The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics Part 88. In the past decade, Cognitive Linguistics has developed into one of the most dynamic and attractive frameworks within theoretical and descriptive linguistics The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics is a major new reference that presents a comprehensive overview of the main theoretical concepts and descriptive/theoretical models of Cognitive Linguistics, and covers its various subfields, theoretical as well as applied. | 840 RICARDO MALDONADO Figure . Get downplaying the children. Now the important restriction about intransitives is that Agent defocusing only obtains with agentive subjects as attested by the ungrammaticality of examples in Welsh 14 and Spanish 16 both of which involve a nonactive subject 14 Tyfwud gan y plant yn sydyn. grown with det children pred suddenly There was growing by the children suddenly. Perlmutter and Postal 1984 145 15 Se bailo en grande toda la noche. impers mid in great night They danced a great deal all night. 16 Se creció mucho. impers mid much They grew a lot. Yet the question is whether all of these constructions involving an intransitive stem are actually passive. Let us therefore consider sentence 12 from German and sentences 11 and 15 from Latin and Spanish in somewhat more detail 12 exemplifies the presentative construction and 11 and 15 the impersonal active construction Cennamo 1993 Maldonado 1999 . For one while these constructions show overlap with the passive in that their Agent is made schematic no passive meaning is put forward. Indeed crucial to passive constructions and passive meaning is the fact that the change-of -state undergone by a thematic subject is made most prominent and this is not the case in the examples under discussion. What is put in profile is an action being performed not its terminal point. Note that impersonal constructions are in clear contrast with medio-passive and spontaneous constructions whose subject can be thematic 17 Se abrieron las puertas. mid doors The doors opened. Second the fact that the passive marker extends to impersonal constructions is in itself not sufficient evidence to view them as passive. The impersonal se pronoun not the passive can be translated by the English impersonal they or by the French impersonal pronoun on as in On a dancé beaucoup They danced a lot . Moreover se impersonal constructions designate generic .
