Verbs and Unspecified NP DeletionAuthor(s): Wayles BrowneSource: Linguistic Inquiry, Vol. 2, No. 2 (Spring, 1971), pp. 259-260Published by: The MIT PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4177635 .

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SQUIBS AND DISCUSSION

References Chomsky, N. (1970) "Remarks on Nominalizations," in

R. A. Jacobs and P. S. Rosenbaum, eds., Readings in English Transformational Grammar, Ginn-Blaisdell, Waltham, Mass.

Fraser, B. and J. R. Ross (1970) "Idioms and Unspecified NP Deletion," Linguistic Inquiry i, 264-265.

Perlmutter, D. M. (1970) "On the Article in English," in M. Bierwisch and K. Heidolph, eds., Recent Advances in Linguistics, Mouton, The Hague.

Weinreich, U. (I966) "Explorations in Semantic Theory," in T. A. Sebeok, ed., Current Trends in Linguistics III, Mouton, The Hague.

VERBS AND UNSPECIFIED NP DELETION

W4'ayles Browne, Institut za lingvistiku, Zagreb

In a recent squib (Linguistic Inquiry I, 264-265) Fraser and Ross discuss deletability of NP's after certain English verbs. Their examples (4a-g) purport to show that idioms are not subject to a process omitting an unspecified NP like some- thing (or, as in (4e-g), such an NP with a preposition). These examples of nonidiomatic verbs from similar semantic classes

(4')a. *B. devised. b. *J. consumed/devoured. c. *F. debitted. d. *M. halved. e. *The F. detected/overheard. f. *S. ignited. g. *M. exploited.

show that idiomaticity is not a necessary condition for nondeletability. The failure of deletion, rather, is due to some feature common to the verbs of (4) and their near- synonyms of (4')-seemingly an aspectual one. Lacking a full theory of the syntax of aspects, we here merely suggest that the (4-4') verbs differ from verbs like Fraser-Ross's (i) (drink, smoke, read, . . .) in presupposing progress toward an end point at which an idea is existent, the drink is com- pletely gone, the object lies cleft, the FBI is in possession of information, etc. Some idiomatic verbs agree with the (i)

verbs in lacking obligatory presupposed goal-directedness; as expected, one can find examples allowing deletion of unspecified NP:

(I') a. Max was monkeying/screwing/po6keying around (with something).

b. Pit was mucking about (with something).

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260 SQUIBS AND DISCUSSION

c. Byron was taking liberties (with someone/ something).

d. Aubrey was making love (to/with someone). e. Fanny was bearing up (under something).

BRING AND COME1

Robert I. Binnick, University of Kansas

In recent years it has been proposed that there is a class of "causative" verbs which are derived transformationally from underlying semantic complexes by predicate-raising (see McCawley I968 and de Rijk I968) and lexical incor- poration or insertion (see Gruber I965). One candidate for membership in this class is bring, which on the basis of its meaning would seem to be the "causative" of come. An argument which has been raised against this proposal is that despite this apparent semantic relationship, bring entails accompaniment, whereas cause to come does not; cf. (i) and (2) below.

(i) *I brought the girl to a party which I did not go to. (2) I caused the girl to come to a party which I did

not go to. There are perhaps other, less difficult arguments against the causative proposal as well.

However, there is one powerful piece of evidence sup- porting the causative analysis of bring, having to do with the Verb + Particle "verbal idioms" which bring and come enter into. In my idiolect and the idiolects of all informants whom I have asked about it, every such verbal idiom of come has a corresponding verbal idiom with bring, and vice versa; moreover, the meaning of each is predictable from that of its correspondent precisely in the way we would expect if, in fact, bring were the "causative" of come. I give below a large but probably not comprehensive list of such verbal idioms and their correspondents, culled from Wood (i 967), from various other reference works, and from various speakers. At the end of the paper I give a list of some idioms of other types; it somewhat complicates the situation that only some of these other idioms act as expected if this hypo- thesis is correct.2

1 Essentially the same set of facts presented here have been inde- pendently discovered by Charles Fillmore (private communication) and David Perlmutter (I970). The facts presented here about bring and come are, I note in fairness to critics of the causative proposal, only imperfectly paralleled by the facts about idioms containing send and go, if at all.

2 It should be kept in mind that no verbal idiom of the Verb + Particle type containing bring or come has a precise correspondent in- volving any verb but (respectively) come or bring. Furthermore, when a verbal idiom of this type containing one of these verbs is ambiguous the correspondent idiom is likewise ambiguous, and in precisely the same way. This is inexplicable if the hypothesis is wrong.

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