Lexicalization of Serbian verbs: evidence from literal and figurative uses of Serbian verb cepati

Abstract

In this paper, four Serbian verbs (cepati „tear‟, otcepiti „tear off‟, pocepati „tear (up)‟ and iscepati „tear up‟) are analyzed in terms of their argument realization and their use (figurative and literal). The research explores the hypothesis of manner/result complementarity (Levin and Hovav Rappaport, 2011), according to which verbs can lexicalize either manner or result, but not both. It is suggested that cepati lexicalizes a result meaning, but additional result/manner meaning is yielded through cocomposition with different arguments and/or prefixation, as each prefix has an effect on the verb semantics. Verb phrases with otcepiti and iscepati do not allow for anticausatives when used literally and have demonstrated a very restricted figurative use, unlike the verb pocepati, which has a wide argument selection and can be used figuratively. The research confirms the hypothesis by McNally and Spalek (2015) that figurative uses (other than conceptual metaphors) go only with result predicates.