Serial Verb Constructions in Paraguayan Guarani

Abstract

This article shows that Guarani predicate chains designate a single macro‐event and that unitary eventhood is a matter of degree, involving a variety of formal and semantic configurations. Temporal relations and, in particular, event separability/orderability motivate the formal differences among types of predicate sequences. Levels of formal coalescence range from relatively individuated predicates, carrying their own concordant inflection, to tightly woven predicates which form a single word. Following Talmy’s macro‐event model, I analyze framing events and their supporting co‐events. The positioning of a framing event is correlated with whether or not the construction is interpreted sequentially: in V2 in the case of simultaneous predicate chains and in V1 in sequential chains. Framing predicates are consistently motion- or posture‐related and tend to house grammaticization processes.