On phrasal nominalization: A factorial analysis

Abstract: The phenomenon of phrasal nominalization, as exemplified by the English gerund, raises a challenge for the assumption that a phrase XP is headed by a word of category X. Many proposals have been made to deal with phrasal nominalization, in both multistratal and monostratal frameworks. Some seek to fit it in the endocentric mold; others are plainly exocentric. Comparative evaluations tend to be made along partisan lines (multistratal vs. monostratal) or on the basis of methodological principles (discarding vs. allowing exocentricity). This article aims for a less aprioristic approach, taking generalizability as a criterion for evaluation. More specifically, it investigates three types of phrasal nominalization as they manifest themselves in Dutch, that is, the nominalization of infinitives, adjectives, and participles, providing first a theory-neutral description of the data and then an analysis I call 'factorial' in the sense that it captures both what the three types have in common and what differentiates them. It is cast in the framework of constructional head-driven phrase structure grammar, since the latter's hierarchy of phrase types provides a natural starting point for a factorial analysis. The resulting treatment is exocentric. In a final step I compare it to a number of endocentric alternatives, showing that it scores higher on the scale of generalizability.