On Affectedness In Chinese BEI-constructions

BEI-constructions are often associated with ‘affectedness',a notion construed as a change of state(Li & Thompson 1981;Huang et al.2009;Huang 2013).Previous studies on BEI,however,do not provide a detailed analysis of affectedness(Huang 1999;Bruening & Tran 2015).In addition,the surface subject of BEI is not always affected,as the affectee may be implicit in direct BEI passives(Huang 2014),suggesting that BEI has nothing to do with theta-role assignment(contra,e.g.,Huang 1999).In order to provide a more precise description of affectedness in BEIconstructions,this paper adopts Beavers'(2011)semantic analysis of affectedness.I argue for a unified analysis of BEI-constructions.That is,BEI imposes a general requirement of affectedness that may be satisfied in one of three ways: by the semantics of the lexical verb,by an Appl(icative)projection(e.g.,Pylkk?nen 2008)or via pragmatic means(Bruening & Tran 2015).The affectee interpretation in ‘direct' passives is satisfied by lexical verbs or pragmatic means,while the Appl(icative)projection is responsible for the affectee interpretation in ‘indirect' passives,since the surface subject is not an argument of the lexical verb and thus cannot be assigned an affected interpretation by it.Pragmatic assignment of affectedness – BEI introducing a ‘not-at-issue entailment of suffering'(Bruening & Tran 2015)– only occurs when the lexical verb or Appl cannot license affectedness.The three modes of satisfaction are ordered on a hierarchy similar to that governing binding and coreference(e.g.,Reuland 2001,2011): lexicon > syntax > semantics > pragmatics.The innovation of this paper is that it points out the insufficiency of previous studies.BEI cannot assign a theta-role to its surface subject as proposed by Huang(1999),nor can it introduce a not-at-issue entailment of suffering as proposed by Bruening & Tran(2015).Instead,this paper proposes a unified analysis of affectedness in BEI-constructions.That is,BEI presupposes its clause to be expected to entail a(at-issue or not-at-issue)change of state in some individual.In addition,positing an applicative projection in ‘indirect' passives further explains the fact that the sense of affectedness must target the surface subject in ‘indirect' passives,while it does not need to in ‘direct' passives.