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Communicative constructions in English and Spanish

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DOI: 10.1075/pbns.140.09mar

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Montserrat Martínez Vázquez. 2005. Communicative Constructions in English
and Spanish. IN Butler, Christopher S., Mª de los Angeles Gómez-González &
Susana M. Doval-Suárez (eds.) The Dynamics of Language Use: Functional
and Contrastive Perspectives. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2005, 79-109.

Communicative Constructions in English and Spanish*

Montserrat Martínez Vázquez

1. Introduction
Human beings have always felt an irresistible urge to talk. The etymological meaning of
the verb communicate (from Latin communicare “to share”) reveals its social nature.
The importance we give to this interchange of information is reflected in language,
since “verbs referring to speech constitute one of the most important areas of the
vocabulary of any language” (Wierzbicka 1987: 3). Most of our daily experiences
consist of speech events, either the transmission of our thoughts, feelings, etc. or the
report of that speech by a third person, probably the hearer of the original conversation.
Reported speech has been defined as a “universal of the language capacity”, which is
pervasive in our daily language use (Collins 2001: 1). Indeed this “talk about talk” has
to be recognized as a central role of communication, which has a significant
predominance in language activity (Collins 2001: 1). This central activity of human
beings has received a lot of attention from different angles. Most of the abundant
literature on the metarepresentational ability of human beings has focused on the
“theory of mind”, “the ability to explain and predict the behavior of others by attributing
to them certain beliefs, intentions and desires” (Noh 2000: 1).
Information may be transmitted linguistically or non–linguistically. Ideas or
feelings may be exchanged by speech, writing, gestures, etc. Different extralinguistic
tools used to convey meaning may include sounds or gestures like smiling, weeping,
coughing, nodding or shaking the head. I will be concerned here only with linguistic
constructions, more precisely with constructions used to report a communicative act,
what Rudzka–Ostyn (1988: 513) calls a “secondary speech situation”.
The report of a communicative act may show up in a wide variety of linguistic
constructions ranging from those used to express verbal communication, (1), to those
reporting non–verbal communication, as in (2).

(1) He said hello.

(2) He nodded hello.

In this paper I will examine these English constructions ⎯and their counterparts
in Spanish⎯ both from a verb–centered perspective and from a constructional
approach, as in Goldberg (1995). On this view, constructions are independent form–
meaning pairs with their own semantics, capable of contributing arguments. Thus, non–
subcategorized complements are viewed as licensed by the construction rather than by
the verb. By considering not just the verb but also the semantics of the sentence we will
enlarge considerably the number of communicative constructions. Besides the sentences
built with verbs of saying (verba dicendi) as in (1), other linguistic devices to report an
interchange of information, as, for example (2), will be included. The verb does not
belong to the class of speaking verbs, but the object clearly reveals a communicative
act. Exclusively verb–centered approaches to communicative constructions are
incapable of dealing with the entire phenomenon. So besides the extensive class of
verba dicendi, an analysis of the phenomenon should look at other verbs which are
compatible and may, therefore, eventually appear in a communicative construction.
Sentences like (1) have extensively been studied both in English and in Spanish
under the rubric “communicative verbs”.1 Constructions like (2), however, are usually
considered a peripheral phenomenon in English. I have not seen any reference to
counterparts of (2) in Spanish. In fact, what I have found are statements suggesting the
impossibility of such constructions. Starting from such a state of affairs the main
purpose of this paper is to investigate the productivity of such constructions in English,
and find out if there are equivalent expressions in Spanish, or, as has been suggested,
Spanish syntax does not permit them. In order to reach this goal extensive use of
corpora is required. I have extracted the English data from the British National Corpus
(BNC), the Brown Corpus, the Wordbank of the Collins Cobuild on CD–ROM, and the
British Component of the International Corpus of English (ICE-GB). Spanish
occurrences have been extracted from the Corpus de Referencia del Español Actual
(CREA). Unless otherwise stated, the examples compiled from the CREA illustrate
instances of Spanish from Spain. Occasionally references to linguistic data from other
sources will be made, especially examples taken from novels and their translations,2
which will help to find out more about equivalences in each language.
This paper is organized as follows. First, a brief analysis of the scene of
linguistic action is made in order to isolate the main elements of communicative
constructions. A description of constructions with verba dicendi follows. A third section
will focus on different constructions with other non–speaking verbs, which result from
fusing two processes in one. In order to better understand these constructions basic
concepts of metaphor theory will be applied. A tentative account of why Spanish fails to
make an extensive use of this grammatical metonymy is offered in the concluding
section.
2. The communicative process
An interchange of communication involves at least three nuclear elements: sender,
message and receiver. According to Jakobson (1960) the message has to be related to a
context, and must be put into a code common to the speaker and the receiver. Finally a
contact enables addresser and addressee to communicate. Dirven et al. (1982: 4) offer a
much more complex picture:
…a sender transfers information to a receiver: this information transfer is presented as a
message and/or topic or evaluation; the information is transferred via a channel, put down
in a code and possibly caught in a textual conveyor. The whole process takes place in a
given socio–cultural context, at a specific time and place, in a certain manner and under
certain circumstances; the sender may have a certain purpose and the receiver may be
affected by the result of the information transfer.

The linguistic situation is even more complex with reported speech, which involves a
double communicative process. The second speaker, or reporter, adds her personal point
of view on the first communicative act. Thus, she can focus on any aspect of the
communicative interchange by selecting the appropriate verb. If she wishes to
emphasize the channel, she may select a verb of instrument of communication like
telephone, she may prefer to highlight the mood of the speaker by choosing a manner
verb like yell, scream or bark, or manipulate the original message by presenting it with
her own words.
3. The communicative construction
3.1. The participants
In (1) we find a verb belonging to the class of verba dicendi, verbs used to report a speech
act.3 Verbs of saying such as say, tell, explain, etc. involve two participants: one which is
+human/+intentional, and a second one containing the information transmitted, which may
be sentential. Downing and Locke (1992) call them “sayer” and “verbiage” respectively;
the third, optional, participant which may appear is a “recipient”.

Processes of saying and communicating are verbal processes. The participant who
communicates is the Sayer, and is typically human. That which is communicated is the
Verbiage and may be a reported statement, a reported question or a reported directive. A
Recipient may also be present is some verbal processes. (Downing & Locke, 136)

The subject is inherently human since, as mentioned above, we are referring to a

social activity, as Cano (1987: 207) points out: “…todos exigen sujeto [+ Humano],
pues designan una de las actividades más específicas de los seres humanos” [‘all
demand a [+Human] subject, since they designate one of the most specific activities of
human beings’]. Non–human subjects, which frequently appear with these verbs,
involve metaphor:

(3) In those days poems often told a story in verse… (Brown)

(4) La sangre de Abel vocea el delito de Caín. (DRAE)
‘Abel’s blood shouts Caín’s crime’

The second participant, the dictum, will either reproduce what has been said, or
summarize the content of the communicative act. This participant is inherent to many
intransitive communicative verbs like talk, chitchat, etc.; when we talk information is
exchanged, even though it may not appear as an argument of the construction. When
this argument is present in the syntax it may take the form of a quotation,4 a subordinate
sentence, or a pro–dictum, i.e. a phrase that summarizes the content of a speech act. As
Cano (1987: 207) explains in his analysis of Spanish communicative patterns:
En general, podemos considerar dos tipos: la secuencia verbal efectivamente emitida por
alguien, como en Pedro dijo que vendría, o, sobre todo en el ‘estilo directo’: Pedro dijo:
«Iré a casa»; por otro lado el contenido o tema de un acto verbal, pero no lo enunciado
como tal: Juan contó el modo en que entró.(1987: 207)

‘In general, we can consider two types: the verbal sequence actually uttered by someone, as
in Peter said that he would come, or, especially in ‘direct style’: Peter said: “I will go
home”; on the other hand the content or topic of a verbal act, but not the utterance as such:
John recounted the way in which he entered’.

The quotation is the most neutral and direct way of reporting a speech event, as in (5).
Though, as Noh (2000: 8) observes, the essence of quotation is resemblance rather than
identity. The subordinate pattern found in indirect speech involves a manipulation of the
actual utterance, since it has to be integrated in the syntax of the main sentence by
shifting person and deictics, (6). Finally, the pro–dictum realization implies a higher
grammatical and cognitive effort since it involves a great reduction of the content of the
utterance, involving in many cases the use of metonymy. This phrase functions as a
pro–form which stands for the original exchange of information. The most basic type of
substitution is a metalinguistic word, like message, story, news, facts, report, etc., as in
(7). Vorlat (1982: 27) describes it as a “recitable entity”. A pro–dictum may stand for a
simple sentence quotation, a paragraph or a larger text. The rest of possible pro–dicta
range to cover much more complicated interchanges of information like the expression
of emotions, moods, illocutionary acts, and many other elements which may be part of
this transfer process, as in (8).

(5) She said “I have been fired”

(6) She said that she had been fired.
(7) She told me the news (= that she had been fired)
(8) She expressed her dismay.

Dirven et al. (1982: 3) distinguish three types of transferred information: the

message, which comprises direct enunciation (She said to me “I am 20”), indirect
enunciation (She told me that she was 20) and synthesis (She told me her age); the topic
and the speaker’s evaluation of the speech act (He told us a pack of lies). The topic is
usually introduced by prepositions like on, about, of, while message and evaluation tend
to appear as direct objects. I will use the term pro–dictum to include their message in its
variant “synthesis”, their topic and their evaluation, since in many occasions the
differences among the three types would require an analysis of the first speech act and
other elements of the communicative process which fall outside the scope of this
analysis. This abbreviation of the first speech act, or pro–dictum, will show interesting
syntactic and cognitive features, as will be discussed in the following sections.
The third participant, the recipient, is characterized by Goldberg (1995: 143–
147) as a “beneficiary or willing recipient”, and is sometimes optional. However, this
participant is inherent to any communicative process; without it there cannot be an
exchange of information. Vorlat (1985: 13) distinguishes between the receiver as a
“mere receptor”, or as an “interactor”. It is beyond the present purpose to investigate
interaction.
Summing up, the argument structure of speaking verbs contains a speaker, a
dictum and an optional recipient: verba dicendi <speaker dictum recipient>.5
3.2. The process: communication as transfer
Communicative events have also been grouped within a more general class of transfer
events; the object transferred is the message, the source is the speaker and the goal the
listener: verbs of transfer < source theme goal>. For example, Jackendoff (1990: 266)
conceives the theme argument of the verb say as an entity, belonging to the category
INFORMATION, which moves from a speaker to a receiver. Amberber (1996: 6)
schematizes Jackendoff’s analysis in the following Lexical–Conceptual Structure:

(9) (Amberber (15)) say

[EventCAUSE ([Thing i ]A’[EventGO ([Info ] A’ [FROM ([Thing i ] ])]) ][Path TO
[Thing ]
<A>]
the verb say denotes an event in which the first argument is a Thing, i.e. the Causer and the
second argument is the Event. The embedded sub–event, designated by GO, has two
 arguments: the entity that moves and the trajectory it traverses or the Path. The A in sub–
script stands for arguments which will be linked into syntactic positions. The end–point of
the trajectory –the argument of TO– is optionally A–marked capturing the fact that the goal
argument is not always present in the syntax. (1996: 7)6

Goldberg (1995: 127–128) observes that communicative verbs should be

classified together with verbs of instrument of communication as metaphorical classes,
since the information transmitted is conceived as being packaged and exchanged
between speaker and listener (following Reddy’s “conduit metaphor”). Communication
is viewed metaphorically as “traveling across from the stimulus to the listener”, who
“understands the communication upon reception”. (1995: 148) Goldberg (1995)
illustrates this metaphor with the following examples:

(10) She told Joe a fairy tale. (1995: 148 (28))

(11) She wired Jo a message. (1995: 148 (29))
(12) She quoted Jo a passage. (1995: 148 (30))
(13) She gave Jo her thoughts on the subject. (1995: 148 (31))

This transfer metaphor licenses the use of the ditransitive construction with the
following pattern:

[Insert Figure 1 about here]

However, as Pilar Ron (2003: 88, n. 6) points out, the patient of Goldberg’s
(1995: 112). ditransitive construction should be better labeled “theme” or “argument
which undergoes a change of state or location”. Notice, however, the special status of
this theme, which is different from the theme of other transfer events since when
information is transferred, the principle of exclusive location does not apply, as pointed
out by Jackendoff (1990: 27):
If Bill transfers information to Harry, by (21)7 we can infer that Harry ends up having the
information. But since information, unlike objects, can be in more than one place at a time,
Bill still may have the information too.

The idea of transfer is applied to both English and Spanish verbs of

communication. Gutiérrez Ordóñez (1999: 1876) gives the following list of Spanish
“verbs of communicative transfer” (verbos de transferencia comunicativa):
transmitir, decir, comunicar, anunciar, avisar, confiar, contar, exponer, enseñar, narrar,
dictar, recordar, solicitar, contestar, escribir, manifestar, notificar, repetir, revelar, referir,
sugerir, declarar, gritar, explicar, replicar…

Vázquez et al. (2000) provide a wider list of communicative transfer verbs for Spanish:
anunciar, comunicar, conferenciar, conferir, confesar, contar, contestar, conversar, cotillear,
cuchichear, chafardear, chismear, chismorrear, decir, declarar, dialogar, dictar, discursear,
discutir, divulgar, emitir, explicar, hablar, indicar, informar, murmurar, musitar, narrar,
notificar, predicar, pregonar, preguntar, clamar, relatar, sermonear, susurrar, telefonear,
telegrafiar, televisar, transferir, transmitir.

Vázquez et al. (2000) list a group of verbs of manner of speaking (cuchichear,

murmurar, susurrar, etc.), whereas Gutierrez Ordoñez only includes one member of this
class, gritar. Besides, there is also space for the class of verbs of instrument of
communication (telefonear, telegrafiar, televisar), a class which is absent in Gutierrez
Ordoñez’s classification.
Suñer (2000: 569) considers three classes of verbs introducing direct quotes in
Spanish: verbs of saying, manner of speaking and thinking, which comprise a great
variety of subdivisions. Among verbs of communication she includes: preguntar,
contestar, decir, corregir, interrumpir, añadir, definir, aventurar, or confesar; and in
her class of manner of speaking verbs we find the following verbs: bramar, bufar,
cacarear, cantar, farfullar, gemir, gritar, gruñir, murmurar, recitar, rumiar, suspirar,
susurrar and vociferar.
Levin (1993) divides English verbs of communication into nine semantic
classes:
(i) VERBS OF TRANSFER OF A MESSAGE: ask, cite, pose, preach, quote, read,
relay, show, teach, tell, write
(ii) TELL (neutral)
(iii) VERBS OF MANNER OF SPEAKING: babble, bark, bawl, bellow, bleat, boom,
bray, burble, cackle, call, carol, chant, chatter, chirp, cluck, coo, croak, croon, crow,
cry, drawl, drone, gabble, gibber, groan, growl, grumble, grunt, hiss, holler, hoot, howl,
jabber, lilt, lisp, moan, mumble, murmur, mutter, purr, rage, rasp, roar, rumble,
scream, screech, shout, shriek, sing, snap, snarl, snuffle, splutter, squall, squeak,
squeal, squawk, stammer, stutter, thunder, tisk, trill, trumpet, twitter, wail, warble,
wheeze, whimper, whine, whisper, whistle, whoop, yammer, yap, yell, yelp, yodel.
(iv) VERBS OF INSTRUMENT OF COMMUNICATION: cable, e–mail, fax,
modem, netmail, phone, radio, relay, satellite, semaphore, sign, signal, telephone,
telecast, telegraph, telex, wire, wireless.
(v) TALK VERBS: speak, talk.
(vi) CHITCHAT VERBS: argue, chat chatter, chitchat, confer, converse, gab, gossip,
rap, schmooze, yak.
(vii) SAY VERBS: admit, allege, announce, articulate, assert, communicate, confess,
convey, declare, mention, propose, recount, repeat, report, reveal, say, state, blab,
blurt, claim, confide, declare, note, observe, proclaim, reiterate, relate, remark,
suggest.
(viii) COMPLAIN VERBS: boast, brag, complain, crab, gripe, grouch, grouse,
grumble, kvetch, object.
(ix) ADVISE VERBS: admonish, advise, alert, caution, counsel, instruct, warn.

As Levin (1993) observes in her introduction, these semantic classes described in

section II of her book have emerged from her study of diathesis alternations in section I.
Therefore, even though they are “semantically coherent classes”, they are also grouped
together because their “members pattern in the same way with respect to diathesis
alternations and other properties.” (1993: 17) But an exclusively verb-centered
perspective leads her to exclude from this chapter of “verbs relating to communication
and the transfer of ideas” (p. 202) certain communicative constructions with non–
communicative verbs, such as, for example, those grouped under the heading “reaction
object construction”, in section I, which are paraphrased as “express (a reaction) by V–
ing”, found with manner of speaking verbs and verbs of gestures and signs, as, for
example, She mumbled her adoration.
 I will group seven of Levin’s (1993) nine classes under the rubric verba dicendi.
Verbs of instrument of communication and manner of speaking will be discussed in the
section of constructions without verba dicendi, since their communicative value is a
metonymically derived from their original meaning.
4. Constructions with verba dicendi
The most general verbs in Spanish are decir and contar. The former is considered by
Cano (1987: 207) as an “archlexeme” (“archilexema”).8 The recipient is introduced by a,
(14), but it may also be substituted by a clitic pronoun, (15). If the dictum is also
pronominal the recipient will appear as se, (16).

(14) Dijo la verdad a su madre.

‘(s/he) told the truth to her mother’
(15) Le dijo la verdad.
(s/he) her told the truth
‘She told her the truth’
(16) Se la dijo.
SE it told
‘She told it to her’

This clitic pronoun is optional when the lexical Recipient is in a postverbal position,
(17), but if it precedes the verb the clitic must be present, (18).

(17) (Le) dijo la verdad a su madre

(s/he) (her) told the truth to her mother
‘She told the truth to her mother’
(18) A su madre le dijo la verdad.
(s/he) to her mother her told the truth
‘To her mother she told the truth’

According to Vorlat (1982: 165), say and speak would probably be the verbs
chosen by informants to be the most basic verbs of communication in English (1982:
32), even though the first is much more frequent than the latter. In their corpus-based
study of speak, talk, say and tell, Dirven et al. (1982: 165) describe the first two as
verbs focusing on the linguistic action itself, whereas say and tell have message focus.
The verb tell takes a recipient,9 while say is used with and without this optional
participant. This verb is most productive with sentential complements or quotations:
only four from one thousand sentences randomly extracted from the BNC contained the
verb say with a nominal non-sentential object. All of them are pronominal:

(20) “Look, Dennis obviously ain’t said nothing to him about your family… (BNC)
(21) …as having anticipated elements of psycho–analysis in what he said on this.
(BNC)
(22) This was said so low as to be virtually inaudible. (BNC)
(23) The same source, it must be said, also believes that …(BNC)

The Spanish verb decir with an NP object also occurs with modest frequency.
From 127 occurrences randomly taken from García Márquez’s Crónica de una muerte
anunciada (CMA), only 12 examples occur with an NP object (9.4%), as in examples
(24)-(27). Another random search, this time from the oral component of the CREA
corpus, shows similar results: from 100 occurences only 17 appear with NP objects, all
of which are pronominals of the type lo que dijo, lo dijo, se lo digo, etc.

(24) Tres personas me dijeron la misma cosa. (CMA)

three people me told the same thing
‘Three people told me the same thing’
(25) No nos dijeron la verdad. (CMA)
‘(they) did not tell us the truth’
(26) Cuando me dijeron la noticia… (CMA)
when (they) me told the news
‘When they told me the news…’
(27) A mí nunca me dijeron el nombre de mi enfermedad… (CMA)
(they) to me never me told the name of my illness
‘They never told me the name of my illness’

The mobility of the participants in the clause permitted in Spanish and illustrated in the
last examples contrasts with the rigidity of the English SVO pattern. In the following
example, the translator makes use of the passive in order to keep the same thematic
order as in the Spanish original:

(28) “Hablaba con el alma en la mano” me dijo el doctor Dionisio Iguarán, que estaba
jugando con ellos. (CMA)
(29) “He was speaking with his heart in his hand,” I was told by Dr. Dionisio Iguaran,
who was playing with them. (CDF)

With quotes the subject is postponed in Spanish, whereas it usually keeps its preverbal
position in English:

(30) “Nunca la dejaba cargada”, me dijo su madre. (CMA)

(31) “He never left it loaded,” his mother told me. (CDF)
(32) “No seas bárbara” le dijo él.(CMA)
(33) “Don't be a savage,” he told her. (CDF)
(34) “Tenía ese color verde de los sueños”, le dijo Pura Vicario a mi madre. (CMA)
(35) “He had that green color of dreams,” Pura Vicario told my mother. (CDF)

However, as Suñer (2000) notes, English subjects may also be postverbal with
quotations (36a), but they can never be free-inverted, (36b), as in Spanish, (36c).

(36) a. “I’d like some more”, requested John from his friend (Suñer 2000, 11a))
b. * “I’d like some more”, requested from his friend John. (Suñer 2000,
11c))
c. Nosotros, que bajemos –le decía a Gumersindo el guardia joven. (Suñer
2000, 10b))
we, should go down –him told to Gumersino the young guard
‘We should go down –the young guard told Gumersindo’
 When the recipient is not expressed, say is preferred.

(37) “Tiene el nombre bien puesto” dijo. (CMA)

(38) “She’s well–named,” he said. (CDF)

Both say and decir are frequently attested in impersonal expressions, especially in the
passive:

(39) Bayardo San Román se había hecho muy amigo nuestro, amigo de tragos, como
se decía entonces, y parecía muy a gusto en nuestra mesa. (CMA)
(40) Bayardo San Roman had become our very good friend, a friend of a few drinks, as
they said in those days, and he seemed very much at ease at our table. (CDF)
(41) His condition was said to be, “fair”. (Brown)
(42) All the sins of ancient Rome are said to be collected into this three–hour film.
(Brown)
(43) It was said that he had had a vision. (Brown)

Even though say may take a recipient, it does not allow the dative alternation. In fact, as
Levin (1993: 46) points out, only verbs of transfer of a message and instrument of
communication take the dative alternation. According to Bresnan & Nikitina (2003) the
most frequent verb that appears in the dative construction is tell. In 99% of their corpus
examples it occurs in the dative NP construction, a syntactic pattern which is associated
to possessive semantics, more precisely, change of possession. The dative PP
construction, on the other hand, is related to allative semantics or motion of an object to
a goal. This would mean that the recipient does not necessarily understand the dictum,
therefore does not “possess” it, while in the dative NP construction the recipient
decodes, and therefore, “possesses” the dictum. Thus, Krifka (1999) explains that a
sentence like Beth told her sorrows to God “presupposes that God exists”, whereas Beth
told God her sorrows “could be uttered by an atheist”.
5. Constructions without verba dicendi
5.1. Discharge verbs
Another lexical domain which may express verbal communication comprises verbs like
spread, hurl or Spanish soltar, lanzar, etc, which involve an idea of motion through
space. The presence of a dictum makes us decode them as communicative processes:

(44) I never heard them spread any gossip about anybody. (Brown)
(45) Just as now anyone may hurl insults at a citizen of Mars… (Brown)
(46) Luego, más calmado, me soltó una larga perorata sobre sus creencias. (CREA)
‘Later, more calm, (he) let out a long speech about his beliefs’
(47) El presidente del Gobierno lanzó un mensaje a ETA (CREA)
the president of the government threw a message to eta
‘The president issued a message to ETA’

Sometimes within this frame the source is profiled, and is viewed as a container –
the mouth– metonymically understood to discharge words. This class is related to
manner of speaking verbs, since it usually also involves sound. As Rudzka–Ostyn
(1988: 514) observes:
The domains of acoustics and space frequently interact when they extend into speech acts.
The interaction is brought on either by a spatial particle or preposition…, or a verb denoting
discharge of some substance: (9) Come on, cough it up, we know you are guilty. (DPV:
110)

For example, verbs like cough, spit, gasp, or sigh may appear as speaking verbs:

(48) Rather coughed his orders out. (BNC)

(49) “You’re from MID.” the old man spat out his accusation. (BNC)
(50) Yeremi at least gasped out an apology to the body below him. (BNC)
(51) She sighed a dirty word and left. (Brown)

Likewise, in Spanish toser, escupir, resoplar and jadear include dicta in the following
examples:

(52) En el castigo hallará la penitencia –tosió. (CREA)

‘in punishment (s/he) will find penitence– (s/he) coughed’
(53) Le escupió mil improperios… (CREA)
him (s/he) spat a thousand insults
‘She spat a thousand insults at him’
(54) ¡Ya estamos otra vez! –resopló. (CREA)
‘here we come again! – (s/he) snorted’
(55) Nos van a ver, amor –jadeó la muchacha. (CREA: Chile)
‘(they) are going to see us, love –panted the girl’
5.2. Cognitive verbs
A linguistic action may also be coded as a cognitive process with verbs like
reason/razonar or speculate/especular. However, the use of this domain to express
communication is quite limited. In English, Rudzka–Ostyn (1988) mentions muse,
reflect, speculate, and reason as verbs of speaking, but only 14 out of 700 examples of
communicative constructions belong to this cognition domain. Indeed the productivity
of these verbs as compared to other speaking verbs is poor. A quick look at the CREA
corpus reveals a similar distribution in Spanish. Thus, while there appear 100746
occurences of dijo and 1156 cases of murmuró; only 87 examples of razonó and 133 of
especuló have been attested. Razonar is closer to the verba dicendi class than especular.
Thus, the former appears in 60.9% of the extracted examples with quotations, while the
latter only introduces direct speech in 8.2% of the examples. Razonar may appear with
nominal objects (su voto, su decisión, su optimismo), but especular introduces the dicta
mainly through the preposition con (38.3%). Both of them may introduce indirect
speech:

(56) La Sala razonó que,…, el fiscal debía concretar… (CREA)

‘the courtroom reasoned that, …, the attorney should specify…’
(57) Antrás especuló que dicho bufete podría solicitar… (CREA)
‘Antrás speculated that the aforementioned lawyer’s office could ask for…’
5.3. Manner of speaking verbs
A much more productive group of verbs in communicative constructions is the class of
sound emission verbs, which extend their meaning to express manner of speaking. In a
detailed analysis of these verbs, Zwicky (1971) proposed twenty properties to single
them out. However, Mufwene (1978) proved that these properties were not exclusive of
manner of speaking verbs. He observed that the three structures in (58-60) share the
incorporation of an adverbial component “WHILE SHRIEKing”, but their syntactic and
semantic differences derive from their different subordinate structures.

(58) Martin shrieked that there were cockroaches in the caviar.

(59) Martin shrieked how we could free him from the trap.
(60) Martin shrieked to Pierre to fetch a nurse.

When manner of speaking appears as the adverbial component of the verbal entry
they are used transitively. But this behavior is also shared by manner of motion verbs
like float, bounce, roll etc., a phenomenon analyzed under the heading of “conflation
patterns” (see Talmy, 1985). Mufwene (1978: 286) suggests the following rule of
English Grammar:
…incorporation of some semantic material corresponding to an existing verb as the
adverbial component of another lexical entry (may) impose(s) on the lexical entry the
morpheme commonly associated with the adverbial component. Although the statement
remains subject to verification, it demonstrates at least that 'manner–of–speaking' is not the
responsible factor here, while 'manner' probably is.

This manner component of the manner of speaking verbs is included internally in the
Lexical-Conceputal Structure Amberber gives for the quotative verb say.

(61 ) say
[EventGOsay ([Thing ]A’[I MANNER ] A’ [Path ] <A>)])] (Amberber (18))

Amberber claims that this verb has to be represented as a variety of the conceptual
function GOSAY with an unsaturated manner component (INNER MANNER). This
component is usually encoded lexically, but with the verb say it will be encoded
syntactically by the quotation. This would explain why manner of speaking verbs,
which encode this INNER MANNER lexically, do not require the quotation.
According to Faber and Sánchez (1990) manner of speaking verbs should be
placed in a transition zone between speech sounds (sonidos articulados) and non speech
sounds (sonidos no articulados). They claim that the sound component in these verbs is
more central than their communicative value; the sound is “foregrounded” inside the
communicative frame. But it is precisely this adverbial component what differentiates
the members of this class of verbs, the only common component is the underlying
verbal lexeme (speak, say someting) (1990: 23-24).
Faber and Mairal (1999: 254) illustrate this “transition zone” between the domains of
SOUND and SPEECH, where they place manner of speaking verbs, with the following
examples:

(62) She screamed/yelled/screeched/shrieked when she saw the cockroaches in the

refrigerator. [SOUND] (Faber & Mairal 1999 (289a))
(63) She screamed/yelled/screeched/shrieked, “Look at the cockroaches in the
refrigerator!” [SPEECH] (Faber & Mairal 1999 (289b))

Under a constructional perspective, we may explain the fact that manner of

speaking verbs appear transitively by proposing that when the verb occurs in a
communicative construction it comes to denote the manner in which the action is
performed. The participant role of the verb (agent/sound maker) fuses with the agent
argument of the construction (speaker); the construction contributes the dictum
argument. The recipient is optionally expressed, as already noted, gained from the
fusion with the construction:

(64) I saw Humber whisper something to one of the junior sisters… (BNC)

The blending of sound emission verbs with the communicative construction involves a
metonymic process, which expands the possibilities of expression of different
communicative reports without enlarging our vocabulary of reporting verbs. Metonymy
is lexicalized in most of these SOUND-FOR-SPEECH metonymies and results in polysemy.
Seto (1999) classifies this type of metonymy as a WHOLE EVENT-SUBEVENT metonymy,
which implies a whole-part type of reference of a temporal metonymy (“the referential
transfer between two contiguous temporal entities”, (p. 107). He includes manners and
gestures also as source domains for this type of metonymy. We will deal with these
domains in Section 5.5.
Another semantic feature associated to manner of speaking verbs relates to a
syntactic phenomenon which has received a lot of attention: the dative alternation. In
clear contrast with verbs of transfer of a message and instrumental verbs, English
manner of speaking verbs are found to be ungrammatical with the NP dative. As
discussed above, this syntactic difference would reveal a semantic different type of
transfer. Communicative constructions with the PP dative are viewed as the movement
of an object to a goal, the recipient; whereas in the NP dative construction an idea of
change of possession is implied. Krifka (1999: 9-10) further argues that manner of
speaking verbs denote a homomorphism between speech production and transfer of
information, thus they refer to a non-movement event, and so do not allow the NP
dative (*Ann yelled Beth the news). Instrumental verbs are found in both constructions
because only the initial stage of the transfer is specified. However, Bresnan & Nikitina
(2003: 7) provide corpus examples of manner of speaking verbs in the NP dative
construction:

(65) a. …she muttered him a hurried apology…

b. You just mumble him an answer.
c. …and whispered me the answer…

Bresnan & Nikitina (2003: 12) claim that these verbs express the same emitted sound
continuously accompanying the speech acts in both the NP and the PP dative contexts,
and that in the NP dative construction “they appear not to be grammatically impossible,
but just improbable” (p. 12). We will return to this point in section 5.4.
5.2.1. Sound classes
In order to analyze this metonymical process that turns verbs of sounds into manner of
speaking verbs –the SOUND FOR SPEECH metonymy– I will distinguish three classes with
differences in the degree of metaphorization.10
5.2.1.1. Sounds emitted by human beings
A first level of conceptual abstraction which expands the meaning of sound related
verbs in both languages involves sounds produced by human beings. Intransitive verbs
like murmur and whisper –Spanish murmurar and susurrar– involve an unexpressed
dictum and may easily actualize it to express manner of speaking. The only change in
argument structure is the expression of a participant, a dictum, which is already part of
the process, “an elaboration of the event itself” (as Amberber (1996: 6) views the
dictum of the quotative verb say, equating it to a cognate object).
These verbs may take the three types of dicta defined in section 3.1: quotation,
(66), subordinate clause (67) and NP pro–dictum, (68).

(66) ‘Get up!’ the Chetnik screamed. (Cobuild)

(67) One girl whispered that she couldn't tell anyone at home (BNC)
(68) … Juron murmured an oath. (BNC)

Faber and Sánchez (1990) state that Spanish morphosyntax does not allow this
conflation process found in English:
Sin embargo el foco ⎯el componente de “sonido”— es estable y traducible con más o
menos razonable facilidad, aunque sea necesario un cambio, obligado por la morfosintaxis
española, de la perspectiva semántica, eg. “…shrieked that…” “…dijo estridentemente
que…”. (emphasis mine)

However the focus –the component of “sound”- is stable and reasonably easily translatable,
even though a change, dictated by Spanish morphosyntax, is necessary in the semantic
perspective, e.g. “shrieked that…” “said stridently that…”

In previous research (Martínez Vázquez 1998) I also noted the absence of this
phenomenon in Spanish. Similar remarks about the impossibility of conflation of
manner and motion in Spanish have been stated. (cf. Martínez Vázquez, 2001 and
references). However, the following occurrences show that this conflation of MANNER +
COMMUNICATION in the verb is not totally banned by Spanish syntax:

(69) Me susurró que necesitaba hablarme a solas… (CREA)

‘(s/he) whispered to me that (s/he) needed to talk to me alone’
…gimió que presentía que iba a morir. (CREA)
(70) ‘(s/he) moaned that (s/he) felt that (s/he) was going to die’
… pero casi al mismo tiempo murmuró una disculpa (CREA)
‘…but almost at the same time (s/he) murmured an apology’

There is indeed a rejection of these conflation processes in Spanish, but it seems

to me that it is of a cognitive rather than a syntactical nature. Spanish speakers avoid
fusing two predicates in one, but the conflation pattern is not syntactically prohibited
(cf. Martínez Vázquez (2001) for occurrences of conflation of manner and motion in
Spanish). Notice that even Faber and Sánchez (1990) who argue that illocutionary acts
like “order” or “ask” cannot be expressed through manner of speaking verbs in Spanish,
admit exceptions with gritar and susurrar.
…en español no es posible encapsular en un solo predicado o unidad significativa el acto de
habla de ordenar o solicitar junto con la manera de hablar (estridente, gritando, etc.)
(p.22)… de estos verbos sólo gritar(2), con valor estilístico fam. (familiar), contiene en su
estructura un acto de habla: mandar a alguien hacer algo… (p. 27)…posiblemente para
algunos hablantes susurrar (“Me susurró que cerrara la puerta”).

… in Spanish it is not possible to encapsulate in a single predicate or unit of meaning the

speech act of ordering or requesting together with the manner of speaking (strident,
shouting, etc.) (p. 22)… of these verbs only gritar(2), with the stylistic value fam.
(familiar), contains a speech act in its structure: ordering someone to do something … (p.
27) … possibly for some speakers susurrar (“Me susurró que cerrara la puerta”. ‘He she
whispered me to close the door’

Indeed susurrar occurs in such uses, but I have also found instances of chillar and
murmurar:

(71) … le entregó una pequeña bolsa de cuero, susurrándole que no interviniese y que
repartiese aquellas monedas conmigo. (CREA)
‘(s/he) gave him a small leather bag, whispering to him that he should not act and
that he should share those coins with me’
(72) …para acercarse a Mojarrita y susurrarle que volviera al día siguiente. (CREA)
‘…to come closer to Mojarrita and whisper to her that she should come the
following day’
(73) Pablo me chillaba que volviera al coche que lo dejara ya. (CREA)
‘Pablo screamed at me that I should come back to the car, that I should stop it.
(74) … murmuró que lo hiciera pasar. (CREA: ARGENTINA)
‘(s/he) murmured that I should make him come in’

If the construction is attested, though with a modest frequency (only 11 occurences of

chillar, 1.02%, and 74 of murmurar, 0.33%, in the whole CREA) we cannot claim that
it is syntactically impossible, but just infrequent.
5.2.1.2. Sounds emitted by animals
A second class of sound emission verbs which extends metaphorically to include a
sense of manner of speaking involves sounds uttered by animals. English verbs like
roar, howl, purr, bark or crow or Spanish bramar/rugir, aullar, ronronear, ladrar or
cantar/gorjear, which originally describe the sounds made by lions, wolves, cats and
cocks, respectively, have moved to a human domain: the agent, an animal sound maker,
thus, becomes a speaker. Contiguity seems to be the process at the heart of this
grammatical blending of the sound process ⎯once transferred to the human domain
⎯with the communicative process: part of the action (“roar”) is used to convey a
broader sense (“communicate by roaring”). The dictum is added to a process in which it
was not originally involved.
In English the construction is mostly found with direct speech. In a random
sample of 158 occurrences of roar, 37 introduced quotations (23,4%) and only 6 (3,8%)
appeared with NP pro–dicta (his triumph, it, his rage, its approval, approval, protests),
as in (75). Another random sample of bark throws the following results: 57 examples
with quotes and 2 with NPs, (76-77); and of 90 occurrences of purr, 34 (37%) were
manner of speaking verbs introducing direct speech, as in (78-79). No examples of roar,
howl, purr or bark as manner of speaking verbs with sentential complements were
found, and only two examples of such a use with crow were attested in the entire BNC,
(80) and (81).

(75) He stuck his head out of one of the windows of the coach, and roared protests at
the policemen who were desperately trying to cope with the traffic confusion.
(76) The platoon commanders barked their orders to dismount (BNC)
(77) The portiere barked some instructions at the boy (BNC)
(78) “Now that would be marvelous,” purred Imelda, effusive, just as she always was
after a victory.” (BNC)
(79) “Perfect,” crowed Mr. Yarrow.
(80) One week after our chat Jeff hit Ilona with divorce proceedings and everyone in
the art world crowed that they had always known it wouldn't last.
(81) Tanjug, the Belgrade news agency which reflects official thinking in Serbia,
reacted to the Washington agreement by crowing that “Bosnia will go down in history
as a state that never existed.”

In Spanish this SOUND FOR SPEECH metonymy is expressed in a similar way. As

has been observed in English, most occurrences appear with direct speech, as shown in
(82)-(83). Only two examples with bramar and one with ladrar appear with sentential
complements in the CREA corpus, (84)-(86), and occasional uses with NP pro–dicta
tend to be limited to metalinguistic words, as in (87)-(88), though I have found an
example with an object expressing mood, as illustrated in (89).

(82) ¡Al! ¡Albert! –rugió el Jefe. (CREA)

‘Al! Albert! roared the boss’
(83) Y bramó: –¡Largo de aquí, guarra!…– (CREA)
‘and (s/he) roared –out of here, dirty pig’
(84) …uno de ellos ladró que lo fusilarían si hablaba una palabra más. (CREA)
‘…one of them barked that (they) would execute him if he spoke one more word’
(85) Y si se empeña en bramar que no… (CREA: MÉXICO)
‘and if (s/he) insists on roaring that no, …’
(86) …hasta salir a la terraza bramando que no se fueran sin él… (CREA: CHILE)
‘…until he went out to the balcony roaring that (they) should not go away without
him’
(87) …pasa su brazo en torno a mi cintura, ronronea palabras sin sentido… (CREA)
‘… (he) puts his arm around my waist, purrs words without sense…’
(88) El pomposo obispo francés debió cantar y gorjear aquellas palabras tan labradas y
pulidas. (CREA)
‘the sumptuous French bishop must have sung and chirped those words so
embroidered and polished’
(89) …mientras la gata ronroneaba su misteriosa felicidad en mi regazo (CREA)
‘…while the cat purred her mysterious happiness in my lap’
 These conceptual mappings between sound emission and information transfer
are verbalized in similar ways in English and Spanish, as shown in the following
analysis of the different degrees of metaphorization with the verbs aullar/howl. The
Spanish verb aullar appears with its original sense in (90). Examples (88) and (89)
illustrate both metaphor (the conceptual association between a human and an animal
domain) and the SOUND FOR SPEECH metonymy. In (90), we find a much more complex
conceptual process, which may be briefly explained in the following terms: the source
domain aullar ⎯which suggests a sad sound, a wolf’s lament⎯ is mapped into the
domain of sickness through the use of a siren, which reveals the presence of an
ambulance. This vehicle, in turn, stands as a source domain for the patients driven in it.

(90) Un lobo aulló a lo lejos. (CREA)

‘a wolf howled in the distance’
(91) ¡Estás loca! –aulló. (CREA)
‘you are crazy –(s/he) howled’
(92) El Subjefe de la Policía aulló una orden…(CREA: MÉXICO)
‘the second-in-command of the police howled an order…
(93) Una sirena aulló en la calle. (CREA)
‘a siren howled in the street’

The same type of conceptual mappings give rise to similar metaphorical linguistic
constructions in English. The verb howl in (94) reveals the non–metaphorical sense of
the verb. In (95) the use of a metaphor transfers the animal sound to an inanimate
domain; (96) and (97) imply the use of the SOUND FOR SPEECH metonymy, though in
(96) we should rather term it SOUND FOR MANNER OF COMMUNICATION, since the agent is
a dog, capable of sending information, though not exactly by speaking.

(94) A dog howled in the distance. (BNC)

(95) Outside, the storm howled about the house as though a pack of wild wolves were
trying to get in. (BNC)
(96) So when I skirted sleeping farms where dogs howled alarm… (BNC)
(97) Amy had screamed for him to stop and, scooping up the kittens, had thrown back
her head and howled obscenities at the cruelty of human beings. (BNC)

Despite the fact that these conceptual processes are similarly encapsulated in
English and Spanish communicative constructions, we find that this transfer process
seems to be more regularized in English than in Spanish. This fact can be tested by
looking at the information supplied by dictionaries. Thus, while COBUILD includes
senses of roar, howl, purr, and bark11 as transitive verbs describing manner of
speaking, neither MOLINER nor DRAE acknowledge such a use with verbs like rugir,
bramar, aullar, ronronear, ladrar, or gorjear in Spanish. Curiously enough, however,
there are transitive entries for the verbs rugir and bramar in the first corpus–based
Spanish dictionary, DEA, (“decir [algo] rugiendo/bramando”). This could suggest that
these transitive uses are recent and have not yet been included in dictionaries which are
not based on corpora. However, the DEA shows no entry for grajear, and ronronear
does not show a transitive use.
5.2.1.3. Sounds emitted by inanimate beings
A third class of sound emission verbs involves sounds produced by inanimate beings. A
first correspondence is established between an inanimate domain and a human one. For
example, the sound made by a trumpet ⎯to thunder/trompetear⎯ in (98)-(101) is
applied to a human domain; a person making the sound of a trumpet, thus, speaking in a
very loud voice. But the verb is also associated to the idea of boasting, through a
metonymic inference, since trumpets are used to make announcements (INSTRUMENT
FOR ACTION metonymy). Finally, we find the metonymy MANNER FOR ACTION (SOUND
FOR SPEECH), which is common to all the manner of speaking verbs.

(98) A writer in the Town Planning Review trumpeted that train–sheds were now
obsolete (BNC)
(99) …as Khrushchev set deadlines and trumpeted warnings in his attempt to frighten
the West… (BNC)
(100) . . .el que trompeteó con entusiasmo sus méritos literarios por los cuatro puntos
cardinales de la ciudad de Guatemala. (CREA)
‘he who trumpeted with enthusiasm his literary merits throughout the four
cardinal points of the city of Guatemala’

A similar metaphorical expression is attested in both languages with the use of

thunder/tronar, the sound of storms, used as a source domain to express
communication. In (101) and (102) the SOUND FOR SPEECH metonymy gives rise to a
direct speech construction. Metonymy is at the heart of the constructional meaning;
metaphor makes us understand this manner of speaking as one involving violence.

(101) “Donna Frizzell, I thought better of you!” she thundered. (BNC)

(102) ⎯¿Quién le ha sacudido a Prada?⎯ tronó Poveda. (CREA)
‘who has beaten Prada? –thundered Poveda’
5.4. Instrumental verbs
These verbs appear in a communicative construction through the activation of a double
metonymic process. A first INSTRUMENT FOR ACTION metonymy will turn the noun of
the instrument into the verb expressing the action performed with it. The class of
instrumental verbs is larger in English than in Spanish. Morphology plays an important
role in this difference. English instrumental verbs derive from the noun denoting the
instrument by a very flexible derivational process –conversion– which changes the word
class without changing form. This metonymical morphological process of word
formation is not very productive in Spanish. Thus, for example, the INSTRUMENT FOR
ACTION metonymy, turns the noun teléfono into telefonear, but we do not get
*modemear or *satelitear from modem or satélite, just to mention some examples. In
fact, from the 18 English instrumental verbs of communication given by Levin (cable,
e–mail, fax, modem, netmail, phone, radio, relay, satellite, semaphore, sign, signal,
telephone, telecast, telegraph, telex, wire and wireless) only four have been attested in
the CREA corpus: faxear, telefonear, telegrafiar and radiar.
A second metonymical process will insert these verbs into a communicative
construction, which contributes the dictum. This communicative construction is,
however, different from the one built with sound emission verbs. The former activates
the MEANS FOR ACTION metonymy, the latter the MANNER FOR ACTION metonymy. This
difference is also perceived through their different use of the dative construction. As
stated above, while manner of speaking verbs tend to appear only with the NP dative
construction, the instrumental verbs may be inserted into both the NP and the PP dative
syntax. Krifka explains that verbs of means of communication behave differently from
manner of speaking verbs since they do not express a homomorphism between the
causing event and the transfer of information; they only make reference to the initial
phase of the transfer process. He illustrates his point with the following example:

(103) Ann faxed Beth the results. Actually, Beth’s secretary got the fax, and he phoned
them to Beth. (Krifka (39a))

This would explain why instrumental verbs may appear also in the PP dative
construction (Ann faxed the news to Beth), whereas manner of speaking verbs, which
fuse the manner activity with the transfer event, cannot express the movement event that
the NP dative construction contributes (*Ann yelled Beth the news), and can only appear
in the PP dative construction (Ann yelled the news to Beth). Bresnan and Nikitina argue
that these instrumental verbs “almost always involve communication –that is transfers
of the possession of information” (2003: 15). According to them, since the most
prototypical dative verb of communication, tell, is most frequently used in the dative NP
construction, and instrumental verbs usually appear in a communicative discourse, we
tend to assimilate them to tell and use them in both dative NP and dative PP syntax.
The means of communication which is closer to speaking verbs is telephone, since
this action involves direct communication between speaker and listener, guaranteeing,
thus, that the transfer of information would successfully reach the recipient. From 105
examples of telephone randomly extracted from the BNC, 35 examples ⎯33.3%⎯ are
followed by a communicative process in a clause with a verb from the verba dicendi
class, as in (104) and (105). In 5 cases –4.8%– the message follows in a reduced phrase
introduced by for (106) or with (107).

(104) Liz telephoned her parents and told them that she had been sick (BNC)
(105) …she telephoned, saying “Thank you for your letter”. (BNC)
(106) …she telephoned for help from the M50 motorway. (BNC)
(107) The next day, Mr Goodwin’s source telephoned him with information… (BNC)

However, only 5 of the 105 examples with telephone appear in a communicative

construction: 1 introduces a quotation, 3 take NP pro-dicta (a warning, congratulations
and his offer to recommend Ramsey to the Queen for Canterbury), and 2 are built with
subordinate infinitive clauses, (108) and (109).

(108) At last, in 1975, the wife of one of the prisoners, a former air force pilot,
telephoned the young woman’s mother to come to her house quickly. (BNC)
(109) However thirty-six hours before she died she telephoned for some of us to visit.
(BNC)

The other 94 examples do not show up in a communicative construction, that is,

even though telephones are used for communication purposes, the constructional
metonymy is not easily activated. When an instrument verb is inserted in a
communicative construction, the dicta contributed by the construction may take the
form of a pro-dictum (110)-(115), a subordinate clause, (116-117), or a quotation (118).
(110) She had seen neither Andrew nor Erica Pringle since Friday night and was acutely
aware that Moira Harris had never telephoned her traditional ‘thank you’ for Friday’s
disruptive dinner party, a discomforting lapse in Moira’s impeccable etiquette that
added to her uncertainty. (COBUILD)
(111) After some crucial minutes, nothing had happened. I began to get worried – I was
learning that collectivity had its drawbacks. Had the other man phoned the warning?
(COBUILD)
(112) You can telephone, fax or post your order using the enclosed order form.
(COBUILD)
(113) Two officers radioed his warning to control. (BNC)
(114) Then Linda rang and advised me not to Fax the apology to Africa … (ICE)
(115) Well then could it be to ring out a warning. (ICE)
(116) Miguel telephoned that you were on your way and that you were exhausted.
(BNC)
(117) “The man radioed that his engine broke,” Bellybutton grumbled. (BNC)
(118) A Welsh farmer telephone [sic] him: ‘It’s all there but the body is not up to much.
(COBUILD: magazine)

In Spanish the communicative construction with instrumental verbs is also

attested, but it seems to be even less conventionalized than in English. Thus, while
COBUILD introduces a communicative construction in the entry for telephone (He
telephoned a warning from London), there is no space for such constructions with
telefonear in DEA nor DRAE.
From the 830 cases of telefonear which appear in the CREA corpus, there is no
example with an NP pro-dictum; 6 examples are built with the subordinative pattern
(0.72%), as in (119)-(120); and 8 examples show direct speech (0.96%), as in (121).

(119) Me pareció bien pegarme un baño, telefonear a Nilda que la iría a buscar el
domingo… (CREA: ARGENTINA)
‘it seemed good to take a bath, telephone Nilda that I would fetch her on Sunday’
(120) A primeros de setiembre, Crucita telefoneó que llegaría en el rápido de
Irún…(CREA)
‘at the begining of september, Crucita telephoned that she would arrive in the train
from Irun’
(121) Al día siguiente me telefonea: "Oye, he pensado que..."
the following day (s/he) me telephones: “hear, I have thought that…
‘The following day s/he telephones me: “Look, I’ve been thinking that…”’

The examples under (122)-(123) show conventional uses of telegrafiar and radiar with
metalinguistic pro-dicta objects. In (124) the verb telegrafiar introduces direct speech.
The verb faxear is of a recent incorporation, and there are only two occurrences of it in
the whole CREA corpus, one in a communicative construction, (124).

(122) …le dejó telegrafiar textos en código (CREA)

‘…(s/he) telegraphed texts in code’
(123) El Almirante Latorre radió un mensaje al final del día…
‘admiral Latorre radioed a message at the end of the day…’ (CREA)
(124) No obstante, aquel mismo día telegrafié a mamá: Me he comprometido con Ena.
‘however, that same day I telegraphed mom: I have gotten engaged to Ena.’
(125) Esa información se radió al mundo el 11–9–1973 por el Comando de Unidade.
‘this information was radioed to the world on 11–9–1973 by the Comando de
Unidade’
(126) También le indicó que le iba a faxear la orden de cese… (CREA: PERÚ)
‘(he) also told him that he was going to fax him the cease warrant’

The subordinative pattern seems to be, if not ungrammatical, at least less

conventional, and probably not accepted by most native speakers.

(127) … su antiguo marido (…) telegrafió que “la necesitaba”. (CREA)

‘…her former husband telegraphed that (he) “needed her “’
(128) …a las 2245, radió que recibía fuego de artillería. (CREA)
‘…at 22:45, (he) radioed that he was receiving artillery fire’
5.5. Verbs of gesture
Gestures frequently accompany communicative acts, as illustrated in (129). This
association between a gesture and a speech act facilitates the metonymic transfer which
extends the meaning of the verb to express communication, as in (130).

(129) “The driver – I know now it was Keith – waved to say thanks and drove into the
car (BNC)
(130) [he] pulled his bicycle to the ground, waved his thanks at the old farmer, and…
(BNC)

The gestures used to introduce dicta are related to the domain of the face/head or
hands, and they include processes like smiling, nodding, shaking the head or waving.
They may activate different varieties of the PART FOR WHOLE metonymy: MEANS FOR
ACTION or INSTRUMENT FOR ACTION. Metonymy has been described as an “abbreviation
device”, which “enables us to say things quicker, to shorten conceptual distances”
(Nerlich, Clark and Todd 1999: 362). It also requires a lot of linguistic, conceptual and
pragmatic “unpacking”. The shortening device that gives rise to communicative
constructions is permitted when there is enough extralinguistic information to decode
the linguistic expression unambiguously. For this reason, it is quite common to find
verbs of gestures introducing dicta which stand for the prototypical message associated
to the verbal process. For example, the act of nodding is directly related to an act of
approval, as seen in COBUILD: “If you nod, you move your head quickly down and up
to show that you are answering ‘yes’ to a question, or to show agreement,
understanding, or approval.” This might explain why expressions like to nod yes are
often labeled as formulae, and are, therefore, not given a proper grammatical analysis.
However, this act is not completely lexicalised, as the different forms it takes in the
following examples illustrate:

(131) Beach nodded his approval. (BNC)

(132) Ruth nodded her agreement. (BNC)
(133) Duncan nodded his affirmation. (BNC)
(134) Biff glanced at his Sergeant, who nodded confirmation. (BNC)
(135) Donna nodded assent. (BNC)

Besides, the verb nod is not only used with dicta expressing affirmation, (136-139),
neither is agreement transmitted only by nodding, (140-141).

(136) …a stranger stood up and nodded farewell. (Brown)

(137) She nodded her thanks and reciprocal sympathy, and then moved on. (BNC)
(138) Shamlou nodded his understanding. (BNC)
(139) He nodded recognition at Chantal. (BNC)
(140) and President of the Club, smiled his agreement. (BNC)
(141) … the dog yapping his agreement. (BNC)

Thanking is also a very brief communicative act, which, as has been observed with the
act of agreement, is an expected answer in certain types of situations. Smiling is a
prototypical gesture that accompanies the expression of thanking, and may
metonymically encapsulate a verb of communication, as in (142-143), though other less
conventional ways of thanking can also be expressed through this construction, as in
(144-145).

(142) Sir John grinned his thanks… (BNC)

(143) Paige smiled her thanks and pulled out a chair, yet before she sat down (BNC)
(144) …she cried, hugging Daddy and Mummy tightly and squeezing her thanks right
into them. (BNC)
(145) Tail wagging his thanks, he took the handle of the basket in his mouth… (BNC)

Another conventional gesture is the act of waving in a farewell situation, (146), but it is
not linguistically limited to this expression; the gesture is also used to convey other
meanings, as in (147)-(151).

(146) Meredith waved him goodbye from the gate…(BNC)

(147) When he waved down a taxi, he saw that her hand…(BNC)
(148) …and waved a greeting at a couple by the bar. (BNC)
(149) Lillee waved a fisted salute. (BNC)
(150) Hayman waved the objection aside. (BNC)
(151) She waved her thanks to Joujou. (BNC)

The object inserted in these constructions acquires a complex status. We can no longer
choose between the three dicta we have found in other constructions –quotation, content
clause or nominal pro-dictum; only the latter form may be used with verbs of gestures.
As noted in section 3.1., these nominal objects are the most complex type of dictum,
since they involve substitution of the exchanged information. However, it is important
to distinguish different degrees of recoverability of the original message, ranging from
pro-dicta which permit us to recover the exact original message, to more complex pro-
dicta, which simply give us an idea of the type of information transferred, but which do
not allow us to recover the precise message. For example, in a construction like (152),
we may easily deduce that the first speaker uttered the words thank you. In (51),
reproduced here for convenience as (153), the object is a metalinguistic word which
describes the type of message, but which no longer enables us to recover the exact
speech act. The antecedent of its ecstasy in (154) is even more difficult to replace; we
would have to imagine all the people in this legendary stadium uttering enthusiastic
expressions of all kind, which are summarized with a common feature they all share: a
state of ecstasy. The relation between the pro-dictum and its antecedent becomes even
more relaxed when the means of communication is a gesture, as in (155). We no longer
have a first speech act but a paralinguistic act.

(152) Merrill murmured her thanks. (BNC)

(153) She sighed a dirty word and left. (Brown)
(154) Old Trafford roared its ecstasy (ICE-GB:W2C-004 #47:2)
(155) McCready waved his gratitude (BNC)

Levin (1993: 98) groups the different objects in (152), (153) and (154) under the rubric
“reaction object” (see also Huddleston and Pullum’s (2002: 305) “object of conveyed
reaction”). She describes it in the following terms:
Certain intransitive verbs—particularly verbs of manner of speaking and verbs of gestures
and signs—take nonsubcategorized objects that express a reaction (an emotion or
disposition); possible objects include: approval, disapproval, assent, admiration, disgust,
yes, no. When these verbs take such objects they take on an extended sense which might be
paraphrased “express (a reaction) by V–ing,” where “V” is the basic sense of the verb. For
instance, She mumbled her adoration can be paraphrased as “She expressed/signalled her
adoration by mumbling.” Most of the verbs that allow such reaction objects name activities
that are associated with particular emotions, and the action they name is performed to
express the associated emotion.

Note, however, that objects like yes or no express linguistic acts rather than
reactions. Words and feelings often appear in a paradigmatic relation, as illustrated with
the following resultative constructions:

(156) …but the coroner just waved his words aside. (BNC)
(157) Oswin waved her worries aside (BNC)

Since words are used to express both ideas and feelings, it becomes at times very
difficult to distinguish between the two. Thus, the objects in the following sentences
may stand for the expression of feelings or speech acts of the type “I appreciate” or “I
agree”; but, anyway, there is communication, or transfer of information in both cases.

(158) … and Emily smiled her appreciation.

(159) Levitt smiled polite agreement

As has repeatedly been noted, Spanish tends to avoid the use of non–
subcategorized objects (see Martínez Vázquez 2001, and references). Instead of
inserting a verb into a foreign construction, Spanish prefers the use of two separate
predicates. This seems to be also the case in other languages. Brdar and Brdar-Szabó
(2003: 261) show that Croatian and Hungarian, in clear contrast with English, also have
a natural tendency to keep predicates formally apart, which is facilitated by their richer
morphosyntactic devices. Dirven (1990) also arrived at similar results in his contrastive
analysis of English and German verbs of speaking; while German exploits its rich
morphology to create new lexemes, English makes use of syntactic and metaphorical
devices.
 In the following translations into Spanish, we find that the English verb nod
either splits into two verbs, asentir y soltar, none of which denotes gestures, or becomes
an adverbial, con la cabeza, while a general verb is introduced, dar.

(160) I smiled and nodded a curt though not impolite good morning without lodging a
complaint. (AP)
(161) he sonreído y asentido y he soltado un breve aunque no inadecuado buenos días,
sin llegar a presentar la protesta. (AP)
(162) (I) nod my thanks. (AP)
(163) doy las gracias con la cabeza (AP)

However, some writers make novel uses of this metonymical device, which somehow
shows that the construction is not totally incompatible with the Spanish syntax:

(164) César cerró la boca y cabeceó que sí, que orinaba estupendamente. (CREA)
‘Cesar shut his mouth and nodded that yes, that he urinated well’

As I have suggested above, the constraint is not of a grammatical nature; there

rather seems to be a cognitive tendency to avoid such a blending in Spanish. We may
claim that this metonymy is not syntactically conventionalized, but we cannot deny that
it is a possible device for creative Spanish speakers, as seen in the following examples
with gestures (165)-(167), and with a sound emission verb, (168) (see also 89 above).

(165) Los pobres ejercieron su derecho democrático a protestar, llorar sus penas y agitar
su desesperación frente a las cámaras. (CREA: Bolivia)
‘the poor exercised their democratic right to protest, weep their sorrows and
agitate their despair in front of the cameras’
(166) Miss Susan sonrió su aprobación y… (CREA: PUERTO RICO)
‘Miss Susan smiled her approval and…’
(167) ¡Ríen su alegría…! (CREA: VENEZUELA)
‘(they) smile their happiness…’
(168) Y Pola ladrando su bienvenida con aire desconfiado. (CREA)
‘and Pola barking her welcome with a distrustful air’

6 Concluding Remarks
I have analysed the way communicative events are encoded in English and Spanish.
Besides the so called verba dicendi other semantic domains introducing secondary
speech situations have been examined. General verbs denoting discharge or motion
through space (let/soltar) and cognitive processes (speculate/especular), appear in
similar constructions in both languages. Both are transitive verbs; the first group fuses
with the ditransitive construction to gain the recipient/listener argument. Another
domain which blends with the ditransitive/communicative construction involves sound
emission verbs. The sound will metonymically express manner of speaking. We have
observed a metaphorical gradation in this construction formation process, ranging from
sounds belonging to a human domain to those produced by inanimate beings. This
SOUND FOR SPEECH metonymy is coded in a parallel way in both languages, though it
seems to be more lexicalised in English. This point is reflected in the information
supplied by dictionaries, where most English sound verbs show a communicative
meaning which is the result of the metonymy. Spanish verbs rarely show this extended
meaning in dictionaries, even though examples of the construction have been attested.
Instrumental verbs can also be inserted in communicative constructions both in
English and Spanish. The number of instrumental communicative verbs in Spanish is
quite restricted, probably due to morphological reasons. Paralanguage can also be
inserted in a communicative construction. English shows a variety of constructions with
verbs of gesture introducing dicta. This metonymical device is not limited to
conventional situations of the type kiss goodnight or nod yes. Novel uses extracted from
different corpora prove that it is a powerful abbreviation tool which is more widespread
than is generally believed. Communicative constructions with verbs of gestures and
“reaction objects” are rare in Spanish, though it cannot be claimed that it is a non-
existent phenomenon in this language.
Summing up, the conflated communicative pattern, or in constructional terms,
these mismatches between the semantics of the verb and the semantics designated by
the construction, which are very productive in English, also occur, though with modest
frequency, in Spanish. I have tried to show that even though this grammatical
metonymy is not as productive in Spanish as it is in English, it is not banned by syntax,
as has been claimed. I would rather suggest that the modest frequency of this process in
Spanish reveals a cognitive preference of Spanish speakers to avoid syntactic
metonymies.
Reddy points out that English conceptualizes communication in terms of the
conduit metaphor and that thought process is biased towards this preferred framework.
He claims that even though there are ways of avoiding these conduit “metaphorisms”,
“this would still not free you from the framework” (1979: 299). We can likewise claim
that Spanish conceptualizes predicates individually, and has therefore a natural tendency
towards analytic frameworks. But this framework should not be seen as an oppressive
system from which it is difficult to escape; it is rather the easiest cognitive and linguistic
option for speakers. The Spanish blended predicates in communicative constructions
which have been attested have to be explained as unconventional uses produced by
creative speakers, which may eventually become part of the general framework.
Notes
*. The research presented in this article is part of the projects “Sintaxis contrastiva inglés–español” (BFF
2000–1271) and “Metáfora y Metonimia en el Metalenguaje” (BFF 2003–04064) funded by the
Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology and the FEDER (Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo
Regional) Program.
1. The following terms have also been used: “linguistic action verbs” (Verschueren, 1985), “verbs of
saying/utterance/communication”, and “metapragmatic descriptors” (see Collins, 2001: 304 n.9). In
Spanish I have come upon the following labels “verbos de transferencia communicativa”, (Gutiérrez
Ordoñez, 1999) “verbos de comunicación verbal” (Cano, 1987) and “verbos dialogales” (Contreras,
1988).
2. The examples have been extracted from: Bret Easton Ellis’s American Psycho (AP) and its translation
into Spanish; and García Márquez’s Crónica de una muerte anunciada (CMA) and its translation into
English, Chronicle of a Death Foretold (CDF).
3. I use the term “speech act” as synonymous with “communicative act”, which implies a locutionary
act, without taking into account possible illocutionary forces encoded in the report.
4. For a full account of the syntactic nature of quotations see Amberber (1996).
5. The term “speaker” stands for both the first speaker and the reporter of the first speech act.
“Recipient” likewise refers to the receiver of either the first speech act or the reported speech.
6. Amberber (1996: 6-9) further argues that the subject of the quotative verb say is an Agent, which
behaves as the argument of the unergative verbs (walk, dance, laugh); the event is internally–caused,
i.e. it can only be caused by the person engaged in it. But, unlike the unergative verbs, it appears with
another obligatory entity. This entity, however, is different from thematic arguments, and is viewed
rather as “an elaboration of the event itself”, which will occupy the same syntactic position as a
cognate object (lower Spec VP).
7. The inference rule referred to, (21), reads as follows:
At the termination of [EventGO ([X], [Path TO ([Y])])],
it is the case that [State BE ([X], [Place AT ([Y])])].
8. “El más genérico de todos estos verbos [los verbos de comunicación verbal] es decir. Podría
considerársele el ‘archilexema’ de esta área semántica de verbos”. [“The most generic of all these
verbs [the verbs of verbal communication] is decir. It could be considered the ‘archilexeme’ of those
semantic area of verbs.’] (Cano, 1987: 207).
9. It is exceptionally used without recipient (19.i-iii), or even without dictum (19.iv):
(19) i. Mary-Ann, who was a bit of an innocent, told all. (BNC)
ii. But his mother told the story over and over… (Brown)
iii. But at the coroner's inquest Delphine told a forthright story. (Brown)
iv. “Have you told your editor?” (BNC)
10. I use “metaphorization” as a hyperonym which involves the shifts of meaning produced both by
metaphor and metonymy. Goossens (1990:328) comes to the conclusion that sound used as a donor
domain for linguistic action shows a “hybrid character”, since it gives rise to “metonyms in some
contexts, metaphors from metonymy in others and sometimes undecided between these two
interpretations in actual contexts.”
11. There is an entry for crow as an intransitive manner of speaking verb.

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 Sem CAUSE–RECEIVE < agt rec pat >

R: instance, PRED < >

means

Syn V SUBJ OBJ OBJ2

Figure 1. Ditransitive Construction

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