
Grammaticalization as Economy
Elly Gelderen(Author)
John Benjamins Publishing Co
Published on 31. August 2004
Book
Hardback
318 pages
978-90-272-2795-9 (ISBN)
Description
This book provides much detail on the changes involving the grammaticalization of personal and relative pronouns, topicalized nominals, complementizers, adverbs, prepositions, modals, perception verbs, and aspectual markers. It accounts for these changes in terms of two structural economy principles. Head Preference expresses that single words, i.e. heads, are used to build structures rather than full phrases, and Late Merge states that waiting as late as possible to merge, i.e. be added to the structure, is preferred over movement. The book also discusses grammar-external processes (e.g. prescriptivist rules) that inhibit change, and innovations that replenish the grammaticalized element. Most of the changes involve the (extended) CP and IP: as elements grammaticalize clause boundaries disappear. Cross-linguistic differences exist as to whether the CP, IP, and VP are all present and split and this is formulated as the Layer Principle. Changes involving the CP are typically brought about by Head Preference, whereas those involving the IP and VP by Late Merge.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Amsterdam
Netherlands
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 245 mm
Width: 164 mm
Weight
600 gr
ISBN-13
978-90-272-2795-9 (9789027227959)
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Elly van Gelderen
Grammaticalization as Economy
E-Book
08/2004
1st Edition
John Benjamins Publishing Company
€144.99
Available for download
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Content
1. Acknowledgements; 2. Notes for the Reader; 3. List of Tables; 4. Part I; 5. Introduction; 6. Economy; 7. Part II; 8. The structure of CP and the layer parameter; 9. Spec to Head: The rise of the (embedded) CP; 10. Late merge: The rise of the split CP; 11. More late merge: Heads to higher Heads and Specs to higher Specs; 12. Part III; 13. The IP, VP-shell, and their layers; 14. Changes in modals and have : Competition for ASP-hood; 15. Perception verbs and ASPect; 16. Aspect: The Tense Aspect Parameter and inner to outer aspect; 17. Late merge: Heads to higher Heads; 18. Part IV; 19. The layer parameter and pronominal argument languages; 20. Conclusion; 21. Notes; 22. References; 23. Index