A Further Note on the Nominal in the Progressive Author(s): Dwight Bolinger Reviewed work(s): Source: Linguistic Inquiry, Vol.

2, No. 4 (Autumn, 1971), pp. 584-586 Published by: The MIT Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4177671 . Accessed: 08/04/2012 10:54
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their complements when the proper "subset relations" hold? Do these verbs constitute an independently motivated natural class? Do all types of complements in which subjects are deleted allow deletion under such conditions? Are performatives related in any way to this phenomenon? How can such rules as Equi-NP Deletion (or Super EquiNP Deletion, if it exists) make use of such subset relations among noun denotations in their operations? Do complement objects ever delete under such conditions? These are just a few of the questions which can be brought up. References Bouton, L. F. (I969) Pro-sententialization and the "do it" in English,unpublished Doctoral dissertaConstruction tion, University of Illinois. Perlmutter, D. M. (i 968) DeepandSurface Structure Constraints in Syntax,unpublished Doctoral dissertation, MIT.

FURTHER

NOTE ON THE

NOMINAL IN THE PROGRESSIVE

Dwight Bolinger, HarvardUniversity

The adverbial inversion that characterizes the type of sentence that might be called presentational, in which the referent of the subject is introduced on the scene, is also found with the progressive. Initial position is taken by the adverbial: Round the bend came the train. Up jumped the rabbit. On the stump sat a great big toad. With the progressive, the -ing phrase takes the initial position of the adverbial: Rounding the bend was a runaway locomotive. Charging at us full tilt was an infuriated bull. Standing there was my brother. (When another adverbial is in initial position, the progressive may retain normal word order, but this is less frequent: Sitting on the stump was a great big toad. On the stump was sitting a great big toad.) That both instances represent the same construction not only is felt intuitively but also is indicated by the meaning of the possible verb phrases. The adverbials are directional and locational. The same is true of the verb phrases, and this shows most clearly when the verb is unmodifiedit must explicitly bring or keep something on the scene: *Standing (eating, working, fighting) was my brother. Approaching was a strange sort of three-headed figure.

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Appearing was a never-before-seen conglomeration of bugs and worms. Emanating was a weird greenish vapor. Surviving are a son and three daughters. With modification, other verbs may acquire the requisite meaning: ?Staring were two beady little eyes. Staring at me were two beady little eyes. ?Living are a son and three daughters. Still living are a son and three daughters. The "position" may be merely some sort of recognized or official status: At first base is Ron Remigio. Playing first base is Ron Remigio. *Wiping his face is Ron Remigio. In power at that time was a three-man junta. Ruling at that time was a three-man junta. *Gobbling her breakfast at that moment was Jane Doe. In charge of the arrangements is Louisa Meredith. Handling the arrangements is Louisa Meredith. *Handling the paintbrush is Louisa Meredith. (The last example would be acceptable referring to a picture, where the image of Louisa Meredith is located by mentioning what she is doing. In a somewhat similar way the -ing phrase may itself paint the scene; this is a literary device: ?Fitting them was a little old man. Fitting them together one by one was a little old man. Making the news these days is Jack Ivor.) The requirement of vividness is seen in the difficulty of the perfect tenses and some modals even when "location" is literally satisfied: Out of the morass had risen a hand. ?Round the bend had come the train. *Up the street have walked the soldiers. *Over there might stand a tall building. *Approaching has been a strange sort of three-headed figure. Existential sentences are a subtype of presentational; a therenot only introduces the referent of the subject on the scene but brings it into existence for the purpose of the discourse. The type Herecomes thetrainbrings trainon the scene; the type How shall we go ?-Well, there's thetrain,of course, but I'd preferto go by plane does more than bring train on the scene; it raises train as a topic. The point of this small di-

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gression is that existential sentences may also incorporate adverbials, and when they do the progressive again takes the same place as other adverbials: In the way (there) was a huge truck. Blocking the road (there) was a huge truck. There was a huge truck in the way. There was a huge truck blocking the road. On its way (there) was a train. Approaching (there) was a train. There was a train on its way. There was a train approaching.

Russian has two coexistent phonological systems, one corresponding historically to unassimilated loans, the other to Theodore M. Lightner, real Slavic forms.This division of the phonology is motivated University of Texas at Austin in several ways: (i) the underlying segmental inventory of the two systems is different; (2) the constraints on underlying sequences of segments are different in the two systems; (3) some rules apply only to one system, other rules only to the other system; (4) the morphology of the two systems is slightly different (only unassimilated loans, for example, can form verbs with the help of the suffix -irovat';only unassimilated loans can form indeclinable nouns, and so forth). I assume morphemes are idiosyncratically specified for some binary feature like +foreign. The root morpheme in a word like poet 'poet', for example, must be +foreign; the root morpheme in a word like zena 'wife' must be -foreign. For discussion, see Saciuk (I969), and the references given there. The two systems are not disjoint: some underlying segments (e.g. p, t, k) occur in both systems; some constraints on underlying sequences of segments are the same in both systems; some rules apply to both +foreign and to -foreign forms; some (actually most) morphological processes apply in both systems. An example of rules which apply to both systems are the so-called ikan'e and akan'e rules (see Lightner I968; Kenstowicz and Kisseberth I970). Roughly speaking, these rules assure that unstressed o is pronounced [a] (the akan'erule) and that unstressed e is pronounced [i] (the ikan'erule). No -foreign forms are exceptions to the ikan'e/akan'e rules. Most +foreign forms undergo ikan'e/akan'e. The only exceptions to these rules are found in +foreignforms. Thus poet, for example, may be pronounced [poet] with unPROBLEM IN COEXISTENT PHONOLOGICAL SYSTEMS