Light Verb Constructions. An interlinguistic analysis to explain systemic irregularity

The chapter provides a comparative analysis of a set of LVCs of some Romance languages (Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian and Romanian) employng the LVs ‘have’, ‘do/make’, ‘give’, ‘take’. LVCs are classified according to the Aktionsart of nouns. From the cross-linguistic data analysis, prototypical and marked uses of LVs in co-occurrence with nouns regularly emerge: the former concern nouns and LVs having the same actionality, while the latter refer to LVCs including LVs and nouns which are not coherent from the actional point of view. Marked combinations may produce inchoative/incremental and lexical diathetic effects. The investigation demonstrates that LVs participate in the LVC’s semantics based on their basic or less prototypical function. According to this perspective, LVs are not considered truly empty, and LVCs are used to modulate different aspectual nuances and even configurations of the information structure. Finally, the cross-linguistic investigation also provides explanations for irregularities among the languages considered, according to some diachronic and areal considerations.