Manner Adverbs

This paper recalls some basic facts on syntax of adverbs and negation in Czech. It has been proposed recently to analyze adverb phrases (AdvP) as the unique specifiers of distinct maximal projections, rather than as adjuncts (ClNQUE 1999). Cinque argues for the existence o f a fixed universal hierarchy of clausal functional projections. Furthermore, he rejects the assumption that languages vary in the number and type of functional projections and their distribution. Instead, he tries to construct a plausibility argument against these assumptions, suggesting that no such variation is allowed by UG and that the same number, type and order (hierarchy) of functional projections holds across languages and clause types, despite apparent counterevidence. Specifically, he argues that in addition to the order of free functional morphemes ("particles" and auxiliaries) and of bound functional morphemes (affixes), there is a third type of different classes offunctional projections of AdvP.

Similarily to the proposal that has been made by Uwe Junghanns (2006), I do not adopt the specific approach to the grammar of adverbials that are associated with specific functional projections (cf. also ALEXIADOU 1997 for Greek).

Instead, and as opposed to Uwe Junghanns, I make the claim that sentential adverbs are base-generated as adjuncts
to an agreement phrase as opposed to VP-Adverbs that adjoin to VP in the base.

This vision is supported with respect to the different properties of Negation and Scope w.r.t. sentential adverbs (SA) and manner (lower) adverbs: The contrast of manner adverbs with respect to structural position and the SA is striking both with respect to lexicon (semantics) and to scope properties of negation.

First descriptive generalization + manner adverbs are subcategorized by the verbal projection (light vP) whereas the higher adverbs are subcategorized by the CP phase heading and dominating the higher sentential negation phrase that outscopes manner adverbs. If the negational scope outscopes the propositional phrase and thus also the higher sentential adverbs, it usually takes scope over the lower adverbs and thus has properties of focus (partial) and contrastive focus.

My proposal is the following: The fact that in most cases SAs do not meet scope conflicts (for the exceptions see JUNGHANNS, 2006) can be explained by the fact that sentential negation does not build a scope domain of SA, the latter being situated higher in the sentence structure. Whereas SAs usually and mostly do not affect the reading of the negated proposition - despite their apparent scope conflicts that are then resolved by covered movement after Speil-out out of the scope of sentential negation (cf. JUNGHANNS, 2006) - manner adverbs such as pekne 'nicely', vlEdne 'moderately', nah/as 'loudly', dobfe 'good', etc. strictly combine with constituent negation interpretations with different scope properties than the sentence negation has. As I already stated my proposal will be that the negation - besides its main property as operator responsible for binding the trace or variable of negated sentences - constitutes the focus domain of the lowest phrase, viz. VP-shell. The starting point of my analysis is then the assumption that the negation -like other scope taking items (e.g., the particle only, etc.) - can be a candidate for focalizers or focus sensitive particles in the sense of HAJlcovA (l995a,b).
I assume that the focus feature [FOC can be assigned to syntactic constituents that include SAs and manner adverbs. Because SAs must take scope over the whole proposition (they
take the proposition as their argument in complement position)
they have to stand higher than the NegP. Scope conflicts between a sentential negation and SAs as discussed in Junghanns are resolved or overcome in the non-overt part of syntax (traditionally called LF). After Speil-out, the SA, the offending item, leaves its base position to adjoin to CP (or in my version to AGRSP) from where it takes scope over the whole clause.

This paper is focused on intensive comparative structures (which are by far the most numerous in language and discourse) applied to the intensive adverbs in -mente of Medieval Spanish. It is found that collocations formed with the intensive adverbs include, above all, verbal nuclei. It is possible that collocations formed with non-participial adjectives and even other adverbs exist, but the corpora do not provide evidence (only some isolated examples of adverbial collocations with adjectives can be traced), probably because they were at the first steps of their development (from a primary structure of adverb + participle) or probably because the preserved texts are still scarce and not fully representative. Some successful collocations are identified (llorar / combatir / herir fuertemente; herir fieramente; desamar mortalmente; pagar enteramente) and other ones less widespread, but already established in usage (conocer enteramente, destruir totalmente…).
The most widespread intensive adverbs that gave rise to the greatest number of collocations and from the earliest centuries are fuertemente and fieramente. They became part, already in the thirteenth century, if not before, of relevant lexical solidarities that increased as the Middle Ages progressed. Collocations with other intensive adverbs (except altamente) flourished only from the fourteenth century onwards and, especially, during the fifteenth century. This fact can be interpreted as a consequence of the progressive integration of this type of adverbs into the language. In some cases, this led to an imbalance between these adverbs and their possible collocational variants (the short forms of these same adverbs or some adverbial phrases), which are also taken into consideration in this work.
The data provided throughout this paper show how one of the most interesting collocational paradigms of Spanish language began to be built.

In this issue’s column focusing on adverbs and English language learners, columnist Kristin Lems explores some
of the basic but not-so-obvious features about adverbs that readers and writers need to learn in order to take
advantage of these powerful levers of language. The odds are very good that your native English speakers will also
benefit from this information—and you might learn a thing or two as well

In this issue’s column focusing on adverbs and English language learners, columnist Kristin Lems explores some of the basic but not-so-obvious features about adverbs that readers and writers need to learn in order to take advantage of these powerful levers of language. The odds are very good that your native English speakers will also benefit from this information—and you might learn a thing or two as well

This thesis is an in-depth study of the semantics of -mente adverbs in Spanish. With the goal of explaining the distribution of these adverbs on the basis of their semantic characteristics, 84 adverbs from seven subclasses were analysed, with two important results: 1) a refinement of the existing descriptions of these adverbs, largely thanks to the consideration of a wider array of data; and 2) a description of the semantic features that characterize each of the seven subclasses and predict their behavior. In particular, we get a clear picture of the relationship between the semantics of the base adjectives and the resulting adverbs, including aspects of meaning such as the inheritance of the argument structure of the adjectives by the corresponding adverbs, and the role argument structure plays in determining the adverbs' uses.