In name-informing constructions like "The phenomenon is called a “sun halo”", the noun mentioned in the quotation (a “sun halo”) adopts a referring interpretation, as indicated by the determiner. As an account, we claim predicates like call to introduce a copular relation, which is the source of referring uses of nominals in name-informing quotation: To call y “n” entails that y is an n. Two copula types are argued to be covertly contained in name-informing constructions, an identificational copula and an equative ...

The current paper discusses the lexicalization of complex constructions composed of an adjective and a noun. It is argued that compounds/compound-like constructions are more prone to become lexicalized than phrases/phrase-like constructions. The relationship between lexicalization and the cognitive process of memorization represents a key point of our analysis. We report evidence from psycholinguistic studies contrasting compounds/compound-like constructions to phrases/phrase-like constructions either within a single ...