Tuomas Huumo

A scoping hierarchy of locatives

The principle that the semantic function andscope ofadverbials are reflected in their sentential position applies most obviously to sentence adverbials indicating the Speakers attitude towards the events or entities described in the sentence (e.g., probably, even, also etc.), but also to elements expressing locations ofdifferent types. In this article I examine the way in which the interpretations oflocative adverbials are determinedby their sentential position. My basic assumption is that a locative will more likely be interpreted äs having a wide scope and an abstract semantic function when occurring sentence-initially, whereas a locative introduced after the nuclear predication is more likely to be interpreted in its basic meaning, i.e., äs introducing a concrete place. From this point ofview I study Finnish locatives introducing spatial, possessive and temporal spaces. I show how a sentence-initial spatial locative can become abstract and take on properties of possessives or temporals, thus taking other elements in the sentence into its scope. Ipropose a scoping hierarchy temporal > possessive > spatial, indicating that a locative higher in the hierarchy tends to have locatives lower in the hierarchy within its scope, and that in order to have a locative ofa higher type within its scope, a locative lower in the hierarchy must be abstracted to at least the same level

Is perception a directional relationship? On directionality and its motivation in Finnish expressions of sensory perception

Abstract This article examines the hypothesis that sensory perception is linguistically conceptualized as a directional relationship that involves the motion of a signal between the experiencer and the stimulus. The hypothesis is tested with data from Finnish. The study focuses on expressions of visual, auditory and olfactory perception. The data consist of sentences including a perception verb and a locative element that indicates the position of either the experiencer or the stimulus. There are three options for marking such a locative: a static ‘in’/‘on’/‘at’ case, a directional ‘from’ case, or a directional ‘to’ case. The results reveal crucial differences on the one hand between different verbs in each domain, on the other between the different sensory domains. Agentive perception verbs favor the directionality experiencer ⇒ stimulus to a greater extent than non-agentive or intransitive perception verbs. The opposite directionality (stimulus ⇒ experiencer) is favored if the stimulus is a signal or a mental content rather than a concrete entity. In general, expressions of visual perception favor the static coding to a greater extent than expressions of auditory and olfactory perception, which favor the directional stimulus ⇒ experiencer coding. It is argued that this difference follows from the conceptualization of auditory and olfactory perception as involving the motion of a signal (a sound or a smell) as opposed to visual perception, which is conceptualized as the perception of a concrete entity.

How fictive dynamicity motivates aspect marking: The riddle of the Finnish quasi-resultative construction

Abstract This article studies fictive dynamicity as a factor motivating aspectual case marking in Finnish. In Finnish transitive sentences aspect is marked with the morphological case of the object: the restrictive object is used in sentences with a resultative meaning, whereas the partitive object is used in sentences indicating either atelicity, irresultativity, or progressivity. Interestingly, however, the restrictive object is also used in so-called quasi-resultative sentences, the aspectual meaning of which is atelic. These typically express a static physical location, perception, or cognition. In this article I argue that the use of the restrictive object in quasi-resultative sentences reflects the telic features of the conceptualization used to construct the representation of the atelic situation, where the atelic situation is represented as the result of a fictive change. This study thus extends the concept of fictive dynamicity to cover phenomena related to linguistic aspect.

An introduction to Finnish spatial relations: Local cases and adpositions

In their paper, Tuomas Huumo and Krista Ojutkangas first introduce the system of Finnish local cases in general and then discuss the main features of the system of adpositions. The Finnish system for expressing spatial relations consists of six local cases and many adpositions, the precise number of which cannot be determined since the borderline between adpositions and relator nouns is obscure. The local cases are divided into two series: the so-called internal cases and external cases. The internal cases express relations such as ‘inside’, ‘into’, ‘out of’, while the external cases express relations such as ‘at’,’to the outside of’ and ‘from the outside of’ or ‘on’, ‘onto’ and ‘off’. Thus, a pervasive feature in the case system is the expression of directionality: in both case series there is one static case (‘in’/ ‘at’/ ‘on’), one ‘to’ case and one ‘from’ case. Similar directional oppositions are expressed by many adpositions, since the adpositional stems generally bear locative case suffixes. This is possible because many Finnish adpositions typically originate from nouns; this is reflected in the fact that they still carry local case endings and take their complement in the genitive form. In their structure such adpositional phrases resemble noun phrases where the locative case-marked head is a relator noun preceded by a genitive modifier.

Fictive dynamicity, nominal aspect, and the Finnish copulative construction

Abstract The article presents a cognitive linguistic study of fictive dynamicity, nominal aspect and the case marking of the predicate adjective (PA) in Finnish copulative clauses. The term fictive dynamicity refers to the dynamic construal of a static situation, a classic example being fictive motion as illustrated by The highway goes from Tartu to Tallinn, where a static situation is referred to by a motion verb and directional locative adpositions. The term nominal aspect refers to the aspectual meaning of the sentence that is based on an incremental participation of a nominal referent. For instance in She was mowing the lawn the activity proceeds gradually along the referent of the object and reaches its endpoint when the whole referent has been affected. In the Finnish copulative construction, fictive dynamicity manifests itself as incremental scanning of the subject referent and as distributive attribution of a quality (indicated by the PA) to its components. The received view in Finnish linguistics assumes that the PA is in the nominative if the subject is a singular count noun, and in the partitive if the subject is a mass noun or a plural. Semantically, the nominative PA attributes a quality to the referent of the subject holistically, whereas the partitive attributes it in a distributive way to the (conceived) components of the referent. I show that this distributive meaning often gives rise to the incremental conceptualization of the subject and results in dynamic nominal aspect. The data discussed consist of copulative clauses with different kinds of subjects (mass, count, plural). The article also includes a comparison between the PA and other relevant uses of the partitive case, including objects and existential subjects. Special attention is paid to copulative clauses with an action noun subject and the complicated interaction of the verbal and nominal features of the action noun in the aspectual meaning of the sentence.

Space as time: temporalization and other special functions of locational-setting adverbials

Abstract The basic semantic function of locational elements with the syntactic status of c lause modifier is typically assumed to be the establishing of a (spatial, temporal, or other) setting, within which entities interact and processesunfold. Less attention has been paid to structures where several settingsare connected to the same predicate, and to the mutual semantic relationof the settings in these structures. In this article evidence is produced for the argument that these constructions (called multiple locational specifications) reveal a scope relation between the settings such that a semantically higher domain dominates a lower one. For instance, in the sentence On Monday nights, Ollie played chess with Arthur in London, time dominates space by confining the spatial relation between Ollie and London to Monday nights only. The opposite scope relation can be achieved by creating a special interpretation of the lower domain. For instance, space can dominate time only if it acquires a temporal sense itself. Such a reading foregrounds the duration of the presence of an entity in the space. Syntactically, this effect is created by word order; e.g. In London, Ollie played chess with Arthur on Monday nights evokes a temporal reading for in London (‘when in London’), enabling it to include on Monday nights within its scope. It is argued in this paper that temporal and other special interpretations are quite productive and possible for many different kinds of domain.

Force dynamics, fictive dynamicity, and the Finnish verbs of ‘remaining’

Abstract This article examines the semantic factors motivating the use of directional (‘to’) local cases in the morphological marking of the locative argument of the verb jäädä ‘remain’ in Finnish. It is argued that this use of the directional cases is motivated by the dynamic conceptualization of an apparently static situation. In this dynamic conceptualization, the actual course of events where the entity remains in a location is contrasted with a projected course of events whereby the entity leaves the location. The event of ‘remaining’ thus constitutes a change from the projected course of events into the actual one, and it is this dynamic meaning that motivates the directional case marking. The paper also addresses the more theoretical question of whether conceptualization can motivate the use of grammatical markers with other Finnish verbs.

On the many faces of incompleteness: Hide-and-seek with the Finnish partitive object

In the interplay of aspect and quantity in the Finnish system of object-marking the opposition between the partitive object and the (morphologically heterogeneous) total object plays a central role. The received view holds that the partitive object indicates incompleteness of the event in one way or another: it is used if the event does not take place at all (negation); if the aspect is unbounded; or if the quantity of the object referent is open (unbounded). The total object is used in affirmative sentences that indicate bounded aspect together with a closed quantity affected in full. Recent grammars have crystallized the three conditions of the partitive into a hierarchy of decreasing strength: negation > aspect > quantity: negation triggers the partitive irrespective of both aspect and quantity, and unbounded aspect triggers it irrespective of quantity. The article elaborates the hierarchy and argues that the aspectual function of the partitive is in fact not monolithic but consists of three different subfunctions.

Instrumentals and implicit causal and conditional relations with special reference to Finnish

In their prototypical function, instrumentals are modifiers indicating an entity that is used by a volitional, typically animate agent in transmitting a force to a patient (e.g. Father crushed the coconut with a hammer). Such Instrumentals have a central role in the volitional relation expressed by the verb, and differ, in this sense, from many other types of modifiers that have a more peripheral role in indicating the setting of the event (so-called setting adverbial). There are, however, instrumentals that fulfill less prototypical semantic functions, especially in sentences where no volitional agent is indicated. This paper argues that nonprototypical instrumentals can be divided into two subclasses, cause and conditional instrumentals. Cause instrumentals are most typical in sentences with an inanimate subject, e.g. The rope cut with a knife, where the instrument (the knife) is not used by the referent of the subject (the rope) but typically (but not always) precedes it in the causal relation and implies the existence of an external agent who uses the instrument and participates in the relation. Conditional instrumentals in turn establish a conditional or hypothetical frame of the use of the instrument. They remain outside the relation expressed by the verb and serve a semantic function that is typical of a setting adverbial. In this paper I seek to establish, using data from Finnish, that cause instrumentals and conditional instrumentals (collectively designated as domain instrumentals) may be distinguished from prototypical instrumentals by their syntactic behavior as well as by their semantic properties