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Reciprocal verbs and symmetry

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Abstract

The paper shows that in addition to periphrastic reciprocal constructions and lexical reciprocal verbs, there is a third type—found in Romance and certain Slavic languages—whose reciprocity is not periphrastic but nonetheless composed only in the course of the syntactic derivation. Examining a sample of ten languages, the study reveals and derives the syntactic and semantic properties of these syntactic reciprocal verbs in comparison with their lexical counterparts. It further formulates the precise mechanisms forming the two types. Among other things, the paper devotes considerable attention to the notion “symmetric verb,” to the so-called “I” reading of embedded reciprocal clauses, and to a particular reciprocal construction that denotes reciprocity between two discontinuous phrases.

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  1. Department of Linguistics, Tel Aviv University, Ramat-Aviv, 69978, Tel-Aviv, Israel

    Tal Siloni

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Siloni, T. Reciprocal verbs and symmetry. Nat Lang Linguist Theory 30, 261–320 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11049-011-9144-2

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