Characterizing ‘Have’ Predicates and Indefiniteness
M. Teresa Espinal & Louise McNally
3. The data in more detail
First, as noted above, not all intensional transitive ‘have’ verbs (cf. Larson et al. 1997 for a list of intensional transitive verbs) combine equally felicitously with BSNs; we repeat the data in (1) for convenience.
(1) CATALAN
(a) Tinc cotxe.
have.1SG car
‘I have a car.’ (= I am a car owner) (b) ?Necessito cotxe.
need.1SG car
‘I need a car.’
(c) ?Busco cotxe.
look-for.1SG for car
‘I’m looking for a car.’
(d) ??Vull cotxe.
want.1SG car
‘I want a car.’
(e) *Desitjo cotxe.
wish-for.1SG car
‘I wish for a car.’
Second, not all nominal expressions combine equally felicitously with ‘have’-predicates. Ab-stract nouns (e.g., pau interior ‘internal peace’, silenci ‘silence’, amistat ‘friendship’, sincerit-at ‘sincerity’, qualitsincerit-at de vida ‘quality of life’) are systemsincerit-atically accepted in object position without the requirement of an overt article, but this is no doubt due to the fact that they can have a mass interpretation (cf. the acceptability of bare mass nouns such as informació ‘in-formation’ in (10)).
(10) (a) Tinc pau interior / informació.
have.1SG peace internal / information
‘I have internal peace / information.’
(b) Necessito silenci / informació.
need.1SG silence / information
‘I need silence / information.’
(c) Busco amistat / informació.
look-for.1SG friendship / information
‘I’m looking for friendship / information.’
(d) Vull sinceritat / informació.
want.1SG sincerity / information
‘I want sincerity / information.’
(e) Desitjo qualitat de vida / informació.
wish-fo.1SG quality of life / information
‘I wish quality of life / information.’
However, other nominal expressions introduce some variation in acceptability. For example, we have observed that intensional transitive ‘have’ verbs can combine only with a very lim-ited set of simple event (count) nominals (Grimshaw 1990), but not with the vast majority of other (count) event nominals, such as abraçada ‘embrace’, compliment ‘compliment’, dis-culpa ‘apology’ or petó ‘kiss’. Compare (10) and (11).
(11) CATALAN
(a) Tinc partit / reunió / sopar / viatge / visita.
have.1SG match / meeting / dinner / trip / visit
‘I have a(n) match / meeting / dinner / trip / visit.’
(b) Necessito hora.
need.1SG hour
‘I need an appointment.’
(12) (a) *Tinc disculpa.
have.1SG apology (b) *Necessito disculpa.
need.1SG apology (c) *Busco disculpa.
look-for.1SG apology (d) *Vull disculpa.
want.1SG apology (e) *Desitjo disculpa.
wish.1SG apology
Although the difference between the singular (count) event nouns in (11) and (12) requires further study, we suspect that the excluded event nominals have argument structures that need to be satisfied but cannot be in this context, while those that are acceptable lack the relevant sort of argument structure.3
3 Note that count event nominals of the sort exemplified in (12) improve when an internal complement is made explicit.
(i) (a) *Tinc disculpa. (=12a) have apology
(b) ??Tinc disculpa de l’agència de viatges.
have apology from the agency of travel
‘I have an apology from the travel agency.’
(c) Tinc una disculpa de l’agència de viatges.
have an apology from the agency of travel
‘I have an apology from the travel agency.’
Let us now consider some restrictions that apply when combining various intensional transitive ‘have’ verbs with BSNs in object position.
3.1 Tenir / tener ‘have’ vs. desitjar / desear ‘wish, desire’
Only tenir ‘have’ is free to combine with various types of count nominals, among others: ca-pacity nominals (secretària ‘secretary’) and nominals that describe a full range of physical entities (llapis ‘pencil’, entrepà ‘sandwich’, etc.). 4
(13) CATALAN
(a) Tinc secretària.
have.1SG secretary
‘I have a secretary.’
(b) Tinc pis.
have.1SG apartment
‘I have an apartment.’
(c) Tinc bolígraf.
have.1SG pen
‘I have a pen.’
(d) Tinc entrepà.
have.1SG sandwich
‘I have a sandwich.’
In sharp contrast to tenir ‘have’, we find the verb desitjar ‘wish (for), desire’, which cannot combine with any type of BSNs.
(14) (a) *Desitjo secretària.
wish-for.1SG secretary (b) *Desitjo pis.
wish-for.1SG apartment (c) *Desitjo llapis.
wish-for.1SG pencil (d) *Desitjo entrepà.
wish-for.1SG sandwich
Note, however, that desitjar allows BSNs in object position of a subordinate infinitive clause.
See the contrast between (14) and (15).5 (15) (a) Desitjo tenir secretària.
wish.1SG have secretary
‘I wish to have a secretary.’
(b) Desitjo trobar apartament.
wish.1SG find apartment
‘I wish to find an apartment.’
4 Posseir ‘possess’ behaves semantically like tenir ‘have’ but is more restricted in the BSNs it combines with because in general it imposes stricter selectional restrictions on its object arguments than does tenir.
5 Desitjar does seem acceptable with BSNs in examples like Desitjo habitació amb bany ‘I would like a room with a bathroom’. We thank Daniel Jacob for pointing similar examples in Spanish to us.
We do not have an explanation for this case at this time, but we observe that what distinguishes acceptable examples of desitjar with BSNs from the examples in (14) is the fact that the former appear to always involve a speech act of requesting, while the latter do not.
(c) Desitjo escriure amb llapis.
wish-for.1SG write with pencil
‘I wish to write with a pencil.’
(d) ??Desitjo menjar entrepà.
wish-for.1SG eat sandwich
‘I wish to eat a sandwich.’
3.2 Necessitar / necesitar ‘need’ and buscar / buscar ‘look for’
In between the two verbs we have just mentioned, we find necessitar / necesitar ‘need’, bus-car / busbus-car look for’ on the one hand, and voler / querer ‘want’ on the other.
Necessitar and buscar form a single class in that they can freely combine with capacity nominals, but they can combine with nouns that describe ordinary individuals/physical objects (hereafter, sortal nouns) only depending on the contextual information that is available: the question marks below indicate that only in certain contexts are the VPs in (16) and (17) likely to denote characterizing properties of the subject.
(16) CATALAN
(a) Necessito secretària / company de pis.
need.1SG secretary partner of apartment
‘I need a secretary / partner for the apartment.’
(b) Necessito apartament / cotxe.
need.1SG apartment car
‘I need a(n) apartment / car.’
(c) ?Necessito llapis.
need.1SG pencil
‘I need a pencil.’
(d) ???Necessito entrepà.
need.1SG sandwich
‘I need a sandwich.’
(17) (a) Busco secretària / company de pis.
look-for.1SG secretary partner of apartment
‘I’m looking for a secretary / partner for the apartment.’
(b) Busco apartament / cotxe.
look-for.1SG apartment car
‘I’m looking for a(n) apartment / car.’
(c) ??Busco llapis.
look-for.1SG pencil
‘I’m looking for a pencil.’
(d) ???Busco entrepà.
look-for.1SG sandwich
‘I’m looking for a sandwich.’
One factor that improves the possibility of interpreting the VP as a characterizing property is the uniqueness of the referent of the bare nominal with respect to the external argument of the VP, in the particular context. This appears to be a pragmatic phenomenon, though its explana-tion will have to await further research.
(18) (a) Tinc família / marit.
have.1SG family husband
‘I have a family / husband.’
(b) Necessitem director de departament / plaça de pàrquing.
need.1PL head of department slot of parking
‘We need a head of the department / parking slot.’
(c) Busco pis / parella.
look-for.1SG apartment / partner
‘I’m looking for a(n) apartment / partner.’
Given that in the right context the examples in (16) and (17) become felicitous, we conclude that, from a semantic point of view, necessitar ‘need’ / buscar ‘look for’ form a single class with tenir ‘have’.
3.3 Voler / querer ‘want’
In contrast to the verbs discussed so far, intensional transitive voler is puzzling because it can-not freely combine with either sortal or capacity nominals, even though, when followed by a nominal, it is often analyzed as entailing that the subject has an entity describable by the nom-inal in his or her preferred bouletic alternatives to the actual world. It thus might be expected to behave like tenir ‘have’, but it does not.
(19) CATALAN
(a) ??Vull secretària.
want.1SG secretary
‘I want a secretary.’
(b) ??Vull apartament.
want.1SG apartment
‘I want an apartment.’
(c) ???Vull llapis.
want.1SG pencil
‘I want a pencil.’
(d) *Vull entrepà.
want.1SG sandwich
However, for Catalan we observe that when the sentence introduces what we will refer to as a situational argument for which the BSN can form part of a characterizing ‘have’ predicate, then the sequences are completely well-formed. See the contrast between (20) and (21). It should be noticed that the clitic hi in (21) is theta-related neither to voler nor to the overt infinitival complement.6
(20) ??Vull piscina / taula / aperitiu.
want.1SG swimming-pool table appetizer
‘I want a(n) swimming-pool / table / appetizer.’
(21) (a) No em fa res anar de càmping, però hi vull piscina.
not me makes anything go of camping but there want.1SG swimming-pool
‘I don’t mind going camping, but I want there to be a swimming pool.’
(b) Al despatx, hi vull taula de reunions.
at+the office there want.1SG table of meetings
‘In my office I want there to be a meeting table.’
6 We thank Anna Bartra and Mar Massanell for their judgments on these and similar examples.
(c) Ja m’està bé que fem un sopar després del casament, però jo hi already me is fine that do.1PL a dinner after of+the wedding but I there vull aperitiu.
want appetizer
‘It’s fine with me to have dinner after the wedding, but I want there to be an appetizer.’
We postulate that the contrasts in (20) and (21) parallel those illustrated in (22) and (23), which show that a BSN can occur in object position of the existential ‘have’-predicate haver-hi / haber ‘there be’ only if the BSN is anchored by the oblique clitic (cf. Espinal and McNally 2007:exs. (33) and (34)).7
(22) CATALAN (a) *Ha garatge
has garage (b) Hi ha garatge.
there has garage
‘There is a garage.’
(23) SPANISH (a) *Ha garaje.
has garage (b) Hay garaje
has-there garage
‘There is a garage.’
Additional evidence for the similarity between the clitic hi ‘there’ required with voler ‘want’
in (21) and the situational argument required with existential haver-hi ‘there be’ comes from the parallel in the contrast between (24a-b), on the one hand, and between (25a-b), on the oth-er. Like haver-hi, voler ‘want’ does not allow for locative modifiers or secondary predicates of the BSN unless they are left dislocated and coindexed with the locative clitic because, as argued in E&McN, the BSN does not introduce a (temporary or permanent) discourse referent to anchor the predication and to be the holder of an argument denotation.
(24) (a) */??Hi vull taula de reunions al despatx.
there want table of meetings at+the office
‘I want a meeting table at the office.’
(b) Al despatx, hi vull taula de reunions.
at+the office there want.1SG table of meetings
‘In my office I want there to be a meeting table.’
(25) (a) */??Hi ha garatge a l’ edifici. (E&McN 2007: ex. (43a)) there has garage at the building
(b) A l’ edifici, hi ha garatge. (E&McN 2007: ex. (42a)) at the building there has garage
‘There is a garage in the building.’
7 Spanish existential haber differs from Catalan haver-hi with regard to the fact that the oblique clitic y is only
spelled out in the third person singular of the indicative present tense. See Freeze (1992) for a description of the relation between existential and locative sentences.
Finally, observe that the hi that cooccurs with voler ‘want’ does not have the same status as the one that could possibly appear with other intensional transitive verbs such as necessitar
‘need’. In both (26a-b) necessito jaqueta serves to characterize the first person subject. Clitic hi is not obligatory here; if made explicit, it is not the external (or situational) argument of the characterizing complex predicate, but is bound to the left-dislocated ‘comitative’ adjunct in-troduced by the preposition amb ‘with’.
(26) (a) ?Necessito jaqueta.
need.1SG jacket
‘I need a jacket.’
(b) Amb aquest vestit, (hi) necessito jaqueta de conjunt.
With this dress there need.1SG jacket of set
‘With this dress, I need a matching jacket.’
3.4. Desitjar / desear ‘wish, desire’
The verb desitjar / desear ‘desire’ contrasts with voler / querer ‘want’ in several respects.
First, desitjar cannot appear in contexts analogous to (21). The data in (27) are ungrammatical, but the sequences in (28) with clitic hi do not improve.
(27) *Desitjo piscina / taula / aperitiu.
wish.1SG swimming-pool table appetizer
‘I wish a(n) swimming-pool / table / appetizer.’
(28) (a) *No em fa res anar de càmping, però hi desitjo piscina.
not me makes anything go of camping but there wish.1SG swimming-pool (b) *Al despatx, hi desitjo taula de reunions
at+the office there wish-for.1SG table of meetings
(c) *Ja m’ està bé que fem un sopar després del casament,però jo hi already me is fine that do.1PL a dinner after of+the wedding but I there
desitjo aperitiu.
wish appetizer
Second, according to most speakers, desitjar, in contrast to voler, does not allow clitic climb-ing (Picallo 1990). Compare (29a) with (29b).
(29) (a) Aquesta pel·lícula, la vull veure.
this film it want. 1SG see
‘This film, I want to see it.’
(b) *Aquesta pel·lícula, la desitjo veure.
this film it desire.1SG see
Third, while voler allows cliticization of the partitive clitic en in certain cases depending on the properties of the infinitival complement (e.g., when this infinitive is an unaccusative verb), desitjar never does. Picallo (1990) argues on the basis of these facts that a control analysis is necessary for desitjar, but is not appropriate for voler in cases like (30a).
(30) (a) Volen venir quatre estudiants. → En volen venir quatre.
want come four students one-PART want come four
‘Four students want to come.’
(b) Desitgen venir quatre estudiants. → *En desitgen venir quatre.
wish come four students one-PART wish come four
‘Four students wish to come.’
Finally, although desitjar is a hyponym of one reading of voler, voler also has a semi-modal use (see Picallo 1990 for detailed discussion). This use is evident in the potential semantic lightness of voler, which appears to facilitate its combination with meteorological verbs, a property shared with other modal verbs but not with desitjar.
(31) (a) Vol ploure.
wants rain
‘It looks like it will rain.’
(b) Pot / ha de ploure.
can / has to rain ‘It may / must rain.’
(c) *Desitja ploure.
wishes rain
This difference suggests an important lexical semantic difference that accompanies the syn-tactic differences mentioned above. We will present our analysis of the contrast between vol-er / quvol-ervol-er ‘want’ and desitjar / desear ‘wish, desire’ in Section 5.