Introducing and discussing the thematic roles and the thematic hierarchies: a interface question

Abstract

The thematic roles and thematic hierarchies have been utilized largely in linguistic theory which focus on argument realization. In this work, our specific aims are (a) to introduce and to discuss the thematic roles and the thematic hierarchies; and (b) to demonstrate that the utilization of notion of the thematic roles and the thematic hierarchies reflects the interface between syntax, semantics and pragmatics. In order to prove this idea, we will make a revision of literature about thematic roles, focusing the controversial questions of this theory. At the end, we will come to two conclusions: (i) the thematic roles can not be the primitives to argument realization, but even can be largely utilized in linguistic descriptions as elements of primary description of language; e (ii) the thematic hierarchies reflect generalizations about argument realizations governs by interfaces between semantics, syntax and informational structure.