"I will eat you alive!": What is this construction?

Question

"To wipe the table clean" : A well-known example for a resultative verb.

However, I'm looking through many Aktionsart right now, and I just cannot figure out what happens in "I will eat you alive" or "He ate the chicken raw". I guess we can elongate it to "I will eat you {while you are} alive", but, well, there has to be a name for this usage of putting an adjective that describes the state the person something is done to to the moment the action takes place?

Please help me out, just one term is enough, or one link, you don't have to bring lots of effort.

It's a complex-transitive clause where "alive" is an optional depictive complement of "eat". "You" is object and the predicand for the complement. The same applies to "He ate the chicken raw", where "the chicken" is object and predicand for the complement. — BillJ, Dec 01 '22 at 13:27
You are right that it is a "depictive construction", at least I can find some people calling it that and giving this kind of example! — DumbQuestionButAnswerAnywayPle, Dec 01 '22 at 13:30
Maybe write an answer and I can checkmark it as most helpful one? — DumbQuestionButAnswerAnywayPle, Dec 01 '22 at 13:32
Does this answer your question? When can verbal passives be used in secondary predicates? '"John hammered the metal flat" is indeed a resultative construction: the hammering brings about the flatness.
But "I prefer/eat my food salted/hot" is an object-orientated depictive construction.' — Edwin Ashworth, Dec 01 '22 at 14:37
I've posted an answer, as requested. I've included some additional info about the function of the predicatives. Just ignore it if it's of no interest to you. — BillJ, Dec 01 '22 at 14:37
Btw, it's the complements that are either resultative or depictive, not the verbs — BillJ, Dec 01 '22 at 14:40
@BillJ I have accepted your request to mark this question as a duplicate. I was really stranded, so I appreciate the help. — DumbQuestionButAnswerAnywayPle, Dec 01 '22 at 14:45
Now that I know Aktionsart is a property of mostly verbal predicates concerning the internal temporal constituency of a type of situation denoted by a given predicate, I can die peaceful. — Yosef Baskin, Dec 01 '22 at 16:57
I doubt if any native Anglophones would recognize allusions to *raw / uncooked* if they heard *He'll eat you alive* (or *...for breakfast*). — FumbleFingers, Dec 01 '22 at 17:19
There are a number of constructions with this gross description. The general term for them is The Green Conspiracy. — John Lawler, Dec 01 '22 at 23:04

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 01 '22 at 14:35

[1] I wiped the table clean.

[2] I will eat you alive.

[3] He ate the chicken raw.

The items in bold are all optional predicatives in complex-transitive clauses.

[1] is, as you say, a resultative predicative which, although optional, is licensed by the verb.

By contrast, in [2] and [3] the predicatives are depictive and, although optional, are adjuncts. In other words, the predicative/non-predicative contrast cuts across that between complements and adjuncts, and hence they are best called predicative adjuncts.

"I will eat you alive!": What is this construction?

1 Answers1