Tanja Samardžić

action verbs (3b) are not characterized by any of these properties. Although they
can be paraphrases of verbs, they are considered as regular instances of verb
phrases. The relation between vague action verbs and fully specified verbs is not
discussed.
(3) a) John gave the bottle a shake.
b) John made an inspection.
The difference between true light verbs and vague action verbs is relevant
for Serbian too. (3a) cannot be translated with a phrase to Serbian, it is translated
with a single prefixed verb (4a). The prefix is the element of structure that
changes verb’s aspect in Serbian, which makes its role parallel to that of the light
verb in English. On the other hand, (3b) can be translated with a phrase but the
verb is not a lexical counterpart of the English verb and it bears a prefix too (4b).
Only the fully specified use of the verb can be translated with a lexical counterpart
(1b, 2b). 2
(4) a) Jovan je promućkao flašu.
John shaked+PREFIX bottle+ACC
b) Jovan je izvršio inspekciju.
John did+PREFIX inspection+ACC.
We can see that the translation equivalents in Serbian reflect the
differences between three different types of constructions in English:
Constructions with true light verbs are translated with one prefixed verb.
Constructions with vague action verbs are translated with constructions too, but
with a different heading verb. And finally, the phrases with fully specified verbs
can be translated word by word.
2
By lexical counterpart we mean the word that is listed in the ESSE bilingual dictionary as a
translation for a given word.