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
3Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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.
4Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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’
5Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
6Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
7Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
8Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
9Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
10Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
CASE STUDY 1
• Epistemic adverbsderiving from ‘may / can be / happen
11Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
‘MAYBE’ IN SCANDINAVIAN
• Swedish kanske < ‘can happen’• Swedish måhända < ‘may happen’• Norwegian kanskje < ‘can happen’• Danish måske < ‘may happen’
12Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
‘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’)
13Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
14Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
15Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
16Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
WHAT HAPPENED?
• Source: MLG mach-schên ‘may happen’
-> loan word maxan (now obsolete)
-> loan translations kanske, måhända, kanhända
17Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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’
18Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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)
19Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
CASE STUDY 2
• Dutch tigfrom suffix to numeral to intensifier
20Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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’
21Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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’
22Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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!’
23Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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)
24Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
25Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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)
26Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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’
27Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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’
28Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
29Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
30Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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’
31Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
32Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
33Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
34Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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)
35Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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)
36Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
37Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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
38Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
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”
39Colloque Fribourg 03-10-2006
THANK YOU
• This presentation will soon be downloadable from:
http://odur.let.rug.nl/~norde/downloadables.htm