Milli mála - 2021, Blaðsíða 179
178 Milli mála 13/2021
I was not to fall-asleep immediately was high up and
completely done on it
‘I couldn’t fall asleep immediately, I was tipsy and
completely exhausted.’
b. Tjaldstæðið stendur við hlið íbúðahverfis og fólkið þar er
búið að fá gersamlega nóg af þessu ástandi (DV.is)
the-camp-site stands by side residential-area and the-people
there are completely done to get enough of that situation
‘The camp site stands next to a residential area and people
there have totally had enough of the situation.’
c. Eru menn gersamlega búnir að missa vitið? (Andriki.is)
are men completely done to lose reason
‘Have men completely lost their mind?’
In example (7a), búinn is used in the idiomatic phrase (vera) búinn á
því. The ÍNO defines this phrase as “vera örmagna, uppgefinn” ‘to be
exhausted’, and it is unequivocally compatible with the above state-
ment. In the RMH, there are as many as ten examples of this phrase
as well as one example of búinn á líkama og sál ‘physically and men-
tally exhausted’. Even in the case of the auxiliary construction vera
búinn að (7b,c), it often occurs in a negative context in which a feel-
ing of unacceptability or impossibility is displayed. This is sup-
ported by the data showing that the verbs tapa ‘lose’ (9 times), fá
‘get’ (5, mostly in the phrases fá nóg af ‘have enough of’ or fá upp í
kok af ‘have it up to here with’) (7b), vera ‘be’ (5), gleyma ‘forget’ (4),
missa ‘lose’ (3) (7c), and gefa ‘give’ (3, in gefast upp ‘give up’) are
among the most frequent collocates. Such data show that, although
the word búinn itself might be a neutral word, the phrases including
it exclusively refer to negative situations when they co-occur with
gersamlega.
As Partington (1998, 72) states, such information on semantic
prosody is particularly important for non-native speakers. In this
regard, one example in the ÍNO seems worth noting. The example
is given below, and in this sentence, gersamlega co-occurs with
áhyggjulaus ‘unconcerned’.
SEMANTIC PROSODY IN ICELANDIC
10.33112/millimala.13.7