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the measures of syntactic complexity or „weight‟ are highly correlated Arnold et al.,
2000; Wasow, 2002; Szmrecsanyi, 2004a; Bresnan et al., 2007, the difference in number of graphemic words between the theme and beneficiary to measure
their relative weight. The factors of animacy, definiteness, and pronominality of theme were taken into account. Animacy and definiteness were coded using the
coding practices of Garretson 2004, and discourse accessibility was coded based on Prince 1981 and Gundel et al. 1993. Pronominality was defined to
distinguish phrases headed by pronouns personal, demonstrative, and indefinite from those headed by nonpronouns such as nouns and gerunds. In addition to
these features, concreteness of theme, person of beneficiary, and number of beneficiary and theme are taken into accounts. From the cross-linguistic
evidence, number singularplural and person could also have an influence Aissen, 1999,2003; Bresnan, 2003; Haspelmath, 2004.
2.2.1 Semantic Verb Class
In Bresnan et al 2007, the dative verbs are classified into six semantic classes. The classification includes
„transfer‟ of possession as with give, „future transfer‟ as with offer, „communication‟ of information as with tell, „prevention of
possession‟ as with deny, and „abstract‟ as with give that a thought. Theijssen et al.
2009 formed semantic categorization with four classes . They are „creation of
possesion‟ as with produce, „obtaining of possesion‟ as with get, „keeping of possession‟ as with keep, and „abstract‟ as with do someone a favor.
Nia 2009 based on Jackendof 1990 divides the verbs indicating benefactive semantic role into 5 classes. The first class includes benefactive
ditransitive verbs with the meaning „make available‟. The verbs are buy, organize,
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save, catch, fetch, find, get, order, and take. The second class will be the one
includes benefactive verbs with the meaning of „creation‟. The verbs are build, make,
and write. The third category carries the meaning of „performance‟. The
verbs belong to this class include do, give, play, show, and sing. The fourth cat
egory with the meaning „preparation‟ includes verbs fix and pour. The last category of benefactive ditransitive verbs is the one brings the meaning
„idiomatic‟. The verbs are bet, bear, spare, do, deal, earn, and grant. Referring to Dowty in Jackendoff 1990 this research classifies the
semantic feature into 4 clusters of semantic categories: the verbs carrying meaning „make available‟, „creation‟, performance‟, and „preparation‟. The first semantic
class was represented by the verb get. The second semantic class was represented by the verb make. The third class was represented by the verb play. The last class
is represented by the verb fix See the examples below See also Appendices 1 and 2
6.
a. to rest while your Dutch girl - what s her name? Catrine? – gets us
