Grammaticalization Patterns Research Articles

Ukrainian Translation of English Lexicalized Constructions: A Case of BBC News and BBC News Ukraine Headlines

Drawing on the headlines from the BBC News and BBC News Ukraine websites, the paper seeks to identify the patterns of translating English lexicalized constructions consisting of fixed and non-fixed elements. The fixed component is considered to be a stable island of reliability that has a phonological form unchanged in different contexts, while the non-fixed component is dependent and selected according to the communicative situation. The paper is the first study finding that English lexicalized constructions in BBC News headlines are translated on the BBC News Ukraine website according to four semantic patterns: re-perspectivation, generalization or specification of the meaning of the Ukrainian components of the English lexicalized constructions, as well as grammaticalization. The implementation of the re-perspectivation pattern involves shifting the focus of attention from one feature of a referent in the original to a different one in the translation with the help of adjectives or nouns. Within the generalization translation pattern of English lexicalized constructions, the semantics of their components shifts from the basic categorization level, associated with the speakers’ perceptual experience, to the superordinate level involving generalization. According to the specification pattern, the semantics of the English lexicalized constructions’ components shifts in translation from the basic to the subordinate categorization level, focusing on the specific features of referents. The shifts in the categorization levels, characteristic of the generalization and specification translation patterns, results from the peculiarities of the British and Ukrainian worldviews brought about by the nations’ histories and lifestyles. The grammaticalization patterns render the English lexicalized constructions into Ukrainian by the prepositional structures denoting CONTAINER and by the relative structures specifying the features of referents.

Diverging Grammaticalization Patterns across Spanish Varieties: The Case of perdón in Mexican and Peninsular Spanish

This study investigates the contemporary grammaticalized uses of perdón (‘sorry’) in two varieties of Spanish, namely Mexican and Peninsular Spanish. Methodologically, the investigation is based on a taxonomy of offenses, organized around the concept of ‘face’ and based on spoken data of Spanish from Mexico and Spain. This taxonomy turns out to be a fruitful methodological tool for the analysis of apologetic markers: it does not only offer usage-based evidence for previous theorizing concerning the grammaticalization process of apologetic markers, but also leads to a refinement of these previous results from a contrastive point of view. Evidence from both corpora suggests a more advanced stage in the grammaticalization process of perdón in Mexican Spanish, where it can be used not only as a self-face-saving device geared towards the positive face of the speaker, but also in turn-taking contexts oriented towards the negative face of the interlocutor. Peninsular Spanish, on the other hand, resorts to a more varied gamut of apologetic markers in these contexts.

Periphrases with Motion Verbs in Vedic Sanskrit: (between) Textual Analysis and Grammaticalization Patterns

AbstractThe Sanskrit language knows the use of iterative‐continuative periphrases which are so far mostly unexplored. The aim of this paper is to investigate the grammaticalization of the motion verbs i‐ ‘go’ and car‐ ‘move’ plus participle into auxiliary verbs, collecting data from the earliest attestations (c. 2nd millennium BC) to Late Vedic (c. 900–600 BC). I argue that in the earliest attestations there are no clear cases of periphrasis, but the motion verbs are combined with an extremely high percentage of intensive participles (with iterative Aktionsart). On the other hand, in Late Vedic i‐ ‘go’ and car‐ ‘move’ function as iterative‐continuative auxiliaries in composition with participial form. As I will show, this new periphrastic construction is one of the strategies to substitute the synthetic intensive category, which was slowly disappearing after the Early Vedic time.

From space to time and beyond: A corpus inquiry into the grammaticalization patterns of a/one step away from

ABSTRACT Cross-linguistically, spatial expressions display a propensity to undergo semantic extensions, thus frequently giving rise to grammatical markers. Drawing on diachronic material derived from the Corpus of Historical American English and synchronic data extracted from the Corpus of Contemporary American English, this study reports on a hitherto unexplored, incipient change of this kind, namely that affecting the multiword string a/one step away from. It is shown that with the conventionalization of the invited inference of closeness, the construction at issue was reanalyzed as a complex preposition, functioning initially as an exponent of prospective aspect, then additionally as a similitude marker, and finally also as an approximator. This chronology further finds reflection in the current functional gradience of a/one step away from, in that among its grammatical instances, which amount to slightly more than half the tokens in the sample, aspectual uses constitute the largest proportion, followed by similative occurrences and degree modifier attestations. At the distributional level, the investigated case of grammaticalization manifests itself in the highly confined determination and modification patterns of the form step, counterbalanced by the entire expression’s compatibility with inanimate subjects as well as host-class expansion to abstract NPs, verbal gerunds, and adjectives.

ОТНОВО ЗА РЕЧЕВИТЕ АКТОВЕ И ЗА РАЗЛИКИТЕ МЕЖДУ ГЛАГОЛ И СКАЗУЕМО / SPEECH ACTS, VERBS AND THE PARADIGMATIC VS. SYNTAGMATIC MEANING REVISITED

This paper re-examines some classical theories of the meaning and the embedding of verbs (words for acts) both outside and within context. F. de Saussure’s dichotomy concerning paradigmatic/syntagmatic aspects of meaning finds its further interpretation in various theoretical models, especially in the field of pragmatics and the philosophy of language. Among them the works of M.A.K. Halliday and R. Hassan, as well as of P. Ricoeur could serve as a point of departure in explaining some newer and sophisticated cases of grammaticalization. The paper focuses on examples of the exchange of mental patterns, clichés and frozen expressions due to contemporary language contacts. Keywords: verb semantics, clause predicate semantics, paradigmatic vs. syntagmatic meaning, lexical taxonomies, cross-lingual exchange of conceptualizations and grammaticalization patterns

Typology of number systems in languages of Western and Central Siberia

This paper investigates the linguistic expression of number in seven languages from Western and Central Siberia. In a first step the number system of each language is described in detail, and afterwards the most relevant convergences and divergences of the languages are dealt with. Three particularly interesting phenomena are discussed in more detail: First, it is shown that the concept of general number, denoting noun forms underspecified for number, is able to account for a range of related phenomena (unmarked noun forms after numerals, nouns denoting paired objects). Second, singulatives in Selkup, Ket and partly Eastern Khanty are analyzed, whereby it is argued that their similar morphosyntactic and grammaticalization patterns allow for analyzing them as a contact phenomenon. Third, two splits on the animacy hierarchy between the first and second person in Dolgan as well as Chulym Turkic are presented. Finally, the results are evaluated against a broader areal-typological background, whereby it is shown that the category of number does not support any larger areal groupings within Western and Central Siberia, but that the analyzed languages rather adhere to patterns of number marking present all over Northern Eurasia.

Imperfect(ive) variation: The case of Bulgarian

This paper explores the connection between morphological and semantic imperfectivity in Bulgarian from a comparative perspective set against the framework of situation semantics. Stressing the characteristics of Bulgarian, we juxtapose the uniquely complex Tense-Aspect-Modality-Evidentiality (TAME) system of this language with those in other Slavic languages and in Romance with regards to variation in (un)availability of a large variety of readings of imperfectives, including habitual, ongoing, intentional, and factual types. Bulgarian is interesting as it lacks some imperfective readings characteristic of Russian and Polish, such as the factual type specialized for complete events, and displays intentional imperfectives, which are commonly found in Romance but restricted or absent elsewhere in Slavic. We adopt the idea that imperfectives share a modal architecture where an imperfective operator IMPF with an intrinsic semantic core is subject to different restrictions on its domain of quantification based on specific grammaticalization patterns across languages. From this perspective, we also examine the interaction between IMPF and an evidential operator encoded by the so-called Renarrated Mood in Bulgarian, proposing that the latter scopes over IMPF adding an evidential flavor to available imperfective readings; we establish contrasts with so-called Narrative Imperfects in Romance, which also serve a reportative function.

La réciprocité dans les langues romanes anciennes

The paper traces evolutionary pathways of various methods of expressing reciprocity found in Old French (12th century) and Old Portuguese (13–15th century) texts. Most of grammaticalization patterns responsible for the emergence of reciprocal markers and documented in human languages are demonstrated to have been active in Old Romance, too. Medieval reciprocal exponents are first compared with their Latin ancestors to show what Romance innovations consisted in and what formal means were retained throughout. Then, an account is given of how the two languages were different from each other. Finally, two suggestions are made on how current grammaticalization theory can be modified so as to grasp more efficiently the origin of reciprocal markers found in European languages.

Goal–source asymmetry and crosslinguistic grammaticalization patterns: a cognitive-typological approach

In this paper, the patterns of semantic extensions of allative markers are compared with those of ablative markers from a cognitive-typological perspective. Despite the symmetry the two notions appear to exhibit semantically, goal and source exhibit asymmetry and the prevalence of the former over the latter can be seen in a wide range of linguistic and cognitive phenomena. Previous studies indicate that speakers tend to produce goal-oriented events much more frequently than source-oriented events. Goal markers are often associated with an extensive array of functions and usages as well. Building on these findings, the present study investigates how such a prevalence of goal-markers over source-markers may or may not be reflected in their grammaticalization patterns. Do allative markers exhibit more robust patterns of semantic extension across domains compared to ablative counterparts? What are the patterns of semantic extension of the allatives and the ablatives, and how do they differ from each other? The synchronic usage patterns of the allative and ablative markers from 24 languages including English, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Spanish, Polish, and Tamil are examined. The results indicate that goal-markers have generally undergone a more extensive semantic development than source-markers, thus providing more evidence for goal-bias in human cognition.

Uses of ter- in Malay: A corpus-based study

Many instances of ter- in Standard Malay of Malaysia have confusing active and passive forms (i.e., a construction such as [Noun TER-VP] can represent both active and passive functions). Two criteria, namely (a) substitution by a canonical passive marker, and (b) addition of the agentive phrase, are established in order to distinguish the passive and the active. Utilizing a modern corpus and a historical corpus, words comprised of passive ter- were extracted and were then compared to the Malay canonical passive di- and the adversative passive kena. The results show that ter- appears less frequently than di- but more frequently than kena. Additionally, ter- is used informally in contexts related to personal daily life, typically denoting an unintended action. This study not only provides a criteria-based methodology to extract a particular meaning from the multiple meanings of a grammatical morpheme, but also it discusses the grammaticalization process of these different functions of ter- utilizing corpora data. The results indicate that ter- develops from perfected to imperfected to stative forms in addition to other grammaticalization patterns such as from ability to possibility and from definite to superlative forms.

Grammaticalization Patterns: Evidence from Future Markers in Jordanian Arabic

Grammaticalization Patterns: Evidence from Future Markers in Jordanian Arabic

Crosslinguistic grammaticalization patterns of the allative

Goal-marking morphemes, or allatives, are notoriously polysemous crosslinguistically. In a survey of 44 genetically and areally diverse languages, we have tracked synchronic usage patterns for 54 allative markers and confirmed that they indeed exhibit a wide range of semantic and grammatical functions. A number of previous grammaticalization studies undertaken from a cognitive/typological perspective have argued that various non-spatial goal-marking senses of allative morphemes, such as dative/benefactive and purposive, often develop out of a spatial sense through various semantic extensions. Our data also indicated that allatives grammaticalize extensively, but that dative, purposive, and other common abstract extensions, perhaps strongly associated with the allative sense, have an equal – and thus independent – likelihood of developing. That is, their functional evolution is not fully predetermined by a single implicational hierarchy or by a unidimensional grammaticalization chain. Instead, an allative marker undergoing grammaticalization has multiple extension pathways available to it.

Irrealis and the Subjunctive

This paper suggest that in order to understand the cross-language distribution of the subjunctive mood one needs to understand the cross-grammar distribution of the irrealis modality, as well as have a general theory of modality, within which irrealis takes its rightful natural place. The subjunctive mood turns out to occupy two coherent sub regions within irrealis: (a) the subjunctive of lower certainty (within the epistemic sub-mode of irrealis), and (b) the subjunctive of weaker manipulation (within the deontic sub-mode of irrealis). A grammaticalized subjunctive may take the same form in both sub-modes (as in Romance), or two distinct forms (as in some Bantu languages). The paper also investigates the diachronic pathways of grammaticalization through which various subjunctive patterns arise, showing that analogical extension patterns exist in both directions — from deontic to epistemic and vice versa. The interaction between grammaticalization patterns and functional universals is also discussed.