantic Interpretation. Foundations of Language 7(3): 387–396. Available at [URL] [last accessed 1 August 2017].
Barnbrook, G. 2002. Defining Language. A Local Grammar of Definition Sentences. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bednarek, M. 2008. Emotion Talk across Corpora. London: Palgrave. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bolinger, D. 1977. Meaning and Form. London: LongmanGoogle Scholar
Breivik, L. E. 1983. Existential There. A Synchronic and Diachronic Study. Department of English. University of Bergen.Google Scholar
Brůhová, G. 2015. Passivization of Ditransitive Verbs from the FSP Point of View. Linguistica Pragensia 251: 27–36.Google Scholar
Dowty, D. 2000. The Garden Swarms with Bees and the Fallacy of ‘Argument Alternation’. In Polysemy: Theoretical and Computational Approaches, Y. Ravin and C. Leacock (eds), 111–128. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dušková, L. 1999a. On Some Functional and Stylistic Aspects of the Passive Voice in Present-day English. Studies in the English language. Part 1: 113–148. Prague: Karolinum.Google Scholar
1999b. On Some Semantic and FSP Aspects of the Subject in Czech and in English. Studies in the English language. Part 2: 247–272. Prague: Karolinum.Google Scholar
2015. From Syntax to Text: the Janus Face of Functional Sentence Perspective. Prague: Karolinum.Google Scholar
Ebeling, J. 2000. Presentative Constructions in English and Norwegian. A Corpus-based Contrastive Study. Oslo: Acta Humaniora.Google Scholar
Ebeling, J. and Ebeling, S. O. 2013. Patterns in Contrast. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Erdmann, P. 1990. Discourse and Grammar: Focussing and Defocussing in English. Tübingen: Niemeyer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Firbas, J. 1992. Functional Sentence Perspective in Written and Spoken Communication. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Freeze, R. 1992. Existentials and Other Locatives. Language 68(3): 553–595. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fried, M. 2005. A Frame-based Approach to Case Alternations: the Swarm-class Verbs in Czech. Cognitive Linguistics 16(3): 475–512. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Halliday, M. A. K. and Matthiessen, C. M. I. M. 2004. An Introduction to Functional Grammar. London: Hodder Arnold.Google Scholar
Haspelmath, M. 2010. Comparative Concepts and Descriptive Categories in Crosslinguistic Studies. Language 86(3): 663–687. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hunston, S. and Sinclair, J. 2000. A Local Grammar of Evaluation. In Evaluation in Text: Authorial Stance and the Construction of Discourse, S. Hunston and G. Thompson (eds), 75–100. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hunston, S. 2008. Starting with the Small Words. Patterns, Lexis and Semantic Sequences. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 13(3): 271–295. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2013 (1st ed. 2011). Corpus Approaches to Evaluation: Phraseology and Evaluative Language. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
2015. Lexical Grammar. In The Cambridge Handbook of English Corpus Linguistics, D. Biber and R. Reppen (eds), 201–215. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Johansson, S. 2007. Seeing through Multilingual Corpora. On the Use of Corpora in Contrastive Studies. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kettnerová, V. 2014. Lexikálně-sémantická konverze ve valenčním slovníku. Prague: Karolinum.Google Scholar
Klégr, A., Malá, M. and Šaldová, P. 2012. Anglické ekvivalenty nejfrekventovanějších českých předložek. Prague: Karolinum.Google Scholar
Lambrecht, K. 1994. Information Structure and Sentence Form: Topic, Focus, and the Mental Representations of Discourse Referents. Cambridge Studies in Linguistics 711. Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Levin, B. 1993. English Verb Classes and Alternations: A Preliminary Investigation. Chicago/IL: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Lyons, J. 1967. A Note on Possessive, Existential and Locative Sentences. Foundations of Language 31: 390–396.Google Scholar
Malá, M. 2013. Translation Counterparts as Markers of Meaning. Languages in Contrast 13(2): 170–192. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Martinková, M. 2014. K metodologii využití paralelních korpusů v kontrastivní lingvistice. Naše řeč 97(4–5): 270–285.Google Scholar
Mathesius, V. 1936. On Some Problems of the Systematic Analysis of Grammar. Travaux du Cercle Linguistique de Prague VI1: 95–107.Google Scholar
Panevová, J. et al. 2014. Mluvnice současné češtiny 2. Syntax češtiny na základě anotovaného korpusu. Prague: Karolinum.Google Scholar
Salkoff, M. 1983. Bees Are Swarming in the Garden. Language 59(2): 288–346. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Warren, M. and Leung, L. 2016. Do Collocational Frameworks Have Local Grammars? International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 21(1): 1–27. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Primary source
Český národní korpus – InterCorp. Ústav Českého národního korpusu FF UK, Praha. Available at [URL] [last accessed 1 August 2017].