THE GRAMMATICALIZATION OF ADVERBS two case studies Muriel Norde

Faculty of Arts University of Groningen

THE GRAMMATICALIZATION OF

ADVERBStwo case studies

Muriel Norde

2Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006

OUTLINE

• Preliminaries– the category of adverbs– grammaticalization vs. lexicalization

• Case studies– epistemic adverbs– Dutch intensifying tig

• Theoretical discussion


THE CATEGORY OF ADVERBS

Open or closed class?• Talmy 2000: only N, V and Adj form open

classes• Ramat & Ricca 1998: range from relatively

open (fortunately) to relatively closed class (monomorphemic advs such as now, just)

• Brinton & Traugott 2005: no clear binary distinction between lexical / major / open classes on the one hand and grammatical / minor / closed classes on the other. “Lexical” and “grammatical items form a continuum.


GRAMMATICALIZATION

• “Grammaticalization consists in the increase of the range of a morpheme advancing from a lexical to a grammatical or from a less grammatical to a more grammatical status.” (Kuryłowicz 1975 [1965]

• “[…] an evolution whereby linguistic units lose in semantic complexity, pragmatic significance, syntactic freedom, and phonetic substance […]”(Heine & Reh 1984)

• “A grammaticalization is a diachronic change by which the parts of a constructional schema come to have stronger internal dependencies” (Haspelmath 2004)

• taken litterally: ‘having become grammatical’


DEGRAMMATICALIZATION

• Based on: the cline of grammaticalitycontent item > grammatical word > clitic > inflectional affix

• Single shift from right to left• Constructional identity is preserved• Main mechanisms involved:

– reanalysis– resemanticization– decreased bondedness– recategorialization– phonetic strengthening


LEXICALIZATION

• “recruitment of linguistic material to enrich the lexicon” (Hopper & Traugott 1993)

• “today’s grammar may become tomorrow’s lexicon” (Ramat 1992)

• Dependent on one’s definition of lexicon• Definition adopted here: Brinton & Traugott 2005“[…] the view that the lexicon does not exist solely of a list of

discrete and fully fixed items but represents a continuum from more to less fixed, from more to less fully conventionalized, and from more to less productive items. […] the continuum models of the lexical / grammatical split and of the lexicon fit better with the historical facts of change, which is often (though not always) gradual in the sense that change occurs by very small steps.

• Contra GL conception of grammatical categories as discrete entities


SUBTYPES OF LEXICALIZATION

• Function words– Pros en cons– [Shaved her legs and then] he was a she (L.

Reed)• Suffixes

– ologies (object of study, cf, sociology)– isms (ideology, cf. communism)

• phrases– forget-me-not– has-been– no-show

• acronyms– sms’es– nimby


LEXICALIZATION “vs” GRAMMATICALIZATION

• Lehmann 2002: e.g. transition N > P is first and foremost a case of lexicalization with subsequent grammaticalization

• Antilla 1989: grammaticalization involves lexicalization (e.g. by adding P’s to the lexicon)

• Sum: lexicalization is concomitant with, but neither congruent with nor opposite to grammaticalization


LEXICALIZATION “vs” DEGRAMMATICALIZATION• Ramat 1992: lexicalization =

degrammaticalization• What is meant is: lexicalization of

affixes (isms etc.)• However: this is just one type of

lexicalization• Sum: lexicalization is concomitant,

but not synonymous, with degrammaticalization


CASE STUDY 1

• Epistemic adverbsderiving from ‘may / can be / happen


‘MAYBE’ IN SCANDINAVIAN

• Swedish kanske < ‘can happen’• Swedish måhända < ‘may happen’• Norwegian kanskje < ‘can happen’• Danish måske < ‘may happen’


‘MAYBE’ IN OTHER LANGUAGES

• English maybe• Dutch misschien (< ‘may happen’)• French peut-être• Russian možet (byt’) < ‘may (be)’• Serbian – Croatian možda < ‘may

that’• Polish może < ‘may’• Lithuanian gal(būt) < ‘may (be’)


TYPICAL FEATURES OF SWEDISH KANSKE

• prosodically a compound, not a phrase

However: phrase-like properties• may be followed by a subordinate

clause:Kanske att hon soverMaybe that she sleeps

• may violate Swedish V2-rule


SWEDISH AS A V2 LANGUAGE

Vi äter alltid lunch kl. 12

We eat always lunch 12 o’clock

Alltid äter vi lunch kl. 12

Always eat we lunch 12 o’clock

Kl. 12 äter vi alltid lunch

12 o’clock eat we always lunch

Lunch äter vi alltid kl. 12

Lunch eat we always 12 o´clock


WORD ORDER WITH KANSKE

Han har KANSKE inte ätit

He has maybe not eaten

KANSKE har han inte ätit

Maybe has he not eaten

KANSKE han inte har ätit

Maybe he not has eaten

Han KANSKE inte har ätit

He maybe not has eaten


WHAT HAPPENED?

• Source: MLG mach-schên ‘may happen’

-> loan word maxan (now obsolete)

-> loan translations kanske, måhända, kanhända


KAN SKE AS A PHRASE

• thet kan wel skee at en liten hoop offuerwinner en storan

‘It may well happen that a small lott conquers a large (lot)’

• thz kunde honom ekke ske

‘That could not happen to him’


SUMMARY: CHANGES INVOLVED

• Phonetic reduction• Semantic bleaching• Univerbation• Decategorialization• Layering (phrase-like properties)• Subjectification (from sentence subject to

utterance subject)

Tentative conclusion: grammaticalizationbut: Ramat 2001: lexicalization (MN:

lexicalization is not a competing term)


CASE STUDY 2

• Dutch tigfrom suffix to numeral to intensifier


ETYMOLOGY

• PGmc *teXu- ‘unit of 10’• > Suffix –tig (engl. -ty, germ. –zig,

fris. –tich, sw. –tio)• > Indefinite numeral: tig keer

‘umpteen times’• > Intensifying adverb: tig leuk ‘very

nice’


Change 1: TIG AS AN INDEFINITE NUMERAL

• DutchDie kerel heeft al tig vriendinnen gehad

• FrisianDy keardel hat al tich freondinnen hân

• GermanDer Kerl hat schon zig Freundinnen gehabt‘That guy has already had dozens of girlfriends’

meaning: ‘umpteen, dozens, zillion’


ORDINAL TIGSTE

• DutchJe vraagt dat nu al voor de tigste keer!

• FrisianDo fregest da no al foar de tichste kear!

• GermanDu fragst das jetzt schon zum zigsten Mal!

‘You are asking that for the zillionth time already!’


WHY DEGRAMMATICALIZATION?

• decreased bondedness : – bound > free– independent usage: ik heb er wel tig ‘I’ve got dozens

of them’• resemanticization :

– -tig: ‘x10’, only when combined with numeral stem– tig ‘indefinite, large quantity’

• Subjectification : (!!)• : recategorialization

– ordinal inflection tigste• phonetic strengthening: (Du/Fri)

– -tig: [təx] – tig: [tιx] (possibly spelling pronunciation)


WHY NOT MERELY LEXICALIZATION?

• Lexicalization of numeral suffixes:– Engl.: Girls in their teens ‘aged 13-19’– It.: Ha passato gli anta ‘he is over forty’– < quaranta, cinquanta

• Isms, teens: hyperonyms– all ideologies ending in –ism– all ages ending in –teen

• Lexicalization: one giant leap from affix to lexical element

• Tig: does not mean ‘any quantity between 20 and 90’

• Tig: gradual change


ALTERNATIVE ANALYSES

• Haspelmath 2004: back formation, -tig is part of compound twin- and der- are not independent morphemes

• Lehmann 2005: *teguz ‘unit of 10’ > numeral tig, leadning a hidden life in spoken language, “non-demonstrability of non-existence” : Taboo word? : No evidence at all, in spite of 1000 years of

written sources?? WNT 1960: no tig Grimm 1956: zig “in jüngster Zeit” (example from

1935)


Change 2: DUTCHTIG AS INTENSIFIER

• Het is nu al tig laat

‘It is now already very late’• tig veel antwoorduh

‘Very many answers’• Shoarma is toch tig lekkerder

‘Shawarma is however much more tasty’


GERMAN ZIG AS INTENSIFIER

• Ich hab diesen Film schon zig oft gesehen

‘I have seen this film very often already’

• zig viel Geld

‘a whole lot of money’


DEGREES

Class Grade Example

I absolute absolutely

II approximative almost

III extremely high extremely

IV high very

V moderate rather

VI minimal somewhat

VII quasinegative little

VIII negative not


SUSPENSION TESTS

Class Example Can be suspended by

Example

I I’m absolutely sure - -

II I I’m almost ready, if not completely ready

III She’s unbelievably rich

- -

IV III She’s very rich, if not unbelievably rich

V IV or III She is rather happy, maybe even very happy / extremely happy


RESULT OF SUSPENSION TEST

?Het is al tig laat, om niet te zeggen heel laat. (class V)

‘It is already quite late, if not very late’Het is al tig laat, om niet te zeggen

ontzettend laat (class IV) ‘It is already very late, if not awfully

late’Het is al tig laat (class III) ‘It is already awfully late’


SOURCES OF INTENSIFIERS

• Heine / Kuteva 2002:– ‘terrible’ and other qualitative adjectives

• terribly ugly / beautiful• vreselijk lelijk / mooi• furchtbar hässlich / schön• terriblement laide / belle• hemskt ful / vacker

– ‘true’• very ugly / beautiful (< Older French verray)• richtig hässlich / schön


MORE SOURCES

• “Superlatives”– extremely

• extremely ugly / beautiful• extreem lelijk / mooi• ausserordentlich hässlich / schön

– madly• madly in love• waanzinnig verliefd• vansinnigt förälskad

• ‘Much’ (sometimes with comparatives only)– much better (OE: moche worthy)– veel beter– mycket bättre, mycket bra


INTENSIFYINGTIG

• No cross-linguistic equivalents• Not comparable to much

– much is used with mass nouns: much work

– tig is used with count nouns: tig mensen / *tig werk


WHAT HAPPENED?

Bridging context (Heine 2002):

Er zijn tig betere systemen te koop

1: ‘There are dozens of better systems for sale’ (numeral)

2: ‘There are much better systems for sale’ (adverb)


WHY GRAMMATICALIZATION?

• Semantic bleaching: – meaning becomes more abstract, functions merely to

intensify the meaning of the following adjective or adverb

• Decategorialization: – can no longer be inflected as an ordinal numeral (as

could the indefinite numeral tig)

• Phonetic reduction: - (no change)• Less syntactic freedom:

– can no longer be used independently

• Context expansion: (from comparatives to simple Adjs)


OTHERS ON DEGREE ADVERBS

• Klein 1998: only degree adverbs deriving from qualitative adjectives (terribly) are instances of gz, because they involve semantic “bleaching”– She is terribly mean– She is terribly beautiful (bleaching)

• Brinton & Traugott 2005: all degree adverbs deriving from other adverbs are instances of gz


IMPLICATIONS FOR UNIDIRECTIONALITY

• From suffix to indefinite numeral: “counterdirectional” change

• Degrammaticalized elements can (re)grammaticalize

• Crucially however, they do not return to the old stage of affairs


CONCLUDING REMARKS

• Lexicalization does not compete with either grammaticalization or degrammaticalization

• The present terminology cannot capture the changes involved in the rise of adverbs

• Crucially, the mechanisms which are assumed to be defining properties of grammaticalization need to be re-evaluated– In particular, this is true for pragmatic inferencing,

subjectification and scope changes

• Besides addressing clear-cut cases (the French inflectional future ) attention ought to be paid to changes in the “grey area”


THANK YOU

• This presentation will soon be downloadable from:

http://odur.let.rug.nl/~norde/downloadables.htm

THE GRAMMATICALIZATION OF ADVERBS two case studies Muriel Norde

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