Abstract
Cognitive and generative approaches to linguistics have taken a different perspective on grammatical polysemy and grammaticalization. While the former see polysemy as a core characteristic of language and a necessary result of grammaticalization within idiolects, the latter see it as a less interesting phenomenon peripheral to linguistics proper. Grammaticalization is seen as a phenomenon of language acquisition which does not disturb the homogeneity of idiolects. These differing perspectives have generated much debate between the two approaches and are even in large part responsible for the different programmatic focuses of each. While the disagreement over grammatical polysemy between these two approaches to language is rooted in entrenched commitments on each side that are perhaps irreconcilable, at least some common ground does seem to be possible. Specifically, when it comes to intergenerational corpora, it seems that both cognitive and generative approaches to linguistics can agree that the universal phenomenon of grammaticalization would result in polysemy at least at the language community level. This can serve as a common ground on which both generative and cognitive linguists can join efforts in describing and explaining usage profiles of grammatically polysemous forms at the corpus level according to prototypicality, even if disagreement persists on the nature of the idiolect.
Highlights
Grammatical polysemy refers to grammatical forms that are used in multiple ways
This is a less well-known aspect of linguistic inquiry, but constitutes the focus of one of four basic research questions in linguistics—namely, how do people use a grammatical construction (Glynn 2010: 18-19)?3 Grammatical polysemy appears to pose a particular difficulty for compatibility between generative and cognitive linguistics since it cannot be quarantined within the lexicon and does not enjoy the uncontroversial status of the fact that a concrete concept may be referred to in multiple ways or that a schematic grammatical relationship may be realized in multiple constructions
The purpose of this paper is to suggest an inviting playing field where the disjointed ground between these models becomes more aligned and uneven patches are leveled out—namely, intergenerational corpora of ancient languages, using the Hebrew Bible as an illustration
Summary
Grammatical polysemy refers to grammatical forms that are used in multiple ways. This is a less well-known aspect of linguistic inquiry, but constitutes the focus of one of four basic research questions in linguistics—namely, how do people use a grammatical construction (Glynn 2010: 18-19)?3 Grammatical polysemy appears to pose a particular difficulty for compatibility between generative and cognitive linguistics since it cannot be quarantined within the lexicon (as with lexical polysemy) and does not enjoy the uncontroversial status of the fact that a concrete concept may be referred to in multiple ways (lexical synonymy) or that a schematic grammatical relationship may be realized in multiple constructions (grammatical synonymy, e.g. “I like a good run/to run/running” where a noun phrase, infinitive, or gerund can be the direct object of a verb).. This is a less well-known aspect of linguistic inquiry, but constitutes the focus of one of four basic research questions in linguistics—namely, how do people use a grammatical construction (Glynn 2010: 18-19)?3 Grammatical polysemy appears to pose a particular difficulty for compatibility between generative and cognitive linguistics since it cannot be quarantined within the lexicon (as with lexical polysemy) and does not enjoy the uncontroversial status of the fact that a concrete concept may be referred to in multiple ways (lexical synonymy) or that a schematic grammatical relationship may be realized in multiple constructions “I like a good run/to run/running” where a noun phrase, infinitive, or gerund can be the direct object of a verb).4 An example of this phenomenon can be seen in the polysemy of the English adverbial conjunction since which may be temporal or causal, seen in example (1) below from Haug (2008: 289-290; cf Kortmann 1997: 90-91). The comments I will make here apply to both phenomena, and so for simplicity sake, I will refer to these as polysemy
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