• Dutch
  • Frisian
  • Saterfrisian
  • Afrikaans
Show all
34.0. Introduction
quickinfo

Adpositional phrases usually resist modification, except for the spatial and temporal ones. Thus, while the non-spatial/temporal PP in (1a) cannot be modified, the spatial and temporal PPs in (1b&c) can.

1
a. Vanwege de vakantie is de bibliotheek gesloten.
  because.of the vacation is the library closed
  'The library is closed because of the vacation.'
b. (Vlak) voor de deur stond een grote lamp.
  just in.front.of the door stood a big lamp
  'A big lamp stood just in front of the door.'
c. (Vlak) voor zijn vakantie moest hij plotseling naar het ziekenhuis.
  just before his vacation must he suddenly to the hospital
  'Just before his vacation he suddenly had to go to the hospital.'

Note that this does not hold for focus particles like alleenonly, juistespecially and pasonly in (2), which can also be used to modify non-temporal/spatial PPs. We will not discuss this in the present chapter, because these particles can be construed with all lexical categories (cf. Barbiers 1995a: §3), and thus deserve a separate discussion, which can be found in Section V13.3.2.

2
a. Alleen vanwege de sneeuw blijf ik niet thuis.
  only because.of the snow stay I not home
  'I will not stay at home just because of the snow.'
b. Juist vanwege de sneeuw wil ik wandelen.
  especially because.of the snow want I walk
  'It is precisely because of the snow that I want to make a stroll.'
c. Pas na de vakantie heb ik weer tijd.
  only after the vacation have I again time
  'I only have time after the vacation.'

Section 34.1 discusses the modification of spatial adpositional phrases and shows that the hypothesis that spatial adpositions denote a set of vectors is very helpful in describing the modification possibilities. Section 34.2 then shows that the description of the modification possibilities of the spatial adpositional phrases can be extended to the temporal ones. Section 34.3 concludes with a discussion of some rare cases of non-spatial/temporal adpositional phrases that can be modified.

readmore
References:
    report errorprintcite