Modification

Abstract

This chapter explores issues in the syntax and semantics of modification. The main focus is on adjectival modification, since the syntax and semantics of adjectives is fairly complex and illustrates many key issues. Section 13.1 provides an overview of the syntax of adjectival modification, Section 13.2 discusses three semantic classes of adjectives and how their meanings are represented, and Section 13.3 discusses adjectival modification at the syntax-semantics interface within the glue approach introduced in Chapter 8. Section 13.4 addresses problems in defining the semantic contribution of modifiers, which have a straightforward solution within our framework. The chapter concludes with a brief examination of the syntax and semantics of adverbial modification: Section 13.5 discusses the syntax and semantics of manner adverbs and sentential adverbs.