We examine universals and crosslinguistic variation in constraints on event segmentation. Previous typological studies have focused on segmentation into syntactic (Pawley 1987) or intonational units (Givón 1991). We argue that the correlation between such units and semantic/conceptual event representations is language-specific. As an alternative, we introduce the MACRO-EVENT PROPERTY (MEP): a construction has the MEP if it packages event representations such that temporal operators necessarily have scope over all subevents. A case study on the segmentation of motion events into macro-event expressions in eighteen genetically and typologically diverse languages has produced evidence of two types of design principles that impact motion-event segmentation: language-specific lexicalization patterns and universal constraints on form-to-meaning mapping

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We ask whether there is a “macro-event phrase,” a uniform level of syntax at which complex scenarios may be described as single events under the Macro-Event Property (MEP). The MEP is a form-meaning mapping property that constrains the compatibility of event descriptions with time-positional modifiers. An examination of English infinitival complements, Ewe serial verb constructions, and Japanese converb constructions suggests that the putative crosslinguistic “macro-event phrase” is the verbal core of the Layered Structure of the Clause theory of Role and Reference Grammar. Across languages, simple cores necessarily have the MEP, whereas complex cores have it if and only if they are integrated by ‘cosubordinate’ nexus, defined as a symmetric union of two cores that together behave like a single core. We furthermore argue that this connection between core cosubordinations and the MEP may help explain why cosubordinate cores seem to always share an argument through control.