Syntactic change from within and from without syntax: A usage-based analysis

This study is an investigation of the expression of negation in the history of Greek, through quantitative data from representative texts from three major stages of vernacular Greek (Attic Greek, Koine, Late Medieval Greek), and qualitative data from Homeric Greek until Standard Modern. The contrast between two complementary negators, NEG1 and NEG2, is explained in terms of sensitivity of NEG2 μη‎ to nonveridicality: NEG2 is a polarity item in all stages of the Greek language, an item licensed by nonveridicality. The asymmetry in the diachronic development of the Greek negator system (the replacement of NEG1 and the preservation of NEG2) is explained with reference to the particulars of the uses of NEG2, specifically the inertial forces drawn by the nonnegative uses of NEG2, which being nonnegative did not experience the renewal pressures predicted by the Jespersen’s Cycle. These are its complementizer uses: (i) as a question particle, and (ii) in introducing verbs of fear complements. A viewpoint for Jespersen’s Cycle is proposed that abstracts away from the morphosyntactic and phonological particulars of the phenomenon and explicitly places its regularities in the semantics, accommodating not only for Greek, but for numerous other languages that deviate in different ways from the traditional description of Jespersen’s Cycle. The developments observed in the history of the Greek negator system agree with current generative theories of syntactic change, regarding the notions of up-the-tree movement.

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The prefield after the Old High German period

10.1093/oso/9780198813545.003.0005 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Augustin Speyer ◽

Helmut Weiß

Keyword(s):

Ninth Century ◽

Structural Constraints ◽

Old High German ◽

Syntactic Change ◽

The One ◽

Split Cp

The filling of the prefield in Modern German is determined by information-structural constraints such as scene-setting, contrastiveness, and topichood. While OHG does not yet show competition between these constraints, competition arises from MHG onward. This has to do with the generalization of the V2 constraint (i.e. the one-constituent property of the prefield) for declarative clauses, in which context the information-structural constraints are loosened. The syntactic change whose result eventually was the loss of multiple XP fronting comprised a change of the feature endowment of C because the fronting of expletive thô (roughly in the OHG of the ninth century) led to the reanalysis of XP fronting as a semantically vacuous movement whose only function is to check the EPP feature of C. Data from doubly filled prefields in ENHG and post-initial connectives indicate that an articulated split CP-structure, as proposed within the cartographic approach, is also at play in German.

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Modeling Syntactic Change under Contact: The Case of Italiot Greek

Languages ◽

10.3390/languages6020074 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 6 (2) ◽

pp. 74

Author(s):

Cristina Guardiano ◽

Melita Stavrou

Keyword(s):

Social Context ◽

Ancient Greek ◽

Potential Source ◽

Syntactic Change ◽

The Social ◽

Linguistic Structures

In this paper, we investigate patterns of persistence and change affecting the syntax of nominal structures in Italiot Greek in comparison to Modern (and Ancient) Greek, and we explore the role of Southern Italo-Romance as a potential source of interference. Our aim is to highlight the dynamics that favor syntactic contact in this domain: we provide an overview of the social context where these dynamics have taken place and of the linguistic structures involved.

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In search of the origin of na in Mavea

Studies in Language ◽

10.1075/sl.38.4.02gue ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 38 (4) ◽

pp. 690-716

Author(s):

Valérie Guérin

Keyword(s):

Common Noun ◽

Language Family ◽

Structural Requirements ◽

Structure Preserving ◽

Syntactic Change

Reflexes of the Proto-Oceanic common noun marker *na are found throughout the Oceanic language family. In Mavea, there is a morpheme na but it no longer partakes in the determiner system and is best analyzed synchronically as a preposition. This paper argues that today’s preposition is a reflex of the Proto-Oceanic common noun marker *na. Locative constructions are shown to provide a critical context conducive to the reanalysis of *na. Reanalysis has long been established as a mechanism of syntactic change, yet the factors motivating it remain a matter for debate. The dominant view is that reanalysis is driven by pragmatic factors. A rarely voiced view is that it is driven by structural requirements. The data adduced in this paper lend support to a model of syntactic change which can be structure-preserving in nature.

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Deverbal nouns, lexicalization and syntactic change

Nordic Journal of Linguistics ◽

10.1017/s0332586507001655 ◽

2007 ◽

Vol 30 (1) ◽

pp. 55-86 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Øivin Andersen

Keyword(s):

Language Use ◽

Morphological Type ◽

Frequency Data ◽

Difference Principle ◽

Token Frequency ◽

Syntactic Change ◽

Central Elements

Deverbal nouns are often referred to as hybrids, containing both verbal and nominal features. In many languages deverbal nouns tend to develop into what Vendler (1967) called perfect nouns. Various stages of this development in Norwegian are proposed, drawing on Grammaticalization Theory and Lexicalization Theory. Frequency data are provided from a large newspaper corpus. The deverbal nouns are analyzed as going through a process of lexicalization where reduction in compositionality, reduced token frequency and increased idiosyncrasy are central elements. This process is triggered by relevance to the root, language use, isomorphism and the maximal difference principle. The article shows that Norwegian deverbal nouns are in a state of flux and that even different members of the same morphological type may behave quite differently syntactically and semantically.

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Taking it up a level: Copy-raising and cascaded tiers of morphosyntactic change

Language Variation and Change ◽

10.1017/s0954394518000078 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 30 (2) ◽

pp. 231-260 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Marisa Brook

Keyword(s):

Historical Linguistics ◽

Canadian English ◽

Change Over Time ◽

British English ◽

Finite Structure ◽

Syntactic Change ◽

Copy Raising ◽

Over Time ◽

As If

AbstractThis paper uncovers evidence for two linked levels of morphosyntactic change occurring in Canadian English. The more ordinary is a lexical replacement: with finite subordination after seem, the complementizer like has been overtaking all the alternatives (as if, as though, that, and Ø). On top of this, there is a broader syntactic change whereby the entire finite structure (now represented primarily by like) is beginning to catch on at the expense of infinitival subordination after seem. Drawing on complementary evidence from British English and several partial precedents in the historical linguistics literature, I take this correlation to mean that like has reached sufficient rates among the finite strategy to have instigated the second level of change, to the point that it has ramifications for epistemic and evidential marking with the verb seem. I propose that the best model of these trajectories is a set of increasingly large envelopes of variation, one inside the next, and argue that the envelope might itself be an entity susceptible to change over time.

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