<TARGET "iba" DOCINFO AUTHOR "Iraide Ibarretxe-Antuñano"TITLE "Entering in Spanish"SUBJECT "ARCL, Volume 1"KEYWORDS ""SIZE HEIGHT "220"WIDTH "150"VOFFSET "4">
Entering in Spanish
Conceptual and semantic properties
of entrar en / a*
Iraide Ibarretxe-Antuñano
University of Deusto / University of the Basque Country
This paper analyses some of the conceptual and semantic properties of
entering events in the construction entrar en / a ‘enter in / to’ in Spanish.
The first part focuses on the question of how entering events are conceptualised in this language. Recent studies on entering events (Kita 1999) have
shown that some of the semantic primitives considered central to the
conceptualisation of motion are not necessarily present in all languages. Our
starting point will be to test the validity of this argument in Spanish. We will
show that Spanish entering events do depict a motion process from one
point into another with a boundary crossing involved in most cases. However, we will also argue that the way in which this event is conceptualised varies
with respect to two parameters: force dynamics (Talmy 1988) and profiling
of events (Langacker 1987, 1991, 2000). The second part deals with the
semantic differences brought up by the alternation of the prepositions a and
en with the verb entrar. In previous analyses (Morera 1988: 149; Gili Gaya
1990: 254; Menéndez Pidal 1944: 347; Roegiest 1980: 94), the difference
between choosing a or en was reduced to a diatopical variation based on a
higher or lesser degree of dynamism. We will argue that the choice of preposition triggers other semantic interpretations where mechanisms such as
metonymy, deixis, and scope play a fundamental role.
If we were asked to describe what ‘entering’ means, we could say something
along the lines of “moving towards the interior of something”. No matter how
intuitive and ad hoc this definition is, we can already pick up some basic
elements central to the understanding not only of what motion in general is —
motion, path (direction)- but also of what entering is — interior. These basic
elements correspond more or less to what researchers have considered the basic
Annual Review of Cognitive Linguistics 1 (2003), 29–59.
issn @@ / e-issn @@© John Benjamins Publishing Company
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semantic primitives or components of a motion event (see, for instance, the
work of Talmy (1985, 1991, 2000) and Jackendoff (1983, 1990) in this area).
The underlying assumption in these studies is that these semantic components
are basic and universal, that is, they are present in the conceptualisation of this
type of events in any language. However, some recent studies (Kita 1999) have
shown that this is not necessarily the case. According to Kita, Japanese entering
events are conceptualised differently because the transition1 between two points
is not expressed in the semantics of entering verbs. Results such as those
obtained in Kita’s analysis constitute a real challenge for the universality of
these components, and therefore, they make us wonder whether Japanese is the
only language where these semantic primitives do not apply.
With this question in mind, the first part of this paper focuses on the issue
of how entering events are conceptualised in Spanish. Our starting point will be
Kita’s entering scenario and their application to Spanish. We will show that
Spanish entering events do depict a motion process from one point into
another with a boundary crossing involved in most cases. However, we will also
argue that the way in which this event is conceptualised varies with respect to
two parameters: force dynamics (Talmy 1988) and profiling of events
(Langacker 1987, 1991, 2000). We will focus our analysis on the linguistic
expression of these events via the construction entrar en and entrar a.
In the second part of this paper, we analyse some of the semantic differences triggered by the alternation of the prepositions a and en with the verb entrar.
Traditionally, this alternation with entering verbs2 has been regarded as
diatopical. Authors such as Morera (1988: 149) argue that the ‘normative’ use
of this type of verbs requires the preposition en, and that the use of the preposition a in these cases responds to a dialectal preference, typical of the Spanish
spoken in America and the Canary Islands and of earlier periods of the language
(Corominas 1954: 303; García Yebra 1988: 114; Menéndez Pidal 1944: 347).
Independently from this diatopical variation in the use of a/en, some
authors (Morera 1988: 149; Gili Gaya 1990: 254; Roegiest 1980: 94) have pointed
out that this alternation with verbs like entrar in the same type of scenes also
carries a slightly different connotation.3 In cases when the verb entrar is
construed with the preposition a, the dynamic character of motion is highlighted, whereas with the preposition en what is enhanced is the endpoint of motion,
the limits established by the place the movement is directed towards.
Our main goal in the second half of this paper will be to show that the
semantic differences caused by this alternation are not just restricted to a higher
or lesser degree of dynamism. We will argue that the choice of preposition
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triggers different semantic interpretations where mechanisms such as
metonymy, deixis, and scope play a fundamental role.
1.
Towards a conceptualisation of entering in Spanish
Kita (1999) in his analysis of Japanese entering4 events argues that Japanese
verbs of entering kairu do not express in their semantics alone the notion of
transition between two points, i.e. translational motion from one point to
another. According to this author, entering verbs in Japanese encode a different
type of Aktionsart, what he calls a ‘discrete change of state’. The inherent aspect
in these verbs “predicates that a certain spatial configuration holds up to Time
1, and another spatial configuration holds after Time 2. It does not encode at all
how this change is brought about between Time 1 and Time 2” (1999: 310). It
is only in cases where these verbs co-occur with others such as iku ‘go’ and kuru
‘come’ that the complex expression encodes the primitive of motion process.
In order to show the lack of transition in this type of events and consequently, the negation of the universal primitive of motion for these cases, Kita
designs a scenario for hairu ‘entering’ events that allows multiple interpretations. In this scenario, we have two participants: a circle and a square, the circle
is bigger than the square. At Time 1, the circle is on the left and the square on
the right. The circle and the square are 10 cm. away from each other. After some
time passes by, at Time 2, we find that the square is inside the circle. Figure 1
schematises this scenario.
According to this author, the class of events schematised in Figure 1 can
describe three different situations, the first two presuppose some type of motion
and the third does not:
i.
Situation A: a default interpretation where the referent of the nominative
NP moves as in Figure 2. That is, the square that was on the right moves 10
cm. to the left so that the square ends up inside the circle.
Time elapses
10 cm
Figure 1.Kita’s schema for a class of Hairu Events
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ii. Situation B: one where the referent of the locative NP moves as in Figure 3.
That is, the circle that was on the left moves 10 cm. to the right so that the
square ends up inside the circle.
iii. Situation C: one where no movement of an object is involved as in Figure 4.
That is, we draw a circle around the square so that the square ends up inside
the circle.
Figure 2.Situation A
Figure 3.Situation B
Figure 4.Situation C
Even though motion is not presupposed in all of them, the same hairu verb can
be used to describe each of these three situations in Japanese as we can see in
example (1), which covers Situations A and B, and in sentence (2), which
exemplifies Situation C.
(1) Shikaku-ga en-ni
hai-ta
square-nom circle-loc enter-past
a. ‘(Because the square moved to the left by 10 cm,) the square entered
the circle’
b. ‘(Because the circle moved to the right by 10 cm,) the square was in
the circle’
(2) Taro-ga totemookina en-o kai-ta node,
shikaku-ga en-ni
hait-ta
Taro-nom very big circle-acc draw-past because
square-nom cicle-loc enter-past
‘Because Taro drew a very large circle, the square was in the circle’
(Examples from Kita 1999: 311)
According to Kita, the fact these hairu verbs can convey situations with or
without motion shows that these events are not necessarily conceptualised as
transitions, as motion events where entities move from one place to another,
but as discrete changes of state. As he puts it “at Time 1 the square exists and it
is not in the circle. Later, at Time 2 the square is in the circle” (1999: 312). This
implies that what is in between Time 1 and Time 2, the transition, is not part of
the conceptualisation of entering in Japanese. If we look at the English translations provided by the author, on the other hand, we see that English behaves
differently. Contrary to Japanese, English does not respond to these three
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situations in the same way: Situation A is encoded by an entering verb as in
(1a), whereas B and C require a static description as in (1b) and (2) respectively.
Kita’s argument has important consequences not only for Japanese and
English and the conceptualisation of entering events in these languages, but also
for the very nature of motion events and their semantic primitives. As we have
mentioned in the Introduction, authors working in this area such as Talmy
(1985, 1991, 2000) and Jackendoff (1983, 1990) consider ‘motion (and stasis)’
as one of the universal semantic components or conceptual primitives that
motion events consist of.5 To say that this component does not take part in the
conceptualisation of this type of events in Japanese therefore, challenges the
universality of the motion process itself. But such a groundbreaking claim needs
to be tested in more than one or two languages, and in the first part of this
paper, we will do so with respect to Spanish.
In the following section, we will apply Kita’s scenario to Spanish. Despite
the shortcomings of using ‘artificial situations’6 as those depicted in Figures 2,
3, and 4, we think that this type of task is useful and necessary for two reasons.
First of all, if we want to test the validity of Kita’s claim, we will have to use the
same materials so that we can compare results.7 Secondly, this scenario is open
to different interpretations as we have already seen; this means that with the
same scenario we can obtain a prototypical, or in Kita’s words, default entering
situation, as well as some others not so prototypical but equally important. In
other words, Kita’s scenario will give us a chance to collect some contrastive
data on the nature of an entering event and at the same time, an opportunity to
study the conceptualisation of these events in Spanish.
1.1 Kita’s scenario in Spanish
In this section we study how Spanish deals with the three situations described
by a hairu verb in Japanese. The aim is twofold: on the one hand, we will test
whether Kita’s claim about the defeasibility of transition in entering events in
Japanese also applies to Spanish. If this is the case, we will have found further
support against the universality of a motion component in motion events. On the
other, we will learn about the conceptualisation of this type of events in Spanish.
In order to carry out this study we choose one of the most prototypical
verbs for describing entering events in Spanish, the verb entrar ‘enter’, and test
whether this verb can describe these three situations. The data reported in this
paper has been tested with Spanish native speakers from Northern Spain.8
Before we go on with our discussion, we should point out that we have slightly
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changed Kita’s drawings for the sake of clarity.9 Instead using of a circle as one
of the geometric figures that take part in the scenario, we use a triangle. In our
discussion of entering events we make use of Talmy’s force-dynamics theory
(see Section 1.2). This author uses a circle as the graphic representation of his
notion of agonist, what might cause some confusion. This change does not
affect either the results or the stimuli in any way, but it will help us avoiding
counter-intuitive situations.
In Spanish, there are two different sentences10 that can be used to describe
Kita’s scenario.
(3) El cuadrado entra en el triángulo
the square enters in the triangle
‘The square enters the triangle’
(4) El cuadrado le
entra al
triángulo
the square it.dat enters to.the triangle
‘The square enters the triangle’
In sentence (3), the boundary crossing verb entrar is construed with the locative
preposition en. In sentence (4), this same verb is construed with the allative
preposition a.11 It is important to notice another feature of this sentence: the
presence of the dative pronoun le.12 If we remove this pronoun the sentence
turns out to be ungrammatical as in (4’).13
(4¢) *El cuadrado entra al
triángulo
the square enters to.the triangle
‘The square enters the triangle’
Once we have accepted these two possibilities entrar a and entrar en as the
possible candidates for the description of Kita’s scenario, our next step is to find
out what the distribution of these two sentences is with respect to the three
situations stemming from Kita’s scenario. Our proposal is the following:
Situation A can be described by sentences (3) and (4); Situation B only by
sentence (4), and finally, Situation C only by sentence (3).
We hypothesise that this distribution is based on three different but
complementary factors:
i.
the choice of a different construction, entrar en and entrar a + dative
pronoun. Each construction carries a different conceptualisation of an
entering event. If we use the verb entrar with the preposition en then, we
conceptualise an entering event where the landmark and the trajector hold
what we call a ‘neutral force dynamic relation’, i.e. the trajector smoothly
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enters the landmark without the need of an extra amount of force on any
part. That is, the landmark does not show any resistance to the trajector’s
entering and the trajector does not need an extra force for entering the
landmark. If we use the verb entrar with the preposition a on the other
hand, we conceptualise an entering event as one where at least one of the
participants, either the landmark or the trajector, exerts more force than
usually needed. That is, either the landmark shows some extra resistance to
the trajector’s entering — what we could call a ‘negative force dynamic
relation’-, or the trajector needs some extra force for entering the landmark
— a ‘positive force dynamic relation’.
ii. the semantic content of the prepositions a and en. The preposition a
profiles a dynamic event. Preposition en profiles a static event.
iii. the polysemous character of the verb entrar. This verb conveys a ‘dynamic
sense’, i.e. inward motion, and a ‘static sense’, i.e. to fit, to be of the correct
size and shape for one object to be placed inside another.
The main argument that we would like to put forward in this paper is that these
factors and their interrelation, apart from explaining Kita’s scenario, are
decisive in the characterisation of the nature of entering events in Spanish. In
the following section, we will briefly explain some of the main theoretical tools
that we will use to develop this hypothesis namely, Talmy’s (1988) force
dynamics, and Langacker’s (1987, 1991, 2000) concept of profiling, together
with the notion of Source-Path-Goal (Johnson 1987) and Boundary image
schemas (Bretones, Cristóbal, & Ibarretxe in press).
1.2 Some theoretical background: image schemas, force dynamics,
and profiling
Image schemas are abstract and pre-conceptual gestalt structures based on our
perceptual interaction, bodily experience and motor programmes, which
organise our experience and comprehension. They are recurring structures with
a “relatively small number of parts or components that stand in very definite
relations to one another” (Johnson 1987: 79). These structures have been widely
used within the Cognitive Linguistics framework not only for the analysis of
adpositional semantic networks (Brugman 1981; Ibarretxe-Antuñano 2001;
Lindner 1982; Lakoff 1987) but also for that of metaphorical and metonymical
ones (Cienki 1998; Lakoff & Johnson 1999). From the possible list of image
schemas, two will be useful for the explanation of entering events in Spanish:
the Source-Path-Goal (SPG), and the Boundary (BND).
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The ‘Source-Path-Goal’ image schema (Johnson 1987) structures a finite
path. It has three roles or components: source (starting point), path (the route
from the source to the goal), goal (intended destination).
The ‘Boundary’ image schema (Bretones, Cristóbal, & Ibarretxe in press)
relates a boundary to a one-, two-, three- dimensional space. It has three roles
or components: region A, boundary, region B.
One of the advantages of using image schemas is that they are characterised in
terms of semantic components. These components are a very useful tool for the
comparison of similar structures with different locational adpositions. This is due
to the fact that they allow us to show exactly what semantic input comes with what
part of the speech, that is to say, what part of the event is actually inferred by these
adpositions, and how they interact with the rest of the co-occurring elements.14
These components are also useful when several image schemas are taking
part in the characterisation of a single event. In these situations some of the
components of each image schema are related to each other because they refer
to the same part of the event, they are ‘bound’ together (Bergen, Chan, & Paskin
to appear). This is precisely the case of entering events in Spanish. The trajectory, covered by the moving entity from the place where it rests before starting to
move up to the place where it stops, can be explained in terms of the SourcePath-Goal schema. The boundary schema can explain the boundary crossing
that takes place when one of the entities enters the other. As we will see later in
the discussion, the entities that perform the motion and the boundary crossing
vary in each of the three situations. Nevertheless, the relations or bindings
between the components of these two schemas in a prototypical entering event
are schematically represented in Figure 5.
As we can see from Figure 5, the source component of the SPG schema is
bounded with region A of the Boundary schema, i.e. the place where the
source & region A
path
goal & region B
boundary
Figure 5.Schematic representation of an entering event
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translational motion starts from is linked to the area outside the landmark.15
The goal is bounded with region B, i.e. the place where the translational motion
ends at is linked to the area inside the landmark. Finally, path and boundary are
not bounded because the path is the whole trajectory from the source to the goal,
and the boundary only the point at which the trajector enters the landmark.
Image schemas are also a useful tool for the explanation of the semantic
content of prepositions. In traditional accounts of Spanish prepositions, a
expresses motion towards a limit, and en rest, location. In terms of image
schemas, the dynamic meaning a is captured by the semantic component of
goal of the SPG schema; the static meaning of en, on the other hand, by the
semantic component of region A of the Boundary schema.
Talmy’s ‘force dynamics’ deals with the issue of “how entities interact with
respect to force [in such different situations as] the exertion of force, resistance
to such exertion and the overcoming of such resistance, blockage of a force and
the removal of such blockage” (1988: 49). According to this author, force
dynamics can explain not only causative notions in linguistic analysis but also
fundamental areas such as modality. He further argues that there is a parallelism
between how the linguistic system is understood and how force interaction is
related to other cognitive domains. In other words, how we use linguistic
expressions which show this notion of force dynamics is grounded in the way
we experience force interaction in everyday experience. For the analysis of force
dynamics, Talmy offers four basic notions and distinctions with a graphical
representation as shown in Table 1.
These distinctions are: (i) ‘force entities’: the ‘agonist’ is the focal force
entity, and the ‘antagonist’ is the element that opposes it,16 (ii) ‘intrinsic force
tendency’, whether the entity has an intrinsic tendency to exert force, and
whether this tendency is towards motion or rest (action or inaction), (iii)
‘balance of strengths’, one entity is able to manifest its force because its opponent is weaker, and (iv) ‘resultant of the force interaction’, whether the result of
the opposing forces is action or inaction. Although Talmy’s model for the
analysis of force dynamics is much more detailed and complex than what we
have presented here, these are the basic concepts needed for describing steady-state
force-dynamic patterns, and for the analysis of entering events in this paper.
Finally, the last theoretical tool that we will be using for this analysis is
Langacker’s concept of ‘profiling’. He defines a ‘profile’ as “the entity designated by a semantic structure. It […] functions as the focal point within the
objective scene, and achieves a special degree of prominence (resulting in one
level of figure/ground organisation)” (1987: 490). This notion of profiling is
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Force entities
Agonist (ago):
Antagonist (ant):
Intrinsic force tendency
Toward action:
>
Toward rest:
Balance of strengths
The stronger entity:
+
The weaker entity:
Resultant of the force interaction
Action:
Rest:
Table 1.Force dynamic notions
fundamental in the characterisation of the three sets. As we will see later, there
are cases where neither image schemas nor force dynamics can capture the
differences among these sets by themselves. It is only by means of profiling that
we are able to really understand the fine-grained differences. Following
Langacker, the profiled element will be represented in bold lines.
Once we have introduced the main theoretical tools that we will be using in
our analysis of Spanish entering events, let us start with the discussion of our
proposal for the distribution of the two constructions, entrar en and entrar a, in
the three entering situations.
1.3 Situation A and two possible contructions: entrar en and entrar a.
Situation A refers to the entering event where the square on the right moves 10
cm. to the left so that the square ends up inside the triangle. For this Situation
A, we proposed two different constructions, one with entrar en and one with
entrar a. But why is it possible to use two different constructions for the same
type of entering situation?
In order to answer this question, we need to focus our attention on the
nature of the boundary crossing itself. That is, we need to carefully analyse how
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the trajector, the square in this case, enters inside the landmark, the triangle,
and how much and what type of force is involved in this entering situation. In
our opinion, there are two possibilities:
i.
One where the boundary crossing is ‘smooth’, that is to say, the square
moves left towards the triangle and enters it without finding too much
resistance on the triangle’s part or without imposing too much force on the
triangle. The square (trajector) and the triangle (landmark) hold a ‘neutral
force dynamic relation’, i.e. the trajector smoothly enters the landmark
without the need of an extra amount of force on any part.
ii. One where the boundary crossing implies the exertion of an extra force
from the participants. On entering the triangle, the square finds an opposing force in the triangle, and therefore, it has to exert some extra force in
order to be able to enter it. In other words, the triangle (landmark) shows
some extra resistance to the trajector’s entering — what we could call a
‘negative force dynamic relation’-, and the square (trajector) needs some
extra force for entering the landmark — a ‘positive force dynamic relation’.
In Spanish, these two possibilities are overly expressed by different constructions. The entrar en construction conveys the first possibility, the ‘neutral force
dynamic relation’. The entrar a construction, on the other hand, the second
one, the ‘positive/negative force dynamic relation’.
Therefore, it seems that the crucial factor in the conceptualisation of
entering events in Spanish is not that the square moves and enters the circle
(like in English), or that the square is located at a different place at a different
time (like in Japanese), but the way in which the entering takes place, the
amount of force and resistance that each of the entities involved in the entering
event exerts to carry out the entering.
In Langacker’s terms, we could say that what seems to be profiled in an
entering event in Spanish is just the entering moment itself, the boundary
crossing, and how it has happened, rather than the motion process or the
discrete change of location. Furthermore, we argue that the default construction
for an entering event in Spanish is that overtly expressed by the entrar en
construction, where the entering moment does not require an extra-effort on
any of the entities’ part. The entrar a construction, however, is the overt
realisation of those cases when the entering has not been accomplished in the
default way, that is, when it needed some extra-force on both sides. In these
cases, the entity that causes the entering, the one who exerts more positive/
negative force is profiled too.
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The two possible interpretations in Situation A can be schematically
represented following Talmy’s model as in Figure 6 (a,b).
In sum, Situation A in both constructions represents an entering event
where the trajector, the square, moves left towards the landmark, the triangle,
until the trajector enters the landmark. This translational movement into the
landmark was explained in terms of SPG and BND image schemas in Section 1.2 and schematised in Figure 5. In Figure 6, the square plays the role of the
‘Agonist’ (the focal force entity represented by a circle) and the triangle, that of
the ‘Antagonist’ (the opposed force entity represented by a hexagon). The
difference between the constructions entrar en and entrar a, as schematically
represented in Figure 6a and Figure 6b respectively, is twofold. First of all, we
see that both trajector (square) and landmark (triangle) are equally strong in
Figure 6a, whereas in Figure 6b, the trajector (square) is the strongest entity of
both, the one that exerts all the force needed to penetrate the landmark.
Secondly, the other difference lies in the opposition towards this penetration. In
Figure 6a, the landmark (triangle) does not show any opposition to this
penetration, whereas in Figure 6b, it does and it is a profiled feature of the
landmark, as represented by the ‘| |’ symbol.17
1.4 The entrar a construction in Situation A and Situation B.
We proposed that the construction entrar a could be applied to two different
situations: Situation A, where the square moves left to the interior of the triangle,
and Situation B, where the triangle moves right until the square ends up inside the
triangle. The fact that the same construction covers two different situations implies
that there are both similarities and differences between the two cases. The main
similarity is that both cases refer to an entering event with some force exertion and
some force opposition.18 However, these two cases differ in the roles that each of
the entities plays in the entering event as represented in Figure 7.
>
>
+
Situation A
Figure 6a: Situation A – entrar a
Figure 6.Situation A with entrar en/a
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Figure 6b: Situation A – entrar a
Entering in Spanish
>
+
Situation A
Figure 6b: Situation A – entrar a
>
+
Situation B
Figure 7a: Situation B – entrar a
Figure 7.Situation A and B with entrar a
As we can see from this schema, the roles of agonist and antagonist have
shifted.19 In Figure 6b, the agonist was the square and the antagonist the
triangle. In Figure 7a, on the contrary, the agonist is the triangle and the
antagonist the square. In the former, the square is the trajector that moves
towards the landmark (triangle), whereas in the latter, the triangle is the
trajector that moves towards the landmark, now the square. This role shifting
has important consequences for the nature of the entering event and the
exertion of force.
In Figure 6b, when the square moves left towards the triangle, it finds that
the triangle, a bigger entity in size, is exerting some resistance force against its
penetration. The square, however, is the strongest entity and therefore, it is able
to overcome the resistance force exerted by the triangle and penetrate the
triangle. In Figure 7a, the situation is different. This time the triangle is both the
biggest and the strongest entity, and as a consequence, the square enters the
triangle only because the latter provokes its penetration. This is a crucial
distinction between Situation A and Situation B, and it is reflected in the
different profiling of these elements as we can see in Figures 7. In Figure 6b, the
square (agonist) and the opposition (resistance force) from the triangle are
profiled, while in Figure 7a, the triangle (agonist) and the action that it provokes (translational motion plus entering) are. In other words, if we needed to
paraphrase both situations with a different expression that would capture these
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differences, Figure 6b would be described as something similar to The triangle
has been entered/penetrated by the square, while Figure 7a would be so as The
triangle made the square go inside itself/penetrate it.
1.5 The entrar en construction in Situation A and Situation C.
We proposed the construction entrar en for both Situation A and Situation C.
The main difference between these situations is the presence of motion in the
former and the lack of it in the latter. According to Kita, the possibility of using
the same verb hairu for describing these two situations was a proof for the
defeasibility of transition in Japanese. Since the same situation is also found in
Spanish, one could think that this is also the case in this language. However, this
is not right. The fact that these two situations can be linguistically expressed
with the same construction entrar en is a direct consequence of the polysemous
character of the verb entrar itself.
The construction entrar en in Situation A refers to an entering event that
entails a translational movement from a source through a boundary into the
inside of the goal, what we described in Section 1.2 in terms of SPG and BND
schemas. The same construction in Situation C, however, does not convey any
of these two schemas, or at least, not in the same physical way. The construction
entrar en in Situation C is equivalent to saying that ‘there is enough space in the
landmark so that the trajector can ‘fit’ inside’. The meaning of entrar does not
refer to the translational motion from source to goal, neither does it refer to the
physical crossing of a boundary in order to get to the goal. In this sentence,
entrar en has a locative meaning rather than a dynamic one. This implies that
only the semantic role region A of the Boundary image schema is activated.
Therefore, what we have in this case is simply a different type of verb class
conveyed by the same lexical item. Levin (1993), in her description of English
verb classes, classifies the verb enter in a similar context to the entrar en construction in Situation A as an inherently directed motion verb,20 whereas the
verb fit, which is similar to the entrar en construction in Situation C, as a
location subject alternation class of FIT verbs.21 We think the same type of
distinction applies in these two cases. In fact, most of the native speakers that
we asked about the construction entrar en in Situation A and Situation C
confirmed the static character of the latter and offered an alternative formulation of this situation with verbs such as caber ‘fit’.
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1.6 Wrapping up: some thoughts on the conceptualisation of Spanish
entering events.
As we said at the beginning of this section, the main goal of this first part was to
study how entering events are conceptualised in Spanish. Our starting point was
Kita’s previous study on entering in Japanese. We used his entering scenario
and applied it to Spanish in order to obtain some contrastive data. The analysis of
these data would help us formulating our own hypothesis in relation to two issues:
(i) the presence or lack of the semantic primitive of motion in entering events; (ii)
the characterisation of the conceptualisation of entering events in Spanish.
First of all, with respect to the defeasibility of transition in entering events,
we can state that Spanish does not support Kita’s findings in Japanese. As we
have seen in the above discussion, the semantic component/primitive of motion
seems to take part in the conceptualisation of entering events in Spanish. The
fact that the same entrar verb can be also used for the description of a nondynamic event as in Situation C does not respond to the lack of this semantic
component, but to the polysemous nature of the verb itself. The verb entrar has
a dynamic, possibly central sense, i.e. inward motion; as well as a static, less
prototypical sense, i.e. to fit, to be of the correct size and shape for one object to
be placed inside another.
In relation to the second issue, we can conclude that Spanish entering
events do depict a motion process from one point into another with a boundary
crossing involved, but that key factors in this conceptualisation are the nature
of the boundary crossing itself and the force dynamic relationship between the
entities that take part in the entering event.22 Spanish distinguishes between a
‘neutral force dynamic relation’, where neither of the entities in the event needs
an extra force, and a ‘positive/negative force dynamic relation’, where one of the
entities exerts a higher degree of extra force/resistance. This distinction is
overtly expressed in the constructions entrar en and entrar a respectively. Force
dynamics is a useful tool for explaining not only the different interpretations in
Situation A, but also the reasons why some of the extended senses of the verb
entrar are construed with one preposition and not the other. Let us examine
some of these cases.
Three of the possible extended meanings of the verb entrar that we can find
in the Diccionario de la Lengua Española recently published by the Real Academia de la Lengua Española are the following:
a. ‘start getting acquainted with some knowledge or some practice’ as in (5),
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(5) No pude entrarle
a la lengua griega
neg could enter-it.dat to the language greek
‘I couldn’t get to grips with the Greek language’ (rae)
b. ‘be able to exert some influence on somebody’s mind’ as in (6),
(6) A Fulano no hay por
donde entrarle
to so-and-so neg thereis through where enter-he.dat
‘It’s impossible to exert some influence on so-and-so’ (rae)
c. ‘start feeling what the name refers to’ as in (7),
(7) Entrar en calor
enter in heat
‘To warm up’ (rae)
In the first two examples, (5) and (6), the verb entrar is used with the
prepostion a, and in the last one, (7), the verb entrar goes with the preposition
en. Unlike Situation A, these expressions require these specific prepositions; if
we alternate the preposition in these sentences they will be ungrammatical:
entrarle *en la lengua griega, entrarle *en Fulano, entrar *a calor.
If we did not include force dynamics as one of the main factors in the
conceptualisation of entering events in Spanish, we would not be able to explain
why the above mentioned expressions do not admit the other alternative
preposition. But thanks to the different force dynamic relationships that we
identified in the previous section, we can justify the use of a in (5) and (6), and
the use of en in (7).
According to our theory, sentences (5) and (6) require a because there is a
‘positive/negative force dynamic relation’ between the entities that participate
in the entering event. In (5), these entities are Greek and myself as a student of
this language. Entering is metaphorically understood as ‘to get to grips with
some knowledge’. Greek functions as the landmark and antagonist, and myself
as the trajector and agonist. In this entering event, I, as the trajector, would like
to enter the Greek language and for doing so, I exert some positive force on the
landmark-antagonist. Unfortunately, this is not an easy task. The Greek
language resists, exerts some negative force, and prevents me from entering. In
force dynamic terms, this means that in the balance of strengths, the antagonist
is more powerful than agonist. Greek exerts some negative force, this force is
more powerful than mine is and as a result I cannot enter. I cannot learn Greek.
It is important to notice that the balance of strengths directly depends on
the structure of the sentence in particular. In (5), the sentence is negative and
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that is why, we can say that the agonist’s negative force is stronger than the
antagonist’s. This is also the case in (6), where entering is metaphorically
understood as ‘influence somebody’s ideas.23 Here, the antagonist, Fulano, is
also more powerful than the agonist. But if we eliminate the negation particle
as in (8), the balance of strengths changes. That is to say, we will still have a
positive/negative force dynamic relation as in (5), but the result will change, the
agonist is stronger than the antagonist and consequently, it is able to enter.
(8) Al
final pude entrarle
a la lengua griega
to.the end could enter-it.dat to the language greek
‘In the end I was able to get to grips with the Greek language’ (rae)
The force dynamic relation in sentences (5), (6), and (8) is schematically
represented in Figure 8.
In Figure 8a, the strongest entity is the antagonist represented by the +
symbol, and the profiled information is its resistance (||). In Figure 8b, the
agonist is the strongest and the profiled information is the boundary crossing
itself (Æ). As we can see, these entities received different values and different
profilings but, in all cases, we deal with the same positive/negative force
dynamic relation. That is to say, there is always one entity that exerts a higher
degree of extra force/resistance.
In example (7) on the other hand, we have the verb entrar with the preposition en. Following our theory, this means that there is a ‘neutral force dynamic
relation’ between the entities that participate in the entering event. In (7), these
entities are the person/object that warms up, the agonist, and calor ‘heat’, the
antagonist.24 Entering is metaphorically understood as ‘start feeling
something’.25 The person that warms up is the agonist and trajector, and the
heat is the antagonist and landmark. The heat or the state of being warm is
understood as a location, and in order to reach that location, the agonisttrajector needs to move until it enters it. Unlike in previous examples, this
>
+
>
Figure 8a: Examples (5) and (6)
Figure 8.Force dynamics in (5), (6), and (8)
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Figure 8b: Example (8)
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entering is smooth; there is no need for an extra force or resistance on either of
the entities’ part. The important information in this sentence is not that the
antagonist has prevented the agonist from entering as in (5) and (6) or that the
agonist is stronger and therefore, it overcomes the antagonist’s resistance as in
(8). In (7), the profiled information is that there is a (metaphorically understood) translational movement from one location, a state where the agonisttrajector is not warm, to another location, a state where the agonist-trajector
warms up. This is why we have to use the verb entrar with the preposition en
instead of a.
2. A note on some other uses of the construction entrar en / a
One of the main reasons why the construction entrar en/a is so interesting from
a linguistic analysis viewpoint is its enormous versatility and ambiguity. So far
in Section 1, we have mainly talked about the conceptualisation of entering
events as construed in entrar en/a and the possible factors that play an important role in such a conceptualisation. In this section, we will focus on other
possible occurrences of this complex construction, and on the different semantic interpretations caused by the alternation between the prepositions a and en.
As we said in the Introduction, this alternation has been traditionally
explained in terms of diatopical preference. The preposition en is considered as
the default and normative choice, and the preposition a as the typical choice of
Spanish spoken in America and the Canary Islands. Some authors have also
pointed out that this alternation carries a slightly different connotation. The
preposition a highlights the dynamic character of motion in the entering event,
and the preposition en, on the other hand, the endpoint of motion, the limits
established by the place the movement is directed towards.
In the rest of the paper, I will show that that the semantic differences caused
by this alternation are not just restricted to either a higher or lesser degree of
dynamism or a specific dialectal area. We will argue that the choice of preposition triggers different semantic interpretations that can be explained with the
help of mechanisms such as metonymy, deixis, and scope. What I present next
does not aim at providing a full picture of how these semantic variations work and
how they are dialectally distributed26 but just as a guideline for future research.
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2.1 Metonymy and the construction entrar en/a.
Another situation where the verb entrar can be used with both prepositions en
and a27 is illustrated in sentences (9) and (10).
(9) Entro a la escuela a las 9.30
enter.1s to the school to the 9.30
‘I go to school at 9.30’
(10) Entro en la escuela a las 9.30
enter.1s in the school to the 9.30
‘I go into the school at 9.30’
As we can already see from the English translations of (9) and (10), each sentence
has a different interpretation. Whereas (9) refers to the activity that takes place at
school, (10) refers to the building itself. These subtle differences can be explained
in terms of the metonymy28 activity for place, where the prototypical activity
stands for the place in which it usually takes place. In sentence (9), the prototypical
activity of a school is understood as ‘studying, going to classes, etc.’; therefore, the
meaning inferred in (9) is that I start my classes at 9.30, not that I arrived at the
school at 9.30. The latter is the interpretation for (10). This type of metonymical
understanding of the construction entrar a is very common in those cases where
the goal of motion (the landmark) refers to a place which can be easily identified with the activity that takes place in it. For instance, la escuela can be
replaced by such places as la oficina ‘the office’, la fábrica ‘the factory’, el teatro
‘the theater’ or el cine ‘the cinema’ with the same type of interpretation.
A possible explanation for the activation of this metonymy in these cases
might be found in the use of the preposition a itself. This allative preposition,
as it is the case in a wide variety of languages (Kabata & Rice 2001, Rice &
Kabata 2002), not only expresses goal of motion (voy a casa ‘I go home’), but
also purpose (subí a coger un libro ‘I went upstairs to get a book’). My claim is
that when the preposition a co-occurs with goals that allow this type of
metonymical process, the purposive meaning of the preposition a pops up, so
that the meaning does no longer refer to a physical motion to the landmark, but
to a metaphorical understanding of purposes as destinations (Johnson
1987: 114–117, Lakoff & Johnson 1999, Lakoff & Turner 1989).29 This argument
also accounts for the lack of activation of this metonymy in sentences like (10).
The preposition en does not convey the same metaphorical meaning of
‘purpose’ as the preposition a does, but simply that of ‘location’. As a consequence, sentence (10) refers to the physical entering the landmark.
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2.2 Deixis and the construction entrar en/a30
In a motion event, deixis can be defined as the point from which motion is
perceived. Although authors such Talmy (2000) include deixis as a subpart of
the motion component of path, there are not many studies focusing on the
deictic component of prepositions and how this constraints and interacts with
the semantics and possibly, with the deictic component of a verb (or other cooccurring elements).
A possible exception is the work of Bretones, Cristóbal & Ibarretxe (in
press) in their analysis of the construction salir-de ‘go out of ’ in Spanish. These
authors claim that for very specific exiting events, those where the boundary
crossing takes place through a physical portal, there is a “deictic constraint that
requires the observer to be positioned in the zone towards which the path of
motion is directed”. It is on the basis of this constraint that Spanish native
speakers allow sentences such as Estaba esperándote cuando le vi salir de la puerta
‘I was waiting for you when I saw him coming out the door’, but not sentences
such as Estaba con Daniel en la habitación hasta que él salió de la puerta ‘I was in
the room with Daniel until he (Daniel) went out the door’, where the path of
motion followed by Daniel goes in the opposite direction with respect to the
viewer’s position.
In the case of the construction entrar en/a the deictic constraint seems to
work in a different way. Let us look at the following examples.
(11) Estaba trabajando (en mi habitacióni) cuando Pedro entró eni la
habitacióni
was.1s working (in my room) when Peter entered.3s in the room
‘I was working (in my room) when Peter came in’
(12) Estaba trabajando (en mi habitacióni) cuando Pedro entró
ak la
habitaciónk
was.1s working (in my room)
when Peter entered.3s to the
room
‘I was working (in my room) when Peter went in’
Both sentences describe almost the same simultaneous situation: I was in my
room, and while I was there, Peter entered a room. The difference lies in the
reference to the room.31 In (11), the room where I was and the one that Peter
entered refer to the same room, whereas in (12), on the other hand, they do not
refer to the same room, they are different. Since both sentences are almost
identical but for the preposition, it is quite plausible to argue that these deictic
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differences are triggered by the choice of en or a in each sentence. If we look at
examples like (13) and (14) below, the deictic restrictions that we notice for
(11) and (12) seem to be confirmed.
(13) Estaba trabajando en la biblioteca cuando Pedro entró alok / en? el baño
was.1s working in the library when Peter entered.3s to.the/ in the bathroom
‘I was working in the library when Peter entered the bathroom’32
(14) ¿Cuándo entraste enok / a? casa? No te
he
oído
when
entered.2s in
to house no you.acc have.1s heard
‘When did you enter the house? I didn’t hear you’
In sentence (13), both subjects are supposed to be in different places, I was in
the library and Peter was in the bathroom. Since these two places are different,
the use of the preposition en seems to be odd, whereas a sounds fine. Notice
that the English translation when Peter came in the bathroom would be inappropriate for this situation. This will imply that I was in the bathroom, but we said
that I was in the library. The appropriate translation has to be when Peter went
(in)to the bathroom.
The opposite case occurs in (14), the sentence presupposes that I was inside
the house when the other person entered it. That is why, the use of en is correct,
but not that of a. Here again, the English translation would require the use of the
deictic verb come rather than go (when did you come in? vs. when did you go in?).
2.3 Scope and the construction entrar en/a.
The last set of examples that I will examine is one that seems to take into
account what Langacker (1999: 49) has called ‘an expression’s scope’, i.e. “the
array of conceptual content that [the expression] evokes and relies upon for its
characterisation”. Two points are fundamental in the notion of scope: (i) the
activated conception of the expression, and (ii) the portion of that conception
that comes into play.
Based on this definition, I will argue that the expression’s scope activated in
the following examples is the same, but that the portion that comes into play in
each of them is different. This difference is triggered by the choice of a different
preposition, a or en. Let us examine these examples.
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(15) Estaba yo esperando al
tren, cuando vi
que entraba
en la
estación
was.1s I waiting to.the train when saw.1s that come.imp.3s in the
station
‘I was waiting for the train when I saw that he entered the station’
(16) Estaba yo esperando al
tren, cuando vi
que entraba
a la
estación
was.1s I waiting to.the train when saw.1s that come.imp.3s to the
station
‘I was waiting for the train when I saw that he entered the station’
In both examples, the setting is the same. I am waiting for the train inside the
station, when somebody I know also enters the station. These examples are
different from those analysed in the previous section because now both the
deictic center (I) and the person that moves (trajector) are in the same space.
Remember that in (13) and (14), the preposition indicated whether the deictic
center and the trajector were located in different spaces or not.
According to Langacker’s theory of scope, these two expressions share what he
calls the ‘expression’s maximal scope’ (MS), i.e. the full range of contexts evoked
by the expression. In other words, the whole station where I (‘the conceptualiser’)
wait and wherein the other person goes. However, I argue that what these expressions do not share is the ‘immediate scope’ (IS) or “those facets of the maximal
scope that figure most directly in the characterisation of the profiled entity”
(1999:49). That is to say, these two sentences seem to profile different regions
within the station through the use of the preposition a or en, or as Langacker
would put it, the ‘onstage’33 region for these sentences is different. These differences in the expression’s scope are represented in Figure 9, maximal scope is represented with a fine line, and immediate scope with bold line and filled in area.
In (15), I, the person waiting for the train sees the whole of the station as its
focal area, and therefore, when the other person enters, I conceptualise his
entering as if he is coming to the same place where I am. In (16) on the other
hand, I do not consider that the person that enters the station is coming into the
same area where I am waiting for the train.34 Overtly in the expression, the place
where I am and where he comes in is the same, i.e. the station. However, the use
of either en or a in these two sentences triggers a different interpretation. In
Langacker’s terms, sentence (15) considers all of the expression’s maximal scope
as equal to the expression’s immediate scope, while sentence (16), the maximal
and immediate scope do not coincide.
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Figure 9.Maximum and Immediate scope in entrar en/a
3. Conclusions
This paper has analysed how Spanish understands entering events construed
with the verb entrar ‘enter’ together with either the preposition en (locative) or the
preposition a (allative). Three are the main arguments put forward in this paper:
i.
an entering event in Spanish is conceptualised as a translational motion
process with a boundary crossing involved. Key factors in this conceptualisation are the nature of the boundary crossing itself and the force dynamic
relationship between the entities that take part in the entering event,
ii. the choice of a preposition triggers a different interpretation of what
superficially seems the same entering event,
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iii. different cognitive mechanisms play an important role in the choice of these
interpretations not just with different prepositions but also within one
preposition (force dynamics, image schemas, metonymy, deixis, and scope).
In the first part, we focused our study on the conceptualisation of Spanish entering
events. On the basis of the data obtained from Kita’s entering scenario, we claimed
that Spanish distinguishes between a ‘neutral force dynamic relation’, where
neither of the entities in the event needs an extra force, and a ‘positive/negative
force dynamic relation’, where one of the entities exerts a higher degree of extra
force/resistance. This distinction is overtly expressed in the constructions entrar en
and entrar a respectively. Consequently, we argued that the choice of a different
construction carries a different conceptualisation of an entering event. When
we use the construction entrar en, we profile the translational motion into a
place (e.g. entrar en calor ‘to warm up’). When we employ the construction
entrar a, we profile the extra effort that it took the participating entities to either
avoid or obtain the entering (e.g. entrarle al griego ‘to get the grips with Greek’)
We also showed that the motion semantic primitive is always present in
Spanish entering events. Similarly to Japanese hairu events, the verb entrar can
also be used to describe situations where motion is not implied (Situation C).
However, we argued that, unlike Kita’s claim for Japanese, this is not due to the
defeasibility of this component but to the polysemous nature of the Spanish
verb entrar. This verb conveys a dynamic sense, i.e. translational motion from
one place into another, and a static sense, i.e. to fit. Spanish, therefore, does not
comply with Kita’s discrete change of location theory.
The second part of this paper was devoted to some other cases where the
choice of the preposition is also decisive for the creation of different interpretations. I have examined just three of those cases. In the first one, the preposition
a selects a metonymical interpretation of the landmark, not as the physical place
it refers to but as the activity that prototypically takes place in it. This
metonymical reading is not present in the case of the preposition en. This
interpretation in the entrar a construction is probably due to the metaphorical
semantic extension of the preposition a from allative to purposive.
In the second case, the choice of a and en triggers a deictic interpretation of
the entering event. With the preposition en, it is understood that the deictic
centre and the trajector are both situated in the same landmark; with the
preposition a, deictic centre and trajector are located at different landmarks.
Finally, in the third case, both the deictic centre and trajector are in the
same landmark but the choice of the preposition seems to cause a difference in
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what the deictic centre considers as its general focus of attention, i.e. ‘onstage’
region. In the entrar en construction, the maximal scope and the immediate
scope of the expression are the same onstage region; that is, the place where the
deictic centre and the trajector are located are conceptualised as within the same
focus of attention. In the entrar a construction, they are not. The immediate
scope is a region that does not include the area where the trajector is located.
In these two cases, the preposition a seems to infer a more detached
relationship between the deictic center and the trajector, rather than an
inclusive and more involved one in the case of en.
In this paper, we have analysed in more or less detail some of the possible
occurrences with the construction entrar en/a in Spanish entering events.
Although the constraints and interpretations that we describe in this paper seem
to work well for these specific scenarios, this description is far from complete.
There are still many questions and cases where the explanations offered here may
not apply to, or at least, where the subtle differences pointed out might be blurred.
We cannot forget that this work is only based on one prototypical entering
verb, entrar. This study should be therefore expanded to other inward motion
verbs such as penetrar ‘penetrate’, meter ‘put into’, insertar ‘insert’, and so on.
It is only in this way that we will be able to confirm that the key factors and
characteristics that we have proposed in this paper are really those participating
in the conceptualisation of entering events in Spanish.
Another issue that requires a deeper study is the dialectal status of the
alternation between a and en with inward motion verbs. Our data already shows
that this alternation has a wider dialectal scope (Northern Spain) than it is
traditionally recognised. Furthermore, these data contradict the idea that the
choice of a and en is based on dialectal preference. As we have argued, the use
of one preposition or the other triggers several different semantic interpretations. These facts need further confirmation with data from other Spanish
speaking areas.
In conclusion, what we have presented in this paper is just the tip of the
iceberg, a first characterisation of entering events in Spanish and a starting
point for future analyses in this area.
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Notes
*Research for this paper has been funded by Grant BFI01.429.E from the Basque Country
Government’s Department of Education, Universities, and Research. Special thanks to Dan
Slobin and Sotaro Kita. I would also like to acknowledge the support I received at the Max
Plank Institut für Psycholinguistik, Nijmegen (especially Stephen Levinson).
1. In Kita’s study, transition is understood as translational motion from one point to
another. The term ‘transition’, therefore, presupposes two of the semantic primitives of
motion, the motion component itself and the path.
2. In this paper we focus only on the verb entrar, but the alternation between these two
prepositions applies to the whole semantic field of ‘motion to(ward) the interior of
something’ verbs, e.g. meter ‘put into’, introducir ‘insert’ and so on.
3. I use the term ‘connotation’ here in order to be neutral or loyal to the linguistic background of these authors. As we will see later in our own analysis, we prefer to deal with this
‘connotation’ in terms of Langacker’s concept of ‘profiling’.
4. Kita’s study not only concerns entering events but also exiting events with deru verbs.
Since this paper deals with entering events in Spanish, we will only focus on Kita’s work in
the former.
5. Talmy, for instance, proposes that a motion event consists of internal components, Figure,
Ground, Motion, Path, and external components, Cause and Manner.
6. ‘Artificial’ in the sense that it is not very common to find a circle entering a square
(geometric figures) in real linguistic usage. However, we cannot forget that in this section we
are discussing the very nature of an entering event, and this is why we need to use ‘neutral’
sentences where neither the semantic content of the trajector and landmark nor the speaker’s
experience and cultural background can have an influence on the interpretation of the
sentence. Geometric figures are typical objects in psycholinguistic experiments, and in this
paper, both the circle and the square must be understood as ‘neutral’ entities playing the role
of trajector and landmark.
7. As we will explain in the following section, we have slightly adapted Kita’s materials for a
better and clearer exposition and understanding of these issues.
8. Mostly from the Basque Country, and La Rioja.
9. I would like to thank an anonymous reviewer for this suggestion.
10. The reader should bear in mind that the sentences that we propose in (3) and (4) are the
two possibilities that the verb entrar provides us with for the description of these situations.
This does not mean that these two particular sentences are the only possibilities that we have
in Spanish in order to talk about these situations. There are indeed more choices, even with
other inward motion verbs like meter ‘put in’, but these are not the object of study in this
paper, and therefore, they remain outside its scope.
11. As we will see later, the choice of the preposition a and en with the verb entrar shows a
diatopic preference. This is why, it is important to point out that the acceptability of this
sentence may be subjected to regional use.
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12. This type of construction with a dative pronoun in directional motion events has been
preliminarily analysed by Bretones & Robles (2002) in terms of blending and conceptual
integration (Fauconnier & Turner 1998, 2002). These authors argue that in cases where the
destination is construed with a, the destination becomes personified as a participating agent,
whereas in those with the preposition en it remains a conventional destination. Furthermore,
they claim that the a construction “increases the emotional involvement of the relation
between agent and recipient by personifying the recipient and integrating it as a participant
in the scene, [whereas the en construction] expresses detachment by increasing the distance
between agent and recipient, who now lies outside the scene”. In this paper, I will argue that
the ‘involvement’ that these authors classified as ‘emotional’ corresponds to a force dynamic
relation between the entity that moves and the entity that stays still.
13. All the examples discussed in Section 1 comply with this constraint, therefore, when I
refer to the entrar a construction I assume that it is entrar a plus the dative pronoun. This is
not the case in some of the other sentences discussed below, where a seems to cover other
meanings such as purpose, a common semantic development in allatives (Kabata & Rice
2001; Rice & Kabata 2002). In these cases, the construction entrar a refers, unless indicated,
just to the entrar a without the dative pronoun.
14. In previous work on polysemy, we have called this interaction ‘compositional polysemy’,
i.e. different polysemes of a lexical item are obtained through the interaction of the semantic
content of both the lexical item itself and its different co-occurring elements in different
degrees of compositionality (Ibarretxe-Antuñano 1999, under review).
15. According to Langacker (1987) there are two elements in a relationship: ‘trajector’ the
more highly profiled participant in a relation, and ‘landmark’ a salient but less highly profiled
entity in a relation. In the case of motion events, the landmark usually provides a point of
reference for locating the trajector, and the trajector is the moving entity.
16. According to Talmy (1988: 50), the issue at stake in the agonist case is whether it is
capable of manifesting its force tendency or on the contrary, it is overcome. The antagonist,
on the other hand, is taken into account for the effect that it has on the first, whether it
overcomes it or not.
17. This is a modification on Talmy’s model. As we said before, we only use the basics of this
system to represent these subtle differences in Spanish, it is not my intention to apply his
model accurately to these constructions.
18. This implies that the same explanation in terms of SPG and BDN schemas also applies in
Situation B.
19. This role shifting is graphically represented in the linear order of the agonist and
antagonist.
20. Levin defines the meaning of these verbs as “a specification of the directed motion, even
in the absence of an overt directional complement” (1993:263). Other authors such as Talmy
(1985, 1991, 2000) have called these verbs ‘path verbs’, since they conflate in the same lexical
item semantic components of the motion event: motion and path. This type of conflation
pattern in typical of verb-framed languages, a group which Spanish belongs to.
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21. These are defined as those which “are used with location subjects to describe the capacity
of the location with respect to the action named by the verb” (Levin 1993: 82).
22. When we say that force dynamics is a key factor in the conceptualisation of entering
events in Spanish, we do not mean that force dynamics does not play a role in the
conceptualisation of these events in other languages, it probably does. What we would really
like to emphasise is the fact that, unlike in other languages (Japanese and English in this
paper), force dynamic distinctions are lexicalised in Spanish via different constructions,
entrar en and entrar a.
23. Fulano is metonymically understood as his mind, his ideas in this case. This can be
considered an example of the metonymy person for ideas.
24. Apart from calor ‘heat’, the RAE also offers other examples with different antagonists
entrar en cuidado ‘care’, entrar en recelo ‘distrust’, entrar en deseo ‘desire’.
25. This metaphorical meaning could be explained in terms of conceptual metaphors such
as states are locations (being cold, being warm), changes are movements (in order to
warm up we need to move), and changing a state is entering a location (I’m warming
up _ I’m moving from the cold state into a warm state). Unfortunately, a more detailed
analysis of these issues falls outside the scope of this paper. The interested reader may consult
the work of Lakoff & Johnson (1980, 1999) where these metaphors are explained in greater
detail.
26. Remember that the data in this paper has been tested with Spanish speakers from
Northern Spain. We will need a more thorough dialectal study of these semantic interpretations in order to firmly state that the choice of a and en is not just a question of diatopical
distribution but a standard strategy to convey different meanings. Nevertheless, the data that
we present in this paper seem to favour this second view.
27. In this set of examples, the construction entrar a does not allow the use of the dative
pronoun. This is explained by the lack of a force-dynamic relationship between the landmark
and trajector in the sense exposed in Section 1.
28. The role of metonymy in the description of the semantic extensions in prepositions has
been discussed, if not as often as that of metaphor, in the Cognitive Linguistics framework
by authors such as Cuyckens (2002).
29. For more information on metonymical and metaphorical processes see Barcelona 2000,
Panther & Radden 1999.
30. I would like to thank Dan Slobin for drawing my attention to the phenomenon discussed
in this section.
31. Notice that the translations into English require the use of a deictic verb come in (11) but
go in (12).
32. Notice here again, that the English translation when Peter came in the bathroom would be
inappropriate for this situation. This will imply that I was in the bathroom, but we said that
I was in the library. The appropriate translation has to be when Peter went (in)to the
bathroom.
33. The ‘onstage’ region refers to objectively construed entities within the locus of viewing
attention (Langacker 1990).
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Entering in Spanish
34. Notice here again, that the English translation would be when I saw him coming into the
station for (11), and when I saw him going into the station for (12).
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Author’s address
Current Address
Universidad de Deusto — Deustuko Unibertsitatea
Facultad de Filosofía y Letras.
Sección de Filología Inglesa.
Apartado 1.
E-48080 Bilbao. Bizkaia.
Fax: +34 94 413 90 87
Email: [email protected]
About the author
Dr. Iraide Ibarretxe-Antuñano received her PhD in Linguistics from the University of
Edinburgh, United Kingdom. She is currently a Research Fellow in the English Department
at the University of Deusto, Spain, and a part-time Assistant Professor in the Linguistics Unit
at the University of the Basque Country, Spain. Her main research interests include
Cognitive Linguistics, Pragmatics, Cognitive Science, Language Typology, and Basque
Language. She is especially interested in issues related to cross-linguistic polysemy, semantic
change, semantic typology, metaphor and metonymy.
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