The Grammar of Putting Verbs: A Homogeneous Syntactic and Semantic Verb Class?

Facultad de Filología GRADO EN ESTUDIOS INGLESES TRABAJO DE FIN DE GRADO CURSO: 2022/2023 Título: The Grammar of Putting Verbs: A Homogeneous Syntactic and Semantic Verb Class? Alumno: Javier Borrego Navarro Firma: Profesor: Joaquín Comesaña Rincón Firma: 1 Table of contents 1. Abstract……………………………………………………………………............3 2. Theoretical Background……………………………………………………….…3 3. Introduction…………………………………………………………………….…6 4. Content………………………………………………………………………….....8 4.1 A case study in lexical semantic analysis: Verbs of Putting……………………...8 4.2 Introducing the verbs..............................................................................................8 4.3 Variations regarding the use of prepositions………………………………..……9 4.3.1 Preposition to…………………………………………………………..….9 4.3.2 Preposition for………………………………………………………..…..12 4.3.3 Preposition into……………………………………………………..…….12 4.3.4 Preposition on………………………………………………………….....14 4.3.5 Preposition in………………………………………………………..……15 4.4 The hallmark of the verb arrange…………………………………………….....17 4.5 (Linguistic) context and putting verbs…………………………………………..18 4.6 Semantic roles in putting verbs…………………………….…………………...20 5. Conclusion……..………………………………………………………………....22 6. Bibliographical References……………………………………..……………….23 2 3 The Grammar of Putting Verbs: A homogeneous syntactic and semantic verb class? 1. Abstract This paper is concerned with the grammar of verbs that belong to the semantic class of putting verbs (Levin 1993) to check whether this verb class behaves homogeneously or heterogeneously. The investigation of grammar has been carried out in terms of syntactic and semantic points of view. The tools that have been used for the collection of data are several academic dictionaries, specially focusing on the verbs´ meanings and structures considering what accompanies the putting verb. What is more, the data collected is paramount and essential to determine if this class of verb homogeneously follows the prototypical meaning, structures, sentence patterns, and semantic roles bearing in mind the context in which they take place. Lastly, there is an explanation based on the findings of each analysed putting verb either by highlighting its meaning or by indicating its sentence pattern or its semantic role in that specific linguistic context. Keywords: Putting verbs, Syntactic analysis, Semantic analysis, Meaning, Sentence Pattern. 2. Theoretical Background The central topic of this analysis resides in some of the verbs that belong to the class of putting verbs. The verb has been the chosen category since it is the most difficult and relevant type of word within a sentence since “it is the life and soul of every sentence, and the science of grammar centres” (Pettingell 1876: 146). On top of that, renowned grammarians and lexicographers such as Lindley Murray, Henry William Fowler, or Goold Brown have been able to create an adequate definition of the concept of “verb”. Notwithstanding, these statements 1 are not suitable for everyone because they are being unclear and not much precise to young learners owing to the complexity of the concept since according to Pettingell, the verb “is the most important and the most difficult of all the parts of speech. It is the life and soul of every sentence, and the science of grammar centres in” (Pettingell 1876: 146). 1 According to Lindley Murray, "a verb is a word which signifies to be, to do, or to suffer” (Pettingell 1876: 146). According to Goold Brown, “a verb is a word which signifies to be, to act, or to be acted upon” (Pettingell 1876: 147). According to Henry William Fowler, "a word which by itself can form the copula of a proposition, or which can by itself form both the copula and the predicate of a proposition, is called a verb” (Pettingell 1876: 147). 4 It is widely thought that there are five classes of verbs. The first class is the verb to be which is known as the neuter verb because of being “the most general and comprehensive of all verbs” (Pettingell 1876: 147). Then, the second and third classes are correlated with each other since one of them is an intransitive verb, which is that type of verb that is not accompanied by an object, and the other one is the transitive verb that is accompanied by a direct object. The transitivity of verbs is a relevant point to comment on in this section since the analysed putting verbs in this case study, arrange, lodge, place, put, and set are all transitive verbs, so, they are in need of an animated object such as a person or an inanimate one, for instance, an item. To conclude with the types of verb, the fourth one is the copulative verb while the fifth is the adjunct verb. As Michael Halliday illustrates, “transitivity is the set of options whereby the speaker encodes his [sic] experience of the processes of the external world, and of the internal world of his [sic] own consciousness, together with the participants in these processes and their attendant circumstances” (Halliday 1973: 143). Considering that quote, what Halliday wants to express is that the speaker has a series of different resources whose origins come from his/her own environment, where the participant lives, and the processes that the speaker uses in order to deal with that environment to create and convey a final message that is intended to be fixed and meaningful. On top of that, within that speaker´s communicative discourse, there are mandatory aspects and optional ones. For example, on the one hand, one non-compulsory point of a participant´s discourse is the circumstantial element. What the circumstantial element refers to is, for instance, the moment or the way in which the participant does something. On the other hand, the participant and the process or development of the sentence are elements that have to be present obligatorily. For instance, in the sentence ‘Ryan puts the clothes into the closet every morning’, ‘every morning’ is the non-obligatory element of the sentence since it is the circumstance while the rest of the sentence ‘Ryan puts the clothes into the closet’ is compulsory. Therefore, arrange, lodge, place, put, and set are transitive verbs since someone or something has always to be included as a direct object where these verbs appear since their quintessential meaning is to ‘locate or situate something or someone in a place’. Furthermore, a putting verb often tends to depict the same sentence pattern in the sentence in which this type of verb takes place. That sentence pattern is known as SVOA, where the participant “construct a sentence for the picture and then add the adverb onto their 5 sentence” (Trahey 1993: 194), consisting of a subject + verb + object + adverbial. There are various points to be considered and commented on why this class presents this pattern. The first aspect is the presence of the object that is portrayed as an ‘O’. As indicated in the two previous paragraphs, putting verbs and transitivity are related to each other, so, that means that putting verbs, at least the ones which appear in the case study, are transitive verbs. Otherwise, without any object, it would not be possible to have a grammatical sentence, for example, ‘Ryan puts in the vase*’. Additionally, transitive verbs are considered the ones that require an object to have a complete meaning. However, considering the different types of transitive verbs, putting verbs are regarded as adjunctive transitive ones because of their occurrence in the pattern (SVOA) since the adverbial ‘A’ refers to the object ‘O’. As we have seen in the previous line, ‘A’ is an essential part of the sentence to refer to the object. Normally, adverbials are regarded as optional elements, except for those that appear in patterns such as SVA and SVOA, since if you remove them from a sentence, the meaning, and the structure will not be affected. Nonetheless, as the previous line affirms, the adverbials in SVOA are obligatory because of the fact being “central elements of the clause, part of the clause nucleus” (Quirk et al. 1985: 730). On top of that, these predication adjuncts are mandatory because of being object-related since they partake in an SVOA sentence pattern and there is a complementary relationship between these two elements because the “location is attributed to the referent of the object” (Quirk et al. 1985: 55). It is relevant to indicate that if the adverbial appeared in an SVA pattern, the adverbial would be subject-related. Considering the semantic properties of adverbials, they refer “to the circumstances of the situation (adjunct and subjunct), comments on the form or content of the clause (disjunct), or provides a link between clauses (conjunct)” (Quirk et al. 1985: 730). Therefore, the sentence pattern SVOA has much to do with the archetypal meaning of putting verbs since they locate something somewhere, so, in most cases, the adverbial presents the location of the object and the latter performs the semantic role of located. Complementation is an aspect that goes hand in hand with the sentence pattern. Complementation can be defined as “the function of a part of a phrase or clause which follows a word 2 , and completes the specification of a meaning relationship which that word implies” (Quirk et al. 1985: 65). In these cases, the complementation is known as complex- 2 However, although this definition is valid, there are cases in which the object is thematized. For instance, in the sentence ‘What did you see?’, ‘What’ is the object and does not follow the verb ‘see’. 6 transitive complementation since these putting verbs require the object and the complement structurally. Specifically, within the range of complex-transitive complementation, the one presented by putting verbs is the complementation by object and adjunct. The adjuncts that normally partake in this type of complementation are prepositional phrases of space, and more particularly of direction” (Quirk et al. 1985: 1201). In addition to it, verbs like put or place are found in this section since they can represent a metaphorical or physical location. Therefore, these putting verbs depict this complementation due to the fact they convey a location by means of the adjunct, locating the object resulting in an SVOA sentence pattern. 3. Introduction Echoing Levin and Rappaport Hovav (1991: 124-126), the fact that more contrasting aspects and meanings are found in verbs and in their own arguments might be the result of their lexical properties. Two important properties of this lexical point are the meaning of the verb and its representation based on the rules set provided by the grammar. Indeed, these two things seem to be correlated. In Chomsky’s words, “the fact that the speaker relates sound and meaning, it does not follow logically that he uses a representation of the rules of grammar to carry out this act” (Chomsky 1986: 306). That means that although a user knows how to use a word in its meaning, it is also important to know the grammar to avoid making mistakes in writing. That shows the importance of grammar since it is “the set of rules and principles that determine the form and meaning of an infinite number of sentences” (Chomsky 1986: 303). Knowing and learning the meaning of a word is imperative since it constitutes a paramount part of knowing that specific word. In addition, knowing what a word means can help you to know its properties, syntactically speaking, when it comes to forming a sentence. Generally speaking, grammarians and linguists argue that perhaps the most important part to be learned in a verb (or any word) is its meaning. This may be correct since this meaning helps us discover some of its syntactic aspects. Nonetheless, not only do the words´ meanings play an important role in this diagnosis but also all the arguments and components have their respective relevance in trying to find the syntactic properties of a word. There are clear examples of it in some verb classes. For instance, putting verbs is a class that meets the requirement of taking into consideration every single aspect of them since they can convey different meanings and be placed with different structures regarding their arguments and components´ position. Putting verbs entail a great amount of them: 7 arrange, immerse, install, lodge, mount, place, position, put, set, situate, sling, stash, and stow. Normally, when you think of a putting verb, the immediate meaning or, core meaning that comes to mind is to locate or situate something in a specific place. Nevertheless, the meaning can be altered by the arguments that take place in the sentence. For example, depending on the preposition that goes with a putting verb, the meaning can refer to the prototypical one or something that has never been considered at first sight. In fact, many verbs are divided and classified just in terms of form and their most predictable or obvious meaning, resulting in a wrong classification or even a misleading one. Therefore, people impelled by the verbal form tend to fall into a generalization that all putting verbs have the same meaning of locating any item or person in a space or presenting the same structure in which a located or location appear. An example to clarify that would be the verb set. If the verb set appears in the phrase ‘Michael sets the time’, we cannot conclude that the verb set is situating or establishing something somewhere. Hence, as this example illustrates, the meaning of verbs cannot be formally generalized since they can behave in a different way depending on their components and arguments, implying the existence of various and contrasting syntactic properties that a verbal form can include. Nonetheless, that does not mean either that a putting verb cannot express its prototypical meaning or its expected syntactic properties since there are cases in which, according to the context, its interpretation and connotation are predictable. Having said that, this paper will deal with a case study in the lexical-semantic analysis of putting verbs but not all of them. The points that this research will concentrate on are an introduction of the presented putting verbs with their prototypical meaning and sentence pattern in 4.2. Furthermore, an exploration of the different prepositions that are normally used with this class of verbs will be covered in 4.3. In addition, the peculiarity of the putting verb arrange will be covered in 4.4. Moreover, the context has also a lot to do. That is to say, the interaction or co-occurrence between an alleged or assumed putting verb and a specific word may change the whole descriptive panorama, as will be seen in 4.5. That will be another point of discussion in the present piece of work. Hand in hand with this, another important aspect to be considered is the way in which participants partake or are involved in the predication expressed by the putting verb. All these procedures will be carried out to 14 On is another preposition that is considered to be analysed. This preposition is one of those prepositions which are normally placed with a putting verb because of its meaning that is covering, touching, or forming part of a specific position on a surface. Thereby, SVOA is the sentence pattern that will normally occur with this preposition but there are cases in which another sentence pattern is possible. Nonetheless, the meaning, depending on the context or the verb used, can vary from the original one that is putting something somewhere. (11) a. Michael lodges on the sofa. b. Michael places a high value on respect. c. The doctor puts Michael on a diet. d. The policeman puts a special tax on Michael. e. Michael put the blame on Susan. f. Michael put 100$ on his favourite football team. In (11), it is visible that put is the verb that conveys more different meanings and uses with the preposition on. Firstly, lodge + on and place + on are going to be examined. This sentence pattern of the example (11)a is known as SVA which consists of subject + verb + adverbial. Thus, it portrays an adjunctive structure because there is no object. An adjunctive structure implies that the adverbial in the sentence is an indispensable part of the sentence to convey the whole meaning and, on this occasion ‘A’ is realized by the prepositional phrase: On + Noun Phrase, resulting in a contrastive adverbial. The meaning of this sentence is ‘to sleep in a place for a short period’. Example (11)b indicates an SVOPO sentence pattern, whose structure consists of subject + verb + object + preposition + object. The meaning of (11)b is ‘to attribute something to something’. In addition, this meaning is not exclusive to place + on but put + on can also mean the same as (12) represents: (12) Susan puts a low value on her relationships. Having explained (11) a-b, we concentrate on c-f now. All these four examples present the same sentence pattern as in (11)b which is SVOPO, so, there are two objects in which the last of them is introduced by the preposition, so, it is a prepositional object. Nonetheless, their meanings are not the same. Example (11)c means ‘to prescribe a patient a specific regimen’; example (11)d means ‘to impose something on someone or something’; example (11)e means ‘to impute on someone’; example (11)f means ‘to bet or wager’. On balance, it is depicted that although just only one verb appears with the same preposition, as in the case of put + into, the sentence pattern can coincide but not in terms of meaning. 15 4.3.5 Preposition In The last preposition that will be investigated within this section will be in. This preposition with putting verbs is considered the most important one. The reason for this relevance is that this preposition is used to express position, location, or inclusion as the sentence in (1) indicates with the use of this preposition. Moreover, the presence of in always signals an adverbial coming along. Thereby, the sentence pattern, in which this preposition is included, will be either SVOA or SVA. However, as this point portrays, despite having a putting verb + a preposition that belongs with this verb, there can be other meanings as (13) represents: (13) a. Michael´s scars lodge in his face. b. Michael lodges Susan´s number in his phone. c. The troops lodged themselves in the town. (Merriam-Webster). d. Michael lodges his money in his case. e. She had the sapphire set in a gold ring. (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries). f. Her jaw was set in a determined manner. (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries). g. Michael places Susan in leadership. h. Michael places Rafael Nadal in the top of three tennis players´ rankings. i. Michael puts Susan in a good mood. j. Michael puts his faith in God. k. Michael puts all his money in Microsoft. l. Michael puts a sock in his mom´s mouth. m. Put a spoke in somebody’s wheel. (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries) As we can see, in (13), many examples take place. Therefore, these sentences will be divided in terms of the verb that is used. First, the verb to lodge will be analysed. (13)a-b are correlated with each other since they present the same meaning, (‘to become something fixed in any place’), but are expressed structurally differently. On the one hand, in (13)a, an intransitive structure is visible (‘lodge in something’) with an SVA pattern, consisting of a subject + verb + adverbial. On the other hand, (13)b is a transitive structure (‘lodge something in something’) with an SVOA pattern implying the presence of an object. In the case of (13)c-d, they both represent the same sentence pattern, which is SVOA, but different meanings. Example (13)c means ‘to establish someone or something in a place’ whereas the meaning of the example (13)d is ‘to deposit something in a location’. It is not 16 the lexemic content that changes, but the communicative proposal of the sentence, motivated by the words co-occurring with the verb lodge. Set + in is another relevant point to comment on in this analysis. In (13)e, a peculiarity takes place because the verb set appears as a past participle due to the existence of the verb have, resulting in a causative structure. Again, the sentence pattern is an SVOA whose meaning is ‘to put a stone into a jewellery piece’. In (13)f, another adjunctive transitive structure takes place, in which the verb set is passivized, so, the sentence pattern is an SVOA, in which the adverbial has the semantic role of manner instead of being located. The verb set in this sentence could also be considered adjectivized since the verb set is regarded as a statal passive because it has quasi adjectives features. However, the verb set, functioning adjectively, has a constitutional preposition that is with when set is not inserted in a causative verb structure. The meaning of this example is to ‘“fix your face into a determined expression”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries). In (13) g-h, place is an adjunctive-transitive verb. That means that the verb to place is always in need of an adverbial and an object in these specific cases. In addition, the preposition in indicates an adverbial. Therefore, the sentence pattern of these examples is SVOA. Notwithstanding, they differ in terms of their respective meanings. The meaning of (13)g is ‘to put something or someone in a specific situation’ and the meaning of (13)h is ‘to rank someone or something having contrasted his/her/its connections’. Last, but not least, the verb put associated with the preposition in is the last one to be analysed. As in the case of the verb place, to put is a transitive verb and the presence of in highlights an adverbial that results in an SVOA pattern. Example (13)i means to ‘“bring somebody/something into the state or condition mentioned”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries). The adverbial ‘In a good mood’ performs the semantic role of aim while the subject ‘Michael’ has the semantic role of an agent and ‘Susan’ is an experiencer in this example. Example (13)j means ‘to rest or repose’ and ‘In God’ does not convey the role of a recipient but of a stimulus since ‘His faith’ has the semantic role of an experiencer. Example (13)k means ‘to invest’, in which ‘In Microsoft’ has not the role of the beneficiary but of the aim in which ‘All his money’ performs the semantic role of an instrument. Finally, yet importantly, example (13)l and example (13)m present the same structure in which the preposition in had never occurred previously with the verb put or with the other putting verbs of this analysis. The combination put + in, in these specific contexts, takes 17 part in an idiomatic expression, whose structure is an SVOPO. Regarding their meanings, the idiom in the example (13)l means ‘“to tell somebody to stop talking or making a noise”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries) whereas the idiom in the example (13)m means ‘“to prevent somebody from putting their plans into operation”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries). In this section, the intention was to provide examples in which putting verbs were present with a wide range of prepositions in order to express that a putting verb does not mean to locate something or somebody in a place or space. Likewise, it has been proved, thanks to this analysis, that a putting verb can have different meanings that differ from the core one, taking into account the preposition used. On top of that, taking into consideration the given examples, some sentence patterns, other than the prototypical SVOA, can be found alongside this type of verb. Therefore, regarding the use of a specific preposition with a putting verb, it is possible to find variations in the meaning of a sentence, in the structure, or in the sentence pattern, implying that putting verbs are not homogeneous, grammatically speaking. 4.4 The hallmark of the verb arrange As you may have noticed, the verb arrange is the only putting verb that has not appeared in the co-occurrence with any presented preposition such as to, into, for, or in. Arrange differs from all four verbs in this analysis in terms of the deletion of the adverbial since in its presence, the adverbial is not mandatory but optional. Not only the suppression of the adverbial is the only feature that characterizes the verb arrange but also the presence of any preposition depending on the context. Therefore, the feature of the preposition´s presence alongside arrange can make variations in terms of the sentence meaning or the sentence pattern. Besides, those variations can also reside in the fact of being perceived as a putting verb since there are examples in which the verb arrange appears with two prepositions, specially with and for, but is not a real putting verb as (14) indicates: (14) a. Michael arranges for a football match with his close friends. b. Michael arranges traditional classical songs for his violin. c. We arranged for a car to collect us from the airport. (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries). d. Michael arranges music for Susan´s orchestra. e. Michael arranges with Susan about feeding his dog. 18 At first sight, we might think that this is another case of a putting verb suffering changes due to the presence of the prepositions with or for. Additionally, these examples in (14) also present different meanings and sentence patterns that derive from the prototypical one which is ‘“If you arrange things somewhere, you place them in a particular position, usually in order to make them look attractive or tidy”’ (Collins Dictionary). For instance, the examples (14)a, c, and e mean the same, ‘to make preparations for or plan’. Additionally, the meaning of example (14)b is ‘“to change a piece of music so that it is suitable for a particular instrument or voice”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries) whereas the meaning of example (14)d is ‘to compose music for an orchestra’. However, even though these examples present the verb arrange, which is widely recognized as a putting verb, they cannot be considered real putting verbs since they do not convey in their core meanings any location of something or someone. Therefore, there is no case of putting implications that is something which is represented in (15): (15) A number of seats have been arranged in front of the painting. (Collins Dictionary) 4.5 (Linguistic) Context and putting verbs In the previous point, it has been discussed that a putting verb does not follow an established pattern and meaning considering its co-occurrence with a preposition. In this section, we will check whether a putting verb maintains its prototypical meaning and structure regarding the linguistic context in which the putting verb takes place without delving into the use of prepositions. Before presenting the different contexts in which a putting verb can appear, it is necessary to clarify that there are cases in which a preposition can be thought to be included in the structure of a phrasal verb but in fact, that preposition is not forming a phrasal verb but introduces a completive structure as in (16): (16) Michael places the price of gasoline. As it is observable, the presented sentence pattern is an SVO. An SVO will be by far the most presented sentence pattern at this point. In point of fact, this pattern is the one obtained since the preposition of implies “the relationship of a part of something to its whole” (Learn Grammar) that is, it has a partitive meaning. Hence ‘Of gasoline’ in (16) is the completive structure of ‘The price’ since heads of a nominal group functioning as an object can have its completive structures. Thereby, the preposition of, in this specific example, does not function as a part of a phrasal verb. 19 Now, focusing on the linguistic context, all the verbs of this case study, which are arrange, lodge, place, put, and set, are involved in this point. Thereby, many examples of each verb will appear in which the prototypical structure or meaning will vary, considering the linguistic context of each example as (17) illustrates: (17) a. Michael arranges his cards. b. The brain lodges the hippocampus. c. Michael lodges a demand. d. Michael places the price of gasoline. e. Police placed them at the crime scene. (Merriam-Webster) f. Michael places an advertisement. g. The agency placed about 2 000 secretaries last year (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries) h. Michael does not place Susan. i. Michael placed a video call. j. Michael put his name. k. Michael put the time as about half-past six. l. Put the question. (Merriam-Webster) m. Put the motion. (Merriam-Webster) n. Put the shot. (Merriam-Webster) o. Michael sets the table for dinner. p. Michael wanted to set a precedent. q. The government has set a growth target of 6%. (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries) r. Michael has not set his agenda. s. Set the pace. (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries) As it is patent, all the examples in (17) seem to present the same sentence pattern which is an SVO, that is a monotransitive structure. However, although these five verbs are transitive ones, some examples do not represent the sentence pattern SVO but a different one because of their linguistic context. Regarding the explanation of each example, their respective analysis will be separated in terms of the specific putting verbs used except for the verbs arrange and lodge due to these verbs presenting fewer examples. As the previous paragraph indicates, the examples in (17)a-c present an SVO sentence pattern. Besides, they differ in their meanings. Example (17)a means ‘to put something in its proper order or its correct relationship’; example (17)b means ‘to contain’ and example 20 (17)c means ‘“to lay (something, such as a complaint) before a proper authority”’ (Merriam-Webster). Having examined the examples that appear with the verbs arrange and lodge, now, it is the turn of the next verb place. Again these examples in (17)d-i depict the same sentence pattern as in the previous examples. Nevertheless, there are variations in terms of meaning. Example (17)d means ‘to estimate something’; example (17)e means ‘“to identify by connecting with an associated context”’ (Merriam-Webster); example (17)f means to ‘“make a request for something to happen”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries); example (17)g means ‘“to find a suitable job, home, etc. for somebody”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries); example (17)h means ‘to recognize someone or something’; example (17)i means ‘“to try to establish a connection for”’ (Merriam-Webster). Examples in (17)j-n will be examined since the verb put is the one used in these examples. Again, they follow the same sentence pattern as the three previous verbs. Example (17)j means ‘to write a person´s name’; example (17)k means ‘to estimate the time’; example (17)l means ‘“to set before one for judgment or decision”’ (Merriam-Webster); example (17)m ‘“to call for a formal vote on”’ (Merriam-Webster); example (17)n means ‘“to throw with an overhand pushing motion”’ (Merriam-Webster). Finally, the verb set is the last one that has to be scrutinized at this point. Needless to say, the examples in (17)o-s share the same sentence pattern of SVO. Example (17)o means ‘“to arrange knives, forks, etc. on a table for a meal”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries); example (17)p means to ‘set something in order not to be copied by any person’; example (17)q means ‘“to give somebody a piece of work to do or a task or target to achieve”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries); example (17)r means ‘to arrange something’. In example (17)s, there is a variation. That variation is that the verb set takes part in an idiom. Its meaning is ‘“to do something at a particular speed or to a particular standard so that other people are then forced to copy it if they want to be successful”’ (Oxford Learner´s Dictionaries) or ‘to run faster than anyone in a race’. 4.6 Semantic Roles in putting verbs In the previous points, it has been remarkably considered to analyse the co-occurrence of the putting verbs with certain prepositions, the linguistic context that accompanies this class of verbs and the singularity of the verb arrange. It is necessary to illustrate that the 21 different meanings, sentence patterns, and structures of the following examples in this section, will not be covered since the main concern on this point is the semantic roles. In this section, the semantic roles will be analysed in order to prove that the prototypical semantic role that is related to the presence of a putting verb does not always appear. First and foremost, the appearance of a putting verb is often associated with the semantic role of located and location. This semantic role of located can be defined as an item or person, that is the participant, whose location is predicated by the verb whereas the semantic role of location refers to the physical or metaphorical placement of the participant as (18) presents: (18) Michael lodges his mother in his mansion. In (18), it is observable that ‘his mother’ performs the semantic role of located since she is the participant affected by the verbal unit, and ‘in his mansion’ has the semantic role of location because of being the placement in which the located is found and ‘Michael’ is the agent. On top of that, there are examples with putting verbs in which the located participant is not found in a specific location or situation but in a temporal length of event or period in which the participant performs the semantic role of time and varying the meaning of locating or situating an entity in some place as (19) indicates: (19) The hotel lodges its customers at five o´clock. As we have seen in the examples in (18) and (19), the adverbial in the sentence pattern SVOA is able to present the semantic role of location, located, or time introduced by a preposition such as at or in. Apart from the adverbials, there are cases in which other arguments might represent other semantic roles that are not common with putting verbs as the different examples in (20) can highlight: (20) a. The nutritionist puts James on special treatment. b. The shareholder put 10000$ in his last company. c. I lodge on my couch. d. The players put their intentions to win the match. Regarding their semantic roles, in (20)a ‘James’ performs the semantic role of experiencer which consist of feeling any sensorial or psychological emotion or experience. Therefore, if there is an experiencer, there has to be the stimulus which is introduced by the preposition 22 on in the part of ‘On special treatment’. In (20)b, the object ‘10000$’ is a measure since it expresses the value of something, in this case with money. Furthermore, ‘In his last company’ has the semantic role of affected by that quantity of money. The next example, (20)c, presents the subject ‘I’ that is performing not only the semantic role of agent, which means that the participant starts the action, but it also expresses the semantic role of located because of being lodged on his couch. Lastly, (20)d, the object ‘Their intentions’ conveys the semantic role of affected, and ‘To win the match’ is the aim that consists of the objectives that have to be achieved or accomplished. Therefore, through these examples, we have checked that semantic roles, same as meanings, sentence patterns, and structures, can vary regarding the position of the arguments and constituents of the phrase. 5. Conclusion On balance, it has been proved that putting verbs, at least arrange, lodge, place, put and set, do not behave homogeneously but in a heterogeneous way in terms of semantic approach and syntactic approach. Despite these verbs are considered to express the meaning that is expected from verbs that belong to the class of putting verbs, some examples indicate and clarify the opposite since the meaning can present variations, bearing in mind the preposition that accompanies the verb or its co-occurrence with the linguistic context. Moreover, the same situation as in the case of meaning takes place with the semantic roles that the arguments present in a sentence or the sentence pattern. For example, we have seen that the adverbial, in the prototypical sentence pattern SVOA, can perform many semantic roles instead of just being the semantic role of located such as aim or stimulus. On top of that, the archetypal sentence pattern, SVOA, has been replaced by some patterns such as SVA, SVO, SVOPO or SVÄPO. Therefore, these variations in the different points that characterize putting verbs have proved that this verb class does not behave homogeneously from syntactic and semantic points of view. 23 6. Bibliographical References Bibliographical References (used and cited) Beare, K. (2019, May 27). Uses of the preposition 'to' for beginning English students. ThoughtCo. https://www.thoughtco.com/how-to-use-preposition-to- 1211798#:~:text=Use%20the%20preposition%20'to'%20when,%2C%20fly%2C %20sa l%2C%20etc. Chomsky, N.A. (1986). Knowledge of Language. New York: Praeger. Halliday, Michael A.K. (1973). Explorations in the Functions of Language. London: Edward Arnold. Levin, B. (1993) English Verb Classes and Alternations: A preliminary investigation. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Levin, B. & R. Rappaport Hovav (1991) “Wiping the slate clean: A lexical semantic exploration,” Cognition 41, 123-151. Pettingell, J. H. (1876). English Verbs. American Annals of the Deaf and Dumb, 21(3), 146–164. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44401519. Published By LearnGrammar.Net. (n.d.). Use of prepositions: Of, about, for, with, by: Learn English. https://www.learngrammar.net/. https://www.learngrammar.net/english-grammar/use-of-prepositions-of-about-for- with-by Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G. & Svartvik, J. (1985). A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language. London: Longman. Trahey, M., & White, L. (1993). Positive Evidence and Preemption in The Second Language Classroom. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 15(2), 181–204. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44487617 Bibliographical References (used but not cited) Atkins, B. T., Kegl, J., and Levin, B. (1988). “Anatomy of a Verb Entry: from Linguistic Theory to Lexicographic Practice”, International Journal of Lexicography 1: 84- 126. Bartley, L. (2018). Putting transitivity to the test: a review of the Sydney and Cardiff models, 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40554-018-0056-x Levin, B. (1991) “Building a lexicon: The contribution of Linguistics,” International Journal of Lexicography 4, 205-226