1932
0
  1. Home
  2. A-Z Publications
  3. Annual Review of Linguistics
  4. Volume 8, 2022
  5. Article

Annual Review of Linguistics

Volume 8, 2022

Nominalization and Natural Language Ontology

Abstract

Nominalization (e.g., , , ) allows speakers to refer and ascribe properties to whatever sorts of entities clauses, verbs, or adjectives typically denote. Characterizing these relatively abstract entities has challenged semanticists and philosophers of language for over 50 years, thanks especially to Zeno Vendler's early work. Vendler took different kinds of English nominalization constructions to support positing facts, propositions, and events as distinct ontological objects. However, his conclusions remain controversial. The research on nominalization and natural language ontology has never been brought together or put into perspective; in this article, we clarify the complex variety of subsequent ontological positions that build on Vendler's work, identifying points of consensus and disagreement. We also reflect on the consequences and challenges of focusing on the English data and offer a glimpse of how the landscape might change with greater attention to nominalization in other languages.

Keyword(s): abstract objects, events, facts, natural language ontology, nominalization, propositions
Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031120-020110
2022-01-14
2024-04-29
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

/deliver/fulltext/linguistics/8/1/annurev-linguistics-031120-020110.html?itemId=/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031120-020110&mimeType=html&fmt=ahah

Literature Cited

  1. Abney S. 1987. The English noun phrase in its sentential aspect PhD Thesis MIT Cambridge, MA:
  2. Asher N. 1993. Reference to Abstract Objects in Discourse Dordrecht, Neth: Kluwer
  3. Asher N. 2011. Lexical Meaning in Context Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
  4. Bach E 1986. Natural language metaphysics. Studies in Logic and the Foundations of Mathematics, Vol. 114: Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science VII R Barcan Marcus, GJ Dorn, P Weingartner 573–95 Amsterdam: Elsevier
     [Google Scholar]
  5. Barwise J, Perry J. 1983. Situations and Attitudes Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
  6. Bassaganyas-Bars T. 2018. Have-sentences in discourse. PhD Thesis, Univ. Pompeu Fabra Barcelona, Spain:
     [Google Scholar]
  7. Bäuerle R. 1987. Ereignisse und Repräsentation. Habilitationschrift Thesis, Univ. Konstanz Konstanz, Ger:.
  8. Bennett J. 2002. What events are. The Blackwell Guide to Metaphysics RM Gale 43–65 Oxford, UK: Blackwell
     [Google Scholar]
  9. Betti A. 2015. Against Facts Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
  10. Carlson GN. 1977. Reference to kinds in English. PhD Thesis Univ. Mass., Amherst:
     [Google Scholar]
  11. Carlson GN 2003. Weak indefinites. From NP to DP: On the Syntax and Pragma-Semantics of Noun Phrases 1 M Coene, Y D'Hulst 195–210 Amsterdam: Benjamins
     [Google Scholar]
  12. Chatzikyriakidis S, Luo Z. 2013. Adjectives in a modern type-theoretical setting. Lecture Notes in Computer Science 8036 Formal Grammar: 17th and 18th International Conferences, FG 2012/2013 G Morrill, M-J Nederhof 159–74 Berlin/Heidelberg, Ger: Springer
     [Google Scholar]
  13. Chierchia G. 1984. Topics in the syntax and semantics of infinitives and gerunds PhD Thesis Univ. Mass. Amherst:
  14. Chierchia G. 1998. Reference to kinds across languages. Nat. Lang. Semant. 6:339–405
     [Google Scholar]
  15. Chomsky N 1970. Remarks on nominalization. Readings in English Transformational Grammar R Jacobs, P Rosenbaum 184–221 Waltham, MA: Ginn
     [Google Scholar]
  16. Comrie B, Thompson SA. 2007. Lexical nominalization. Language Typology and Syntactic Description 3334–81 Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
     [Google Scholar]
  17. Cooper R. 2005. Records and record types in semantic theory. J. Logic Comput. 15:99–112
     [Google Scholar]
  18. Cooper R. 2021. From perception to communication: an analysis of meaning and action using a theory of types with records (TTR) Work. Pap. Univ. Gothenburg Gothenburg, Swed:.
  19. Cresswell M. 1973. Logics and Languages London: Methuen
  20. Cresswell MJ 1979. Interval semantics for some event expressions. Semantics from Different Points of View R Bäurle, U Egli, A von Stechow 90–116 Berlin/Heidelberg, Ger: Springer
     [Google Scholar]
  21. Davidson D. 1967. The logical form of action sentences. The Logic of Decision and Action N Rescher 81–95 Pittsburgh, PA: Univ. Pittsburgh Press
     [Google Scholar]
  22. Davies M. 2008. The Corpus of Contemporary American English. https://www.english-corpora.org/coca/
  23. Dowty D. 1985. On recent analyses of the semantics of control. Linguist. Philos. 8:291–331
     [Google Scholar]
  24. Fonteyn L. 2019. Categoriality in Language Change: The Case of the English Gerund Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press
  25. Francis WN, Kucera H. 1979. Brown corpus manual Tech. Rep. Dep. Linguist., Brown Univ. Providence, RI: http://icame.uib.no/brown/bcm.html
  26. Gehrke B, McNally L. 2015. Distributional modification: the case of frequency adjectives. Language 91:4837–70
     [Google Scholar]
  27. Ginzburg J, Sag IA. 2000. Interrogative Investigations: The Form, Meaning, and Use of English Interrogatives Stanford, CA: CSLI Publ.
  28. Grimm N, Grimm S. 2021. Form and meaning in Havu nominalizations Talk delivered at 10th World Congress of African Linguistics Leiden Univ. Leiden, Neth.: June 7
  29. Grimm S, McNally L. 2015. The -ing dynasty: rebuilding the semantics of nominalizations. Proceedings of the 25th Conference on Semantics and Linguistic Theory (SALT 25), ed S D'Antonio, M Moroney, CR Little82–102 Washington DC: Linguist. Soc. Am.:
     [Google Scholar]
  30. Grimm S, McNally L. 2016. The+VPing as anaphoric event-type reference. Proceedings of the West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics (WCCFL) 33167–75 Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proc. Proj.
     [Google Scholar]
  31. Hamm F, van Lambalgen M. 2003. Event calculus, nominalisation, and the progressive. Linguist. Philos. 26:4381–458
     [Google Scholar]
  32. Haspelmath M 1995. The converb as a cross-linguistically valid category. Converbs in Cross-Linguistic Perspective M Haspelmath, E König 1–56 Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter Mouton
     [Google Scholar]
  33. Horn G. 1975. On the nonsentential nature of the POSS-ing construction. Linguist. Anal. 1:4333–87
     [Google Scholar]
  34. Huang Z. 2021. Distinguishing between POSS-ing and ACC-ing: evidence from with(out) Paper presented at the 29th Conference of the Student Organisation of Linguistics in Europe (ConSOLE 29) Leiden, Neth.: Jan. 26–28
    [Google Scholar]
  35. Huddleston R, Pullum GK. 2002. The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
  36. Iordachioaia G, Soare E 2015. Deverbal nominalization with the ‘down’ operator. Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 2013: Selected Papers from ‘Going Romance,’ Amsterdam 2013 EO Aboh, J Schaeffer, P Sleeman 223–38 Amsterdam: John Benjamins
     [Google Scholar]
  37. Kaiser G. 1978. Materialen zur Diskussion der Ereignisse Pap. SFB 99, Number 31 Univ. Konstanz Konstanz, Ger:.
  38. Koptjevskaja-Tamm M. 1993. Nominalizations London: Routledge
  39. Kratzer A. 1989. An investigation of the lumps of thought. Linguist. Philos. 12:607–53
     [Google Scholar]
  40. Kratzer A. 2002. Facts: particulars or information units?. Linguist. Philos. 25:655–70
     [Google Scholar]
  41. Landman M, Morzycki M 2003. Event-kinds and the representation of manner. Proceedings of the Western Conference in Linguistics (WECOL) 2002 NM Antrim, G Goodall, M Schulte-Nafeh, V Samiian 136–47 Fresno: Calif. State Univ.
     [Google Scholar]
  42. Lees RB. 1960. The Grammar of English Nominalizations. The Hague Neth: Mouton
     [Google Scholar]
  43. Lieber R. 2016. English Nouns: The Ecology of Nominalization Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
  44. Lowe JJ. 2019. The syntax and semantics of nonfinite forms. Annu. Rev. Linguist. 5:309–28
     [Google Scholar]
  45. Malouf RP. 2000. Mixed Categories in the Hierarchical Lexicon Stanford, CA: CSLI Publ.
  46. Mari A, Beyssade C, Prete FD 2013. Genericity Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press
  47. Martin-Löf P. 1984. Intuitionistic Type Theory: Notes by Giovanni Sambin of a Series of Lectures Given in Padua in June 1980 Naples, Italy: Bibliopolis
  48. McNally L, Boleda G. 2004. Relational adjectives as properties of kinds. Empirical Issues in Syntax and Semantics 5 O Bonami, P Cabredo Hofherr 179–96 Paris, Fr.: Colloq. Syntax Semant. Paris http://www.cssp.cnrs.fr/eiss5/mcnally-boleda/index.html
    [Google Scholar]
  49. McNally L, de Swart H. 2011. Inflection and derivation: how adjectives and nouns refer to abstract objects. Pre-proceedings of the 18th Amsterdam Colloquium425–34 Amsterdam: ILLC
     [Google Scholar]
  50. Milsark G 2005. Gerundive nominalizations. The Blackwell Companion to Syntax M Everaert, H van Riemsdijk 436–58 New York: Blackwell
     [Google Scholar]
  51. Mulligan K, Correia F. 2020. Facts. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy EN Zalta Stanford, CA: Metaphys. Res. Lab, Stanford Univ. Winter, 2020 ed.. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/facts/
    [Google Scholar]
  52. Peters S, Westerståhl D. 2013. The semantics of possessives. Language 89:4713–59
     [Google Scholar]
  53. Polinsky M. 2013. Raising and control. The Cambridge Handbook of Generative Syntax M den Dikken 577–606 Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
     [Google Scholar]
  54. Portner P 1991. Gerunds and types of events. Proceedings of the 1st Conference on Semantics and Linguistic Theory (SALT 1) SK Moore, AZ Wyner 189–208 Washington, DC: Linguist. Soc. Am.
     [Google Scholar]
  55. Portner P. 1992. Situation theory and the semantics of propositional expressions PhD Thesis Univ. Mass., Amherst:
  56. Poutsma H. 1923. The Infinitive, the Gerund and the Participles of the English Verb Groningen, Neth: P. Noordhoff
  57. Pullum GK. 1991. English nominal gerund phrases as noun phrases with verb-phrase heads. Linguistics 29:763–800
     [Google Scholar]
  58. Schachter P. 1976. A nontransformational analysis of gerundive nominals in English. Linguist. Inq. 7:205–41
     [Google Scholar]
  59. Schirakowski B. 2020. (No) competition between deverbal nouns and nominalized infinitives in Spanish. Boreal.: Int. J. Hisp. Linguist. 9:2257–83
     [Google Scholar]
  60. Schirakowski B. 2021a. Nominalisierte Infinitive im Spanischen Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter
  61. Schirakowski B 2021b. What constrains the formation of Spanish nominalized infinitives?. Formal Approaches to Romance Morphosyntax MO Hinzelin, N Pomino, EM Remberger 225–50 Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter
     [Google Scholar]
  62. van Lambalgen M, Hamm F. 2005. The Proper Treatment of Events Oxford, UK/Boston: Blackwell
  63. Vendler Z. 1967a. Causal relations. J. Philos. 64:21704–13
     [Google Scholar]
  64. Vendler Z. 1967b. Linguistics in Philosophy Ithaca, NY: Cornell Univ. Press
  65. Vendler Z. 1968. Adjectives and Nominalizations. The Hague Neth: Mouton
     [Google Scholar]
  66. Zamparelli R. 2000. Layers in the Determiner Phrase New York: Garland
  67. Zucchi A. 1993. The Language of Propositions and Events: Issues in the Syntax and the Semantics of Nominalization Dordrecht, Neth: Kluwer
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031120-020110
Loading
Nominalization and Natural Language Ontology
Annual Review of Linguistics 8, 257 (2022); https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031120-020110
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031120-020110
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031120-020110
Loading

Data & Media loading...

  • Article Type: Review Article

Most Cited Most Cited RSS feed

This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was a Success
Invalid data
An Error Occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error