An Iconicity-based Approach to Spanish Causative Constructions

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the interaction between form and meaning. Concretely, I discuss the issue of synonymy between <hacer-infinitive> causatives and <hacer-que subjunctive> causatives in terms of Haiman's(1983) Iconicity Principle. Firstly, I examine Curnow's(1993) argument that there exist semantic differences between the two constructions regarding ambiguity, intentionality and directness. However, I point out that my informants judge the two constructions to be totally identical regarding intentionality and directness. In this discussion I show that the two constructions are totally synonymous and then indicate that maybe the Iconicity Principle is not at work in Spanish. On the other hand, I also attempt to account for the observed fact in terms of the Iconicity Principle. Assuming that this principle holds cross-linguistically, I argue that both share the same structure at LF, so the reason why they don't show any semantic difference in spite of being different in appearance is due to this fact, implying that the Iconicity Principle also holds for Spanish. Finally I argue that <hacer-infinitive> causatives belong to morphological type (X+Y), thus supporting Guasti's(1996) claim that the causative verb in the Romance languages behaves as a causative affix. I further argue that <hacer-que subjunctive> causatives also belong to 'X+Y', not to 'X # A # Y'. This claim has an important consequence from a pedagogical point of view, since it implies that <hacer-que subjunctive> causatives are not equivalent to Korean syntactic causatives with -key ha-.