What is the Semantic Role of "Jessica" in the following sentence:

Jane gave the flowers to Jessica

Question

What is the Semantic Role of "Jessica" in the following sentence:

Jane gave the flowers to Jessica

BlackTom AI · Accepted Answer

The question asks for the Semantic Role of Jessica in the sentence: 'Jane gave the flowers to Jessica.'

Option 1: Agent. The agent is the entity that performs the action. Here, Jane is the one who performs the action of giving, so Jane is the agent, not Jessica. Therefore this option is incorrect.

Option 2: Patient. The patient (also called Theme) is the entity that is affected by the action or that undergoes the change. In this sentence, the flowers are the thing being given and thus fit the patient/theme role, not Jessica. So this choice is not accurate for Jessica's SRL.

Option 3: Recipient. The recipient is the person or entity who receives something as a result of the action. Jessica receives the flowers, since the verb 'gave' includes a recipient in the PP complement 'to Jessica.' This aligns with the semantic role of recipient, making this the correct choice for Jessica's SRL.

Option 4: Subject. In semantic roles, 'subject' is not a canonical SRL like Agent or Recipient; it is a syntactic label more than a semantic one. Using 'subject' here would obscure the actual semantic function of Jessica, so this option is misleading and incorrect.

Option 5: Object. While 'the flowers' is an object (a direct object) of the verb 'gave,' Jessica is not the object of the action; she is the recipient of the flowers. Therefore labeling Jessica as 'Object' is inaccurate.

To summarize, Jessica serves as the recipient of the transferred item in this ditransitive construction, while the flowers are the direct object (patient/theme) and Jane is the agent. The other options misidentify Jessica’s semantic role either by confusing agent with recipient, treating Jessica as the recipient but under an inappropriate label, or by assigning a non-standard SRL. The best-fit semantic role for Jessica is Recipient.

LIN 001Y A01-A12 SQ 2025 Semantics HW

What is the Semantic Role of "Jessica" in the following sentence: Jane gave the flowers to Jessica

查看解析

登录即可查看完整答案

类似问题

What is the Semantic Role of "Harold" in the following sentence: I gave Harold a cake.

What is the Semantic Role of "The window" in the following sentence: The window was broken by Harold.

What is the Semantic Role of "Harold" in the following sentence: The window was broken by Harold.

What is the Semantic Role of "The rain" in the following sentence: The rain made Ahmed shiver.

What is the Semantic Role of "Ahmed" in the following sentence: The rain made Ahmed shiver.

What is the Semantic Role of "the flowers" in the following sentence: Jane gave the flowers to Jessica

What is the Semantic Role of "Jane" in the following sentence: Jane gave the flowers to Jessica

What is the semantic role of “the bread” in (i.) and (ii.)?

更多留学生实用工具

考试浏览器助手

风格化写作助手

论文查重助手

文献引用助手

课堂转译助手

课堂笔记助手

Quiz搜索助手

学校历年真题

智能刷题助手

智能匹配练习

希望你的学习变得更简单