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Chapter 2 turns to nympholepsy understood as possession and looks at “real-life” nympholepts. It includes a survey of the archaeological evidence from caves and sanctuaries, including inscriptions and reliefs, built for the nymphs by ancient nympholêptoi. The word nympholêptos appears in an inscription found in a cave at Vari in Attica, which provides us with an example of a sanctuary established by a nympholept, Archedemos, in the fifth-century BC. The cave commemorates Archedemos’s encounter with the nymph through inscriptions and statues, including a portrait of the nympholept that shows him building the sanctuary that becomes the focus of his life. Pantalkes, a younger contemporary of Archedemos, built a comparable shrine in a cave at Pharsalos in Thessaly, which becomes a site of pilgrimage. We find another nympholept at Kafizin in Cyprus in a cave where there was cultic activity from 225 to 218 bce. These sanctuaries highlight the personal and transformative nature of the bond between men and nymphs and the ways in which religious experience engender poetic and artistic representations that come to be significant for the community.

This chapter examines the meaning, method, and practice of conquest in Australia. It suggests that the continent and islands of Australia were claimed for the British Empire in an interlinked chain of ritual extending over more than fifty years. James Cook hoisted the British flag on Possession Island on August 22, 1770 and claimed the territory he had seen in the name of King George III and this claim was reinforced by the King himself on 12 October 1786. Several other claims were made and settlements established from that moment until 1829, but the actual conquest of the country and its people extended a long time beyond those years.

This chapter proposes a reading of Byatt's œeuvre as a continuous series of reimaginings of the art of storytelling and its different (dis)contents. It focuses on Possession and Byatt's interest in the fairytale form. It studies the essentially hermeneutic concept of co-creative reading that Byatt's fictions participate in and also habitually promote. This chapter puts emphasis on a practice of reading that is basically grounded in the use of stories in a culture.

This chapter introduces the two major puzzles posed by possession sentences: the too-many-meanings puzzle and the too-many-(surface)-structures puzzle. The too-many-meanings puzzle is that languages often use the same construction to speak of having a car, having a sister, and having brown eyes, amongst other things, despite these relations being notionally distinct. The too-many-surface-structures puzzle is that languages differ radically in the argument structure used to convey the same possessive meanings. The chapter goes on to lay out the theory of the architecture of the grammar assumed in the main body of the book, and sketches how that architecture gives rise to a solution to both puzzles. A particularly important facet of this solution is the idea that a head which introduces a thematic role in the semantics might fail to take a specifier in the syntax, causing the relevant role to be saturated higher in the structure (Wood 2015)—a circumstance this book refers to as delayed gratification, and which turns out to be commonly attested in the typology of possession sentences. The core predictions of the present approach are presented. A concluding section summarizes the structure of the rest of the book.

This chapter aims to summarize previous approaches to the too-many-meanings puzzle and the too-many-surface-structures puzzle, providing a uniquely detailed and up-to-date appreciation of recent literature on possession. It begins by setting out the scale of the puzzles by examining functional-typological work. The second section introduces the standard generative approach to the too-many-surface structures puzzle, which I refer to as the Freeze/Kayne tradition. This approach, associated with Freeze (1992) and Kayne (1993) (but with antecedents going back much earlier), proposes that the vast surface diversity in possession constructions is to be derived via movement from one or two underlyingly identical structures. The third section looks at extensions of and reactions to the Freeze/Kayne tradition. In the fourth section, various approaches to the too-many-meanings puzzle are discussed, much of it from the formal semantics literature. The main conclusions of this overview are (i) that the Freeze/Kayne tradition is correct to treat HAVE and BE as two realizations of the same element; but (ii) some of the surface differences among possession constructions involve real underlying differences in argument structure; and (iii) the meaning of possession sentences does not come from HAVE and BE themselves, but from other elements in the structure.

The approach of this book makes two important predictions different from those of the Freeze/Kayne tradition: (a.) possession constructions can vary in the place in the structure where the possessor is introduced, (b.) the different ways of building possession sentences permitted by (a.) could have somewhat different meanings, depending on the semantic contributions of the pieces that make them up. This chapter provides existence proofs that these predictions are correct, drawn from new fieldwork data on two understudied Quechua dialects. Prediction (a.) is supported by an analysis of two possession constructions in Cochabamba Quechua, dubbed the BE construction and the BE-APPL construction, which differ precisely in where the possessor is introduced into the structure. Prediction (b.) is supported via a comparison of the BE-APPL construction in Cochabamba Quechua with a similar construction in Santiago del Estero Quechua. Both case studies suggest that the applicative morpheme does not introduce a thematic role of its own, a fact that has important implications for applicative theory. The chapter closes with some preliminary remarks on why Quechua languages vary with respect to whether or not they have HAVE.

This chapter extends the analysis to HAVE sentences, arguing that HAVE is the form that BE takes when it is combined with a transitive Voice head. This approach correctly predicts the various readings exhibited by have in English and by HAVE verbs in other languages, including non-possessive uses such as causer HAVE, experiencer HAVE, and engineer HAVE. Cross-linguistic variation in the availability of such readings is discussed in terms of variation in how BE is spelled out. The analysis successfully extends to languages with more than one transitive HAVE verb, as is shown by a case study from Icelandic (based on Myler, Sigurðsson, and Wood 2014).

This chapter compares the analysis of HAVE from chapter 4 with the standard analysis of HAVE found in the Freeze/Kayne tradition. Whereas the present approach takes HAVE to be BE plus a transitive Voice head, the Freeze/Kayne tradition proposes that HAVE is BE plus an incorporated adposition. After examining the Freeze/Kayne tradition on its own terms and pointing out a number of empirical and technical problems with it, this chapter goes on to compare the predictions made by the two approaches with respect to the structure of HAVE sentences. The Freeze/Kayne approach predicts that definiteness effects in HAVE sentences should match up with those in existential sentences. It also predicts that HAVE sentences should show signs that their subject has raised from below, and that they should pass tests for unaccusativity. In contrast, the present approach assigns a different explanation for definiteness effects in HAVE sentences, and predicts that HAVE should fail unaccusativity and raising tests. It is shown that the predictions of the present approach are correct, and that traditional arguments in favour of HAVE’s being unaccusative (such as its alleged inability to passivize) do not go through.

Stassen (2009) points out a set of possession constructions in which the possessee appears as the predicate in a copular construction. In these constructions, the possessee appears to be marked by a derivational morpheme, often an adjectivalizer or nominalizer. An example is the English –ed in contexts like John is blue-eyed. Stassen dubs this phenomenon Predicativization. In this chapter, I show that Predicativization cannot be related to more familiar types of HAVE or BE construction by movement, further undermining the Freeze/Kayne tradition. This is shown via a detailed analysis of the –yoq suffix in Cochabamba Quechua, in which Delayed Gratification plays a key role. Drawing on and amending ideas from Nevins and Myler (2014, submitted), the chapter then lays out a detailed typology of Predicativization structures cross-linguistically. The main parameters of variation in this typology are (i) the category of the Predicativizing morpheme itself, (ii) the size of the nominal substructure it selects, (iii) whether it requires modifier, and (iv) whether or not the modifier can be phrasal.

This chapter sketches an analysis of WITH-Possessives. It is argued that the analysis of Levinson (2011) is correct in its essentials, and that Levinson’s approach can be broadened to account for other subtypes of possession structure beyond temporary possession. A comparison of the Icelandic WITH-Possessive with similar constructions in Bantu languages reveals an interesting difference. While the Icelandic WITH-Possessive is semantically restricted in a way that suggests that Icelandic með ‘with’ retains its comitative semantics in possessive contexts, Bantu WITH-Possessives are not restricted in this way. I analyse the Bantu situation as a case of grammaticalization, understood as a subtype of reanalysis along the lines of Roberts and Rousseau (2003).

This chapter begins by giving a brief overview of the arguments made in the main body of the book. It then examines prospects for extending the approach to other constructions that involve HAVE and BE beyond possession, including aspectual auxiliary constructions and existential constructions. After discussing some other open questions, the chapter concludes by highlighting that the findings of this book force us to adopt a certain view of the place of thematic roles in the architecture of the grammar: thematic roles are not features assigned to particular positions by the syntax, but instead constitute (part of) the meaning of certain syntactic terminal nodes, and are relevant only in the semantic component.

Using a comparative analysis – mainly looking at French law with some incursions into English law – this chapter examines the effects of possession through the example of possessory protection in Quebec Law. It considers the appropriate parameters of possessory protection in relation to its functions, arguing that the possessory action has a larger function than the protection of ownership, given its supplementary purpose of protecting against violence. The argument consists of three parts. First, following the examination of the notion of possession and the foundations of the protection of possession, it is submitted that the person with detention of the property should benefit from possessory protection. Second, it is argued that this action should not be subject to the conditions set for a useful possession. Finally, it is submitted that the domain of possessory protection should be extended to movables in order to transcend the obsolete maxim ‘res mobilis res vilis’.

This chapter examines how, in Caleb Williams (1794), Godwin brings the Gothic to bear on the eighteenth century. It considers the novel as a manifestation of his radical views outlined in Political Justice (1793) and explores the novel as a response to English anxieties about the French Revolution at home and abroad. This chapter examines representations of the past in the novel, particularly in relation to Godwin’s ‘Of History and Romance’ (1797), which criticises works of Enlightenment history. The psychological introspection of Caleb Williams is discussed, as well as the presence of history in the human psyche and the (unwanted) ideological legacy of the past. This chapter goes on to explore how, in a similar vein to Godwin, Wollstonecraft refuses to use a fictional past as a subterfuge to comment on the present in Maria (1798) and uses the Gothic to examine women’s plight in eighteenth-century England. Discussing Maria in relation to A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, it is argued that the novel brings the Female Gothic and its political agenda into sharper focus. This chapter discusses Wollstonecraft’s exploration of the female psyche, and how Maria’s thoughts and actions are governed by anachronistic and patriarchal social customs.

This chapter takes issue with Slavoj Žižek’s announcement of the “death of ecology.” The “death of ecology” addresses the claim that there is a difference between culture and nature, comforting us with the idea that we can “fix” things by changing our actions so that they no longer harm nature. According to Žižek, human culture—including technology, pollution, and trash—is just as natural as anything else.

In the West, photography and spirit, far from being opposites, have been seen as peculiarly analogous and adapted to one another. Since the beginning of spirit photography in the 1860s, the camera, photographers, spirits and their mediums have built up various alliances. In contrast, spirit mediums in Africa and other parts of the world have shunned photography and refused the presence of the camera during their séances. In my contribution, I will explore the negative relationship between spirits, spirit mediums and photography in Africa, in particular on the East African Coast. This negative relation is connected not only with the political and historical specificity of spirit mediums’ ambiguous position in relation to Islam and the postcolonial state but also with characteristics of the photographic medium itself - freezing, fixation, and serialization - that seem to endanger the auratic power of spirits. While photography has been refused, video technologies have appeared to be more suitable to mediate spiritual power. In fact, in locally produced videos photography and the reasons for its refusal themselves become part of the ways in which the work of spirits and their mediums is represented.Whereas they built up alliances with various technical medias as extensions and intensifications of the capabilities of their bodies and worked out new media “utopias”, they interdicted the doubling of their bodies in photographs. This refusal raises important theoretical questions about the often assumed “innocence” or “neutrality” of Western technical media and the epistemologies they carry within them. Obviously, the “visual programm” of photography (Flusser) that always gives something “more” to see and centers on transparency may clash with other visual regimes that attempt to mediate much more secrecy and concealment.

This chapter addresses the psychological significance of ownership and possession and explores how people perceive them. It shows that an individual’s notion of possession is not necessarily physical but may extend to intangible entitlements and expectations. This state of affairs may support a broadening of the law’s understanding of possession. In addition, the chapter analyzes the relative strength of ownership and possession, which is highly relevant to conflicts between owners and possessors, including the doctrines of first possession and adverse possession. The chapter also employs psychological insights to justify seemingly paradoxical legal rules, according to which owners have more freedom to use their property intensively than to refrain from using it at all, more freedom to restrict the transfer of property totally than to subject it to conditions, and more freedom to destroy the property than to modify or change it.