The structure of predication

Alessandro Lenci

pp. 233-276

in: Synthese 114 (2), 1998.

Abstract

The paper discusses the structure of non-verbal predication, with particular reference to the role of the copula. Differently from the main tenets of contemporary logico-philosophical and linguistic theories, a model of predication is proposed where the verbal component (specifically, tense information) is regarded as central in establishing the syntactic and semantic relation between a predicate and its subject. It is thus possible to recover some of the insights of the pre-Fregean analysis of predication. The proposed solution has a number of significant consequences for the structure to be assigned to non-verbal predication, in particular for the semantics of ‘small clause’ constituents, where the predication is established without the copula.

Cited authors

Frege Gottlob