Aggettivi e valenza in italiano

Abstract

Following an analysis by Guglielmo Cinque based on the different behaviour that adjectives manifest in certain contexts, a number of authors either maintain or take for granted that adjectives, as verbs, divide into transitive and intransitive, and that, among the intransitives, unergative and unaccusative adjectives have to be distinguished. This paper defends the view that adjectives are uniformly unaccusative, and provides a body of evidence to show that when adjectives do show different behaviours the difference cannot depend on their argument structure. Since the main theoretical consideration motivating the split of adjectives is the Lexicalist Hypothesis (LH), the conclusion is reached that the LH is to be abandoned.