Changer et ses synonymes majeurs entre syntaxe et sémantique : le classement des VERBES FRANÇAIS en perspective
Résumé
The dictionary Les Verbes français allows a thorough analysis of the polysemy of most verbs. A close look at its index shows the importance of the division of the headword entry performed by the authors and leads one to wonder about the combination of different syntactic and semantic critera on which these decompositions are based. We focus on the different facets of the verb changer because of its double peculiarity. (1) Although it is the typical representative of the generic “T” class for changes, it displays 19 entries. Thus we assume that the criteria of agent selection are decisive, as suggested by research on this verb by J. Picoche, B. Pottier and J. J. Franckel (§ 1). (2) On the other hand, the primary synonyms for changer do not share this syntactic ubiquity and generally predict specific types of changes (§ 2). The paper finishes with contrasting examples in the lexical entries of changer in Les Verbes français and in two other electronic dictionaries (the Dictionnaire Intégral and WordNet-Fr). In these works the predicative notion of changer appears to be conceptually different according to the properties of agents (§ 3).