Rethinking the Description and Typology of Cantonese Causative–Resultative Constructions: A Dynamic Constructionist Lens

Abstract

This article proposes a new description of Cantonese causative–resultative constructions (CRCs), constructions with two verbal elements relevant to the cause and the effect of an event respectively. We present a constructional schema for the CRC with three argument types and without using traditional categories—such as subject, object and pseudo-passivation, present various syntactic and semantic properties, and subsume constructions such as the comparative construction and numerous particle constructions under this banner. We then argue against traditional approaches to CRCs with two lexical verbs that treat the argument structure of the CRC as composed from argument structures of individual verbs (the decompositional approach); instead, CRC arguments belong to the entire construction and have only semantic orientation-based relationships with individual verbs (the holistic approach). We show how our account can shed light on Sinitic typology and the grammaticalisation mechanism of verbal particles within CRCs, particularly the extension of result verbs into a broader range of contexts to become particles. We also argue that Cantonese CRCs challenge many assumptions of serial verb typology, which typically ignore the existence of multiple layers of constructional abstraction and assume decompositional descriptions, and urge for methodological advancements in this field.