Untersuchungen zur Deutschen Kausativkonstruktion im Rahmen der 'Lexical Mapping Theory'

Abstract

In this paper we treat the syntax and semantics of German causative verbs using the Lexical Mapping Theory(=LMT) of Lexical Functional Grammar. It has been proved in the LMTs research that the various syntactic phenomena such as passive, applicative and causative constructions can be appropriately derived from the argument structure of the predicate. There are two kinds of German causative constructions: one is the causative verb construction derived normally from common nouns and adjectives; the other is the complex causative construction derived from the 'lassen+base verb.' We have, however, restricted our discussion to lexical causative verbs. The German causative verbs 'verfilmen' and 'verdunkeln', for instance, have complex semantic representations, and thus they should also have complex argument structures such as BEWIRK(Ag, FILMWERDEN(Th)) and VERURSACH(Ag, DUNKEL-WERDEN(Th)). The abstract semantic primitives, BEWIRK, VERURSACH, FILM-WERDEN, and DUNKEL-WERDEN are then transformed into the causative verbs 'verfilmen' and 'verdunkeln' by lexical operations. The transformation of the other causative construction 'lassen+base verb' into the syntactic structure presupposes the research on the grammatical function such as XCOMP and COMP. Thus I will leave this problem to future research.