Hebrew copulative perception verbs

Abstract

Abstract Copulative perception verbs such as English sound have received scant attention relative to other perception verbs, especially in non-European languages. In Hebrew, these verbs can take both adjectival and adverbial complements, a fact which sets Hebrew apart from previously studied languages, and which has heretofore been overlooked. This article investigates the usage of Hebrew copulative perception verbs with adverbial complements, with adjectival complements, and in impersonal constructions. A large-scale corpus study and a preference experiment reveal that each of these three constructions has a different interpretation. With adverbial complements, the verbs have an “attributary” meaning, attributing properties to perceptual impressions of objects. The complement slot in these cases is restricted to subjective multidimensional properties, which previous accounts of the attributary meaning fail to predict, motivating a novel analysis in terms of dimension selection. With adjectival complements, as well as in impersonal constructions, the verbs have a parenthetical meaning, taking and modifying a proposition argument. The two constructions are not equivalent, however. With adjectival complements, the verbs encode evidential but not epistemic information, and vice versa in impersonal constructions, reinforcing the need to maintain a distinction between the classes of evidentials and epistemic modals.