Bilingual Compound Verbs (BCVs) in Spanish-English bilingual speech, as in (1), are made up of the Spanish do-verb (hacer) and an English-origin component which together form a complex predicate.Footnote 1
(1) Este pobre hizo invest dinero.
dem.sg poor.man 3sg.pret invest money
‘This poor man invested money.’
It is generally agreed that hacer, ‘to do/make’, is semantically “light” and has the functional role of carrying grammatical meaning of tense, mood, and aspect, while the English-origin component, invest, carries the weight of semantic meaning (Jenkins Reference Jenkins2003; Fuller Medina Reference Fuller Medina2010, Reference Fuller Medina2013; González-Vilbazo and López Reference González-Vilbazo and López2011, Reference González-Vilbazo and López2012). While there is growing consensus that BCVs are little vP structures (Fuller Medina Reference Fuller Medina2007, Reference Fuller Medina2010, Reference Fuller Medina2013; Nakajima Reference Nakajima, Clarke, Hirayama, Kim and Suh2008; González-Vilbazo and López Reference González-Vilbazo and López2011, Reference González-Vilbazo and López2012), the internal structure of BCVs has generally not been well studied, and they have been considered by some to exemplify a separate bilingual grammar (Romaine Reference Romaine1995, Muysken Reference Muysken and Muysken2000) or a new structure (Vergara Wilson Reference Vergara Wilson, Carvalho and Beaudrie2013), while others consider the English-origin component to be code-switched (González-Vilbazo and López Reference González-Vilbazo and López2011) or simply borrowed (Toribio Reference Toribio2001). Furthermore, only dynamic verbs tend to be reported in do-verb constructions, and Spanish-English BCVs are no exception. These structures are highly productive in Belizean varieties of Spanish (Fuller Medina Reference Fuller Medina2005, Reference Fuller Medina, Encalada, Cocom, Pelayo and Pinelo2015; Balam et al. Reference Balam, Pérez and Mayans2014); it would therefore be unexpected to find the virtual absence of a particular verb class. Given this productivity and the assertion in the language-mixing literature that any content word is “fair game” to be borrowed (Poplack Reference Poplack and Preston1993: 277), the observation that BCVs appear almost exclusively with dynamic English verbs is somewhat puzzling.
The proposal
As the discussion will show, appealing to a separate bilingual grammar to account for BCVs is unnecessary (González-Vilbazo and López Reference González-Vilbazo and López2011, MacSwan Reference MacSwan, Bhatia and Ritchie2012). I assume instead that the English-origin component is somehow integrated into Spanish – that is, borrowed – and it is this “somehow” that I attempt to specify. Data shows that BCV hacer is much like the Spanish light verb hacer. It is the phonological spellout of v, retains the lexical meaning ‘to do’ along with the corresponding lexical-aspectual property of dynamicity, and it predicates jointly with its complement (Fuller Medina Reference Fuller Medina2007, Reference Fuller Medina2010, Reference Fuller Medina2013; Gonzalez-Vilbazo and López Reference González-Vilbazo and López2011; Vergara Wilson Reference Vergara Wilson, Carvalho and Beaudrie2013). However, it does less of the functional work, with its main role being to carry the requisite Spanish inflectional morphology and to specify the doing of V. While the English component in BCVs has been analyzed as a nominal, bare verb, or infinitive (González-Vilbazo and López Reference González-Vilbazo and López2011, Vergara Wilson Reference Vergara Wilson, Carvalho and Beaudrie2013), I argue that in Spanish-English BCVs, it is inserted into the structure as a full verb. Thus, the English component brings in argument structure with v as part of its structure. Consequently, BCVs are split vP structures where the roles of v are divided between two separate heads.
Furthermore, I rely on well-known proposals that verbs are composed of different flavours or types of little v and a root, and that the lexical-aspectual properties of the root and v must be compatible for verb formation (Cuervo Reference Cuervo2003; Folli and Harley Reference Folli, Harley, Slabakova and Kempchinsky2004, Reference Folli and Harley2007; Harley Reference Harley, Rathert and Giannadikou2009). I suggest that such a compatibility requirement may be a requisite for BCVs as well. Cast within this type of analysis, the observation that statives are rare in Spanish-English BCVs can be better understood as an incompatibility between some residual dynamic property of the light verb (hacer) and a little v be on stative complements. Thus, I examine BCV constructions using well-known observations in the literature on verb composition and light verbs, with the aim to better understand how English verbs are borrowed and to shed light on the rarity of stative BCVs.
The remainder of the squib is organized as follows: A brief description of the data is presented in section 1.1. The theoretical assumptions are laid out in section 2, followed by section 3, which introduces the proposed analysis of the structure of BCVs. Sections 3.1 and 3.2 analyze the status of the borrowed component and hacer, respectively. A conclusion and summary discussion are found in section 4.
1.1 Data
All examples, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from production data collected via a picture elicitation task with 22 Spanish-English speakers in Belize for whom this structure is productive (Fuller Medina Reference Fuller Medina2005: 135). Examples marked ungrammatical are constructed by the author, but based on an original grammatical example produced by a speaker. These are judged ungrammatical by both a native speaker consultant and the author, also a native speaker.
2. Theoretical assumptions
I adopt the little v hypothesis (Chomsky Reference Chomsky and Kenstowicz2001), where little v is a functional head which introduces events (Cuervo Reference Cuervo2003; Folli and Harley Reference Folli, Harley, Slabakova and Kempchinsky2004, Reference Folli and Harley2007) and determines the category of the root that is selected (Chomsky Reference Chomsky2004: 6). That is, if the nearest c-commanding f-morphemes are little v, Aspect, and Tense, then the root is verbal (Harley and Noyer Reference Harley and Noyer1999: 2). The resulting structure is represented in 0 below.Footnote 2
(2) [vP [agent][v'[v][VP [V] DP]]]
This functional head v does not generally have phonological form in English but can be spelled out in some cases, such as in light-verb constructions. In other languages, such as Japanese, v has an overt phonological form. Nonetheless, it is assumed to be present irrespective of the language or type of construction. It follows from this that verbs are composed of at least two parts: a functional head – that is, a light verb or verbalizing head – and a lexical root (Marantz Reference Marantz1997). This functional head is also responsible for introducing events, introducing an external argument, and assigning case to objects of the verb (Burzio Reference Burzio1986, Chomsky Reference Chomsky1995). In (3), the root invest originates in the VP but moves up to v to merge with the functional head responsible for the agent argument and accusative case on the DP. Alternatively, as will be shown further below, these roles need not be accomplished by one head and may be shared or split between two heads (see Harley Reference Harley, D'Alessandro, Franco and Gallego2017 for a recent detailed analysis of split v).
(3) [vP[agent][v'[v invest][VP[V < invest > ] DP]]]
2.1 Flavours of v
Little v also introduces different types of events, suggesting that there are different flavours or types of v (Cuervo Reference Cuervo2003; Folli and Harley Reference Folli, Harley, Slabakova and Kempchinsky2004, Reference Folli and Harley2007; Harley Reference Harley, Rathert and Giannadikou2009). Thus, verbs are formed by one of four flavours of little v – v do,v cause,v become,v be – which merge with a root, and the resulting predication is dependent on the lexical meaning of the root and the nature of v. Little v do introduces dynamic agentive events (Mary ran a marathon), and v cause introduces dynamic events where the specifier is a causer rather than an agent. Unaccusatives are introduced by v become and, finally, v be introduces stative eventualities. Along with lexical meaning, the roots themselves also encode aspectual meaning or aktionsart, leading to selectional restrictions on the type of v with which they will form predicates. The lexical-aspectual property of the root must be compatible with that of the functional head v. The root dance, for example, is both dynamic and agentive and would therefore be compatible with do but not with become or be (Cuervo Reference Cuervo2003). The type or flavour of v can be determined by examining its complement, its specifier, and the object-taking properties of the predicate.
3. The structure of BCVs
In the following sections I show that hacer and the English component predicate jointly. I also argue that this borrowed component is verbal rather than nominal and that it is not an infinitive as has often been assumed (e.g., Vergara Wilson Reference Vergara Wilson, Carvalho and Beaudrie2013).
3.1 The English component
The English component in BCVs is generally not a nominal form (i.e., hacer penalize rather than hacer penalty), and if a determiner or numeral is used to modify it, then the BCV is ungrammatical, as shown in (4).Footnote 3
(4) *Nos hacían cinco/el penalize
to us do3pl.imp five/the penalize
*They used to five/the penalize us.
Likewise, in (5), un download ‘a download’ is not a predicating nominal and therefore is not predicating jointly with hacer; consequently, hizo un download does not select el archivo, ‘the file.’ This contrasts with (6), where hacer and download predicate jointly and take a direct object (un archivo grande, ‘a large file’). Thus, BCVs function as constituents or complex predicates rather than as two separate lexical verbs.Footnote 4
(5) * Juanita hizo un download el archivo.
Juanita do3sg.pret det download det file
(6) Juanita hizo download un archivo grande.
Juanita do3sg.pret download det file large
‘Juanita downloaded a large file.’
This verbal form is often taken to be infinitival and, in fact, in English, the infinitive form may appear bare and is often homophonous to finite forms. However, this is not the case for Spanish, which is morphologically richer and has overt verbal morphology. Borrowed verbs are integrated into Spanish either into the –ar class of verbs (e.g., to type, tipear) or via BCV (e.g., to type, hacer type), and we can assume some regularity in the borrowing process where differences in surface forms are a result of how verbal inflectional morphology is expressed. It cannot be the case that in tipear the borrowed item is an infinitive form to which Spanish inflectional morphology is affixed. Similarly, the English-origin component in BCVs is not an infinitive. Before turning to details of the English component, the status of hacer as a light verb is discussed.
3.2 Hacer: spell-out of little v?
The verb hacer is quite versatile in Spanish, having at least three different functions (Solé Reference Solé1966) : (i) lexical verb (María hizo un pastel, ‘Mary made a cake’), (ii) idiomatic expression, which may have an encyclopedic entry as a constituent (hacerse el tonto, ‘to pretend to be a fool’), and (iii) functional verb, either a causative (María hizo comer el pastel a Juan, ‘Mary made Juan eat the cake’) or a light verb (hacer fumigaciones, ‘do fumigations,’ ‘to fumigate’). In (i), hacer assigns both external and internal arguments, whereas in the latter cases it assigns an external argument. Thus, it is associated with at least one argument, either an agent or a causer. Note also that even in its light-verb capacity where it predicates jointly with its complement, hacer retains the lexical meaning of doing/making something, which makes it compatible with the nominal complement. The basic properties and functions of hacer in Spanish include: (i) a [+dynamic] lexical-aspectual property, (ii) assignment of an external argument (and accusative case to object DPs), and (iii) carrier of verbal morphology.
In BCVs, hacer behaves most like its Spanish light-verb counterpart as it predicates jointly with the English verbal component as seen in (6), above, and (7)–(9), below. Hacer is dependent for predicaton on this component, which in turn only behaves as a full verb due to hacer. Further, the English component is essential to the meaning of the BCV complex since it specifies the event. This is consistent with the behavior of light verbs and the analysis that roots become full verbs as a result of being selected by a light verb: little v (Marantz Reference Marantz1997). Thus, as in typical light-verb constructions, BCV hacer would be the phonological form for little v. However, this does not fully account for the data.
The data in (1), repeated as (7) below, along with (8)–(9), show that while the verb hacer occurs with an English-origin verbal component in each example, changes in transitivity, agentiveness, and argument structure are observed. Recall that in the previous description of monolingual Spanish, hacer is responsible for introducing the external argument and assigning case. Example (7) is agentive, and dinero has accusative case. So far, BCV hacer appears to behave as in monolingual Spanish and is consistent with little v. However, whether or not there is an external argument does not seem to depend on hacer, even though we would expect it to introduce one, as in monolingual Spanish. Examples (6), above, and (7)–(8), below, all have external arguments, in contrast to (9), which does not, even though they all appear with hacer. In (9), Marta is the theme undergoing the action of falling. I consider this argument to be an internal argument originating in object position in (9), even though it is in subject position, because it patterns with complements. The verb drop, and its particle-verb counterpart drop down, equivalent to fall (in standard English) and Spanish caer(se), alternates with transitive drop (‘Marta dropped the glass’, Marta hizo drop el vaso.)Footnote 5. In both the transitive and unaccusative forms, the object has the role of theme, but in the former it receives accusative case and in the latter nominative. In addition, the argument is completely affected by the falling event in the same way that objects are in transitive constructions such as John ate the apple up. Thus, in (9), there is no external argument. At this point, BCV hacer diverges from Spanish hacer. If hacer does not assign the external argument, then it is not assigning case in (6) or in (7). This suggests that it is doing less functional work and is a lighter form of Spanish hacer. The introduction of the external argument and assignment of case is accomplished through other means.
(7) Este pobre hizo invest dinero.
dem.sg poor.man 3sg.pret invest money
‘This poor man invested money.’
(8) Está haciendo complain.
be3sg.pres do3sg.prog complain
‘He's complaining.’
(9) Marta se hizo drop down.
Marta cl do3sg.pret drop down
‘Marta fell down.’
Further indications that BCV hacer does not introduce arguments come from elision. If hacer is elided from any of the above sentences, while they would be degraded, the arguments are recoverable, which is consistent with the analysis so far of the English component as verbal. This contrasts with Spanish, where the complement of hacer in light-verb constructions is nominal and elision results in ungrammaticality. If hacer is elided from (10), for example, then the resulting structure in (11) is ungrammatical. This structure is not well-formed as neither the relation between the arguments nor the event can be recovered. The argument rezos could be specifying an event or could be the complement of a transitive verb (Juan heard prayers). Thus, the arguments are not recoverable in the same way as in BCVs, where a structure like (12) is not rejected, even if it is degraded.
(10) Juan hizo rezos en el velorio.
‘He did prayers at the wake.’
(11) *Juan rezos en el velorio.
*‘Juan prayers at the wake.’
(12) ?? Este pobre invest dinero.
?? ‘This poor man invest money.’
Together, the observations regarding the unaccusative example in (9) and elision of hacer point to the English verbal component being responsible for argument structure. If it is entering the derivation as a full verb, then consonant with the analysis that verbs are composed of a root and v, its structure must include a v that assigns category, introduces events, introduces external and internal arguments (in (7), hombre and dinero respectively), and assigns accusative case to objects. And, in fact, we see evidence of this v in (4), hacer penalize, where it is spelled out as the verbalizing morpheme -ize. Thus, the work of little v in BCVs appears to be split between two vs, as shown in (13), where Spanish inflectional morphology is not expressed directly on the English component but rather on hacer. Note that unlike simple verbs, where a root merges with little v to form a verb, the English component does not move up to merge with hacer (Fuller Medina Reference Fuller Medina2007, Reference Fuller Medina2010, Reference Fuller Medina2013; González Vilbazo and López Reference González-Vilbazo and López2011). Since Spanish requires inflectional morphology of tense, mood, and aspect to be spelled out on the verb, a host is required. The verb hacer is selected since it is already available as a light verb (i.e., a bleached form) and is akin to an all-purpose verb.
(13) [vP[agent][v'[v hacer][v'[v][VP[V invest]]]]]
I propose that this BCV hacer is an even weaker version of Spanish light hacer. In BCVs, it is bleached of the functional properties of argument introducer and case assigner. In addition, in contrast to Spanish light hacer, which takes nominal complements in forming complex predicates, BCV hacer is not limited to nominal complements and can take verbal ones to form complex predicates. Like its monolingual Spanish light-verb counterpart, however, it retains the lexical meaning ‘to do’ along with the corresponding aktionsart of dynamicity. In other words, it may be less contentful than Spanish light hacer, but it is not vacuous. In BCVs, it is the carrier for verbal inflection morphology and means the doing of V. Within this analysis, hacer could only be a dynamic little v. This hacer may be a further grammaticalized form of Spanish light hacer or may be an adaptation of the existing Spanish light verb for bilingual use.
3.2.1 BCVs: English v and little v hacer
As noted earlier, the type or flavour of v can be determined by examining its complement, its specifier, and the object-taking properties of the predicate. The BCV in example (6) denotes a dynamic event, takes a direct object (un archivo), and has an external argument (Juanita) responsible for the downloading of the file. Consequently, English v may be analyzed as v do or v cause. Similarly, the English component in (7) is analyzed as having v do in its structure. Examples (8)–(9) are both dynamic and intransitive, but (9) does not take an object NP and lacks a volitional agent responsible for the falling, as discussed above. The predicate is unaccusative, and v on the English verb can be analyzed as v become. Note that drop down, once integrated into Spanish via hacer, must now conform to Spanish syntax as evidenced both by the use of se and its position relative to the verb.Footnote 6 In Spanish, se has various functions, one of which is to indicate that the object is totally affected by the action (e.g., Marta se comió la manzana, ‘Marta ate the apple up’). This affectedness is often expressed by a particle in English.Footnote 7 Without se, the reading that the entity is completely affected by the falling is not available, and both the se-less BCV and Spanish monolingual form (*Marta cayó, ‘Marta fell’) are rejected. Regarding the position of se, this is determined by the finiteness of the verb. Since hizo drop down is finite, as determined by the finiteness of hacer, se is preverbal. The preverbal position also confirms the constituent nature of the BCV (Butt Reference Butt, Aygen, Bowern and Quinn2004).Footnote 8
The English component is formed under the usual process of a root merging with v – v do,v cause,v become, or v be – before merging with hacer as a complex predicate. The examples shown thus far exemplify the first three types of v, all of which are dynamic; consequently, there is no source of incompatibility with hacer. Recall that hacer has been analyzed so far as retaining the property of dynamicity. But what of stative BCVs? The only prohibition on monolingual verb formation is the compatibility of root and functional head. Roots like dance or run would not combine with v be, whereas compatible English roots such as love and know would. Yet, prototypical statives in BCVs, such as (14), are neither reported in the literature nor judged to be grammatical.Footnote 9
(14) * Juana hizo know la respuesta.
Juana do3sg.pret know the answer
‘Juana knew the answer.’
If it is the case, as I argue here, that hacer is dynamic and that for a BCV to be well-formed hacer must be compatible with the English v in much the same way that roots and vs must share lexico-aspectual properties for a verb to be formed, then the rarity of stative BCVs may be due to incompatibility of English v be and dynamic hacer. Crosslinguistic evidence is suggestive of such an incompatibility since in other language pairs, two different light verbs are used depending on the aktionsart of the borrowed verb (Muysken Reference Muysken and Muysken2000). In Punjabi-English, for example, a do-verb is used for more dynamic English verbs, and a separate verb, meaning ‘to be’ or ‘to become,’ is used for less dynamic or stative English verbs (Romaine Reference Romaine1995).Footnote 10 It suggests that statives may be borrowed via a bilingual light-verb construction if a light verb with a stative property is available.
4. Conclusion
I have presented evidence that Spanish-English BCVs are complex predicates and that they are split vP structures. The roles of v are split between a Spanish little v spelled out by hacer and a v which categorizes an English root as a verb, introduces arguments and assigns accusative case to objects. This English v is most often null but may also be overt, as shown in examples such as hacer penalize. The verb hacer in these constructions has been analyzed as an even lighter form of the Spanish light verb hacer, and this BCV hacer has the primary functions of carrying verbal inflectional morphology and allowing the English component to predicate fully in Spanish. The borrowed component is a full verb and therefore semantically and structurally rich, bringing in lexical content, argument structure, aktionsart, and transitivity. This suggests that speakers have a full understanding of the English verb that is being borrowed and do not reanalyze or incorporate a semantically impoverished version of the verb. Bilingual speakers appear to make use of a linguistic universal; that is, they exploit vP to borrow English verbs. This, in turn, might explain the productivity and prevalence of bilingual compound verbs in numerous language pairs.
I have also proposed an incompatibility between the two vs in the split vP structure as a possible source for the virtual absence of statives in BCVs. If the two vs must be compatible for the BCV to be well-formed, and hacer is dynamic – meaning, the doing of V – then the rarity of statives in these structures is a logical consequence since, structurally, stative verbs would have a stative v and doing is incompatible with being or the holding of a state.
What appears to be an innovative or special bilingual structure is simply a vP structure that current theories of verb structure and formation can account for. Recourse to a third grammar or bilingual syntax is unnecessary, as is the categorization of bilingual compound verbs as “new” structures per se. The innovation in these structures lies in the bilingual nature of their surface form, in the fact that a vP structure may be built from two different languages, and that speakers make use of a lighter version of hacer to form bilingual compound verbs. While we often appeal to theory to explain bilingual data (see MacSwan Reference MacSwan, Bhatia and Ritchie2012 for a review of various approaches), as has been done here, this type of data is, in itself, fertile ground for testing theory (see González-Vilbazo and López Reference González-Vilbazo and López2011, Reference González-Vilbazo and López2012) and for elucidating the details of how distinct grammars come together in bilingual and multilingual discourse.
