Verb Typesb vP
DP v'
Ursula v vP
v 2 e DP v'
upset 1 v the waiter v VP
e t 2 V'
V
t 1
The first step, represented in (95a), involves the verb moving to the lower light verb
and adjoining to it. The next step in (95b), takes the light verb with the thematic verb
adjoined to it and moves this to adjoin to the upper light verb. The result is a multiple
head adjunction structure of the type discussed in chapter 2.
Multiple light verbs are not unheard of in languages which make more of an overt
use of them than English. Consider the following Urdu example:
(96) nadyane saddafko xat lik lene diya
Nadya-erg. Saddaf-dat. letter write take-inf. give-perf.Masc.s
‘Nadya let Saddaf write a letter (completely)’
The verbal complex at the end of this single clause consists of a thematic verb (write)
and two light verbs (take and give) where the inner one (take) adds some aspectual
meaning of perfection and the outer one (give) seems to add a modal meaning of
permission. Even in English we can have a series of light verbs stacked one on top of
another:
(97) I made him let her take a look
But while this seems a possible analysis for these structures therefore, it does raise
the question of why the light verbs are ordered as they are: why is the agentive one
always higher than the experiencer one? The answer may have to do with the notion of
extended projection. The essence of this is that the thematic verb to some extent
controls the -roles assigned by the light verbs. It has been proposed in several places
that there is a hierarchy of -roles which plays a part in the order in which they are
assigned. For example, we might suppose that agents are higher in the hierarchy than
experiencers and these in turn are higher than themes:
(98) agent > experiencer > theme
The -roles lower on the hierarchy have to be discharged on to an argument before
those higher up. The UTAH ensures that -roles can only be discharged in certain
positions and in combination with (98) we get the following pattern. The first -role to