Advances in Role and Reference Grammar

ARGUMENT LINKING IN DERIVED NOMINALS 381

2. The verbally-derived noun phrase in RRG

2.1 Overview

In RRG, the noun phrase resembles the clause both in having a layered
structure and in utilizing the semantic macroroles for the semantic → syn­
tactic linking of arguments. The NP does not, however, mirror the clause in
either its semantic or syntactic form. In the ensuing RRG-framed analysis
of the English vNP, the question posed in section 0 and repeated here will
focus the discussion: "How does the syntactic manifestation of nominalized
verbs and their understood arguments in the NP correspond to the syntactic
manifestation of verb-argument relations in the clause?" It will be in terms
of the relationship of arguments to the nuclear predicate/vN and semantic
roles that significant similarities and differences between clausal and ver­
bally-derived nominal constructions emerge.
The general format of the discussion will be as follows. In the subsec­
tions included under 2.2, fundamental aspects of the analysis are introduced
as part of a general overview of the vNP in RRG. In the subsections
included under 2.3, the analysis outlined in 2.2 is developed in detail.

2.2 Applying the RRG framework to the vNP

The effectiveness of an analysis of the verbally derived nominal is directly

related to its ability to account for both the nominally discrete and clausally

parallel aspects of vNP syntax and semantics. The analysis presented here

attempts to provide such an account by applying to the NP such RRG con­

cepts as the layered structure of the clause (cf. 2.2.1) and the semantic →

syntactic linking-function of the macroroles (cf. 2.2.2). Undergirding the

analysis is the assumption that while related Vs and vNs share the same

basic semantic representation, vNs are not derived in any direct way from

verbs.^8

2.2.1 The layered structure of the noun phrase

Crucial aspects of NP structure can be analyzed in terms of the layered

structure of the clause — i.e. in terms of a nucleus, a core, and a periphery

(cf. Figures 1 and 2). Thus, just as one can talk about a verbal nucleus and

direct and indirect core arguments in the clause (direct arguments are dis­

tinguished from obliquely-marked indirect arguments), so one can talk