0000000000585942
AUTHOR
Stefan Hartmann
Schema Unification and Morphological Productivity: A Diachronic Perspective
Unified schemas which allow for deriving multiply complex word-formation products are a central concept in Construction Morphology (CxM). Based on examples such as un-V-able formations in English, it has been argued in the framework of Construction Morphology that unified schemas (in this case: [un[V-able]A]A) can be conceived of as short cuts in coining new complex words. In this paper, we explore three prospective cases of schema unification and discuss what kind of evidence supports the assumption of unified schemas. The first two case studies are diachronic in nature. Drawing on corpus analyses of data from the Early New High German period (1350–1650) and from the early stages of New Hi…
What drives morphological change?
This paper investigates the role of syntactic, semantic, and lexical factors in the diachronic development of German nominalization patterns. Drawing on an extensive corpus analysis of Early New High German and New High German texts, it is shown that (a) deverbal nominals in the suffix -ung tend to develop more reified meaning variants, which is reflected in the syntactic patterns in which the word-formation products preferentially occur, and (b) infinitival nominalization becomes more productive and is established as the new default word-formation pattern deriving nouns from verbs. These considerations fit in neatly with a cognitively-oriented theory of word-formation change situated in th…
Entwicklung der satzinternen Großschreibung kontrastiv
Abstract Während die Entwicklung der satzinternen Großschreibung von Nomina und Nominalisierungen fürs Deutsche gut untersucht ist, stellt sie für viele andere Sprachen, in denen ebenfalls eine (wenn auch kurzlebige) Tendenz zur satzinternen Großschreibung festzustellen ist, ein Forschungsdesiderat dar. In diesem Beitrag stellen wir methodische Überlegungen zur kontrastiven Untersuchung der Entwicklung der satzinternen Großschreibung im Deutschen, Englischen und Niederländischen vor und diskutieren die Ergebnisse erster Pilotstudien. Neben übergreifenden Tendenzen zeigen sich auch deutliche Unterschiede, aus denen sich die Notwendigkeit zu einer differenzierten Betrachtung der einzelsprachl…
A MATTER OF PERSPECTIVE: VIEWPOINT PHENOMENA IN THE EVOLUTION OF GRAMMAR
Language provides a variety of means to conceptualize objects, states, events, and abstract entities in different ways and from different perspectives. These so-called ‘construal operations’ play a key role in Cognitive Linguistics. With the example of construal operations pertaining to viewpoint and perspectivation, this paper aims to demonstrate how different theoretical and methodological approaches can be combined to yield a better understanding of how languages systematically make use of general cognitive capacities of perspective-taking, -setting, and sharing. These insights can in turn shed light on the evolution of specific grammatical phenomena as well as on the evolution of langua…