Spurious Resultatives Revisited
山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

ArticleSpurious Resultatives Revisited:
Predication Mismatch and Adverbial Modification*

Toru SUZUKI
Faculty of Literature and Social Sciences, Yamagata University
１. Introduction
In his typological analysis of resultatives, Washio（１９９７）points out that several peculiarities foundin the type of resultative in（１）cannot be reduced to his dichotomy of “strong” resultatives such as The
horses dragged the logs smooth/The joggers ran the pavement thin and “weak” resultatives such as Marydyed her dress pink/I froze the ice cream hard.１（１）

a. He tied his shoelaces {tight/loose}.
b. He spread the butter {thick/thin}.
c. He cut the meat {thick/thin}.

The major characteristics of this type of resultative termed “spurious resultatives” are summarized as in（２）,and the relevant points are illustrated by examples in（３-６）:（２）

Characteristic properties of spurious resultatives（Washio １９９７: １７）（A）they involve an activity such that a particular manner of action directly leads to a particularstate,（B）it makes no significant difference if the adjective is taken as specifying the result state or
specifying the manner of action so that, typically, the adjective can be replaced with thecorresponding adverb with virtually no difference in meaning,（C）they permit either one of the adjectives that form the antonym pair,（D）the standard paraphrase（“x causes y to become z”）often fails, especially with one of theantonymous adjectives.

（３）a. He spread the butter thick/thickly.
b. ≠He caused the butter to become thick by spreading it.

（４）

a. He spread the butter thin/thinly.
b. ≠He caused the butter to become thin by spreading it.

（５）

a. He cut the meat thick/thickly.
－66 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木b.≠He caused the meat to become thick by cutting it.
（６）

a. He cut the meat thin/?thinly.
b. ≠He caused the meat to become thin by cutting it.

Unfortunately, though, Washio（１９９７）merely suggests that the use of adjectives in spurious resultatives issomewhat “adverbial” in nature, leaving open the question of why their properties, as described in（２）, are
not found in normal resultatives（either “strong” or “weak” resultatives in his classification）. The leading
question to be discussed in this article is whether spurious resultatives are qualified for a third independent
category within the classification of resultatives. This paper will claim that spurious resultatives and weak
resultatives in Washio’s（１９９７）sense can be unified under the same category, namely, under spurious
resultatives, rather than under weak resultatives. In other words, I argue that the category of spurious
resultatives is the larger, that it subsumes weak resultatives, and that they stand in stark contrast to true
resultatives（to be characterized below）, which roughly correspond to Washio’s（１９９７）strong resultatives.
The present article is organized as follows. In section ２, I examine Washio’s characterization of spurious
resultatives and reformulate their properties in terms of adverbial modification and predication mismatch.
In section ３, verbs that typically appear in spurious resultatives are discussed and characterized as verbsof transformation consisting of two subclasses, verbs of change in configuration and verbs of change inshape/appearance, each focusing on a different aspect of change in transformation. Section ４ argues that,in terms of the function and interpretation of result phrases, spurious resultatives and weak resultatives
can be unified, with certain differences between the two categories reduced to different dispositions on
a continuum of varied types of transformation. Section ５ looks into a type shifting analysis of Japanesespurious resultatives（Imoto ２００９ among others）, which I essentially adopt in analyzing their counterpartsin English. In section ６, based on the extended characterization of spurious resultatives developed in thisarticle, I reformulate the major resultative dichotomy of true resultatives vs. spurious resultatives. Section ７
discusses some consequences of the present study and section ８ concludes the discussion.
２. Revisiting spurious resultatives
２.１. Adverbial adjectives
In this section, I focus on two main features of spurious resultatives which serve to derive their adverbial
characteristics as originally discussed in Washio（１９９７）.
If spurious resultative phrases function as adverbials as in Washio（１９９７）, they should be expected tobehave like true adverbials in some syntactically and semantically relevant respects. One of the suggestive
facts is that spurious resultative phrases are naturally put into the interrogative by using how-questions incontrast to true resultative phrases（the examples in（７）are from Horrocks and Stavrou（２００３: ３１７））:－77 －山形大学人文学部研究年報（７）

a. How did s/he cut the onion?
What color did s/he paint the house?

第14号（2017．２）69－104/ thin/ redb. How did s/he wipe the table?

/ *clean, vigorously

How did s/he beat the metal?

/*flat, with a hammer

These observations seem to suggest that the apparent adjectives thin in He cut the onion thin and red
in She painted the house red are functionally comparable to the manner adverbs like quickly, slowly, andsloppily as opposed to “true” adjectives in She wiped the table clean and He beat the metal flat.
Another significant fact about their adverbial character is that adjectives in spurious resultatives typicallyseem to largely overlap the lexical class of “adverbial adjectives” or “flat adverbs.” They assume a single
common morphological form, whether they function as adjectives or adverbs. Thus, as shown in（８）,adjectives of this class are often used as adverbs that modify verbal events or manner. The following
examples are taken from Quirk et al.（１９８５: ４０７）:２（８）

a. clean clothes; play the game clean
b. a deep breath; live deep in the woods
c. a flat country; I’m flat broke.
d. light weapons; She travels light.

Huddleston and Pullum（２００２: ５６８）give a sample of adjective-adverb pairs of the same kind as shown in
（９）:３
（９）

clean, clear, dear, deep, direct, fine, first, flat, free, full, high, last, light, loud, low, mighty, plain,right, scarce, sharp, slow, sure, tight, wrong

This type of adjective typically possesses a lexical opposite, together forming a non-complementary
opposition where each member and its lexical opposite generally exist on a scale with a mid-interval left
open to contextual interpretation（cf. Cruse １９８０, １９８６）. Examples of such pairs include deep/shallow,
long/short, fast/slow, wide/narrow, heavy/light, large/small, and thick/thin.４ From a psycholinguistic
viewpoint they might be characterized as “most perceptually salient” core words which mark prototypicalsensory perception such as size（long/short）, weight（heavy/light）, and color（Carter ２００４: １１５）.
The existence of adverbial adjectives as a lexical class might suggest that at least some of the（spurious）
resultative adjectives can be analyzed potentially as adverbs, instead of true adjectives. In this connection,note also that some of such lexical items can be found, often in colloquial use, as intensifying modifiers－77 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

to adjectives, PP locatives or verbs, something typical of adverbials. In the following examples, adverbial
adjectives are shown in italics:（１０）

a. She just stood there with her eyes wide open.
b. She was wide awake.
c. Volcanic eruptions spread dust high into the stratosphere.
d. He fell flat on the floor.
e. The car stopped sharp.

Interestingly, these adverbial adjectives generally have derivationally related -ly adverbial forms
and the two variants are often used interchangeably with certain semantic connotations, although subtle
judgment on the differences between the two variants seems to suggest that there is a certain indeterminacy
in the speaker’s choice（see Geuder ２０００, Broccias ２００４, ２００８, ２０１１, Iwata ２００６, and Levinson ２０１０; seealso Quirk et al. １９８５ and Huddleston and Pullum ２００２）. For example, Broccias（２００８: ６, fn.４）argues
that -ly adverbs seem to correlate with subjective/abstract properties and adjectives with objective/concrete
properties（She fixed the car perfectly/#perfect）, while Iwata（２００６: ４６７）claims that the -ly adverbs canbe used only when they elaborate the outcome of verbal actions（*The lake froze solidly/*He painted thewall redly）. Both analyses are able to account for part of the relevant data in their own way, although there
seem to be multiple factors involved in a complex fashion.
While admitting that there are certain semantic gounds for choice between the two, it seems to me forthe present purposes rather pointless to pursue a reliable criterion for distinguishing between adjective
and adverb status, since most of these lexical items are already listed in dictionaries as both adjectives andadverbs and speakers are not always consciously aware of which is which categorially. Furthermore, inEnglish, unlike French for example, an explicit grammatical agreement system for adjectives has been lost
and thus we do not have a principled way to distinguish the two categories in question when they appear
in the same syntactic position in the same form, that is, without -ly. For these reasons, it seems to be too
simplistic to regard bare adjective variants as adjectives and -ly variants as adverbs. Thus, in the present
article, I take the middle ground where the categorial status of apparent adjectives without -ly can be either
adjective or adverb as far as the context allows, leaving open the question of categorial distinction between
the two and adopt the term “adverbial adjectives” to refer to the result phrases in spurious resultatives
without implying that they are necessarily true adjectives in category.５
２.２. Predication mismatch
One of the most intriguing observations about spurious resultatives is that establishing a proper－77 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

predicative relationship between the theme object and the resultative phrase in spurious resultatives isoften not straightforward（see Iwata ２００６ and Levinson ２０１０）. Although Washio（１９９７）does not go into
detail about the reason why the standard causative paraphrase often fails in spurious resultatives, I suggestthat this is because predication（= subject + predicate）does not always hold in spurious resultatives
between an NP in object position and the resultative phrase. In the following examples（１１-１５）, the（b）-examples are intended to describe the situations literally reflecting the predicative relationships embedded-examples are more appropriate descriptions of thein the resultatives of the（a）-examples, while the（c）-examples. Notice that in（１１-１５）the（b）-examples generally sound more deviant in
events in the（a）-examples:comparison to the（c）（１１）

a. He tied his shoelaces {tight/loose}.
b. His shoelaces are/became {tight/loose}.
c. The knots of his shoelaces are/became {tight/loose}.

（１２）

a. He spread the butter {thick/thin}.
b. *The butter is/became {thick/thin}.
c. The spread of butter is/became {thick/thin}.

（１３）

a. He cut the meat {thick/thin}.
b. *The meat is/became {thick/thin}.
c. The slices of the meat are/became {thick/thin}.

（１４）

a. He opened the window {wide/narrow}.
b. *The window is/became {wide/narrow}.
c. The opening of the window is/?became {wide/narrow}.

To illustrate the point further, consider（１３a）. When he cut the meat thick, it is not the meat itself, butrather each slice of it produced by the act of cutting that became thick. Thus, predicating directly the result
phrase thick of the object the meat fails to capture the situation correctly. The same exposition applies tothe other examples. What they share is a peculiar interpretation in which the host to be predicated by the
result phrase should be construed as an entity “created” or “derived” from the original material througha process of change. In rhetorical terms, the process of change here shifts the reference of the theme
argument from the original entity to its resultant product through synecdoche（based on part-whole
relationship）or metonymy（based on adjacency）. Thus, spurious resultatives can be characterized by apredication mismatch between the syntactically implicit, created entity and the result phrase that is only
apparently predicated of the explicitly realized object. We might say, alternatively, that spurious result
phrases are “non-predicative” in that they do not function as a true predicate in the strict sense of the term.
－77 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木The following illustrates associated pairings of an expressed theme argument（= x）and a created entity（=y）that remains implicit:（１５）

a. tie the shoelaces {tight/loose}［x = the shoelaces; y = knots（ties）of the shoelaces］
b. spread the butter {thin/thick}［x = the butter; y = the spread（layer）of the butter］
c. cut the meat {thick/thin}［x = the meat; y = a slice（cut）of the meat］
d. open the window {wide/narrow}［x = the window; y = the opening of the window］

Nominalization of verbal events into an -ing form also shows a sharp contrast between true resultatives
and spurious resultatives. The nominalized expressions in（１６）that are derived from true resultatives are
generally unacceptable, unlike those in（１７）that are derived from spurious resultatives.
（１６）

a. *The hammering of the metal was flat.
b. *the flat hammering of the metalc. *The wiping of the table was {clean/dry}.
d. *the {clean/dry} wiping of the table（１７）

a. The cutting of the meat was {thick/thin}.
b. the {thick/thin} cut（ting）of the meatc. The opening of the window was {wide/narrow}.
d. the {wide/narrow} opening of the window

The contrast also points to another related difference in the aspectual properties of the verbs involved:
verbs in the true resultatives in（１６）are activity verbs, while those in the spurious resultatives are normallyregarded as result verbs. The latter verbs are known to regularly yield two different readings in theirnominalization, namely a “process” reading and a “result/product” reading（Grimshaw １９９０）. With theresultative predicate in（１７a, c）and the resultative modifier in（１７b, d）, the preferred reading is clearly
that of the “result/product” reading, where an entity created through a verbal activity is predicated of or
modified by the spurious resultative adjective. Note that the nominalized expressions in（１６）, on the other
hand, are generally unacceptable with a “result/product” reading in which the V-ing expression is supposed
to be understood as a created entity.
－77 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

The mismatch between the result phrase and its apparent host in spurious resultatives explains
straightforwardly the unnaturalness of the paraphrase “cause X to become Y by V-ing,” since Y is notproperly predicated of X in the semantics of spurious resultatives. The true host of Y is a created entity
which is not explicitly realized in syntax but hidden in semantics.
Can we relate this mismatch in predication to the adverbial behavior of spurious result phrases? Mytentative suggestion（to be elaborated shortly）is that spurious result phrases are forced to function
adverbially because they fail to be structurally linked to a proper host. Although an adjective is generally
predicated of a subject or modifies a nominal head, the result adjective in spurious resultatives apparently
fails to meet either of those functional requirements in their structural realization. Thus the only way thesepredicates can function is via adverbial modification.
Interestingly, Washio（１９９７）observes that in French, which is considered to lack in general the English
type strong resultatives, spurious resultatives are possible when the adjectival result phrase does not show
agreement with its semantic subject.
（１８）

a. J’ai noue les lacets de mes chaussures bien serre.
“I tied the laces of my shoes very tight.”
b. Hachez-les menu.（les = e.g., the onions）“Cut them fine（i.e., into fine pieces）.”（Washio １９９７: ２９）In view of the fact that French is a language where explicit agreement on adjectives is normally requiredwith the semantic subject, it is clear that the result phrases in（１８）do not serve as true（grammatical）
predicates to their hosts. This also suggests that spurious resultatives are not just a minor category of
resultatives showing certain irregularities, rather a legitimate construction in its own right within thetypological study of language. We will return to this point in ５.１, where Japanese resultatives are discussed.
２.３. Spurious resultatives reformulated
In ２.１, we have seen that in modern English certain adjectives and adverbs have come to behave
ambiguously with respect to their category status, in particular, in VP final position immediately following
a direct object or a verb（cf. Killie ２００７）. Although native speakers generally show certain preferences inchoosing between the bare adjective form and the -ly adverbial form, due to their subtleties it still seems
rather difficult to state explicitly the relevant criteria. I have also argued that predication mismatch inspurious resultatives further motivates the adverbial modification reading of the adjectives in question. I
have also suggested that predication mismatch explains why the standard causative paraphrase does notseem to work in spurious resultatives: in the “X became Y” part of the paraphrase of spurious resultatives,－77 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

proper predication between X and Y often fails due to predication mismatch.

As for the existence ofantonym pairs in the result phrase, the manner orientation of the result phrase seems to be responsible, as
Washio（１９９７）himself suggests. In other words, depending on how the verbal action is carried out, its
effects on the theme argument can vary on the same scale of change. Thus we can reduce the tendency of
having antonymous adjectives in spurious resultatives to their adverbial use and interpretation, which is inturn attributable to predication mismatch.
Viewed this way, the major characteristics of spurious resultatives noted in Washio’s original analysis
can be traced back to predication mismatch in the interpretation of spurious resultatives along with
ambiguity in the use and form of adverbial adjectives in modern English. Accordingly, I reformulate in（１９）the characteristics of spurious resultatives in terms of these two major features:（１９） （A）Adverbial modification:
	The result phrase in spurious resultatives has adverbial properties as shown typically by its
alternation with -ly adverbs and the how-question test. One contributing factor is the historically
accidental prevalence of “adverbial adjectives” in modern English. Adverbial modification
correlates with the existence of antonymous pairs of resultative adjectives, since the result of averbal action is crucially affected by how（in what manner）the action is done.
（B）Predication mismatch:
	The result phrase in spurious resultatives functions “non-predicatively,” in that it often fails
to be semantically predicated of its apparent host. Instead, it is more appropriately construed
as describing the resultant property of a created or derived entity not realized explicitly inthe syntactic structure. Causative paraphrase fails when, due to predication mismatch, proper
predication does not hold between the created theme argument and the result phrase.
In the following discussion, I will further argue that the adverbial behavior of spurious result phrases
in（A）derives from predication mismatch in（B）. Specifically I claim that when predication mismatchoccurs, type shifting by coercion（Jackendoff ２００２, Pustejovsky １９９５）is invoked in order to dissolve thesemantic tension between the predicate and its apparent host. However, before I discuss more specificallywhat kind of interpretive strategy is at work, let us take a closer look from an event-semantic point of viewat what kind of verbs are involved in spurious resultatives.
３. Verbs of transformation: changes in configuration and shape/appearance
Consider what kind of verbs typically appear in spurious resultatives. The following examples（strippedto the bone for expository purposes）are intended to offer an overview of what types of resultatives are－77 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

generally regarded as spurious resultatives. They are compiled from various sources including the linguistic
literature, the internet and dictionaries.
（２０）

Change in configurationa. chop the parsley fineb. clench my fists white tightc. cut the meat thickd. hold her arms rigid
e. grind the coffee beans coarse
f. pile the books highg. rake the gravel flath. slice the bread thini. scrunch her eyes shutj. spread the butter thin
k. stack the records highl. tie the shoelaces tight（２１）

Change in shape/appearance
a. bend the metal closed
b. collapse the box flatc. crush it shapelessd. dye her hair pinke. fold the blanket thickf. roll the notes thickg. shrink the original story shorth. squint her eyes narrowi. stretch her arms wide

Semantically speaking, changes described in these examples may be broadly categorized into two types:
change in configuration in（２０）and change in shape/appearance in（２１）. The former type can be further
divided, in terms of two opposed directions of change, into “assembling” and “disassembling.” Although
admittedly, the categorization of verbs involved is not always clearcut between the two types, the intuitive
idea behind this classification is that the verbal events involved here all denote some kind of event whichtransforms an entity, focusing to varying extents on the configuration or the shape/appearance of thetheme argument. Change in configuration is more specific about rearranging component parts of an entity,－77 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

separating something into parts（= disassembling）or bringing parts together to produce a larger entity（=
assembling）. Change in shape/appearance, on the other hand, focuses on holistic change in the shape/
appearance of an entity.
The verbs that describe these types of event are largely characterized as verbs of transformation,changing an entity into a different shape, appearance, or configuration typically through exerting various
types of physical force. Thus, they can also be accompanied by a prepositional result phrase instead of an
adjectival phrase, describing similar types of events of transformation more explicitly, as shown in（２２）:（２２）

a. He tied his shoelaces into a knot.
b. He chopped parsley into pieces.
c. She rolled the notes into a roll.
d. She stacked the records into a tower.
e. She ground the coffee beans into powder.

Interestingly, the nominal complements to the PPs in（２２）can naturally undergo adjectival modificationby what appear to be spurious adjective phrases, which are italicized in the examples below:６（２３）

a. He tied his shoelaces into a tight knot.
b. He chopped parsley into fine pieces.
c. She rolled the notes into a thick roll.
d. She stacked the records into a high tower.
e. She ground the coffee beans into coarse powder.

These examples suggest that these result adjectives used in spurious resultatives in（２０─２１）are not true
predicates of the object of the verbs but are more appropriately understood as semantically modifying
the resultant object which can have an alternative realization in PP as in（２３）. Compare the spurious
resultative variants in（２４）:（２４）

a. He tied his shoelaces tight.
b. He chopped parsley fine.
c. She rolled the notes thick.
d. She stacked the records high.
e. She ground the coffee beans coarse.

－77 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

Given the present characterization of the verbs under discussion as verbs of transformation specifying
various types of change in configuration and shape/appearance, a straightforward account can be invokedfor predication mismatch between the theme argument and the result phrase as discussed in ２.２: the theme
argument in this type of change event can often fail to retain its unity or integrity during the process ofchange. With verbs of assembling/disassembling, in particular, it is often the case that the original theme
argument undergoes a process of change that transforms its material integrity in two ways: either putting
different parts together into one whole through an assembling process（e.g. clenching, piling, stacking,tying）, or taking a whole apart through a disassembling process（e.g. chopping, cutting, grinding, slicing）.
In either case, the referentiality of an entity involved can be affected after transformation process throughmultiplying or decreasing the number of its constituent parts. If the result phrase as a predicate is supposed
to refer to the state of an resultant entity, it is not unnatural to assume that the affected referentiality might
hinder a proper predicative interpretation between the original theme entity and the result phrase which
describes a resultant product. However, the same does not necessarily hold of the case of changes in shape/
appearance where the theme argument undergoes a significant change in its shape or appearance while
retaining its basic constitutive property as far as its referential identity is concerned. For example, in the
resultative expression collapsing the box flat, the referentiality of the box can remain the same after theprocess of collapsing, although its function as a box is normally lost. In this respect, predication mismatch
can be seen to have more relevance to the events of change in configuration than those of change in shape/
appearance.
Note also that it is not uncommon that the same verb can be seen as describing either a change in
configuration or a change in shape/appearance depending on context. For example, the verb spread in she
spread the cards flat on the table describes an act of disassembling while the same verb can be construed
as an act of transformation in she spread the umbrella open. In other words, an event is seen as an instanceof change in configuration when the material unity of an entity is lost in the process of change, while it isseen as an instance of change in shape/appearance when the unity is somehow held intact, even when it hasgone through a noticeable change in its shape/appearance.７ In the next section, I will put forth a view thatthe category of verbs of transformation can be further extended to include a broader variety of verbs in theso-called weak resultatives.
４. Spurious resultatives and weak resultatives
４.１. How much are they really different?
Given the present characterization of spurious resultatives as formed around verbs of transformationthat typically describe a change in configuration or shape/appearance, the reader might ask the obvious
question whether spurious resultatives should be treated separately from the so-called weak resultatives－77 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

whose main verbs can also be more or less classified as verbs of transformation. In other words, one may
ask if it is really necessary to maintain the distinction between spurious resultatives and weak resultatives
as originally suggested by Washio（１９９７）. In fact, my answer to this question is that most of the changeof state verbs attested in weak resultatives can be subsumed under the larger category of “verbs oftransformation,” along with verbs of change in configuration and in shape/appearance. I will argue that
there are certain differences in degree, but not in kind, between them and consequently spurious resultatives
and weak resultatives are to be grouped together in the general classification of resultatives.
Consider some of the oft-cited cases of weak resultative in the literature.
（２５）

a. He broke the box open.
b. She froze the ice cream hard.
c. He melted the chocolate soft.
d. He burned the books to cinders.
e. She boiled the lobster pink.
f. He fried the potatoes crisp.

It seems clear that the examples in（２５）share certain similarities with the spurious resultatives wehave examined so far. They entail certain results that can be further specified by result phrases, which
are in turn licensed as long as they are construed as describing some kind of additional specification to
the entailed result of the verbal events. In this respect, the verbs in question can be largely classified
into verbs of transformation in（２１）. If we are to define the semantics of verbs of transformation more
precisely, it should involve such conceptual categories as property, configuration, shape, color, and size as
its subcategories. Among them, property is the superordinate concept which unifies other subcategories
including “intrinsic property” which I assume to refer to some inherent property of an entity defined interms of its unity or function at an abstract level. For example, an event of breaking not only physicallydamages an entity but also spoils its function as a result of the process of transformation. An event of
melting or freezing normally changes the constitutive state of an entity, which can in turn lead to a change
in its classification category（e.g. from ice to water and vice versa）. Thus, I claim that verbs of change inintrinsic property, which typically serve as the semantic core of events denoted by weak resultatives, can begenerally subsumed under verbs of transformation. The conceptual subcategories that are involved in thesemantics of verbs of transformation are summarized in the following figure:－88 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

change in property

intrinsic property shapeappearance (color/size) configuration …

Figure １: Conceptual categorization with verbs of transformation

In fact, some scholars who acknowledge the existence of spurious-type resultatives regard the resultative
instances of these verbs as a subtype of the resultatives which consists of the verb implying a result and theresult phrase further specifying it（Iwata ２００６, Rapoport １９９９ among others）. According to Iwata（２００６）,
for example, his Type B resultatives, which roughly correspond to weak resultatives in Washio（１９９７）,
cover the spurious type as well. In the following, despite the strong similarities to the prededing approaches, I will argue that “spurious resultatives,” instead of “weak resultatives” or（Iwata ２００６, Rapoport １９９９）“Type B resultatives,” can be considered a better characterization of our object of study to be contrasted
with “true resultatives” in section ６, where the notion of further specification in resultatives is further
examined.
４.２. Manually controlled processes
Before jumping to the conclusion that spurious resultatives and weak resultatives can be unified into thesame class, however, let us explore some ideas hinted at by the fact that the verbs in the typical spurious
resultatives in（２０-２１）and those in the weak resultatives in（２５）are not perfectly homogeneous in theirsemantic properties. The former type of verbs do not normally yield intransitive variants with their agentive
subjects suppressed: intransitivization is possible only when the theme argument is understood as a kindof natural object in motion, as in（２６）and（２７）. On the other hand, the latter verbs, irrespective of thesemantic type of the theme argument, participate in transitive/intransitive alternation fairly freely, as in（２８）.
（２６）

a. He spread the butter thin.
b. ??The butter spread thin.
c. The soil spread thin over ancient rocks.

（２７）

a. She piled the books high.
b. ??The books piled high.
c. The snow piled thick.

（２８）

a. The glass broke in pieces.
－88 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木b. The ice cream froze hard.
c. The chocolate melted soft.
The change process expressed by the former class of verbs typically requires a responsible agent who
has control over the process of change, while with the latter the relevant change is understood as being
somehow internally caused once initiated. That is, this latter type of change is likely to progress on its
own without aid of an agentive controller（cf. Levin and Rappaport Hovav １９９５ for “internal causation”
vs. “external causation”）. Thus, we may say that change of configuration verbs are relatively less specificabout their outcome, while an agent’s involvement in their activities, such as manually controlled
procedures, is more strongly specified. This relatively higher specificity of agentive control contributes totheir limited occurrence in intransitive forms such as（２６c）and（２７c）.
４.３. Elasticity of types of change and underspecification of results
Viewed from a slightly different perspective, the two types of verb that appear in spurious resultatives
and weak resultatives also differ in the degree of specificity of the result entailment. In spurious
resultatives, verbs are not always specific enough about their entailed results, or at least, it is sometimes
difficult to determine what kind of results are entailed because of the elasticity of the verbal semantics.
Put differently, it is often the case that the resultant situation is rather dynamically constructed from a
combination of the verb, the theme argument and the result phrase. Consider the following cases:（２９）

a. She piled the books high.
b. She piled the broken pieces（of the dish）into her hand.
c. They piled into a taxi.
d. The snow piled thick.

An act of piling usually means putting things up higher and higher in a vertical direction, but in somecases it can also mean moving things to the same place one by one with no implication of vertical growth.
In other words, in（２９b-c）, the cumulative effect of the successive procedures or minievents of piling ishighlighted instead of a cumulative effect in an upward direction（２９a）.
The behavior of the verb spread is similar. In（３０a）, ‘the word’ goes through a disassembling process
while, in（３０b, c）, the change simply concerns the holistic shape or appearance of an entity with no
implication of disassembling.
（３０）
－88 －

a. She spread the word in two halves. ８

山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

b. She spread the umbrella open.
c. She spread the butter thick.
Thus, we may say that the core meaning specification of the verb spread, definable as a widening motionof the parts of an entity, can be expressed either as a change in configuration in（３０a）, or as a change inshape/appearance in（３０b）and（３０c）.
As to how specifically results are implicated, verbs like pile and spread seem to behave slightly
differently from other bona fide result verbs, some of which we have termed verbs of change in intrinsic
property in ４.１. To clarify the difference, let us employ the something is different about X test（Beavers
２０１１: ３４２）as an informative means to detect property change in the result entailment of verbs.
（３１） a. John just cleaned/painted the bedroom, #but nothing is different about it.
b. John just destroyed/ate the cake, #but nothing is different about it.
When this test is applied to pile and spread cases, the results are somewhat difficult to evaluate.
（３２）

a. She just piled the books,（#）but nothing is different about them.
b. She just spread the cards,（#）but nothing is different about them.

As long as it deals with the inherent properties of the books or the cards, the statement nothing is different
does not seem to contradict the former half of the sentence. In fact, Beavers also provides another related
test for change of location, x is somewhere else, but again the results with the verbs pile and spread are
not so bad, if not definitely acceptable. Judgment varies, depending on how narrowly one construes therelevant location where entities move.
（３３）

a. John just walked out of the room, # but he is not somewhere else.
b. She just piled the books,（#）but they are not somewhere else.
c. She just spread the cards,（#）but they are not somewhere else.

Consider another test for scalar change, X is more V-ed than Y（Levin ２００８）, by which the verbs inquestion generally fail to show a scalar change property:（３４）

a. *The parsley is more chopped than the onions.
（cf. The parsley is more finely chopped than the onions.）－88 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

b. *These books are more piled than those ones.
（cf. These books are piled higher than those ones.）c. *These cards are more spread than those on the other table.
（cf. These cards are spread wider than those on the other table.）
Taken together, the results of those tests suggest that the typical verbs in spurious resultatives, verbs ofchange in configuration and change in shape/appearance, may not fully qualify as result verbs in that they
do not seem to entail any change that can be characterized by a distinct scalar notion. Intuitively, however,it still feels too strong to deny that some kind of directed change is involved in the events with these verbs.
In this connection, there is a plausible line of argument suggested by Rappaport Hovav and Levin’s（２０１０）treatment of verbs such as brush, chop, comb, grind, and mow, which apparently constitute a
potential counterexample to their analysis of manner/result complementarity in lexicalization. As theyobserve, these verbs normally require that the agent use a particular instrument（involving a specificmanner）while also entailing a change in the theme as a result of the use of this instrument（involving a
specific result）. They suggest the following:（３５）	These verbs［brush, chop, comb, grind, and mow］, then, specify changes in the entities denotedby both the subject and the object, but we argue that these changes are not scalar so thatthese verbs do not counterexemplify manner/result complementarity. They describe complex
interactions between the entities denoted by their two arguments, so that the change in the object
can be characterized only by concomitant reference to the subject’s activity.
（Rappaport Hovav and Levin ２０１０: ３８）



Based on the insightful characterization by Rappaport Hovav and Levin, I assume that the “ambiguous”
verbs of this type share the duality of manner/result meaning in their lexical specification: their result
entailment is underspecified to the extent that directed change cannot be meaningfully defined in terms ofthe notion of scale without reference to their respective manners, that is, how the subject acts during theprocess of change. This characterization of the semantics of verbs in question corresponds perfectly withour characterization of verbs in spurious resultatives as involving manually controlled process, which inturn explains their inclination to syntactically transitive realization.
To summarize our observations so far, the potential tendency of verbs of change in configuration andshape/appearance to support a variety of result phrases can be seen as reflection of their semantic elasticity.
The source of this, I suggest, lies in the underspecification of result entailment in the lexical semanticsof the verbs in question. Seen from a different perspective, they are likely not to fully specify their result－88 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

states only to be further substantiated with additional result expressions. In other words, they sometimes
fail to behave like genuine result verbs, showing characteristics of “ambiguous” verbs in terms of manner/
result complementarity in the sense of Rappaport Hovav and Levin（２０１０）. The manner component inverb semantics in this case directly conforms to one of their features already discussed, namely manuallycontrolled process. All this suggests that verbs of change in configuration and verbs of change in shape/
appearance are weaker in result specification than other members of verbs of transformation.
However, I would rather not take this point too far about distinguishing between the two types of verbs,
verbs in spurious resultatives and those in weak resultatives. I would rather argue that they cover a largepart of events of transformation together sharing the same type of resultative interpretation in which theresult phrase essentially functions as further specification of the verb meanings.
There is additional evidence that a similar kind of elasticity in result specification with verbs of change in
configuration and verbs of change in shape/appearance is also observed occasionally with weak resultatives
with verbs of change in intrinsic property.
（３６）a. Mr. Gray［…］smashed the headlight dark. （Stephen King, Dream Catcher: ４６０）
（Ben Watt, Patient: ２９）

b. The wax is all gone from it. The dish has burnt dry.
c.［…］hotel rooms that freeze your eyebrows to the pillows［…］（David Lodge, Small World: ３２）



Notice that in these examples, the result component of the verb meaning is somewhat “bleached”（cf.
Rappaport Hovav & Levin ２０１０）in that the verbs in（３６）do not retain the literal sense of convertingsome entity into pieces, cinders or solid, but rather they only convey their manner-oriented senses ofconcomitant effects such as causing the loss of lighting function or giving a high degree of heat or extreme
coldness.
As argued above, the elasticity observed with spurious resultative verbs（in particular, with verbs ofchange in configuration and verbs of change in shape）comes from two sources:（A）agentive（manual）
control of the process of change, and（B）underspecification of the result types. In fact, these two features
can be seen as two sides of the same coin: the existence of manual control during change events somehow
seems to offset explicit specifications of the result state. Put differently, for some result verbs, the result
specification can be left abstract and incomplete if the involvment of agentive control throughout theprocess is entailed to a certain degree.９
In terms of scalar change, partially ordered scales are very similar to two-point scales in thatthey are both very limited in the number of potential degrees ordered on a scale. In fact, this type ofunderspecification is widely shared among change of state verbs, with the exception of so-called degree－88 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

achievement verbs（e.g. cool, warm）which are associated with more fine-grained multiple-point scales.
Note that, among verbs of transformation, predication mismatch is typically observed with verbs ofchange in configuration, while it is not often the case with verbs of change in intrinsic property. This isprobably because, unlike the former, the latter verbs do not always involve the loss of physical unity. In
this respect, some change of state verbs found in weak resultatives, namely verbs of change in intrinsic
property（e.g. break, burn, freeze, melt）, are virtually indistinguishable from other verbs of transformation
with respect to their choice of the result phrase. Therefore, I propose that verbs in spurious resulatives andweak resultatives can be placed on the continuum of various events of transformation: verbs of change in
configuration generally on the side of physically affected unity and verbs of change in intrinsic propertyon the other with other types of verb of change（in shape, appearance, etc.）in-between. Based on theconceptual categorization of transformation in Figure １, the division of labor between the two types ofresultatives in describing events of transformation can be schematically represented as follows:

Figure ２: Division of labor between weak and spurious resultatives

Verbs of transformation generally covers various aspects of change in property, which can be divided into
several conceptual subcategories such as intrinsic property, shape/appearance, and configuration. The
various types of change in transformation often, if not always, involve the loss of unity in the part of thetheme argument, which can have a significant reflex in its function or referential identity. When events oftransformation are realized in resultative constructions, their semantic area is largely shared with two typesof resultatives, namely weak resultatives and spurious resultatives, which are related with each other in acline-like fashion partly overlapping in their coverage of the conceptual field of transformation: while theformer tends to cover autonomous changes, the latter is more likely to deal with changes characterized byagentive control.
－88 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

Although the two types of resultatives have different orientations as to what type of change they
most appropriately describe, this difference is also a matter of disposition where quite a few cases fall
ambiguously between the two spheres. Thus, in my opinion, spurious resultatives and weak resultatives
share the general semantics of the result phrase further specifying the result implied in the verb meaning.
In order to substantiate this idea we still need to clarify how the result phrase actually functions in further
specifying the resultant state of transformation. With that in mind, let me digress a while in the next section
to see what can be learned from Japanese（spurious）resultatives.
５. The view from Japanese（spurious）resultatives
５.１. A Type shifting analysis of Japanese（spurious）resultatives
In his seminal work on the typology of resultatives, Washio（１９９７）argues that Japanese has only
weak resultatives（and spurious resultatives）, but not strong resultatives, while in English both types ofresultative are possible. His account of this typological difference is based on a hierarchy of patienthood,formulated in terms of the strength of result implications in verb semantics. I will not go into the specifics
of Washio’s analysis of patienthood, but see Beavers（２０１１）who offers a concise recapitulation of thehierarchy and a possible reinterpretation of it within the affectedness hierarchy proposed by Beavers
himself. Since Washio（１９９７）, it has been widely assumed that Japanese is a language which is fairly
restricted in its variety of resultative constructions compared to English-type languages with strong
resultatives.
However, recent studies in Japanese linguistics（Imoto ２００９, Miyakoshi ２００９ among others）have castsome doubt on this limited view of resultatives in Japanese, suggesting that there is in fact a broader varietyof resultative expressions than assumed in the traditional literature, some of which are exemplified below（adapted from the previous studies including Imoto（２００９）and Miyakoshi（２００９）with English glossessby the present author.）:１０, １１（３７）

a. Kanojo-ga

kami-wokirei-ni kitta.

She.NOM

hair.ACC

nicelycut.PAST‘She cut her hair nice/lovely’b. Kare-wa

negi-wonaname-ni

kitta.

He.NOM

leek.ACC

diagonally

cut.PAST‘He cut the leeks diagonally’c. Kare-wa

negi-wotaira-ni narabeta

He.NOM

leek.ACC

flat

place in order.PAST‘He arranged the leeks flat’－88 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

d. Kanojo-wa

huusen-wo

ookikuhukuramaseta.

She.NOM

baloon.ACC

big

blow.PAST‘She blew the balloon big/large’e. Kare-wa

sashimi-wo

ookikukitta.

He.NOMraw fish.ACC

big

cut.PAST

akaku

hareta.

‘He cut the raw fish big/large’f. Ude-ga		
Arm.NOM

redswell.PAST‘My arm swelled red’
Imoto argues that although events in so-called spurious resultatives are typically understood as expressing
transformations in which an entity undergoes a significant change to produce a created entity, thisinterpretation is not inherently specified in the verbal semantics（since the verbs in question are mostly
change of state verbs）but rather an emergent property derived by coercion（Jackendoff ２００２, Pustejovsky
１９９５）, more specifically, type shifing in the interpretation of the object noun phrase, as a consequence ofadding the result phrase to the original verbal event, typically an event of transformation.
Abstracting away theoretical details for present purposes, Imoto’s（２００９）analysis of Japanese
resultative expressions can be recapitulated as follows:（３８） （A）The function of the Japanese result phrase is adverbial modification to some（potential）
facet of the verb semantics. Importantly, the categorial distinction between adjectives andadverbs essentially does not matter in the interpretation through type shifting. The result
phrase is understood as a modifier to the verb phrase without being predicated of a hostnoun phrase directly.１２（B）Coercion is at work to accommodate semantic incompatibility, when it arises, yielding ameaningful semantic interpretation between the verbal predicate（with its theme argument）
and the result phrase.１３ By way of type shifting the result phrase can be semantically linked
to a resultant object in a transformation event instead of the syntactically realized object.
More generally, “further specification” in cases like this can be regarded as a dynamic
interpretive process of eliciting a relevant facet of events potentially compatible with theverb semantics.
In some cases, semantic interpretation utilizes static information lexically specified in the verb meaning;in other cases, when the relevant facet of change is not fully predictable from the verb meaning coercion－88 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

is invoked to deal with the apparent semantic incompatibility. To illustrate how coercion works in suchcases, consider the following examples with ooki-ku, -ku form of the adjective ookii（“big” or “large” inEnglish）: １４（３９）

a. Kare-ga		
He.NOM 	sashimi-wo ooki-ku kitta

raw fish.ACC 	large

cut.PAST‘He cut the raw fish into large slices.’b. Kanojo-ga

kabin-wo		

ooki-ku watta

She.NOM

vase.ACC		

large

break.PAST‘She broke the vase into larger pieces.’c. Kare-ga		
He.NOM

te-wo		

hand.ACC		

bigooki-ku hutta
wave.PAST‘He waved his hand in a big motion.’d. Kanojo-ga
She.NOM

ooki-ku		bigwarattasmile/laugh.PAST‘She smiled a big smile/laughed in a loud voice.’
The expression ooki-ku normally refers to the size or volume of an entity in change especially when theeffect of change is regarded as being of some significance. However, when combined with certain verbs,
the verbal activity and the semantics of ooki-ku may fail to fit together in a straightforward way. For
example,（３９a）cannnot be understood as an act of making something larger by cutting; in（３９b）, the actof waving his hand does not make it bigger; and in（３９c）, the act of laughing is not normally understoodas involving an entity that becomes bigger as a result. Still, all these examples obtain natural readings:
in（３９a）, the event of cutting is reanalyzed as a transformation（disassembling）event where each pieceof the resultant product can be described as “large” according to some contextual criterion; in（３９b）, thetarget of ooki-ku is shifted from the hand itself to its motion/trail; in（３９c）, without any apparent targetof modification by ooki-ku, the effect of smiling is construed as an abstract product to be modified in a
coerced reading.
According to Imoto’s type shifting analysis, “further specification” in Japanese resultative expressions isregarded as not just augmenting the result specification of the verb semantics with additional information
but rather prompting constructive process of adjustment in interpreting possible events. In order to achievesemantic coherence, type shifting requires a dynamic reinterpretation of the theme argument, generating
different combinations of verbs, objects, and result phrases.

－88 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木５.２. Adverbial modification as type shifting
I will argue that the basic insight of type shifting analysis of Japanese resultatives by Imoto（２００９）canbe extended to account for a significant part of elastic interpretation of spurious resultatives more generally.
Let us turn again to spurious resultatives in English. We have discussed that English spurious resultatives
have two major features when compared to normal resultatives:（A）predication mismatch and（B）
adverbial modification by the result phrase. We have argued that predication mismatch reflects the generalsemantics of events of transformation, mainly characterized by a change of properties such as change in
configuration and change in shape/appearance, generally denoting an event where the unity of an entity isaffected in some way or other in the process of change. We have also taken a less committed position on
adverbial modification: no single criterion is assumed to determine the categorial status of the modifier if it
realizes in a bare “adjective” form. Along this line of thinking, Imoto’s account of Japanese resultatives inwhich “further specification” plays a constructive role in interpreting events can be extended to capture an
important facet of predication mismatch in spurious resultatives in English.
As we have seen above, verbs in spurious resultatives, namely verbs of transformation, are often
underspecified for their result entailment, tolerating different kinds of result phrase for different event
types. Moreover, it is not always the case that the result phrase is analyzed as a simple modification of
the implied result of verbal activities. Consider the following examples, one in Japanese and the other inEnglish:（４０）

a. Michi-gaRoad.NOM

siro-kukawaita

whitedry.PAST（Imoto ２００９: ２９１）

‘The road dried white.’b. Her breath exploded white.１５
In（４０a）, the drying of the road does not imply a change in color, or for that matter, a change into white.
Likewise, in（４０b）, the explosion of her breath cannot be inherently linked in the verb semantics to its
becoming white. Instead, in each of these examples, the addition of the result phrase white should be seen
as an active trigger to derive a transformation event reading（yielding some entity in white）. In otherwords, the reading “x becomes white as a result of x’s drying or exploding” is coerced in the context.
An advantage of the type shifting analysis of those resultatives is that it is not necessary to strictly
determine the categorial status of result phrases, since type shifting by coercion is not a syntactic process
by nature and the predicative interpretation to be obtained is only a makeshift in semantics involving
various pragmatic factors. As one of the characteristic properties of spurious resultatives, it has alreadybeen pointed out that the result phrase functions as adverbial modification instead of true predication. We－99 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

can now recast the situation as follows: in spurious resultatives, true predication in a structurally motivatedsense does not hold, and thus for the result phrase to receive a proper interpretation, it must be linked toa semantically appropriate host by virtue of its modifying the VP in question adverbially. In this sense,
adjectives in spurious resultatives are coerced into behaving like adverbs, and further specification in
spurious resultatives is not just modification of an inherently specified component of the verb semantics,
but rather a constructive process of exploring a possible reinterpretation of an entity undergoing a change.
A related question to consider is how and when such type shifting is permitted. For the present, I
have a limited answer to this: targets of semantic coercion are constrained lexically and conventionally:
lexically, in that the choice of adjectives available are limited to lexical items of Germanic origin witha monosyllabic structure and to those that normally denote objectively discernible, simple properties;
conventionally, in that combination of the verb and the result phrase must be construed as more or lessconventionally motivated to give a natural interpretation in events of transformation. This latter aspect isoften pointed out to hold more generally about resultatives（Boas ２００３ among others）.
６. The resultative dichotomy reformulated: true resultatives and spurious
resultatives
６.１. True resultatives and temporal dependence
The last question which has been left unaddressed so far in this paper is what true resultatives are.
What can our new understanding of spurious resultatives offer to the major dichotomy of resultatives? In
answering this question, I would like to propose a complementary characterization of the two major typesof resultatives. Following the general trend in mutually-related, though not fully agreed upon, boundedness
constraint approaches to resultative constructions,１６ I adopt the view that in true resultatives, two different
scales, the verbal scale of the main predicate and the secondary scale provided by the result phrase, aremerged to form a complex scale, with the latter typically setting a boundary on the process of change
in the first scale. In other words, true resultatives are characterized by a scale composition, in which an
unbounded process of change inherently specified in the verbal scale is delimited by a bound read off of theresult phrase.１７ A major point of consensus in the relevant literature is that the result phrase must be “virtuallyclosed” in terms of scalar interpretation（cf. Wechsler ２００５）, while there are various implementationsof this idea of boundedness constraint on resultatives（see Goldberg １９９５, Rothstein ２００４, Suzuki ２００６,
Vanden Wyngaerd ２００１, Wechsler ２００５）（４１）

a. ?He talked himself a little hoarse.
b. ?She ate herself a little sick.

（４２）（Goldberg １９９５: １９６）

a. Tim danced himself {completely/almost/half/*very} tired.
－99 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木b. Max shouted himself {completely/almost/half/*very} hoarse.
c. The joggers ran the pavement {completely/almost/half/*very} thin.
d. Charley laughed himself {completely/almost/half/*very} silly.（Vanden Wyngaerd ２００１: ６４）
The data in（４１）and（４２）plainly suggest that even gradable adjectives are forced to behave as nongradables when they are put in the resultative frame. That is, the constructional frame requires the bounded（closed-scale）interpretation of result phrases whether they are lexically specified as closed-scale（= nongradable）or not.
Taking boundedness as the defining property of true resultatives, I adopt a particular view that the scale
composition between the verbal scale and the result scale in true resultatives is intuitively captured by theuntil-paraphrase of the resultative sentence, which is to account for the temporal dependency between thetwo subevents.
（４３）

John hammered the metal flat ⇒ John hammered the metal until it became flat.

In（４３）, the paraphrase with ‘until’ given on the right side of the arrow means the event of John’shammering the metal and the event of its becoming flat proceed in a temporally parallel way.１８
It is sometimes argued that temporal dependence does not hold in unselected object resultatives（ECM
resultatives in Wechsler’s（２００５）terminology）, in particular in those with an intensifying reading of
dysfunction. Rappaport Hovav and Levin（２００１: ７７５）, for example, argue that there can be a temporal gap
between the verbal event and the result event in（４４）since “the hoarseness is achieved some time after thesinging is over”:（４４）Sam sang enthusiastically during the class play. He woke up hoarse the next day and said, ‘Well, I
guess I’ve sung myself hoarse.’ （Rappaport Hovav and Levin ２００１: ７７５）

However, other scholars claim that, even in such instances, “temporal adjacency,” if not temporal
overlap, still holds between the two subevents.（see Croft ２０１２: ２９０-２９１, Goldberg & Jackendoff
２００４ and Rothstein ２００４）. In line with the latter position, I would add two further points to argue thata boundedness analysis can be applied to unselected and reflexive object resultatives like those in（４４）.
First, linguistic expressions do not always reflect real world events as they are. In（４４）, while it would bepossible to have a temporal lag between his singing performance and the appearance of hoarseness in his
throat in a real event, the literal interpretation of the expression can require a coincidental reading, in which
the culmination of his becoming hoarse is understood exactly as being at the end of his performance. In－99 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

other words, the apparently temporally independent interpretation can be seen as a result of a contextuallyinferred reading.
Secondly, unselected object resultatives（ECM resultatives）, in particular those with reflexive objects
or body part objects, are more or less idiomaticized with negative connotations of various types ofdysfunctional state. It is not uncommon for a speaker to use an idiomatic phrase to overstate his experience,
distancing himself from objective descriptions of real-world events. That is, an idiomatic expression
by nature deviates from its literal interpretation. This can be another reason why some resultatives with
unselected objects can have apparently temporally independent readings.
Returning to the general interpretation of true resultatives, I specifically propose that a temporally
dependent interpretation derived from scale composition has two potentially different realizations: one is“total overlapping” where two subevents unfold in parallel from start to finish, and the other is the “terminal
coincidence” of two subevents where the result phrase determines the culminating point as a bound on thescale of the verbal event. In both cases, I assume that the until-paraphrase applies, i.e., even in the case of“terminal coincidence,” it is possible to interpret two subevents as having developed contemporaneously.
For example, he sang himself hoarse has the paraphrase “he sang（songs）until he became hoarse,” where
his singing act continues while the situation in which his throat is being damaged little by little develops ina parallel way. Put differently, we may say that a kind of retrospective reading（going backwards from theresult）is employed to reconstruct a parallel unfolding interpretation.
Given this characterization of true resultatives, we can see the oft-mentioned obligatory reading ofincremental change in（true）resultatives（cf. Croft ２０１２, Rothstein ２００４; see also Rappaport Hovav andLevin ２００１, and Beavers ２０１１ among others）as induced by the scale composition between the verbal
predicate and the result phrase. Thus, in the present analysis, the scale composition between two subeventsis the distinguishing factor of the major typology in the cross-linguistic distribution of resultative
expressions, namely strong/true resultatives and spurious resultatives.
７. Some consequences of the reformulated dichotomy of resultatives
７.１. Counterexamples to the boundedness constraint reexamined
It has been often pointed out in the literature that the boundedness constraint on resultatives has to deal
with apparent counterexamples（Boas ２００３, Ono ２００７; see also Goldberg and Jackendoff ２００４, Wechsler２００５）. Consider the following set of examples in（４５）that apparently violate the boundedness constraint,, who argues against Wechsler’s（２００１/２００５）maximal endpoint
as presented by Boas（２００３: １３６-１３７）
constraint:（４５）

a. Cool to room temperature. Dip a soft cloth in the solution, wring it damp and wipe furniture－99 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木with it.（１９９８/１２/３１, Newsgroups: rec.antiques）
b. The simplest approach is to require the application to mark it dirty after making any changes
and before dropping its strong references.（２０００/１/１８, Newsgroups: comp.lang.java.programmar）
c. Actually, if you’re trying for a Vietnam-look, the best way to do it would just color it dirty（２００１/３/４, Newsgroups; rec. models.scale）
d. Everyday I wipe it wet with WD-４０ before I ride and then wipe it dry after my ride.（２０００/４/
１９, Newsgroups: rec.bicycles.misc）
e. He found his lips dry and licked them wet again before taking a sip from the already sweatingbeer can.（２００２/６/２０, Newsgroups: alt.sex.stories.moderated）
In view of the exampes in（４５）, Boas argues that certain（de facto）open-scale adjectives（closed-scale
adjectives with a minimum standard）can appear in resultatives, in violation of the boundedness constraint.
Note, however, that the adjectives in（４５）constitute antonymous pairs of “complementary opposition,”
their respective antonyms being closed-scale adjectives:１９（４６）a. damp（open scale）		

⇔dry（closed scale）

b. dirty（open scale）⇔

clean（closed scale）

c. wet（open scale）⇔

dry（closed scale）

These open-scale adjectives have in fact been traditionally cited in the literature as unacceptable inresultatives:（４７）He wiped it clean/dry/smooth/*damp/*dirty/*stained/*wet.

（Green １９７２）

Given the present framework, however, it is not difficult to reanalyze these apparently problematic casesin（４５）as spurious resultatives. First, in（４５a）, the act of wringing a wet cloth can yield something dry or
damp depending on the manner in which the wringing activity is performed. Thus, a natural interpretationof wring it damp should be something like “wring it in such a way that it remains damp.” Conversely, theuntil paraphrase does not make sense with this case（wring it damp ≠ wring it until it becomes damp）.
The verbs mark and color in（４５b, c）are verbs of change in apperance and thus the events described here
can be analyzed as transformation events in our terms: they are understood as something like “x marks/
colors y in such a way that z which looks dirty is created,” where z could be viewed as distinct in identity
transformed from y. Although a similar analysis is available for（４５d, e）, it can be alternatively argued－99 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

that these examples are truly exceptional in that they are set in a contrastive context, namely, in（４５d）,
wipe it wet and wipe it dry are placed in tandem, and in（４５e）, wet comes immediately after its antonymdry. It is not unreasonable to consider that this context effectively encourages the appearance of these
unexpected adjectives. In my opinion,（４５d, e）may be justifiably disregarded as idiosyncratic tokens
whose acceptability is heavily contingent on peculiarly contrastive contexts. Thus, they do not constitutegenuine counterexamples to our characterization of true resultatives as far as we maintain the dichotomyof true resultatives and spurious resultatives. I conclude that the apparent counterexamples in（４５）can beanalyzed either as spurious resultatives in the present framework or as highly irregular tokens consciously
created in the context.
７.２. Ambiguity in resultatives: true or spurious
I have presented an expanded view of spurious resultatives that allows a more flexible interpretation of
result phrases with respect to their predicational properties. In addition to true resultative interpretation,
namely, temporally dependent incremental change under strict scale composition, the present analysis
leaves room for some seemingly true resultatives, in particular when the object is selected by a transitive
verb, to have a spurious reading where temporal dependence is not required. In other words, the result
phrase is associated with its host only through adverbial modification instead of structural predication. In
such cases, the resultative sentence can be paraphrased as “x V on y and y is now z,” instead of the until
paraphrase “x V（on y）until y becomes z.” Consider a typical case of true resultatives:（４８）He hammered the metal flat.
I claim that（４８）can be ambiguous in its event-aspectual interpretation:（i）a true resultative readingwhere his hammering and the metal becoming flat totally overlap in their temporal development fromstart to finish, and（ii）a spurious reading where the event of the metal becoming flat does not proceed
incrementally but the flatness can be achieved, for example, instantly in the final moment of a clumsy
five minute hammering.２０ Despite this rather unexpected consequence, it is in fact natural enough when
we consider the fact that incremental change is not always a strict requirement of “resultative” sentences.
In other words, I suggest that the temporally dependent incremental change reading is not an obligatoryinterpretation in apparently true resultatives: on the contrary, it is an optional reading when scale
composition is employed. In this respect, the incremental change reading of true resultatives in which
two subevents unfold contemporaneously is constructed “retrospectively” from potentially ambiguous
resultative sentences by means of scale composition. Note that this type of ambiguity is available only
if the verb lexically selects the object, in other words, only in Control resultatives in Wechsler’s（２００５）－99 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

sense.
８. Conclusion
In this article, I have reexamined the characteristics of spurious resultatives whose independent existence
was first pointed out by Washio（１９９７）. After identifying predication mismatch in transformation events
as well as a greater prevalence of adverbial adjectives in English as the major sources of the peculiarities
found in this type of resultative, I have presented a type shifting analysis based on recent studies ofJapanese resultative expressions. Although rather commonly found in Japanese, those spurious resultatives
have somehow been largely overlooked in general typological approaches to resultatives. Furthermore,
I have proposed to extend the notion of “spurious resultatives” to subsume “weak resultatives” since,as I have shown, the two types of resultatives mainly involve the same class of verbs, namely verbs oftransformation, semantically sharing a larger space of various aspects of change in property. The extended
spurious resultatives in turn sharply contrast with true resultatives that are characterized by the scale
composition which leads to incremental change readings of two subevents.
The present analysis emphasizes the role of the creative aspect of adverbial modification, in which “further
specification” is reconceived as a flexible elicitation strategy by which the result phrase is properly linked
to its host in semantic interpretation without resort to structural predication. This gives a flavor of “adverbial
modification.” This strategy, constrained lexically and conventionally, is invoked by coercion in cases whensemantic incompatibility is detected in predicative interpretation during transformation events. Viewed thisway, spurious resultatives, which stand in sharp contrast to true resultatives under the strict interpretationof scale composition, are also creative in their own way.
* I am grateful to Seiji Iwata for extensive comments on an earlier version of this paper. My thanks also
go to Mark Irwin for suggesting stylistic improvements. This study was supported in part by Grant-in-Aid
for Scientific Research（C）, No. ２４５０５２８ and No. １５K０２５９０ from the Japan Society for the Promotion of
Science. Needless to say, all remaining inadequacies are my own.

Notes
１．Washio（１９９７）defines strong resultatives as having a verb that does not specify a change of state
and weak resultatives as having a verb that specifies a change of state or at least a potential change
in a certain direction. This amounts to saying that in the former the result phrase functions as further
specification of an implicit result of the verb, whereas in the latter it adds a new result to the verbal
event. Theoretical details aside, the essence of this classification is by and large shared by manyscholars including Rapoport（１９９９）（true resultatives vs. false resultatives）and Iwata（２００６）－99 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104（Argument structure resultatives vs. Adjunct resultatives）: in one type the result phrase is more
responsible for characterizing the event semantics independently of the verbal semantics while in theother it is more dependent on the verbal semantics.
２．In Quirk et al.（１９８５）, the order of italicized words in（８）shows adjective uses of the same form
first and adverb uses second. They note that “many such uses in adverb function occur chiefly in fixed
expressions（Quirk et al. １９８５: ４０５）.”
３．Huddleston and Pullum（２００２: ５６７）note that “the overlap is greater in non-standard speech, andwithin the standard variety there are some adverbs of this kind that are restricted to informal style,”
while also pointing out that “the distinction between adjective and adverb is not always entirely
obvious.”
４．It is not actually the case that all the adjectives taken up in（９）appear in spurious resultatives. My
point, however, is that a certain amount of prevalence of such adverbial adjectives in modern English
can be a motivating factor of adverbial interpretation of adjectives in spurious resultatives. It should bealso pointed out that some of the items such as high, low, deep, wide are lexically genuine adverbs as
they are listed in dictionaries as such. With these items, -ly counterparts normally assume more abstract
senses concerning recognition and evaluation.
５．S ee Himmelmann and Schultze-Berndt（２００５）on the general distinction between（apparent）
adjectives and adverbials in adjunct positions; see also Killie（２００７）for the adverbialization process inthe history of English and the recent development of “appearance/attribute” -ly adverbs which largely
overlap with the -ly counterparts of the adjectival adverbs under discussion.
６．See Levinson（２０１０）for an intriguing analysis of spurious resultatives（“pseudo-resultatives” in her
terminology）based on the lexical-syntactic approach of Hale and Keyser（２００２）where “root creation
verbs”（e.g. braid, tie, pile, chop, slice, and grind）are derived from the complement of a PP which
denotes a producing event.
７．“Internal motion” events studied extensively in Iwata（２００８）（e.g. The door swung open/The trap door
fell shut）can also be analyzed as a subtype of change of configuration events, where the integrity ofan entity is lost or split as a result of a part of a larger architecture changing its location. This contrasts
with the cases of “translational motion”（Talmy ２０００）in which an entity itself moves somewhereas it is. Iwata argues that open/shut expressions involve both motion and change of state and that, inparticular, the adjectives open and shut are not predicated of the theme argument directly but instead
express concurrent change of state with internal motion where only part of an entity undergoes amotion. In other words, two predicates both of which denote different kinds of result have different
semantic subjects respectively, although their referents partly overlap with each other in terms of theirinherent part-whole structure.
－99 －Spurious Resultatives Revisited――鈴木

８．
（３０a）is adapted from the following text referring to an act of speaking in which the word “gentleman”
is pronounced with a pause as if “gentle” and “man” were separate words.
（i）‘You’re a gentleman,’ she said, spreading the word into two halves so that for the first time he saw
it for what it meant: a gentle man. （Rachel Joyce, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry: １３８）
９．The manually controlled process can be associated with an abstract path or scale of “partial ordering”（see Beavers ２０１１ for verbs of “cutting”）. In this sense, change of configuration verbs（as well astransformation verbs）are characterized as having specification of result orientation without implying
a final state: their lexical specification is not about result state, as in the case of typical change of stateverbs, but rather about abstract direction of change.
１０．Imoto（２００９, ２０１２）mainly deals with Japanese resultatives, while Miyakoshi（２００９）delves more
into the contrastive issues of resultatives between Japanese and English.
１１．One plausible reason why such resultative-like expressions in Japanese have been given little
attention is likely to be that the majority of Japanese resultative examples examined so far（mostof them are judged unacceptable）typically consist of literal translations from English resultative
examples. Correspondingly, Japanese resultative expressions such as those in（３７）are not always
directly translatable into English.
１２．Imoto（２００９）mainly examines the resultative expressions with -ku form of adjectives in Japanese.
１３．The general coercion rule is informally defined as follows:（i）A constituent identifying an individual X may be used/understood to identify an individual
contextually associated with X（Jackendoff ２００２: １４１）.
１４．Examples are adapted from Imoto（２００９）and glossed for exposition by the present author.
１５．
（４０b）is adapted from the original text:（i）She sighs, her breath exploding white into her face.
（Maggie O’Farrell, The Hand That First Held Mine: ２７３）
See also the following excerpt for a similar example with the adjective white:（ii）I am holding on for dear life, one hand on the ladder, the other on the lip of a shelf, fingers
pressed white.

（Robin Sloan, Mr. Penumbra’s ２４ -Hour Bookstore: １）, Rothstein（２００４）, Van den Wyngaerd（２００１）, Wechsler（２００５）among many
１６．Goldberg（１９９５）
others; see also Tenny（１９９４）for her pioneering work on boundedness in a much larger context;
Krifka（１９９２, １９９８）, Kennedy（２００７）, and Kennedy and McNally（２００５）for the theoreticalfoundations of dealing with boundedness.
１７．I am aware of the fact that some（true）resultatives cannot always be aspectually bounded and in suchcases they have a contemporaneous reading where two subevents totally overlap during the process ofchange. See McIntyre（２００４）, Rothstein（２００４）; see also Goldberg and Jackendoff（２００４）.
－99 －山形大学人文学部研究年報第14号（2017．２）69－104

１８．The essence of temporal dependence between the two subevents in resultatives is theoretically
implemented in various studies in different ways. For example, Rothstein（２００４）puts forth anelaborate analysis in formal semantic terms while Rappaport Hovav & Levin（２００１）and Croft（２０１２）respectively offer semantic analyses in a more intuitive way. Informally speaking, I assume
that the added culmination（the final minimal event in an incremental process）on the scale yields
an incremental change reading with respect to the theme argument. See also Wechsler（２００５）for an
event-argument homomorphism analysis and Beavers（２０１１）for a similar approach formulated in a
broader perspective.
１９．See Cruse（１９８０）for the notion of “complementary opposition,” where two lexical items which
form an antonymous pair are located on the same scale with one occupying one pole indicating thezero point（where the scale is closed）and the other covering all the rest of the scale with no upperboundary（meaning the scale is open）. With the pair clean and dirty, for example, the former occupies
the zero point where all the dirt is removed, while the latter covers the rest of the scale extending out
with no limit of dirtiness in principle; see also Suzuki（２００６）for the relevance of boundedness inresultatives.
２０．Why flat does not alternate with flatly in this case is a matter of interest but presently I am unable tooffer any definite answer.

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Spurious Resultatives Revisited:
Predication Mismatch and Adverbial Modification

Toru SUZUKI
The purpose of this article is to reassess a somewhat ambiguous category of resultatives in the literature,
namely “spurious resultatives”（e.g. she chopped the parsley fine / we stacked the records high）, whose
independent existence was first pointed out by Washio（１９９７）in relation to the dichotomy of “weak”
and “strong” resultatives. By reformulating the properties of spurious resultatives in terms of adverbial
modification and predication mismatch, it is argued that the category of spurious resultatives should be
extended to subsume weak resultatives, which contrast starkly with strong resultatives or “true” resultatives
in their semantic properties. The former typically involve verbs of transformation with further specificationby the result phrase while the latter require scale composition with incremental change reading. The
framework presented in this article thus offers a unified analysis of spurious and weak resultatives withcertain differences between the two reduced to different dispositions on a continuum of varied types oftransformation.
The predication mismatch characteristic to spurious resultatives is largely attributed to the semantics oftransformation events typically expressed by verbs of change. Such verbs describe a type of change where
the theme entity often undergoes loss of its constitutive property, thus leading to referential ambiguity. Thechange can be in configuration or in shape/appearance.
In order to account for the interpretive peculiarities of spurious resultatives in English, a type shifting
analysis based on recent studies of Japanese resultative expressions is adopted. It is argued that an adverbial
flavor in the result phrase interpretation of the relevant expressions is the reflex of semantic coercion. Thisis an elicitation strategy by which the result phrase is forced to find a semantically appropriate host without
recourse to structural predication.

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