Syntactic Productivity

Syntactic Productivity: Extending Argument 

Structure Constructions to New verbs 

Jóhanna Barðdal

2 

This research was conducted in the period 

2003–2007 and is coming out in the Constructional 

Approaches to Language series of Benjamins 

• Barðdal, Jóhanna. 2008. Syntactic Productivity: Evidence 

from Case and Argument Structure in Icelandic 

[Constructional Approaches to Language]. Amsterdam: John 

Benjamins. 

Bergen Jóhanna Barðdal June 5, 2008

Overview 

3 

• Productivity 

• New verbs in Icelandic: A general outline 

• Nonce verbs: A psycholinguistic experiment 

• New Verbs of communication: A questionnaire 

• Old and Modern Icelandic: A frequency comparison 


Senses and Synonyms of “productive” and 

“productivity” (1) 

4 

1. ‘frequent’ 

2. ‘regular’ 

3. ‘rule-based’ 

4. ‘operative’ 

5. ‘easily combinable’ 

6. ‘transparent or compositional’ 

7. ‘having a wide coverage’ 

8. ‘default’ 

9. ‘schematically open or non-restricted, i.e. general’ 


Senses and Synonyms of “productive” and 

“productivity” (2) 

5 

10. ‘schematic vs. listable’ 

11. ‘lexically and semantically modifiable’ 

12. ‘syntactically manipulatable/flexible vs. frozen or idiomatic’ 

13. ‘having a meaning/function vs. being historical relics’ 

14. ‘developing new functions’ 

15. ‘living vs. dead’ 

16. ‘occurring or existing’ 

17. ‘occurring with new/novel/nonce items’ 

18. ‘spreading to already existing items’ 

19. ‘deviating from adult language’ 


Examples of Different Usages (1) 

6 

• Productivity as syntactic ‘flexibility’ or ‘manipulatability’ 

Many linguists have also noted that the noncompositional 

nature of idioms explains why idioms tend to be limited in 

their syntactic and lexical productivity (Gibbs 1995: 98). 

• Productivity as schematicity 

In spite of the fact that it is host to a large number of fixed 

expressions the form [the X-er the Y-er] has to be recognized 

as fully productive. Its member expressions are in principle 

not listable (Fillmore, Kay & O'Connor 1988: 507). 


Examples of Different Usages (2) 

7 

• Productive semantics as semantic transparency 

Thus, it appears that very young children do not have access to 

the productive semantics of the noun class system, but treat it 

rather as a formal grammatical system. (Demuth 2000: 284 

[Emphasis added]) 

• Productivity as meaningfulness/functionality 

... we also have to bear in mind that not all contrasts and 

distributions are meaningful or functional. Some patterns 

represent a lexically-arbitrary residue of formerly productive 

patterns. (Bybee & Thompson 1997: 384 [Emphasis added]) 


Bybee’s (1995) Usage 

8 

• Productivity as extensibility 

... the ability to be extended to new items ... (1995: 426) 

• Productivity as regularity 

The main issue to be discussed is the role of type frequency in 

the determination of regularity or productivity. (1995: 426 


• Productivity as default status 

I will argue that default status or productivity is not 

necessarily associated with source-oriented rules. (1995: 444 



Tomasello’s (2000) Usage 

9 

• Productivity as children’s use of language that goes beyond what they have 

heard from adults (Tomasello 2000: 211) 

... both of which focus on children’s productivity, that is, their use of 

language in ways that go beyond what they have heard from adults. 

• Productivity as production of language (Tomasello 2000: 210) 

Thus, on the basis of hearing just The window broke ... they cannot go over 

to use He broke it ... This lack of productivity ... 

• Productivity as schematicity (Tomasello 2000: 236) 

This construction is highly abstract in the sense that it is not dependent on 

any particular word or phrase, and it is highly productive in the sense that 

any fluent speaker of English can generate innumerable further exemplars. 


The Concepts of Productivity 

10 

1. Productivity as generality 

2. Productivity as regularity 

3. Productivity as extensibility 


Making Sense of Different Senses of “Productive” 

11 


Definitions of productivity 

12 

1. The probability of a word formation pattern accepted as the 

model for new/potential words (Aronoff 1983: 163, fn. 1). 

2. The likelyhood that a pattern will apply to new forms 

(Bybee 1995: 430, Bybee and Thompson 1997: 384). 

3. The interaction between the potential of a morphological 

process to generate repetitive non-creative forms and the 

degree to which it is utilized in language use to yield new 

lexical items (Bauer 2001: 211). 


Measurements of productivity (1) 

13 

1) The number of words a morphological process may apply to 

(Lieber 1981: 114-115). 

2) The number of new words coined by a morphological process 

(during a specific period of time) (Anhsen and Aronoff 1989). 

3) The proportion between actual items and potential items 

generated by a morphological process (Aronoff 1976: 36). 

4) The low token frequency of items as compared to the higher 

mean token frequency of other items in a corpus (Aronoff 

1983). 


Measurements of productivity (2) 

14 

5) The proportion between the number of words, formed by a 

morphological process, occurring only once in a corpus and 

the total token frequency of all the words in the same corpus 

formed by that particular morphological process (Baayen 

1992, Baayen and Lieber 1991). 

6) The proportion between the number of items of a category 

which only occur once in a corpus and the total amount of all 

items occurring only once (Baayen 1993). 

7) The proportion between type and token frequency. 


Predicting productivity 

15 

8) The type frequency of a schema and its coherence (Bybee 

1995: 430, Clausner and Croft 1997, Croft and Cruse 2004). 


Syntactic productivity 

16 

1. The language user’s ability to generate and understand 

sentences never encountered before. 

2. The ability of a syntactic pattern or argument structure 

construction to be extended to new lexical verbs. 

1. = Regularity Concept 

2. = Extensibility Concept 

Productivity is a matter of how available a pattern is for the 

sanction of novel expressions (Langacker 2000: 26 

[emphasis added]). 


“Two kinds of ‘creativity’” 

17 

We can distinguish two kinds of “creativity” in language. 

In one case there is the ability of speakers, using existing 

resources in the language, to produce and understand novel 

expressions. In the other case, the one for which we use the 

term coining, a speaker uses existing patterns in the 

language for creating new resources (Fillmore 2002). 


Regular performance vs. extensibility in 

morphology and syntax 

18 


Types, tokens and patterns in morphology and 

syntax 

19 


The extensibility of regularity in morphology and 

syntax 

20 


Definition of syntactic productivity used here 

21 

The extension of syntactic patterns or argument structure 

constructions to new verbs is a function of the correlation 

between the construction's type frequency and semantic 

coherence. 


Predicting factor 

22 

Inverse correlation between type frequency and semantic 

coherence: 

– High type frequency – Low degree of semantic coherence 

– Low type frequency – High degree of semantic coherence 


The inverse correlation between type frequency 

and semantic coherence 

23 


Different definitions and degrees of productivity 

24 


The productivity cline 

25 


The productivity cline 

26 


High type frequency vs. open schema 

27 

• Can these be teased apart? 


The schematicity–lexicality hiararchy 

28 


Degrees of productivity 

29 

• Assuming different levels of schematicity automatically entails 

gradient productivity 

• The productivity domain of each category is a function of its type 

frequency and coherence 

• The highest level of schematicity of each construction thus 

determines its productivity 

• BUT if the highest level of schematicity is derived from the type 

frequency of a construction, can’t productivity then just be reduced 

to type frequency 

• No, not really, because a construction’s level of schematicity cannot 

be derived from the type frequency of low-type frequency 

constructions. 


Gradient productivity (Clausner & Croft 1997) 

30 

Clausner and Croft (1997) take productivity to be a derivative of the 

relation between a schema and its instantiations. That is, higher type 

frequency contributes to a fuller exploitation of a schemas range, resulting 

in a more entrenched schema than entrenched instantiations. 


Modified version of C&C’s gradient productivity 

31 


Type vs. token frequency (Bybee 1995) 

32 

• High type frequency contributes to productivity 

• High token frequency detracts from productivity 

– Strong verbs are high in type frequency 

– Irregular verbs are high in token frequency 

• Two classes of irregular verbs, the strung vs. the 

swept class, of same type frequency (13 vs.14) 

show differences in productivity correlating with 

token frequency. The swept class is of high token 

frequency and non-productive, while the strung 

class is of intermediate token frequency and semiproductive 


strung vs. swept verbs 

33 

• It is not clear how the type frequency of 13 vs. 14 (based 

on Moder 1992) has been calculated 

• Bybee and Slobin (1982: 288) list 27 strung verbs. 

• Hornby, Cowie and Gimson’s monolingual English 

dictionary (1974: 1003–1006) lists 21 verbs of the strung 

class and 22 of the swept class 

• A short glance at that list reveals that the strung class is 

phonologically much more coherent than the swept class 


Bergen Jóhanna Barðdal June 5, 2008 

34

Token frequency’s contribution to productivity? 

35 


Token frequency’s contribution to productivity? 

36 


The inverse correlation between type and token 

frequency for productivity 

37 


Summary (1) 

38 

• The 19 different usages of the term productivity reveals a 

highly structured and systematic metaconcept of which several 

inferentially-related subconcepts can be discerned. 

• The general concept of productivity within linguistics can be 

broken down into three main subconcepts, i.e. those of (a) 

generality, (b) regularity and (c) extensibility. 

• Productivity is as a function of a construction’s type frequency 

and its coherence, and the inverse correlation between the two. 


Summary (2) 

39 

• There two notions of productivity found within syntax, i.e. (a) 

speakers’ ability to generate sentences never heard before, and 

(b) speakers extensions of argument structure constructions to 

new verbs, reflect the regularity and the extensibility concepts, 

respectively, within syntax. 

• Productivity is gradient with high type frequency correlating 

with high degree of schematicity, while low type frequency 

presupposes a high degree of semantic coherence in order for a 

construction to be productive. 

• It is the highest level of schematicity at which a construction 

exists in speakers’ minds that determines its degree of 

productivity and not its most entrenched level. 


Summary (3) 

40 

• Token frequency can contribute to the productivity of low type 

frequency constructions, since low-level lexically-filled verbspecific 

constructions, rather than abstract schematic 

constructions, are models for analogical extensions. 

• The current approach to syntactic productivity, focusing on the 

Extensibility concept, offers a unified account of productivity 

since it captures different degrees of productivity, ranging 

from highly productive patterns to various intermediate 

degrees of productivity to low-level analogical modeling. The 

Regularity/Generality concept can also be derived from this 

analysis. 


Case study 1: New verbs in Icelandic: A general 

outline 

41 

• Overview of intransitive and transitive case and 

argument structure constructions in Icelandic 

• Type frequency, relative and absolute frequency 

• Semantics of the Nominative subject construction 

• Borrowed verbs from the area of Information technology 

• Problems for generative approaches 

• Analogy and token frequency 


Case and argument structure constructions in 

Icelandic 

42 


Type frequencies 

43 

• Nominative subject construction: Intermediate-sized, 

bilingual Icelandic–English dictionary (Hólmarsson, 

Sanders and Tucker 1989) 

• Oblique subject construction: List of predicates that take 

quirky subjects in Icelandic (Jónsson 1998) 


Type frequency of the Nominative subject 

construction 

44 

• The differences between the three subconstructions across the two counts 

are highly significant, i.e. the chances are only one against 1,000 that they 

are due to coincidence (Pearson Chi-Square, p < 0.001) 


Corpus count 

45 

• Modern Icelandic 

• Written material: 25,000 running words 

• Five different genres, 5,000 words each, ten 500-word texts in each 

genre: 

– Icelandic fiction 

– Translated fiction 

– Children’s literature 

– Biographies and memoirs 

– Non-fiction 

• Spoken material: 15,000 running words 

– Interactive ring-in radio program 


The semantics of the Nominative subject 

construction 

46 

• Narrowly circumscribed verb classes: 

– 303 Nom-Acc verbs: 46 verb classes 

– 188 Nom-Dat verbs: 33 verb classes 

– 24 Nom-Gen verbs: five verb classes 

• On average 6.1 verbs in each class 


Nom-Acc construction 

47 

• Basic event type categories: 

– Making: byggja ‘build’ 

– Moving: afhenda ‘deliver’ 

– Affectedness: lemja ‘hit’ 

– Cognition: skilja ‘understand’ 

– Emotion: elska ‘love’ 

– Change (of state): byrja ‘begin’ 

– Location: gista ‘be accommodated somewhere’ 



48

Nom-Dat construction 

49 

• Basic event type categories: 

– Change (of quantity): fjölga ‘increase’ 

– Cognition: líkja saman ‘compare’ 

– Emotion: kvíða ‘be anxious’ 

– Superiority: stjórna ‘govern’ 

– Motion: kasta ‘throw’ 



50

Animate vs. inanimate reference of the object in 

Nominative subject constructions in Icelandic 

51 

(Pearson Chi-Square, p < 0.000). 


Nom-Gen construction 

52 

• No Basic event type categories: 

– Verb-subclass-specific constructions: 

• Asking/wishing: biðjast ‘ask’ 

• Cognition: vera fullviss ‘be sure’ 

• Emotion: njóta ‘enjoy’ 

• Social influence: mega ‘have power’ 


Nom-Gen 

53 


The Nominative subject construction – an open 

schema 

54 


Recent borrowings in Icelandic (1) 

55 

• 107 borrowed predicates 

– a recent on-line slang dictionary (Magnússon 2004) 

still under construction 

– the Icelandic discussion forum for Mac-users 

(www.apple.is/umraedur) 

– 68 are Nom-Acc verbs 

– 39 are Nom-Dat verbs 



56 

• Nom-Acc (68): 

– archive-a ‘archive’, battla ‘battle’, biddsslappa ‘bitchslap’, blasta ‘blast’, bojkotta ‘boycut’, 

builda ‘build’, bomba ‘bomb’, branda ‘brand’, browsa ‘browse’, bösta ‘bust’, compilera 

‘compile’, copy-a ‘copy’, digga ‘dig’, döbba ‘dub’, editera ‘edit’, erasa ‘erase’, fíla ‘like‘, fixa 

‘fix’, flexa ‘flex‘, formatta ‘format’, fótósjoppa ‘photoshop’, gúggla ‘google’, hakka ‘hack’, 

hössla ‘hussle’, kidda ‘kid‘, krakka ‘crack’, logga ‘log’, massa ‘finish with style’, meisa ‘spray 

with tear gas’, modda ‘modify’, mounta ‘mount’, muffa ‘bang’, mönnsa ‘munch’, offa ‘off’, 

óna ‘own’, paira ‘pair’, partiona ‘partition’, patcha ‘patch’, peista ‘paste’, pinga ‘ping’, 

plögga ‘plug’, pródúsera ‘produce’, prógrammera ‘program’, publisha ‘publish’, r[e]nta 

‘rent’, releasa ‘release’, render ‘render’, resetta ‘reset’, resolva ’resolve’, restora ‘restore’, 

rippa ‘rip’, rokka ‘rock’, skratsa ‘scratch’, skvassa ‘squash, break’, slamma ‘slam’, ssh-a ‘ssh’, 

stúdera ‘study’, supporta ‘support’, sörfa ‘surf’, synca ‘synchronize’, synkrónisera 

‘synchronize’, tagga ‘tag, write’, testa ‘test’, tóka ‘smoke hash’, trimma ‘trim’, updata 

‘update’, upgreida ‘upgrade’, verifya ‘verify’ … 



57 

• Nom-Dat (39): 

– adda ‘add’, blasta ‘blast’, bomba ‘bomb’, bundla ‘bundle’, convertera 

‘convert’, downloada ‘download’, deleta ‘delete’, de-multiplexa 

‘demultiplex’, dumpa ‘dump’, droppa ’drop‘, ejecta ‘eject’, expandera 

‘expand’, exporta ‘export’, farta ‘fart‘, innstalla/innstallera ‘install’, krassa 

‘crash’, mnsa ‘msn‘, mökka ‘contaminate’, neimdroppa ‘namedrop’, offa 

‘off’, parkera ‘park’, peista ‘paste’, poppa ‘deliver when popping by’, 

pósta ‘post’, publisha ‘publish’, releasa ‘release’, resolva ’resolve’, 

restarta ‘restart’, rippa ‘steal’, sjera ‘share’, slamma ‘slam’, starta ‘start’, 

statta ‘stat, dublicate’, streyma ‘stream’, tilta ‘tilt’, umba ‘be agent for’, 

unzippa ‘unzip’, uploada ‘upload’, untara ‘unzip’ … 


Problem for generative approaches to case 

58 

Nom-Acc is structural case 

Nom-Dat is lexical case (idiosyncratic) 

... we make a rough and tentative distinction between the core 

of a language and its periphery, where the core consists of 

what we tentatively assume to be pure instantiations of UG 

and the periphery consists of marked exceptions (irregular 

verbs, etc.). [emphasis original] 

(Chomsky and Lasnik 1995: 19–20) 


Productivity is associated with rules and nonproductivity 

with memory 

59 

The theory that regular forms are generated by rule and 

irregular forms are retrieved by rote is pleasing ... because it 

explains the differences in productivity between the two 

patterns ... (Pinker 1999: 19) 



60


61


62

The productivity of Nom-Acc and Nom-Dat (1) 

63 

• The borrowed verbs assigned Nom-Acc belong to the 

semantic classes of already existing Nom-Acc verbs 

• The borrowed verbs assigned Nom-Dat belong to the 

semantic classes of already existing Nom-Dat verbs 

• This suggests that the productivity of these two 

constructions is based on the extension of either verbspecific 

constructions (a.k.a. analogy) or verb-classspecific 

constructions 


Case assignment based on verb-specific 

constructions 

64 

(1) Eftir að ég updataði tölvuna núna síðast þá ... Nom-Acc 

after I updated computer-the.acc now last then 

‘After I updated the computer last time, then ...’ 

• uppfæra = update 

(2) … þá ákvað ég að offa því um 2–4 vikur. Nom-Dat 

then decided I to postpone it.dat about 2–4 weeks 

‘… then I decided to postpone it for 2–4 weeks.’ 

• fresta = offa 


Low-level verb-class generalizations 

65 

Nom-Dat 

(3) búin að importera öllum færslum þessa árs inn í MT … 

finished to import all.dat transactions.dat this year into in MT 

‘finished importing all transactions from this year into MT …’ 

Nom-Dat 

(4) Farið að farta þessari plötu út svo ég ... 

start to fart this.dat record.dat out so I 

‘Can’t you start farting this record out so that I ...’ 


Semantic overlap 

66 

Nom-Acc 

(5) Þá voru Kanarnir að bomba Júgóslava. 

then were Americans to bomb Yugoslavians.acc 

‘Then the Americans were bombing the Yugoslavians.’ 

Nom-Dat 

(6) Mér tókst að bomba tannkremi í augað á mér. 

I.dat managed to bomb tooth-paste.dat in eye on me 

‘I managed to bomb toothpaste into my eye.’ 


The productivity of Nom-Acc and Nom-Dat (2) 

• On the generative approach, this would at best be expected for the 

Nom-Dat construction, but it is not expected for the Nom-Acc 

construction, which is supposed to be default. 

• This means that borrowed verbs with the Nom-Acc construction are 

also assigned case and argument structure constructions “lexically,” 

exactly like borrowed verbs with the Nom-Dat construction 

• If the borrowed Nom-Acc verbs had not been assigned case and 

argument structure constructions on the basis of their synonymous 

verb-specific construction in Icelandic, but rather on some “default” 

basis, one would expect some more of the Nom-Dat verbs to have 

been assigned Nom-Acc 

67 


Rule-based vs. analogical extensions 

68 

• It is generally assumed in the literature that there is a 

qualitative difference between rule-based extensions and 

analogical extensions: 

Rule-governed innovation is always based on an 

already existing pattern which is found across at 

least two items; rule-changing innovation is based 

on a pattern which is perceived for the first time at the 

point of innovation and which may exist in only one 

model. [Emphasis added] 

(Bauer 2001: 93) 


Two sides of the same coin 

69 

• On the present usage-based constructional approach 

where constructions are assumed to exist at different 

levels of schematicity, there is no qualitative difference 

between an extension based on one model item and an 

extension based on two model items 

• It is only a difference in quantity or the strength of a 

schema 

• Hence, productivity and analogy are simply two sides of 

the same coin 


Role of token frequency 

70 

• Everybody working on productivity, within usage-based cognitive 

and constructional approaches, argues that token frequency 

detracts from productivity 

• Everybody working on productivity, within usage-based cognitive 

and constructional approaches, agrees that productivity is gradient 

• Yet, all these scholars have only viewed the role of token frequency 

in relation to full productivity, not gradient or low productivity 

• It seems obvious that if one model item can be the basis for 

analogical extensions then token frequency can be a decisive factor 

when different model items are in competition 


Choice of model items for analogical extension 

71 

Non-fictive conversation between two Icelandic 

speakers living abroad: 

– A: Ef þú ætlar að applisera þessari greiningu á efnið þá ... 

if you intend to apply this.dat analysis on material-the then 

– B: Þú meinar applisera þessa greiningu. 

you mean apply this.acc analysis 

– A: Nei, applisera einhverju eins og beita einhverju. 

no, apply something.dat like apply something.dat 

– B: Nei, applisera eitthvað eins og nota eitthvað. 

no, apply something.acc like use something.acc 


Differences in token frequency 

72 

• Observe that beita ‘apply’ is the translational equivalent 

of applisera ‘apply’ in Icelandic, not nota ‘use’ 

• In contrast, nota ‘use’ is more general 

• Neither verb collocates more strongly with the noun 

greining ‘analysis’ than the other 

• Token frequency: 


Inverse correlation between type and token 

frequency 

73 


Summary 

74 

• The nominative subject construction is highest in type frequency of 

all argument structure constructions containing two-place predicates 

• The Nom-Acc subconstruction is approximately 58–64% of 

nominative subject predicates 

• The Nom-Dat subconstruction is approximately 34–35% of 

nominative subject predicates 

• Both constructions exist at a high level of schematicity, although the 

semantic domain of the Nom-Acc construction is much wider than 

that of the Nom-Dat construction, and hence its productivity domain 

is also larger 

• Both constructions are productively assigned to borrowed verbs, by 

Icelandic speakers, within their semantic domains 


Summary 

75 

• This case assignment clearly takes place on the basis of low-level 

constructions, either verb-specific constructions or verb-subclassspecific 

constructions 

• This fact is problematic for generative approaches, exactly as the 

fact that the proportion of Nom-Acc and Nom-Dat verbs among 

borrowed verbs mirrors their proportion in language use 

• Full productivity and analogy are two sides of the same coin 

• The role of token frequency for productivity is inverse to the role of 

type frequency for productivity 


Case study 2: Nonce verbs: A psycholinguistic 

experiment 

76 

• 40 participants 

– 20 adults 

– 20 children (6–13 years) 

• Presentation: 

This is a Funny-game. I will be showing you some pictures, and then 

you will tell me what is happening in the pictures. The only thing is 

that you are not going to do it in Icelandic, you are going to tell me in 

Funny-language. Now, Funny-language is almost identical to Icelandic, 

there are only a few words that are different, and you don’t have to 

worry about that because I will teach you those words. 


Five Screen Beans silhouettes 

77 


78 

• Each picture was introduced with a formula 

corresponding to the following: 

In this picture we see a man. What he is doing is 

called grilla [‘barbeque’] in Icelandic, but in Funnylanguage 

it is called slobba. Could you now tell me 

what you see happening in the picture? 


Lexical and semantic priming 

79 


80 

• Priming verbs in the infinitive 

• One filler between each stimulus 

• Experimental comments on the morphological structure 

of the verb 


Statistics 

81 

The differences between the nominative and dative on the subjects of 

flokast and tvíta are not significant, as the chances are 499 against 1,000 

that they are due to a coincidence (Pearson Chi-Square, p < 0.499). 


Results (1) 

82 

• Three participants assigned case and argument 

structure to the nonce verbs on the basis of the priming 

verbs 

• 11 participants assigned Nom(-Acc) categorically to all 

nonce verbs 

• The remaining participants assigned a mixture of Nom- 

Acc and the priming verbs to the nonce verbs 


Results (2) 

83 

• This suggests that speakers, when faced with unknown 

verbs, have two ways of assigning argument structure 

constructions: 

– On the basis of a synonymous verb 

– On the basis of the schematic Nom-Acc construction 

– Some speakers pendulate between the two methods 


Response time 

84 

• Some of the speakers who assigned the case and argument 

structure of the priming verbs took an unusually long time to 

respond 

– It makes perfect sense that assignment of case and argument 

structure on the basis of a low-level verb-specific construction 

takes longer time, as it involves retrieval of a concrete formmeaning 

mapping and the assignment of a form on the basis of 

the meaning component 

• Some of the speakers who assigned the Nom-Acc construction 

simply rattled off their responses in no time 

– It makes perfect sense that assignment on the basis of a highlevel 

schematic construction will take shorter time as, only 

relational meaning is involved 



85

86 

• Differences in subject case marking: Less than one chance against 

1,000 that the differences in subject case marking are due to a 

coincidence (Pearson Chi-Square, p < 0.000) 

• Higher mean age for the children assigning dative case than the 

ones assigning nominative case to the subject of flokast and tvíta, or 

9.47 vs. 8.03 years of age. The difference is highly significant, with 

only seven chances against 1,000 that it is due to a coincidence 

(Paired Sample T-test, p < 0.007) 

• Differences in object case marking: The chances are only three 

against 1,000 that the object case marking is due to a coincidence 

(Pearson Chi-Square, p < 0.003) 


Generative vs. usage-based constructional approach 87 

• All the facts, presented here, about the assignment of case and 

argument structure to nonce verbs are compatible with both the 

generative approach and the present usage-based constructional 

approach, except one: 

– Assignment of Nom-Acc is structural case assignment 

– Assignment of Nom-Dat to one verb is “thematic” assignment of 

dative objects to motion verbs 

– Assignment of Dative subjects is thematic assignment of dative 

case to experience-based verbs 

– *If so, then one of the Nom-Acc verbs, the one meaning ‘love’ 

should have been assigned a Dative subject 


Summary 

88 

• The construction highest in type frequency in Icelandic, the Nom-Acc 

construction, is the only construction extended beyond its verb-specific 

construction, suggesting that it exists as a schematic construction in minds 

of speakers 

• This assumption is supported by the impression of lower response time for 

the participants who categorically assigned the Nom-Acc construction to all 

the nonce verbs in the experiment 

• Hence, Icelandic speakers assign case and argument structure 

constructions to unknown nonce verbs on the basis of (a) synonymous 

verb-specific constructions in Icelandic, or (b) high-level schematic 

constructions with little or only relational content, yielding default effects 

• The results of the experiment also contradict the predictions of generative 

grammar that the Dative subject construction should be productive, as it is 

not generally extended to nonce verbs construed as emotion verbs. 


Case study 3: New Verbs of instrument of 

communication: A questionnaire 

89 

• Faxa ‘fax’ 

• (E)meila ‘e-mail’ 

• SMSa ‘text, send a text message’ 


New Verbs of Instrument of Communication 

90 

• These verbs have been subject to considerable interest 

in the literature (Goldberg 1995, Croft et al. 2001, 

Barðdal 2003). 

• The verb is usually derived from the noun for the 

instrument or the product of the technology. 

• These verbs have emerged during the last two decades 

or so concomitant with the relevant technology, and their 

development can thus easily be traced. 


Why Icelandic? 

91 

• 86% of the Icelandic population has access to the 

Internet and 81% use it regularly. This makes Internet 

usage in Iceland highest in Europe. 

(National Statistical Institute of Iceland) 

• 96% of the Icelandic population use cell phones. Cell 

phone usage in Iceland is thus higher than it is in Finland 

which has been on the top of the cell phone usage 

statistics in the world for years. 

(Síminn: Icelandic National Telecommunication) 


Constructional Choices 

92 

(1) Ég faxa þetta til þín. TRANSFER CONSTRUCTION 

I fax this.ACC to you 

SUBJ+VERB+OBJ ACC 

PP DIR 

‘I’ll fax this to you.’ 

(2) Ég sendi þetta til þín í tölvupósti. TRANSFER CONSTRUCTION 

I send this.ACC to you in email SUBJ+VERB+OBJ ACC 

PP DIR 

‘I’ll send this to you with email.’ 

(3) Ég sendi þér þetta í tölvupósti. DITRANSITIVE CONSTRUCTION 

I send you.DAT this.ACC in email SUBJ+VERB+OBJ DAT 

+OBJ ACC 

‘I’ll send you this with email.’ 


Constructional Choices 

93 

(4) … faxa þessu bréfi á … CAUSED-MOTION CONSTRUCTION 

fax this.DAT letter.DAT on SUBJ+VERB+OBJ DAT 

PP DIR 

‘… faxed this letter to …’ 

(5) ... e-maila þér munstrið … DITRANSITIVE CONSTRUCTION 

email you.DAT pattern-the.ACC SUBJ+VERB+OBJ DAT 

+OBJ ACC 

‘... email you the pattern …’ 

(6) … sms-a mér svefntöflu. DITRANSITIVE CONSTRUCTION 

text me.DAT sleeping-pill.ACC SUBJ+VERB+OBJ DAT 

+OBJ ACC 

‘... text me a sleeping pill.’ 


The Investigation 

94 

• Questionnaire survey 

• 32 participants 

• 18 females and 14 males 

• Age 14–85 

• April 2005 – Iceland 


The Questionnaire 

95 

• Ég (e)meila þessu til þín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

• Ég faxa þetta til þín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

• Ég sms-a þér þetta 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

• Ég (e)meila þér þetta 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

• Ég sms-a þessu til þín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

• Ég (e)meila þetta til þín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

• Ég faxa þér þetta 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

• Ég sms-a þetta til þín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

• Ég faxa þessu til þín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 


Judgments 

96 

1 This is impossible in Icelandic 

2 This is hardly possible in Icelandic 

3 I don’t know whether it is possible to say this but I would 

never do it 

4 I could say this but normally I wouldn’t 

5 I might perhaps say this 

6 I could very well use this formulation 

7 This is exactly how I would say it 



97

Results (1) 

98 

1) All three construction are accepted with new verbs of instrument of 

communication in Icelandic to a varying degree 

2) All verbs are judged most acceptable in the Transfer construction 

(with an accusative object), which is the prototypical construction for 

verbs of sending 

3) The verb faxa, which was borrowed earliest of the three, is most 

accepted in the Transfer construction 

4) The Transfer construction is rated most acceptable with faxa 

5) The Ditransitive construction is rated most acceptable with smsa 

6) Caused-Motion construction is rated most acceptable with (e)meila, 

although these last two conclusions may be due to a coincidence 



99

Results (2) 

100 

7) There is a clear correlation between judgments and the mean age of the participants. 

Younger speakers are generally more acceptant while the older ones are less 

acceptant. 

8) This correlation is strongest for the Caused-Motion construction for all three verbs. 

9) There is also a correlation between participant age, judgment and the age of the 

technology in the society. Faxing has existed longest and then email which has 

existed in Iceland for the last 15 years. Older speakers prefer the verbs faxa and 

(e)meila in the Transfer and the Ditransitive construction and disprefer them in the 

Caused-Motion construction. Older speakers also prefer sms-a, which represents the 

most recent technology, only in the Transfer construction. Whether this is because 

older speakers are more conservative, or because they have been less exposed to 

the technology and its accompanying language, is difficult to know. 


Question 

101 

• Why is the Caused-Motion construction accepted at all with new verbs of 

instrument of communication, given that verbs of sending are 

conventionalized as occurring in the Transfer and the Ditransitive 

construction in Germanic? 

(8) Ég sendi þetta til þín. TRANSFER CONSTRUCTION 

I send this.ACC to you SUBJ+VERB+OBJ ACC PP DIR 

‘I’ll send this to you.’ 

(9) Ég sendi þér þetta. DITRANSITIVE CONSTRUCTION 

I send you.DAT this.ACC SUBJ+VERB+OBJ DAT +OBJ ACC 

‘I’ll send you this.’ 

(10) *Ég sendi þessu til þín. CAUSED-MOTION CONSTRUCTION 

I send this.DAT to you 

SUBJ+VERB+OBJ DAT PP DIR 



102


103

Motion Verbs 

104 

• Nom-Acc (10 types) 

bera ‘carry’, draga ‘draw, pull’, flytja 

‘transport’, flæma burt ‘drive away’, færa 

‘move’, hreyfa ‘move’, senda ‘send’, taka út 

‘withdraw’, toga ‘pull’, (út)breiða ‘spread, 

unfold’ … 

• Nom-Dat (50 types) 

banda frá ‘wave away’, beina ‘direct’, benda ‘direct, point’, 

berja (hrömmunum) ‘thrash one’s paws’, blanda ‘mix’, bylta 

(sér) ‘turn around’, dreifa ‘spread’, feykja ‘blow’, forða ‘get 

sth away’, fresta ‘postpone’, fylgja ‘follow, accompany’, 

fyllast ‘become filled with’, henda ‘throw’, hella ‘pour’, 

hleypa ‘let, allow (sby into sth)’, hliðra ‘shirk’, kasta ‘throw’, 

klappa ‘pat’, koma (sér) ‘get off, go away’, mjaka ‘budge’, 

mæta ‘run into sby’, renna ‘glide’, ríða ‘ride’, róa ‘row’, 

safna ‘gather’, skella (e-u í sig) ‘slam (in oneself), eat’, skila 

‘return’, skjóta ‘shoot’, skjóta upp (kollinum) ‘pop up’, skutla 

‘drive’, slengja ‘throw’, sleppa ‘drop, release’, smeygja (sér) 

‘slide’, smjúga (fingrum) ‘slip’, snúa ‘turn’, sparka ‘kick’, 

spyrna ‘kick’, stilla upp ‘take a position’, stinga ‘insert’, 

sveipa ‘wrap’, svæla (í sig) ‘puff (in oneself), eat’, troða 

‘squeeze (one’s way)’, tylla (sér) ‘take a seat’, varpa 

‘throw’, velta ‘roll’, vefja ‘wrap’, víkja ‘make way’, ýta ‘push’, 

þrengja ‘push’, þrýsta ‘squeeze, thrust’… 


Proportion of motion verbs among Nom-Acc and Nom-Dat 

verbs 

105 

Nom-Acc 

Nom-Dat 

N 

10/303 

50/188 

f 

0.33% 

26.6% 


Borrowed Verbs 

106 

• 3 Verbs of translational motion (Nom-Acc): 

– hakka ‘hack’, logga ‘log’, ssh-a ‘ssh’ … 

• 23 Verbs of caused motion (Nom-Dat): 

– blasta ‘blast’, bomba ‘bomb’, bundla ‘bundle’, downloada 

‘download’, dumpa ‘dump’, droppa ‘drop’, ejecta ‘eject’, 

expandera ‘expand’, exporta ‘export’, farta ‘fart’, innstalla/ 

innstallera ‘install’, neimdroppa ‘name drop’, parkera ‘park’, 

peista ‘paste’, poppa ‘deliver when popping by’, pósta 

‘post’, publisha ‘publish’, releasa ‘release’, slamma ‘slam’, 

streyma ‘stream’, uploada ‘upload’, untara ‘unzip’, unzippa 

‘unzip’ … 


Conclusion: Analogy vs. High type frequency 

107 

• Icelandic speakers have a choice between the Caused-Motion 

construction and the Transfer construction because of: 

• the high degree of semantic overlap between senda and 

new verbs of instrument of communication 

• the high type frequency of the Caused-Motion construction in 

Icelandic in general 

• the boundaries between “analogy” and “productivity” cannot 

be maintained, as both give rise to extensibility, to varying 

degrees. As such they are simply two sides of the same coin. 


Conclusion 

108 


Summary 

109 

• All three new verbs of instrument of communication are accepted in 

all three constructions, although to a varying degree 

• The Transfer construction obtained the highest mean score for all 

the verbs, presumably on analogy with senda 

• Differences in the mean age of the participants who accepted and 

rejected the three verbs in the Caused-motion construction, with 

younger speakers being more acceptant 

• Suggests that the Caused-motion construction is gaining in 

productivity in Icelandic, presumably on the basis of the fact that it is 

a verb-subclass-specific construction, existing at a considerably 

higher level of schematicity than senda 

• The boundaries between “analogy” and “productivity” cannot be 

maintained, as both give rise to extensibility, to varying degrees 


Thank You! 

110

Syntactic Productivity

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