A corpus-based analysis of Post-Auxiliary Ellipsis voice mismatches in Late Modern English

Evelyn Gandón-Chapela

doi:10.1080/03740463.2020.1765272

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper analyses Post-Auxiliary Ellipsis voice mismatches between the antecedent clause(s) and the ellipsis site(s) in Late Modern English, using the Penn Parsed Corpus of Modern British English (PPCMBE) (1700–1914). This study focuses on two subtypes of Post-Auxiliary Ellipsis, namely VP ellipsis and Pseudogapping. The results show that voice mismatches were possible in Pseudogapping and VP ellipsis in Late Modern English with low frequencies. This fact serves as counterevidence for the claim about the impossibility of finding voice mismatches in Pseudogapping and confirms corpus-based findings for Present-Day English. As for VP ellipsis, corpus-based studies show that voice mismatches are not attested in Present-Day English. Since they occur in Late Modern English with low frequencies, this contrast may be due to the stylistics or register of the corpora analysed.

Highlights

This study focuses on two subtypes of Post-Auxiliary Ellipsis, namely Verb Phrase (VP) ellipsis and Pseudogapping
The results show that voice mismatches were possible in Pseudogapping and VP ellipsis in Late Modern English with low frequencies
The present paper investigates Post-Auxiliary Ellipsis voice mismatches between antecedent clause(s) and the ellipsis site(s) in Late Modern English based on data gathered from the Penn Parsed Corpus of Modern British English (1700–1914)

Summary

Introduction

The present paper investigates Post-Auxiliary Ellipsis voice mismatches between antecedent clause(s) and the ellipsis site(s) in Late Modern English based on data gathered from the Penn Parsed Corpus of Modern British English (1700–1914). The main aim will be to analyse the different cases of voice mismatches in Late Modern English qualitatively, providing data from a new period of the history of the English language. This will allow a comparison of the characteristics of Post-Auxiliary Ellipsis voice mismatches in Late Modern English with those reported in other theoretical and empirical analyses on Present-Day English data (Sag 1976; Warner 1993; Kehler 2000, 2002; Hardt and Rambow 2001; Kertz 2008, 2013; Merchant 2008, 2013; Bos and Spenader 2011; Miller 2011, 2014; Miller and Pullum 2014).

Methods

Findings

Conclusion