Inchoative, middle and subject-instrument constructions in the lexical-constructional model

Abstract

Abstract. The Lexical Constructional Model –LCM (Ruiz de Mendoza and Mairal 2008, 2011, Mairal and Ruiz de Mendoza 2008, 2009, Ruiz de Mendoza 2008, cf. Butler 2009 for a critical assessment) is a comprehensive model of language that accounts for meaning construction at the levels of argument structure, implicature, illocution and discourse. Unlike other constructionist approaches (i.e. Goldberg 1995, 2006), the LCM provides a full account of meaning construction where lexico-constructional integration is constrained by a number of internal and external factors. At the level of argument structure, which is the focus of the present contribution, the LCM examines the participation of lexical predicates in argument structure constructions. In this paper I study three related grammatical constructions in English: the inchoative, the middle and the subject-instrument constructions within the framework of the LCM. I examine their semantic and structural properties and the internal and external constraints which regulate them.