Frame Report

An Exerter, Action, or Force is capable of exerting or does exert a physical force at a level specified by the target. That physical force may cause deformation or breakage of, or simply motion in the receiving entity. The receiving entity is conceptually present (even if remotely), but is usually not lexically explicit. This frame covers both individual-level/static uses ("a STRONG person") as well as stage-level/dynamic uses ("a STRONG push"). However, the durative, individual-level meaning appears more frequently in the data and seems more basic.

Eugenie loved the sea and was a strong swimmer|Exer.

Spartacus dealt the Roman soldier a mighty blow|Act.

A powerful force|For tore off the tree's branches.

Exerter, Action, and Force belong to a Core set.


There are several productive metaphors covered by this frame. The first and most common is one in which social influence or control is conceptualized as the physical exertion of force. The social influence/control is more specifically a propensity to cause change in social realms such as the economic, political, militaristic, cultural, or intimate:
There were theoretical limits to the power of the king|Exer.
Voters in the South have a strong incentive|Exer to keep such Democrats in office.

Another similar metaphor is one in which psychological influence or control is understood as the physical exertion of force. The psychological influence/control includes the emotional as well:
Poetic words in a text|Exer can be given more|Deg emotive|Dom power by using melisma.
He was a forceful speaker|Exer.

A third metaphor involves the amount of an entity construed as the physical force exertion of said entity. Depending on context, amount could be volume, etc. (“STRONGEST critics”; “MIGHTY uproar”).



Two related physical force dynamic frames are Level_of_force_resistance and Dynamism.
This frame is distinguished from the Level_of_force_resistance frame in that it describes the level of force exertion instead of the level of resistance, and also in that there are three categories of core FE available to the target (i.e Exerter, Action, or Force), whereas in Level_of_force_resistance there are only two core FEs (i.e. Resisting_entity and Opposing_force). Of the latter frame's FEs, Opposing_force specifies the thing that the main entity resists to a level desginated by the target. Its parallel in Level_of_force_exertion is implied but backgrounded to the extent that it rarely appears as explicit lexical material; thus there is no corresponding core FE.

This frame differs from Dynamism with regard to individual-level cases; targets here express the FE's capability. In contrast, Dynamism targets express the FE's tendency. For example, "a STRONG person" is generally construed as a person who is capable of strength, while "an ENERGETIC person" (energetic.a from the Dynamism frame) is construed as a person who tends to be energetic.

However, there is overlap between the two frames in stage-level cases - "a STRONG push" and "an ENERGETIC push" seem rather comparable.