8.}.}. The narrative component of lexical meaning

A schematic representation like the one that we have outlined so far can also be distinguished from the theory of semantic fields by its ability to explicate the tem­porality within the semantics of many terms. Fields are static representations that describe a specific set of structural relations lacking in internal dynamism. Now in many cases, even the semantic relation between lexical units requires reference to the "history of events" that created that relation. For example, the configura­tion of the commercial exchange that we analyzed in the previous section requires in reality a dynamic schematization that corresponds to a fully fledged narrative (see diagram 18), as indeed is suggested by the schema proposed by Fillmore (1976b: 105). The order of the boxes from left to right indicates temporal transfor­mations, while vertical alignment indicates simultaneity. A schema of this kind is nothing other than the depiction of a minimal narrative program¹⁸ that involves an initial state, defined in this case by a relation of conjunction (that is, of pos­session), in which two subjects (A and D) are respectively in possession of objects С and B. Following an agreement or contract between the two subjects, action X ensues, in which the two subjects exchange С and B. When this action has been completed, the final state, Y, is achieved, in which the relations of possession are opposite to those of the initial state. In this schema, the meaning is no longer defined as the result of a series of paradigmatic oppositions but is inscribed within an openly syntagmatic dimension.

The narrative dimension is particularly evident in the semantics of predi­cates;¹⁹ in fact, all verbs relate to an underlying schema of actions that, through such positional roles as subject or object, already prefigure a minimal narrative structure. All of this was evident from the first formulations of case grammar, in that the cases themselves can be read as actant roles around which the narrativity of the predicate is articulated.²⁰ Of course one could object that not all terms in the lexicon are affected to the same degree by a narrative dimension, nor do they all need to refer to temporal succession to the same extent. From this and other points of view, the lexicon cannot be considered a homogenous system, as we will see more clearly in chapter 10. An initial difference at this level can undoubtedly be identified between verbs and nouns: if verbs express a relation between entities and seem to relate immediately to a narrative microstructure, this does not seem to hold true for nouns. Within nominal semantics, natural kinds seem to be less "narrativizeable" than terms that refer to culturally defined concepts whose mean­ing could not be literally explained without a history of the events that have formed them. There are many examples of this kind: terms like alimony or ransom

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commercial event

- possess А С

— agreement -

A, D X > Y

- possess D В

- X —,

give ACD

give DBA

possess AB

possess DC

Diagram 18

relate to complex narrative scenes that can be seen, following the suggestion of Eco (1979) as genuine micro-intertextual frames.

In Fillmore's analysis, the meaning of alimony, foi example, is projected onto a prototypic scene, or regular context, in which there are two individuals who married at one moment of the temporal sequence and then subsequently divorced and reached an agreement whereby one of the two (typically, at least in a particu­lar age, the man) pays a sum of money to the other. This sum of money is what we call alimony. Whatever format is chosen for the semantic representation of this term, it must take into consideration this complex narrative sequence (and will probably also have to include further information about legal aspects of divorce, possible disagreements, etc.).

The case of ransom is similar. In this case too, understanding of the term involves understanding of a complex narrative sequence in which fiist of all a subject (B) takes away an object of value from another subject (A); subsequently В offets to give it back upon payment by A of a certain sum of money. The third stage is when A gives В the agreed sum of money, which is named the ransom. Note that this narrative sequence is activated and imposed upon the context every time that the tetm is used: if what A pays В is called the ransom, we have the right to assume that В has illegally taken possession of something or someone (C) im­portant to A, that В has offered to return С on the condition that A hands over a certain sum of money in exchange, and that A has agreed to this.²¹ As I have already argued, the lexical selection creates and activates its own context of refer­ence, which in this case is a complex micro-intertextual frame. The tetm thus condenses a narrative configuration that can then be expanded into a whole text. A similar syntagmatic and narrative perspective is to be found within generative

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semiotics, in Greimas' analysis (1981) of anger, the meaning of which is broken down into a complex sequence of states and passionate transfotmations that move from expectation to frustration to discontent to aggression.

I believe that a narrative component is present in an enormous number of words, though maybe less explicitly than in the examples outlined above. We have already seen that in the semantics of artifacts one can talk about an implicit func­tional history that refers to the typical sequence of actions envisaged by their function: fill a glass and drink, pick up a pistol and fire, sit down on a chair. The regular associations between functional terms and the respective functional predi­cates {glass/drink, chair/sit, pistol/fire, etc.) constitute a minimal sequence of narra­tive action.

In other cases, even when the semantic definition seems to be based on non­dynamic properties, there is still an implicit narrative temporality that emerges from the possible inferences activated by the term. Take a term like puddle: it can be defined as "muddy pool of rainwater." But the word rainwater already implies a sequence of events where in some moment prior to the existence of the puddle it rained. All of this is part of our knowledge of the meaning of puddle and this determines the possible inferences. Consider the difference between (10) and (11):

10. The street was full of puddles. It had not rained for a long time.

11. The street was crossed by a rivulet. It had not rained for a long time.

Example 10, unlike (11), appears incongruous because it contradicts the most ob­vious expectation connected to puddle: if puddle then prior rain. This naturally does not mean that such a sequence is semantically impossible or "wrong" but only that, by violating the inferential system suggested by the term, a system of 'attention alert" is activated and we expect an explanation of why there are puddles without rain. This does not occur in (11), because rivulet does not presup­pose the same sequence.

One could therefore say, at least in a great many cases, that lexical units are the site of condensation of an underlying narrative structure. This is an idea found in all semiotic thinking, both in the interpretative semiotics of Eco, which is con­cerned more with the processes of the reader's interpretative co-operation, and in the generative semiotics of Greimas. Eco (1979) suggests looking at the sememe as an instruction oriented toward the text; in this perspective, the individual term already contains its potential textual and narrative development, which will be actualized in the moment it is inserted into a particular co-text. In an instructional semantics like the one suggested by Eco, oriented toward textual insertion, and which is inferential by nature, the lexical level and the textual level are closely inter-related. The mechanism of condensation and expansion between the lexical and the textual levels is also stressed by Greimas: a lexeme like fisherman, for ex-ample, is

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a very condensed surface construction; it describes a person who possesses a competence limited to a particular 'doing' that is liable to expansion, a 'do­ing' that can cover a vast discursive sequence once it has been explicated; but which maintains, at the same time, and more or less at the same level, its seman­tic character It can occupy, in the two grammars—linguistic and narrative— different actantial positions. (Greimas 1973; my translation)

Fisherman thus carries with it "all the possibilities of its 'doing,'" that is, the be­havior one can expect from that petson; it refers both to a thematic role and to a potential narrative program.

Lexemes are therefore surface condensations of deepet (narrative) configura­tions and in the reciprocal relation of condensation and expansion with wider tex­tual units is manifested that fundamental characteristic of language that Greimas has defined as the "elasticity of discourse." By virtue of this elasticity, a correspon­dence is established on the semantic plane between units of different "sizes" and dimensions that can, however, be recognized as semantically equivalent. Ransom can thus be a narrative sequence, an entire text, or a lexeme: in all these cases the underlying conceptual-narrative structure (the scene, in Fillmore's terms) will be the same. The dialectic expansion/condensation that characterizes the elasticity of discourse can be compared with the relation that links Fillmore's scenes with their surface lexicalization. In fact, in both cases the movement between configurations of greatly different dimensions is possible because we are not only talking about words and relations between words (as was the case in the theory of lexical fields), but about conceptual structures and underlying narratives.

This allows us to deal in a different way with the issue of the "size" of the analytic units. The validity of analysis at a lexical level has often been questioned in the field of semiotics, the view being that only the textual unit is pertinent. But the text versus word opposition vanishes, or rathet, it ceases to be significant, in a schematically based semantics like the one I am trying to delineate. If lexical units are seen as points of condensation, they are virtual texts, to use Eco's expression, and an equivalence is established between surface realizations that may vary con­siderably in theit dimensions.