Everything about Raising Linguistics totally explained
In
linguistics,
raising is a form of
argument control in which an
argument that belongs semantically to a
subordinate clause is realized syntactically as a constituent of a higher clause. For example, the sentence "Bill seemed to be angry" is a raising construction, because although
Bill is understood semantically to be the
subject of
to be angry, it's the syntactic subject of
seemed. The verb
seem in this example is known as a
raising verb. Not all languages have raising verbs;
English is one that does.
The term "raising" has its origins in the
transformational analysis of such constructions. In this analysis, in the example above, the noun
Bill is "raised" from its initial position as the subject of the embedded infinitival
clause to its final position as the main clause subject.
Properties of raising
The main characteristic of raising constructions is the fact that the raised constituent isn't a semantic argument of the upper clause. This can be illustrated in two ways, using the English raising verb
seem. First, the understood subject of the embedded infinitival clause can be an
expletive:
- It is snowing again. → It seems to be snowing again.
- There are too many people here. → There seem to be too many people here.
These examples show that seem doesn't require a semantically potent subject. Second, the embedded clause can be put in the active or passive voice without significantly changing the meaning of the entire sentence:
- (active) Bill is spearheading the revolt. ≈ (passive) The revolt is spearheaded by Bill.
- (active) Bill seems to be spearheading the revolt. ≈ (passive) The revolt seems to be spearheaded by Bill.
These examples show that the semantic roles of Bill and the revolt are determined exclusively within the embedded clause. The verb seems doesn't assign an additional semantic role to its subject; otherwise, the meaning conveyed by the sentence would be expected to vary, depending on whether Bill or the revolt appeared as the main clause subject.
Types of raising elements
The English verb
seem is a typical example of a "subject-raising" verb (also known as a "raising to subject verb" or "subject-to-subject raising verb"). These terms refer to the transformational analysis in which the subject of the lower clause is raised to become the subject of
seem. Other subject raising verbs in English include
begin,
continue,
appear.
English also has "object raising" verbs (or "raising to object verb", "subject-to-object raising verbs"), such as
expect and
believe. In the sentence "Bill expected Annie to be late",
Annie is the direct object of
expected, but it's interpreted as the subject of the embedded infinitive
to be late.
In addition to verbs, other syntactic categories can be raising elements. For example, the following examples contain a subject-to-subject-raising adjective:
Bill is certain to win. / It is certain to snow tomorrow.
In all of the cases mentioned above, the raised argument corresponds to the subject of the embedded infinitival clause. Raising from a lower object position is much rarer. In the so-called "tough construction", the adjective has some properties of an object-to-subject raising element:
Bill is tough (for Carol) to convince.
In this example, Bill is interpreted as the missing object of convince, but realized as the subject of the main clause. However, the other properties of this construction can't be accounted for with a raising analysis. Raising from object position has been proposed for the treatment of German passive constructions.
Raising vs. control
The term raising verb is sometimes generalized somewhat to include control verbs, which are much the same, except with a noun argument being semantically an argument both of the control verb and of the verb argument. For example, in "He tried to do that," tried is a control verb, where its subject he is semantically the subject both of tried and of to do. (Note that one can't say, *"It tried that he did that," and that "That tried to be done by him" is syntactically well-formed but has a different, non-sensical meaning.)
As with many technical terms, both raising verb and control verb are used somewhat differently in different papers, partly because different linguistic theories may group verbs in somewhat different hierarchies.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Raising Linguistics'.
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