Constraints for the Russian Middles: A Comparative Approach to English and Russian

초록

This study investigates the syntactic structures and the semantic interpretations of the Russian middle constructions by comparing them with the English middle constructions. Some conditions and constraints for middle formations are differently applied to English and Russian as a different set of parameters. From a perspective of typology, the Russian middle structures seem to belong to type II, the languages of which are independently marked by morphological middle morphemes, such as French and Greek. Yet the Russian middle constructions have the similitude with the English middle constructions that belong to type I, so-called adverbial middles. Adverbial middles have the syntactic structure of [S VMIDDLE+СЯ *(ADV) (*NPINSTR)], which is the same as the Russian middle constructions. The Russian middle constructions are formed by the reflexive postfix –ся, which is homophonous to the passive reflexive morpheme –ся. The Russian middles are less sensitive to the constraints for middle formations than the English middles. The middles denote the property of the subjectTHEME and the generic interpretation. The middles are property-oriented and non-episodic, but not event-oriented and episodic. Non-generic middles are produced in different tense and aspect, yet generic middles - in the present tense.

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