The distribution of French intransitive predicates

Abstract

This article investigates the distribution of intransitive predicates in French. It argues that within each individual construction, the constraints that govern predicate selection are determined by the necessary semantic compatibility between the participating predicates and the construction itself. This “local” analysis based on the lexical semantics of specific verbs and constructions contrasts with most previous accounts that follow the Unaccusative Hypothesis' claim that predicate distribution follows the specific structure of two distinct classes of intransitives. The local analysis is shown to be preferable to its structural counterpart to describe the behavior of intransitives in three constructions, namely: active impersonals, object raising in the context of the faire ‘make’ construction, and croire union. Because object raising and croire union are traditionally considered unaccusative diagnostics, the results obtained in this article raise serious questions about the validity of the Unaccusative Hypothesis for French, and suggests a possible alternative methodology to investigate the syntactic behavior of intransitive predicates.

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