Kristel Van Goethem

The French construction 'nouveau + past participle' revisited. Arguments in favour of a prefixoid analysis of nouveau

The article focuses on the French construction nouveau + past participle (e.g. nouveau-né ‘newborn baby’) in which nouveau is traditionally assigned an adverbial value. However, it will be claimed that an alternative analysis, classifying nouveau as an adjective grammaticalising into a prefix – a ‘prefixoid’ – provides a more accurate account of the construction. The article proposes a set of four parameters applying to the grammaticalisation of French prefixoids (resemanticisation, decategorialisation, paradigmaticisation and productivity). These parameters will be applied to the construction nouveau + past participle and it will be shown that they conflict with the traditional adverbial analysis and plead in favour of a prefixoid analysis of nouveau.

From noun to evaluative adjective: conversion or debonding? Dutch top and its equivalents in German

In this study, we address the ways in which nouns can give rise to new adjectives in Dutch and German. More specifically, the focus is on words with an evaluative meaning that can be used in a wide range of morphological and syntactic constructions in recent (and informal) language use (e.g., German Hammervorstellung ‘very good performance’, hammer film ‘fantastic film’). In the literature, two distinct hypotheses can be found to account for the adjectival uses of such evaluative nouns: the ‘debonding’ hypothesis implies that the intensifying bound morpheme has developed into a free morpheme; the ‘conversion’ hypothesis suggests that the new adjectival uses are the result of a syntactic reanalysis of an N to an A that takes place in the predicative position. As a case study, we analyze the synchronic bound and free uses of Dutch top, and we compare them with German top and spitze. We conclude that the emergence of the adjectival uses of these morphemes imply an interaction between both processes, conversion and debonding.

Reuze bedankt, het was echt top! Een vergelijkend onderzoek naar 'loskoppeling' van samenstellingscomponenten

By means of a comparative corpus study, this paper investigates the rise of new adjectives and adverbs from nominal compound members through a process of ‘debonding’. This is ‘a composite change whereby a bound morpheme in a specific linguistic context becomes a free morpheme’ (Norde 2009, p. 186) and can be illustrated by the adjectival and adverbial uses of the Dutch compound member reuze (een reuzenstap; reuzeleuk; het was reuze; het is reuze meegevallen). It will be claimed that debonding is subject to a series of language-specific factors, in particular the degree of compound cohesion and the complexity of adjective inflection. These factors predict that debonding will be more common in French and English than in German and Dutch. However, debonding still occurs in the latter languages, a fact that will be accounted for by an interaction of multiple processes. A specific case study on Dutch top will indicate how and which different processes interact in the rise of its adjectival uses.

Choosing between A+N compounds and lexicalized A+N phrases: The position of French in comparison to Germanic languages

It has been demonstrated in the literature on Germanic languages that lexicalized A+N phrases may have the same naming function as A+N compounds (Jackendoff 1997, 2002; Booij 2002; Huning 2004, forthcoming a; Schlucker 2008). However, these languages may show particular preferences for either the former or the latter naming strategy, even when both strategies are available. In German A+N compounding is, comparatively speaking, very productive, whereas it is said to be no longer productive in English, which generally uses A+N phrases for the same function (e.g. Festplatte – hard disk). Dutch seems to take an intermediary position: here, both word formation processes are productive; but compared to German, Dutch shows a stronger preference for lexicalized A+N phrases (cf. De Caluwe 1990; Booij 2002; Huning forthcoming a). The central aim of this paper is to situate French on this lexicon-grammar continuum. This, however, requires first of all the formulation of a univocal definition of compounding, since the notion generally receives a less restrictive interpretation in Romance languages than it does in Germanic languages. It will be shown that French has a strong preference for lexicalized A+N phrases: even when both German and Dutch use A+N compounds, French – like English – generally still opts for the syntactic naming strategy (e.g. Schnellzug – sneltrein – fast train – train rapide).

Cette mesure est-elle vraiment clé? A constructional approach to categorial gradience

This article investigates the recently developed adjectival properties of the French noun cle ‘key’, as attested in for instance un poste tres cle ‘a really key position’ and Cette mesure est-elle vraiment cle? ‘Is this measure really key?’. The main purpose of this study is triple: it consists in analyzing (i) which adjectival uses can be found in modern French, (ii) to what extent they are accepted by native speakers (from different geographical varieties) of French, and (iii) how they can be accounted for within the framework of Construction Grammar and Construction Morphology. It will be hypothesized that French cle is subject to categorial gradience as a consequence of an ongoing constructionalization process.

The changing functions of competing forms: Attraction and differentiation

Abstract The relation between functionally similar forms is often described in terms of competition. This leads to the expectation that over time only one form can survive (substitution) or each form must find its unique niche in functional space (differentiation). However, competition cannot easily explain what causes functional overlap or how form-function mappings will be reorganized. It is argued here that the changes which competing forms undergo are steered by various analogical forces. As a result of analogy, competing forms often show attraction, becoming functionally more (instead of less) alike. Attraction can maintain and increase functional overlap in language. At the same time, competing forms are analogically anchored to a broader constructional network. Cases of differentiation typically follow from the relations in that network. Evidence is drawn from the literature and from three corpus-based case studies, addressing attraction and differentiation in English aspectual constructions, English secondary predicate constructions, and in a pair of Dutch degree modifiers. Evidence is provided of a phenomenon competition-based accounts could not predict (attraction), and a solution is offered for one they could not very well explain (differentiation). More generally it is shown that the development of competing forms must be understood against their broader grammatical context.

Debonding and Clipping of Prefixoids in Germanic: Constructionalization or Constructional Change?

This paper is concerned with the debonding of three Germanic prefixoids: Dutch kei ‘boulder’, German Hammer ‘hammer’, and Swedish kanon ‘cannon’. Drawing on an extensive corpus-based and statistical analysis, we compare the formal properties (construction types), semantics (degree of bleaching), collocational properties and productivity of bound and free uses of each prefixoid. We show that debonding of prefixoids is a productive process of lexical innovation in Germanic languages, which may lead to the creation of new intensifying adverbs or evaluative adjectives. In addition, we explore whether debonding of prefixoids can be fruitfully analysed from a constructional perspective. More in particular, we address the question of whether the observed changes accompanying debonding are best accounted for by Traugott and Trousdale’s concept of ‘constructionalization’, or by Hilpert’s concept of ‘constructional change’. To this end, we explore a variety of quantitative methods, including productivity measures and distinctive collexeme analysis. We conclude that the quantitative differences between the bound and the free forms of the three prefixoids studied in this paper allow us to consider them as two separate constructions, but that the distinction is a gradient one.

Les constructions préverbales du français et du néerlandais: typologie et grammaticalisation

Dans cette etude, nous presenterons en premier lieu une typologie des verbes francais et neerlandais introduits par un preverbe de forme prepositionnelle. Cette typologie comporte quatre grandes classes de constructions preverbales : les constructions relationnelles ou le preverbe est toujours proche de son pendant prepositionnel ou postpositionnel (p.ex. survoler une ile), les constructions adverbiales predicatives ou le preverbe (neerlandais) est issu d’un adverbe predicatif (p.ex. zijn geld opdoen /son argent sur-faire/ “depenser son argent”), les constructions prefixales ou le preverbe se comporte comme un vrai prefixe (p.ex. surestimer les capacites de quelqu’un) et les constructions preverbales lexicalisees (p.ex. pourlecher ses phrases). Dans un deuxieme temps, nous montrerons que les constructions preverbales distinguees peuvent etre situees sur une echelle de grammaticalisation.