Dutch Spatial Prepositions in a Cross-Linguistic Context

Dutch Spatial Prepositions in a cross-linguistic Context A lot of work has been done to determine the meaning of Dutch spatial prepositions (e.g. Cuyckens, 1991; Bowerman, 1996; Beliën, 2002). Most of this work has been done on Dutch alone, and has not taken into consideration other languages. The approach in this paper is to situate Dutch spatial prepositions in a cross-linguistic context. I develop an optimality theoretic (OT) system to generate spatial meanings. Based on the Topological Relations Pictures Series (Bowerman & Pederson, 1992), I formulate several features that serve to distinguish spatial situations. These features then form markedness and faithfulness constraints in OT. The constraints are ranked differently in order to generate different languages from the same set of universals. For example, the direction of support is “faithfully” expressed in Dutch (aan: support from the side; op: support from below), but not “marked” in English (on: support from either the side or below). The Dutch language data are collected by myself, the data from other languages are collected mostly by Levinson & Wilkins (2006). Beliën, M. (2002). Force dynamics in static prepositions: Dutch “aan”, “op”, “tegen”. In H. Cuyckens and G. Radden (eds.), Perspectives on Prepositions (pp. 195-209). Tübingen, Niemeyer. Bowerman, M. (1996). Learning how to structure space for language: A cross-linguistic perspective. In P. Bloom, M. Peterson, L. Nadel and M. Garrett (eds.), Language and Space (pp. 195- 209). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Bowerman, M. & Pederson, E. (1992). Topological relations pictures series. In S.C. Levinson (ed.), Space Stimuli Kit 1.2, November 1992, 51. Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics. Cuyckens, H. (1991). The semantics of spatial prepositions in Dutch: A cognitive-linguistic exercise, PhD dissertation, University of Antwerp. Levinson, S.C. & Wilkins, D.P. (2006). Grammars of Space. New York: Cambridge University Press.