Dimensions of Possession - elchacocomoarealinguistica

Possession spaces 63the superspace s. And all material objects fill out a certain space s¹ because oftheir form and extension. The material interior of s is the set of sublocationss¹ 1 ,…,s¹ n satisfying the following conditions: (i) For each s¹ i ,s¹ i isapartofs;(ii) there exists a partition PAR of the object o so that each object in PAR (o)is in an s¹ i and each s¹ i is filled out by an object in PAR. Given these rathernatural extensions of the theory proposed in Section 2, the meaning of (14) inthe part–whole case is: the windows are located within the material interior ofthe factory. So once again we have a space created by the genitive -s, this timethe material interior of the factory. And some windows are located in thisspace. From this account it follows that the windows as objects are part of thefactory as an object. But the flexibility of the genitive is also explained becauseall the meanings of (14) and similar constructions are seen as a variation of thesame pattern, the location pattern. Note that I am not saying that the part–whole distinction can be reduced to location. I am only saying that the genitiveconstruction may involve location in the material interior of an object, andwhen it does then the part–whole relation holds between the two objects. 64.3 Other constructionsThe observations I made in connection with the constructions in (3)–(5) werethat the flexibility of have- and give-constructions is more constrained than thegenitive construction. Why is this so? Is there a beginning of an explanation inthe framework proposed here? If it exists it must have something to do withthe selection of space, as this is the only natural place to make distinctions inthe location patterns I operate with.It is natural that the genitive construction has the greatest flexibilitybecause the genitive -s just introduces a variable over space functions, whichwill be fixed differently depending on the context. This is what I argued inSection 4.2.As for the verbal constructions it is natural that each verb imposes restrictionson its arguments. In the case of space arguments they ought to besensitive to different kinds of spaces. This prediction is corroborated to acertain extent. In Baron and Herslund (this volume) it is shown that themeaning of certain uses of have involves what they call inclusion and can beillustrated by the following examples:(16) a. Huset har et sort tag.‘The house has a black roof’