Among the 310 occurrences in the corpus of light verb dar + Ns morphologically related to a V5, we found 116 different combinations. Most of them have a corresponding transitive main verb (258/310, i.e., 83,2%), as in (7a) and (8–9), respectively dar emprego lit. ‘to give employment’ / empregar ‘to employ’, dar educação lit. ‘to give education’ / educar ‘to educate’, dar indemnização lit. ‘to give compensation’ / indemnizar ‘to compensate’, dar encorajamento lit. ‘to give encouragement’ / encorajar ‘to encourage’, dar fervura lit. ‘to give boil’ / ferver ‘to boil’. But we also found a few instances in the corpus which involve Ns that are derived from unergative verbs, such as dar um grito lit. ‘to give a scream’ / gritar ‘to scream’ (10/310, i.e., 3,2%) (cf. (7b)). In our analysis, these combinations of dar + event N bear an event reading.

In what concerns the internal structure of the Theme DP, we have found many occurrences of bare nouns (125/310 occurrences, i.e., 40,3%) (see (7a–9a)), which are almost exclusively singular, along with Ns preceded by indefinite articles (99/310 occurrences, i.e., 31,9%) (see (7b–9b)). These occurrences correspond to 72,3% of the total analyzed with Ns morphological related to Vs. The use of definite articles, possessive pronouns, demonstratives, numerals, and quantifiers, although available, has low frequencies in complex predicates with the light verb dar in the corpus (86/310 occurrences, i.e., 27,7%) (see (10)).

As mentioned in section 1, according to Grimshaw (1990), Ns morphologically related to Vs have two readings: the event reading and the result reading. In fact, data from the AVPs show that Ns morphologically related to Vs that combine with the light verb dar do not always have an exclusive event reading, as in (7–10). The corpus also exhibits combinations of dar with Ns morphologically related to Vs that can show a double semantic interpretation of event-result (11), and denote states (12).

In fact, combinations such as (11) may be interpreted as alimentar ‘to feed’, medicar ‘to medicate’, sustentar ‘to sustain’ and, in this case, they favor the event interpretation, but they also have the meaning of ’to give (some) food’, to give (some) medication’, ‘to give (some) sustenance’, which favor the result reading. Moreover, Portuguese has “short” alternatives to some of these nouns, the so-called post-verbal nouns / “regressive” nouns, formed by conversion (see alimento vs. alimentação ‘food’), which contributes to the view that these Ns indeed may have in the corpus an event/result reading. Moreover, there are also predicates such as dar ânimo lit. ‘to give encouragement’, dar motivação lit. ‘to give motivation’, dar conforto lit. ‘to give comfort’, in which dar combines with psychological state Ns: the IO is modified by the action expressed by the V. Therefore, we must conclude that, when dar combines with Ns morphologically related to a V in our data, the complex predicate can either have an exclusive event reading or, instead, a double event-result reading.

Data corresponding to complex predicates with Ns morphologically related to Vs but whose meaning cannot be obtained from it (42/310, i.e., 13,5%) are illustrated in (13), respectively dar queda lit. ‘to give drop’, dar medo lit ‘to give fear’, and dar vómitos lit. ‘to give vomits’.

In fact, although the verbs cair ‘to fall’, amedrontar ‘to frighten’, and vomitar ‘to throw up’ do exist in Portuguese, they cannot be used as corresponding transitive main verbs to the combinations presented above. Therefore, we will argue that, in structures such as (13), which do not encode a transference meaning, dar bears a causative meaning, an issue to which we will return to in the next section.

In Table 1 above, it was shown that the corpus exhibits 10,3% (42/407) of occurrences of light verb dar + Ns morphologically related to ADJs and Ns (respectively 7,6% and 2,7%), corresponding to a total of 16 different combinations. Similarly to most Ns we discussed so far, the majority of the complex predicates with denominal and deadjectival Ns we analyzed can be paraphrased by a main verb. See (14), for complex predicates with deadjetival Ns, respectively dar prioridade lit. ‘to give priority’ / priorizar ‘to prioritise’, dar autonomia lit. ‘to give autonomy’ / autonomizar ‘to autonomise’, and dar continuidade lit. ‘to give continuity’ / continuar ‘to continue’. For complex predicates with denominal Ns, consider the examples presented in (15), respectively dar uma bofetada lit. ‘to give a slap’ / esbofetear ‘to slap’, dar uma cabeçada ‘to give a headbutt’ / cabecear ‘to headbutt’6, and dar uma chicotada lit. ‘to give a whip’ / chicotear ‘to whip’.

Rio-Torto et al. (2013, p. 124) show that Portuguese deadjectival nouns denoting properties and states are typically abstract nouns; they occur in the singular, and they do not admit pluralization nor qualification. Indeed, deadjectival Ns in the corpus, denoting properties, and states, occur almost exclusively in the singular and are mainly formed with the suffix -idade.

Denominal nouns represent an heterogenous class, with several readings: “event, individual, local, cause/source, result, product), [that] partially coincide with the ones that characterize deverbal nouns (…)” (Rio-Torto et al., 2013, p. 131, our translation). As illustrated in (15), denominal roots in our corpus are exclusively hit and impact Ns, which are formed with the suffix -ada, which has the meaning of an event realized with the body-part or the object that the root designates (Rio-Torto et al. 2013, p. 146), respectively, cabeça ‘head’, chicote ‘whip’ and batuque ‘drumming’.7 Therefore, the Theme of the complex predicate involves a noun which, again, has a reading with a certain degree of concreteness.8

The internal structure of the Theme DP is mainly that of a bare noun (21/42 occurrences) or a noun with an indefinite article (15/42 occurrences) (cf. (16a), (16c) vs. (16b)). These occurrences correspond to 85,7% of the total analyzed with Ns morphologically related to ADJs and Ns. The use of definite articles, demonstratives, numerals, and quantifiers with these types of N in complex predicates with dar is uncommon in our data (6/42 occurrences) (see (15a) and (16)).

Predicates involving Ns that are morphologically related to ADJs are not uniform in their semantic reading. While it is true that they mainly encode an event reading (see (14–15)), it is also true that the corpus exhibits structures as those exhibited in (17) below, in which Ns encode a stative meaning. In these cases, they can be paraphrased by a main verb: dar bebedeira lit. ‘to give drunkenness’ / embebedar-se ‘to get drunk’, dar tristeza lit. ‘to give sadness’ / entristecer ‘to sadden’, and dar fraqueza lit. ‘to give weakness’ / enfraquecer ‘to weaken’.

Moreover, while one can argue that predicates of the type illustrated in (7–10) and (14–16) encode a transference meaning, independently of the degree of abstractness/concreteness, this is not true when we aim to characterize predicates such as (13) and (17). In fact, these predicates involve Ns of psychological/physical sensations, whose meaning are reminiscent of causative structures.

The 55 occurrences in the corpus of complex predicates with dar and underived Ns correspond to 15 different combinations, such as dar fome lit. ‘to give hunger’, dar indigestão lit. ‘to give indigestion’, and dar dores lit. ‘to give pain’, illustrated below.

An immediate conclusion that can be drawn from the complex predicates with underived Ns, in comparison with those discussed so far, is that they typically do not have a main verb that can paraphrase its meaning. Although Vs such as esfomear ‘to starve’, and doer ‘to hurt’ exist in Portuguese, they do not capture the meaning of the examples presented in (18a) and (18c), for instance. Moreover, there is no main verb corresponding to the complex predicate in (18b).

Note that these structures involving Ns of physical sensations, which mainly occur as bare nouns (33/55 occurrences, i.e., 54,5%), are like the ones in (13) and (17), showing that causative structures with dar can occur independently of the morphological category of the N, i.e., we found evidence that they can occur with both derived and underived Ns.

As we have been showing, bare nouns are very common in the corpus we analyzed. However, this is a property of complex predicates in general, and cannot be taken as a specific property of DPs in AVPs. In section 3.2., however, we will focus on properties of complex predicates in AVPs that are not convergent with EP grammar, arguing that the observed microvariation can be explained through the predicates’ semantic features.

Butt (2010, p. 49) states that “the term complex predicate is used to designate a construction that involves two or more predicational elements (such as nouns, verbs, and adjectives) which predicate as a single unit, i.e., their arguments map onto a monoclausal syntactic structure.” The analysis developed so far lead us to conclude that the predicative Ns that form light verb combinations with dar, i.e., complex predicates, are much more diversified than what is generally assumed in the literature.9

It is widely discussed in the literature that light verb dar can combine with Ns morphologically related to Vs, which are event nouns in the sense of Grimshaw (1990) (e.g., dar emprego lit. ‘to give employment’, dar educação lit. ‘to give education’, dar encorajamento lit. ‘to give encouragement’). However, as shown above, it can also combine with denominal Ns, meaning an event realized with the body-part or the object that the root designates (e.g., dar uma bofetada lit ‘to give a slap’, dar uma cabeçada lit. ‘to give a headbutt’, dar uma chicotada lit. ‘to give a whip’), as well as with deadjectival Ns, acquiring a reading close to what Duarte & Batoréo (2004) classify as a “change of state” (e.g., dar prioridade lit. ‘to give priority’, dar autonomia lit. ‘to give autonomy’, dar continuidade lit. ‘to give continuity’). Further, as we have seen, dar also has a causative reading, irrespectively of whether the N is related to a V, an ADJ, or an underived N, as in dar medo lit ‘to give fear’, dar fraqueza lit. ‘to give weakness’, and dar fome lit. ‘to give hunger’. Next, we will discuss that the different types of combinations allowed with the light verb dar can be better understood if one uses passivization as a syntactic test to understand the syntactic and semantic features of the complex predicate.10

On the one hand, we found that there are predicates whose meaning may be obtained from an eventive passive, formed with the verb ser ‘to be’ + the past participle of the V that paraphrases the predicate. Note that the eventive passive is allowed independently of whether the N that occurs in the complex predicate is morphologically related to V (as in combinations such as dar emprego lit. ‘to give employment’, dar educação lit. ‘to give education’; dar encorajamento lit. ‘to give encouragement’), an ADJ (as in combinations such as dar prioridade lit. ‘to give priority’, dar autonomia lit. ‘to give autonomy’, dar continuidade lit. ‘to give continuity’) or a N (as in combinations such as dar uma bofetada lit. ‘to give a slap’, dar uma cabeçada ‘to give a headbutt’, and dar uma chicotada lit. ‘to give a whip’). We will classify these sorts of combinations as instances of transferential event complex predicates.

On the other hand, we have also seen that dar combines with Ns with a double semantic interpretation, a hybrid reading between an event and a result, sometimes even almost a concrete entity (e.g., dar alimentação lit. ‘to give food’, dar medicação lit. ‘to give a medicine’, and dar sustento lit. ‘to give sustenance’), as well as predicates with abstract Ns, close to psychological mental states (e.g., dar ânimo lit. to give encouragement’, dar conforto lit. ‘to give comfort’, dar motivação lit. ‘to give motivation’). In those cases, both eventive and resultative passives can be obtained. Those passives can, therefore, be formed by the verb ser ‘to be’ or the verb ficar ‘to stay’ + the past participle of the V that paraphrases the complex predicate. We will classify these sorts of combinations as instances of transferential event-result complex predicates.

Finally, we have shown that light verb dar is even able to combine with Ns that encode physical (e.g., dar dores lit. ‘to give pain’, dar fraqueza lit. ‘to give weakness’, dar vómitos lit. ‘to give vomits’), and psychological sensations (e.g., dar medo lit. ‘to give fear’, dar tristeza lit. ‘to give sadness’). In these cases, the meaning of the complex predicate typically cannot be captured by a corresponding main V; and sometimes there is no corresponding verb at all. These are, therefore, instances of a subtype of dar, which have lost their transference meaning and acquired a causative reading.11 With these predicates, only a resultative passive or a predicate construction with the preposition com ‘with’ + DP arise, as shown in the contrast between (21) and (22). We consider these to be causative complex predicates.

The analyzed data thus allow us to distinguish between three instances of complex predicates with the light verb dar, namely those with (i) a transferential event reading; (ii) a transferential event-result reading; and (iii) a causative reading. Table 2 summarizes the findings.

It follows that transferential event reading predicates occur independently of whether the N is related to V, N or ADJ, although transferential event-result predicates occur exclusively with Ns morphologically related to V. A double semantic reading arises from the properties of the deverbal N (Grimshaw 1990). In turn, causative complex predicates are exhibited with N related to Vs and ADJs, as well as with underived Ns. In the next section, we will discuss the semantic features of the three abovementioned complex predicates and account for the variation found in AVPs.

In seminal work by Grimshaw and Mester (1988), light verbs were analyzed as functional elements hosting tense and agreement features but without semantic contribution. However, it has been assumed that, like main verbs, light verbs do contribute to the argument structure of the complex predicate (e.g., Alsina, 1996; Butt, 1995, 2010; Butt & Geuder, 2001; Mohanan, 1994; Rosen, 1989). For EP, this was the approach followed by Gonçalves et al. (2010) concerning complex predicates with light verbs + Ns morphologically related to a V, which denote events.

According to Gonçalves et al. (2010), the formation of a complex predicate depends on feature compatibility between the aspectual properties of the N and the light verb. To form a predication, they propose that light verbs differ from main verbs because they are underspecified for certain aspectual features; as a result, the formation of the complex predicate is essentially an operation of feature compatibility between the light verb and the N morphologically related to a V. Following the aspectual classification from Moens (1987) and Moens and Steedman (1988), Gonçalves et al. (2010), argue that the light verb dar combines with deverbal nouns derived from predicates denoting (i) activities/process (dar um passeio lit. ‘to give a walk’, (ii) accomplishments/culminated processes (dar uma pintura lit. ‘to give a paint’), and (iii) punctuals (dar um espirro lit. ‘to give a sneeze’), but not with (iv) states (*dar um gosto lit. ‘to give a taste’) or (v) culminations (*dar um nascimento lit. ‘to give a birth’). They explain the ungrammaticality of the combination of dar + Ns derived from predicates denoting culminations, by proposing that this light verb is specified with the feature [-change].12

Hence, the data from AVPs we will discuss below pose some challenges to this proposal. It was shown in section 3.1. that light verb dar does not exclusively combine with a deverbal N or a N morphologically related to a V. Therefore, Ns morphologically related to Ns and ADJs (and even some underived Ns) should not be excluded from complex predicate formation.13 On the other hand, it is not adequate to argue that all these Ns preserve the aspectual features of the main verb they are derived from, because they are not always deverbal nominalizations. An alternative hypothesis would be to consider that the N occurring in a complex predicate shares the aspectual features of the verb that can paraphrase the complex predicate, irrespective of their morphological derivation, that is, an approach that accounts for complex predicate formation beyond the morphological nature of the N. In this case, there would not properly be inheritance of aspectual features; they would only share aspectual features. However, as we have seen, the AVP data also exhibits occurrences of predicates that do not have a corresponding main verb. Moreover, we are aware that not all languages allow for a single verb corresponding to a light verb + N combination (see Hale & Keyser 2002, p. 117), and that not all combinations can be paraphrased by a V in the same language.14 To explain these specific cases, next we will discuss an alternative way of understanding the formation of complex predicates.

Suppose that the crucial property to allow the formation of a complex predicate arises from the predicative nature of the N: the N must enter the numeration with a specified [predicative] feature. The aspectual features of the N are then independent of whether it is morphologically related to V, N or ADJ. This approach allows the light verb dar to combine with an underived N, such as Ns denoting psychological and physical sensations, if it is specified for a predicate feature.

In fact, note that the syntactic passivization test used to distinguish between types of complex predicates in the previous section also showed that not all Ns morphologically related to Vs are predicative, i.e., able to form a complex predicate with the light verb dar’. This is the case of combinations such as dar contributo/contribuição lit. ‘to give contribution’, dar colaboração lit. ‘to give collaboration’, dar exemplo lit. ‘to give example’, dar explicação lit. ‘to give explanation’, dar pergunta lit. ‘to give question’, dar resposta lit. ‘to give answer’, among several others that occur in the corpus (see (23)). In these cases, passivization would yield ungrammatical examples in EP (see (24)). Therefore, although these Ns are morphologically related to Vs, they do not share the predicative feature, which is a crucial property to allow the formation of a complex predicate in our analysis.

In these cases, the Theme, although an abstract N, is an internal argument of the main V dar; the structure is not one of a complex predicate, but a typical ditransitive structure, as the one with a concrete N.

As already mentioned, according to Gonçalves et al.’s (2010) approach, light verb dar is specified for certain aspectual features. Being specified with the semantic feature [–change], it cannot combine with culminations, which imply a consequent state (*dar um nascimento ‘to give a birth’), but it can combine with culminated processes. Furthermore, dar is specified for the feature [+dynamic], which rules out combinations with states, specified as [–dynamic] (*dar uma estada lit. ‘to give a stay’). The data presented below show that, in AVPs, the light verb dar can combine with culminations, such as dar parto lit. ‘to give birth’ (see (25). Moreover, the combination with states is available in both AVPs and standard EP, as in dar bom cheiro lit. ‘to give good smell’, dar bom gosto lit. ‘to give good taste’, and dar consistência lit. ‘to give consistency’ (see (26) below).

First, let’s consider example (25), which suggests that dar can be combined with a culmination. The event can be interpreted as having no duration; note that it can occur with a temporal expression of punctuality (see (27a)). However, in this case, the predicate could be interpreted as a culmination that has been added to a process, giving rise to a culminated process (see (27b)).15 As a result, (25) can be interpreted as a culminated process, confirming the predictions of Gonçalves et al. (2010).

Irrespective of (25) expressing a culmination or a culminated process, it shows that combinations with the light verb dar in AVPs are looser than in the EP grammar, independently of the aspectual class of the V which the N is related to.16 Further examples are provided in (28). In our approach, the predicative nature of the N that combines with the light verb dar in these varieties accounts for more flexible combinations.

Let us now turn to the examples in (26). If the combination of the light verb dar with states would not be available in Portuguese, complex predicates of the type shown above would be ruled out. At this point, we should highlight that the prediction of Gonçalves et al.’s (2010) analysis is only confirmed by Ns morphologically related to Vs that denote individual-level predicates. It cannot be extended to the Ns denoting stage-level predicates in (26).

To accommodate the discussed data under a semantic feature account, we propose that the light verb dar is, indeed, unspecified for the feature [change]. Note that, in Gonçalves et al. (2010) approach, the light verb fazer ‘to do’ is also unspecified for the features [change], which would explain the possibility of occurring with culminations. The fact that these two light verbs share semantic features finds empirical support in examples in the AVP where dar is used in combinations that in EP are only allowed with the verb fazer ‘to do’. See the examples in (29), equivalent to fazer uma pergunta lit. ‘to make a question’, ‘to ask’; fazer um resumo lit. ‘to make a summary, ‘to summarize’; and fazer uma reciclagem lit. ‘to make a recycling’, ‘to recycle’.17

Moreover, we propose that the light verb dar is also unspecified for the feature [dynamic], allowing the combination with episodic states, which, as we have seen, occur exclusively in causative complex predicates (see examples (10), (17), (18)). This possibility only occurs, however, when dar is not a transferential verb; note that in predicates like *dar uma estada lit. ‘to give a stay’, there is no causative reading.

By extending the analysis proposed in Gonçalves et al. (2010) to Ns that are not exclusively related to Vs, we can account for the variation in AVP, considering (i) the predicative feature of the N and (ii) the unspecified features [change] and [dynamic] of the light verb dar. In addition, our approach explains the availability of combinations in EP that are apparently ruled out in an aspectual analysis in which the N preserves the aspectual features of the main verb it is derived from.

The array of Ns that can be specified for the predicative feature as well as the light verb they can combine with varies cross-linguistically. As pointed out by Alba-Sales (2002, p. 51), “for example, in Spanish paseo ‘walk’ combines with dar ‘[to] give’, whereas its Italian counterpart passeggiata appears with fare ‘[to] do’ (cf. English walk, which occurs with take).” Moreover, the author states that, “even within the same language we cannot predict the choice of light verb based on the semantics of the V N[ominalization] alone”, because “diachronically, a given V N[ominalization] may be compatible with certain light verbs at some point in its historical development, but not in others” (see also Acedo-Matellán & Pineda, 2019). Our approach considers the possibility of the N being predicative in a language, and not in others, explaining the variation observed cross-linguistically.

With respect to the semantic features, we suggest that complex predicates with event and event-result readings preserve and share the transferential feature (henceforth [transf]) of the main V dar, as well as the [dynamic] feature. However, the N with an event or a double event-result reading does not correspond to a concrete entity; instead, the N of these complex predicates has a predicate feature, independently of concreteness/abstractness. Also, our proposal distinguishes between complex predicates with transferential event and transferential event-result readings according to the feature [change], which only occurs in the former, where it allows an interpretation of a change of state predicate. Finally, when dar occurs with underived Ns referring to psychological and physical sensations, it completely loses its transference meaning, giving rise to a causative (typically) state interpretation. These predicates share the semantic feature [change] with transferential event-result predicates, but are not dynamic.

Below we summarize the described semantic features of complex predicates with dar.

Although we are using AVP data, recall that they do not differ from the data found in standard EP as well as in other languages, irrespectively of the morphological nature of the N. Moreover, the classification of complex predicates based on AVP data is cross-linguistically supported.

Since these different types of predicates are characterized by syntactic properties that have not been explored so far, this will be addressed in the next section.