(Inter)Subjectivity and evidential perception verbs in English and German

Abstract

The verbs of perception—verbs denoting sight, sound, touch, smell, and taste—are often used to express evidential meaning. That is, they indicate that speakers or writers have perceptual evidence for particular propositions. Although it has been taken for granted that evidentiality is subjective due to its deictic nature, the intersubjective aspect of evidentiality—when and how speakers or writers share particular evidence with a larger speech community—has often been overlooked. The current study attempts to fill this gap with an examination of verbs of visual perception in English ( see and look) and German ( sehen and aussehen), taking into account the various approaches to subjectivity and intersubjectivity, as well as how speakers or writers relate to the addressee (known as “stance and engagement”). This study is also diachronic in nature, for it examines the evidential use of perception verbs from the Early Modern and Modern periods. It was found that English and German perception verbs can express evidential meaning in a number of different complementation patterns, and that the type of evidential meaning, as well as the type and degree of (inter)subjective meaning expressed, are linked to these constructions.