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Domain Minimization in English Verb-Particle Constructions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 February 2026

Barbara Lohse ,
John A. Hawkins  and
Thomas Wasow
Barbara Lohse*
Affiliation:
University of Southern California
John A. Hawkins*
Affiliation:
University of Southern California
Thomas Wasow*
Affiliation:
Stanford University
*
Lohse, Schillingstr. 27a, 44139 Dortmund, Germany [lohse@usc.edu]
Hawkins, Department of Linguistics, Grace Ford Salvatori 301, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-1693 [hawkins@usc.edu]
Wasow, Department of Linguistics, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305-2150 [wasow@csli.stanford.edu]
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Abstract

The placement of the particle before or after an object in the English verb-particle construction is influenced by a variety of factors. We argue that many of them can be subsumed under a single simple principle, motivated by considerations of processing efficiency: to the extent that the domains of syntactic and semantic dependencies can be minimized, processing is facilitated. We use a more precise formulation of this idea to make several predictions about the distribution of particles based on the size of the object NP and the semantic dependencies among the verb, the particle, and the object. Corpus studies confirm the predictions, providing evidence for the principle of domain minimization.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 80 , Issue 2 , June 2004 , pp. 238 - 261
Copyright
Copyright © 2004 Linguistic Society of America

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