Abstract
AbstractThe paper focuses on the pace of grammaticalization in (a number of varieties of) Piedmontese, a northwestern Italo-Romance language (which includes a regional koiné and several dialectal varieties), and compares it to the geographically closest languages conventionally discussed in the literature on the Romance grammaticalization cline (RGC): French and Italian. I examine the speed of grammaticalization in Piedmontese with respect to four grammatical domains previously analyzed for national languages in the literature on RGC, namely perfective auxiliaries, indefinite articles, demonstratives, and negation. The data show that Piedmontese varieties are on a par with, or even slightly ahead of, French along the Romance grammaticalization cline. While helping to explain why some languages appear to be more grammaticalized than others within the same genealogical family, these findings contribute to advancing our understanding of the role of language-external factors in the grammaticalization process: contact with other languages and the strength of social ties among speakers appear to be more important in favoring grammaticalization than early urbanization or the size of the speaker community.
Highlights
The proposal of a Romance grammaticalization cline (RGC, referred to as the pace, rhythm or gradualness of grammaticalization in the Romance languages) has given rise to a vast body of research since the publication of pioneering work by Lamiroy (1999)
While French and Italian developed their indefinite article from the articulated less grammaticalized French Italian Spanish (Latin) preposition de, the competition between the articulated and unarticulated forms in Piedmontese came to an end in favor of the latter during the 19th century
The Piedmontese koiné is at the same stage as Italian with respect to perfective auxiliaries, but is consistently ahead in all other domains
Summary
The proposal of a Romance grammaticalization cline (RGC, referred to as the pace, rhythm or gradualness of grammaticalization in the Romance languages) has given rise to a vast body of research since the publication of pioneering work by Lamiroy (1999). The data shows that the Piedmontese koiné or other Piedmontese varieties are frequently to be situated at the same stage as, or are even slightly ahead of, French on the RGC These findings complement De Mulder and Lamiroy’s (2012: 219–221) view about the role of language-external factors in grammaticalization processes: the view proposed here (Section 6) is that contact with other languages and social ties among speakers are more important in favoring grammaticalization than early urbanization and the size of the speaker community. I discuss the relationship between literacy in (official) languages and grammaticalization
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