Download TWISTIN THE NIGHT AWAY

TWISTIN THE NIGHT AWAY
Ray Jackendoff
❖ “We slept the whole afternoon away”, the ‘time’-away construction
proves to have a complex set of syntactic and semantic properties.
❖ The NP the whole afternoon behaves syntactically like a direct object,
even though it is clearly not licensed by the verb sleep.
❖ This construction is shown to be distinct from two others that it
superficially resembles, the resultative and the way-construction.
❖ Two approaches for licensing the NP object are compared:
(1) a lexical rule approach, in which sleep away is treated as a
complex verb that licenses the object
(2) a constructional approach, in which V NP away is listed as a
meaning-bearing construction that licenses both the verb and
the object.
❖ The ‘time’-away construction
(1) Bill slept the afternoon away.
We’re twistin the night away.
❖ Resultative construction and the way-construction
(2) Amy pounded the clay flat.
Beth whistled her way across America.
❖ The ‘time’-away construction has syntactic and semantic peculiarities of
its own, so it cannot be reduced to either of these two.
❖ Before any theoretical conclusions, let us investigate the properties of
the ‘time’-away construction.
1.
2.
3.
4.
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6.
7.
8.
Syntactic properties
Semantic properties
The aspectual particle AWAY
More on aspectual particles
Review of the resultative and WAY-construction
Comparison of the three constructions
Still another family of related constructions/idioms
Two accounts
Syntactic properties
❖ An intransitive verb, followed by an apparently unlicensed NP plus the
particle away
A. Verb - A wide range of verbs is possible in the construnction.
No postverbal NP may be present other than the time phrase,
nor may the verb be one that requires a direct object.
(3) Fred drank the night away.
*Fred drank scotch the night away.
Ann read the morning away.
(4) *Fred devoured the night away. (*Fred devoured.)
B. With-phrase - A with-phrase can substitute for the verb’s direct object in
this construction, even though such a phrase would be imposssible with
the verb alone.
(5) Fred drank the night away with a bottle of Jack Daniels.
*Fred drank with a bottle of Jack Daniels.
C. Particle - The particle away behaves like those in other verb-particle
constructions, in that it can invert with the NP, especially if the NP is a
little longer.
(7) Stan drank away the afternoon of his fiftieth birthday.
Stan fished away all of Tuesday morning.
C. Particle - The particle can also be modified, in which case it does not
invert.
(8) Dan slept the long afternoon entirely away.
*Dan slept entirely away the long afternoon.
❖ It behaves just like ordinary verb particles.
(look the answer right up/*look right up the answer)
❖ Away is the only possible particle in this construction.
*sleep the afternoon up (parallel to drink the milk up)
D. NP - The NP is a free time expression, permitting a variety of
determiners(including quantifiers).
(9) Bill drank the night/three whole weeks/every morning/his
entire vacation away. (VP complements)
❖ It must not be confused with NPs used as free time adverbials.
(10)Fred hasn’t slept this year. (adverbial)
Kate is leaving Monday.
D. NP ❖ They can undergo passive.
(11)In the course of the summer, many happy evenings were drunk
away by the students before they finally realized there was
serious work to be done.
(12)The evening had been nearly slept away, when I suddenly
awoke with a start.
❖ Such passive are impossible with the time adverbials.
(13)*This year hasn’t been slept by Fre.
*Monday is being left by Kate.
D. NP ❖ The time phrases in the construction can undergo tough movement,
whereas time adjuncts cannot.
(14)A morning like this is hard for even me to sleep away.
*A morning like this is hard for even me to sleep.
❖ Contrasted time adjuncts can be stranded by VP-ellipsis, but the time
phrase in the ‘time’-away construction cannot.
(15)Bill read all of Monday afternoon, and Sally did so most of
Tuesday morning.
*Bill read away all of Monday afternoon, and Sally did so most
of Tuesday morning.
E. Manner adverbs - The positioning of manner adverbs in the ‘time’-away
construction is also telling: they can go in the exact places where they
occur in verb-particle constructions such as throw away.
(16)Sue threw the paper quickly away.
Sue threw the paper away quickly.
*Sue threw quickly the paper away.
Sue drank the night happily away.
Sue drank the night away happily.
*Sue drank happily the night away.
Semantic properties
A. ‘For’ phrase - Exampe (1) can be paraphrased by a sentence in which the
time expression is within a delimiting ‘for’ phrase.
(1) Bill slept the afternoon away.
→ Bill slept for the (whole) afternoon.
❖ Such ‘for’ phrases require the rest of the sentence to express an atelic
situation.
(19)*Puala ate the peanut for the whole afternoon.
*Dave died for the whole afternoon.
❖ If an event is bounded but repeatable, its interpretation if coerced into a
repetition reading by the ‘for’ phrase.
(20)Saul sneezed for the whole afternoon. (repeated sneezing)
❖ The ‘time’-away construction behaves similarly.
(21)*Dave died/awakened the afternoon away.
Saul sneezed the afternoon away. (repeated sneezes)
B. Subject - The ‘time’-away construction requires its subject to be acting
volitionally.
(22)The light flashed for two hours.
*The light flashed two hours away.
C. Verb - The verb must denote an activity, not a state.
(23)Celia sat for two hours.
*Celia sat two hours away.
D. ‘Using the time up’ - The subject is in some sense understood as using
the time or even better, ‘using the time up’.
(1) Bill slept the afternoon away.
→ Bill spent/wasted the afternoon sleeping. (paraphrase)
❖ The verbs fritter, while, and the relevant sense of piss requiring the
particle away. In fact, the verb while appears only in this construction.
(24)Sam frittered/pissed the evening away gambling.
I could while away the hours conferring with the flowers.
❖ These verbs require their gerundive complement to express a temporally
extended situation.
(25)*Sam spent/wasted three days dying/awakening.
*Sam whiled/frittered/pissed away three days dying/awakening.
❖ All these verbs except while can take other direct objects besides times,
referring to the subject’s resources: this is not a possibility in the ‘time’away construction.
(30)Bill spent/wasted his energy/hundreds of dollars skiing.
Bill frittered/pissed/*whiled away his energy/hundreds of
dollars fishing.
E. ‘Insinuation’ - There is an insinuation that the activity was heedless
pleasure. So there is something a little ironic in (32).
(32)?#Ivan worked/toiled/labored three (miserable) hours away.
❖ This insinuation can also appear with verbs like spend, waste, fritter, and
piss but not while. An alternative interpretation is that the subject wished
to have spent the time.
(33)Ivan spent/wasted three hours working (when he could have been
out in the sun).
Ivan frittered/pissed three hours away toiling on his manuscript
(when he could have been drinking).
#Ivan whiled away three hours toiling on his manuscript.
F. Distance expression - In the context of a journey, the time expression in a
‘for’ phrase can be replaced by a distance expression D which is read as
‘the amount of time it took to travel D’.
(35)Bob slept for 350 miles/for the whole state of Nebraska.
❖ The same is true in the ‘time’-away construction.
(36)Bob slept 350 miles/the whole state of Nebraska away.
Bob spent 350 miles/the whole state of Nebraska sleeping.
Bob whiled away 350 miles/the whole state of Nebraska sleeping.
❖ In short, the construction has a rather complex and rich semantics.
The aspectual particle AWAY
❖ The particle away occurs by itself with a related aspectual sense.
A. ‘keep on V-ing’ (39)Bill slept/waltzed/drank/talked/read/sneezed away.
❖ This means roughly ‘Bill kept on V-ing’. Away here is more or less a
continuative counterpart of the aspectual particle up, which signals
completion.
(40)Elena drank the milk up.
❖ Like the ‘time’-away construction, away forbids the verb from licensing a
direct object.
(41)*Dave drank scotch away.
B. Prepositional complements - Like the ‘time’-away construction, it allows
some but not all prepositional complements of the verb to follow it.
(42)Hilary talked away about her latest project.
C. (43) *Celia sat away. / *Celia sat two hours away.
Ivan worked/toiled/labored away.
(no need for the activity to be pleasurable)
/ ?#Ivan worked/toiled/labored three hours away.
D. Two striking differences between the two uses of away:
(a) Sentences with aspectual away are atelic,
whereas the ‘time’-away construction is telic, that is, it is
understood as occupying a bounded period of time.
(44)Lois and Clark danced away for/*in two blissful hours.
Lois and Clark danced two blissful hours away *for/*in a month.
D. Two striking differences between the two uses of away:
(b) Away does not admit quantificational modification when used
aspectually, but it does in the ‘time’-away construction.
(45)*Sally waltzed entirely/partly/half away.
Sally waltzed the afternoon entirely/partly/half away.
❖ Thus, the away in the ‘time’-away construction looks as though it might
be related to aspectual away. Aspectual away alone, however, is not
sufficient to explain the semantic properties of the construction
More on aspectual particles
❖ There are at least three different sources in English for the verb-particle
construction.
A. Verb-particle combination with idiomatic meanings - The best known and
large collection, for instance, look NP up, bring NP[a child] up, chew NP
out.
❖ Because of their noncompositional meanings, there is no choice but to
list them in the lexicon.
B. Verbs such as throw, take, and carry that select a directional (path) PP If the PP happens to consist only of an intransitive preposition, the result
behaves syntactically like a verb-particle construction.
(46)Beth threw
took
the fook up/in/away/(up the stairs)
carried
Beth threw/took/carried up/in/away/*up that stairs the food.
❖ There is no need to list the verb-particle combinations in the lexicon, since
the particle satisfies one of the verb’s argument positions, and meaning is
fully compositional.
C. The combination of a verb with an aspectual particle - The particle does
not satisfy an argument position of the verb, rather it contributes an
aspectual sense, often paraphrased by some sort of adjunct PP.
(47)run/sing on → ‘run/sing some more’
(48)read/scan the book through → ‘read/scan the book from
beginning to end’
(49)cook the food over → ‘cook the food again’ or ‘re-cook the food’
❖ aspectual up → roughly ‘to completion’
aspectual away → atelicity
‘time’-away construction → the duration of a process
❖ The meaning of the verb-particle construction is fully compositional.
Review of the resultative and WAY construction
❖ The ‘time’-away construction is reminiscent of two constructions, the
resultative and WAY construction.
A. Resultative - two syntactic variants, the transitive resultative and
intransitive reultative
(52)Willie wiped the table clean./ Tara talked us into a stupor.
(53)[vp V NP AP/PP]
(54)The river froze solid. / The pitcher broke into fragments.
(55)[vp V AP/PP]
❖ None of the verbs in (52) except ‘Willie wiped the table clean’ license
direct objects unless the AP/PP is also present: *cook the pot, *talk us.
❖ They all undergo passive.
(56)The table was wiped clean by Willie.
(57)We were talked into a stupor by Tara.
❖ The diresct objects have the role of patient, as revealed by the do to NP
test.
(57)What Willie did to the table was wipe it clean.
What Tara did to us was talk us into a stupor.
❖ A paraphrase with a causative inchoative main clause - the verb of the
sentence appearing in a means adjunct
(58)Willie caused the table to become clean by wiping (it).
Tara caused us to go into the stupor by talking (to us).
❖ There are various idioms that borrow the syntax and semantics of the
resultative.
(59)I cried my eyes out.
Bill drank me under the table.
B. WAY construction - the verb is followed by the NP X’s way and a PP of
path
(60)Dora drank her way down the street.
James joked his way into the meeting.
❖ The verb cannot occur with a direct object other than X’s way.
(61)*Dora drank scotch her way down the street.
❖ Denoting an action of applying force so as to move object out of one’s
path
(60)Pualette pushed/elbowed her way through the crowd.
❖ X’s way is in direct object position, unlike all the way, which occurs as a
specifier of the path phrase.
(63)Sue sang her way happily down the street.
*Sue sang happily her way down the street.
Sue ran happily all the way down the street.
*Sue ran all the way happily down the street.
❖ X’s way does not undergo passive.
(64)*Her way was sung down the street by Sue.
❖ The verb denote a continuing activity.
(65)Judy jumped her way over the field/*over the ditch.
❖ The overall meaning of the construction is close to ‘go/get/come PP (by)
V-ing.’
(66)Dora went down the street drinking.
James got into the meeting by joking.
❖ There are particular verbs that appear idiomatically in this construction.
(67)Max made/wended/threaded/wormed his way down the narrow
alley.
Comparison of the three constructions
A. Resultative vs WAY construction
❖ Jackendoff(1990) and Goldberg(1995) argue that the resultative and WAY
construction are distinct, each with its own peculiar properties.
❖ The semantics and selectional restrictions of the two constructions do
not match closely enough to allow us to reduce one construction to the
other.
B. ‘Time’-away vs WAY construction
a. Similarity
-Marantz argues that his way in the way construction ‘measures out’
the path traversed by the subject. One might say that the time
expression in the ‘time’-away construction does likewise, the
afternoon measures out Bill’s sleeping.
-Both require activity extended over a period of time.
❖ The WAY construction describes the subject’s activity while traveling
through space, and the ‘time’-away construction describes the subject’s
activity while traveling through time.
b. Differnece
-[WAY construction] The direct object ‘one’s’ way is lexically fixed and
the PP is lexically free.
[‘time’-away construction] The direct object time is lexically free and
the particle is lexically fixed.
-The selectional restrictions on the verb are different.
(71)?#Ivan toiled three hours away.
*Emma elbowed an afternoon away.
(71)Ivan toiled his way up the steep slope.
Emma elbowed her way into the room.
b. Differnece
-The status of the direct object
[‘time’-away construction] Direct object behaves like a fully referential
phrase: it undergoes passive and tough movement.
[WAY construction] Direct object cannot undergo passive and movement.
(74)*His/Bill’s way is hard for Bill/him to push into the room.
❖ The WAY and ‘time’-away constructions differ radically in the semantics of
their direct object.
❖ Neither of the constructions can be reduced to a special case of the other.
C. ‘Time’-away vs resultative construction
a. Similarity
-The direct object in the resultative is fully referential and can
undergo all the usual syntactic processes. In this respect it
resembles the object of the ‘time’-away construction more than
X’way.
b. Differnece
-[resultative construction] The direct object is a patient.
[‘time’-away construction] The direct object time cannot be affected by
what someone does during it.
(83)What Bill did *to/with Monday was sleep it away.
b. Differnece
-The syntax of aspectual away looks much like the intransitive resultative.
(85)Beth whistled away.
Beth grew tall.
❖ There is no resemblance in the semantics of these two. Tall describes
Beth’s state at the end of the event; away describes nothingof the sort.
b. Differnece
(86)Bill gambled his life away.
[‘time’-away] Bill spent his whole life gambling.
[resultative] Bill has bet his life and lost.
(He ends up perhaps submitting to slavery or killing himself.)
❖ The resultative and the ‘time’-away constructions are distinct.
Still another family of related construction
❖ Jay Keyser has pointed out that a class of verb-particle constructions
that resemble idioms such as cry one’s eyes out, which are taken to be
based on the resultative construction.
(88)The chef was cooking up a storm back in the kitchen.
Every night I sit here and sing my heart out.
❖ The NP+particle combination carries a sort of adverbial force.
❖ Like those in (88), they are not really resultatives, rather, they are
instances of yet another family of idiomatic intensifiers that use the
same syntax as the resultative.
Two accounts
A. One possibility is to regard sleep away, drink away, dive away, and so
forth as complex verbs licensing the time NP in object position, produced
by a lexical rule.
❖ Such an account is congenial with the approach of Levin(1995), who says
that verbs of sound emission undergoing a regular lexical meaning shift
to a directed motion sense.
(95)The trolley rumbled across the intersection.
❖ In the present case we can speak of activity verbs undergoing a regular
lexical meaning shift to a ‘spending time’ sense when combined with the
aspectual particle away.
B. Jackendoff 1990 and Goldberg 1995 propose that argumant structure can
be determined in part by constructional idioms.
❖ The construction account of ‘time’-away claims that the direct object is
licensed by the construction. The NP is the object of the VP but not the
object of the verb.
❖ This account contrasts with the lexical rule approach, which claims that
the verb undergoes a meaning shift.
[lexical rule] - rumble is polysemous between ‘emit rumbly noise’ and
‘move while emitting rumbly noise’
[construction rule] - rumble always means ‘emit rumbly noise’ and the
‘move’ part comes from the construction
❖ In the ‘time’-away construction
[lexical rule] - drink is polysemous between ‘ingest fluid’ and ‘waste
time ingesting fluid’
[construction rule] - drink always means ‘ingest fluid’ and the ‘waste
time’ part comes from the construction
❖ Either approach can account, but
(a) The necessity for constructions such as (96), in such cases, there
is no obvious account of such phenomena in terms of lexical
rules.
(96)One more beer and/or I’m leaving. (NP conj S)
The more you eat, the fatter you get.
➔ Hence a notion of constructional meaning is necessary.
(b) Productivity - Any verb that satisfies the construction’s
selectional restrictions can participate. The output need not be
listed in the lexicon.
❖ Jackendoff In light of the universal need for constructions, I am personally inclined
toward the constructional approach, while acknowledging that this may
not be a universal preference given the evidence so far.