Prepositions and particles: Place and path in English, German, and Dutch

Abstract

Germanic languages heavily rely on prepositions and particles (‘Ps’) for describing places and paths. This category P might be considered as a small class of minor function words, but this chapter demonstrates the richness and variety of this category on the basis of Dutch, English, and German data, focusing on two of their aspects that have not received much attention in the literature: transitivity and complexity. Given that Ps are always based on a spatial relation (between a figure and a ground), it is surprising to see that they can often be used, under specific semantic conditions, without a syntactic object that expresses the ground, even as prepositions. A close look at the variation in formal complexity of Ps shows the same semantic conditions at work, revealing a basic gradient of meaning that cross-cuts the distinction between places and paths and prepositions and particles.