Chapter published in:
Nodes and Networks in Diachronic Construction Grammar
Edited by Lotte Sommerer and Elena Smirnova
[Constructional Approaches to Language 27] 2020
► pp. 45–68

Constructionalization and the Sorites Paradox

The emergence of the into-causative

This article discusses the relationship between “constructionalization” and “constructional change” (Traugott & Trousdale, 2013). Expanding on recent critical reviews, the paper argues that the problems with constructionalization arise from the ambiguity of the concept: it refers simultaneously to processes leading to the creation of a new node and to the point of node creation itself. The issues are illustrated by tracking the emergence of the into-causative: the data show that a series of interrelated changes in multiple parts of the network provided necessary and facilitating conditions, some of which predate the into-causative by several generations. The suggestion is that constructionalization should be reserved for its point reading, while aspects of its process reading are better captured by “constructional emergence”.
Keywords: constructionalization, constructional change, constructional emergence, into-causative, Early Modern English, associative links, modal expressions
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Constructionalization and constructional change
  • 3.The into-causative
    • 3.1Synchronic properties
    • 3.2Diachronic assumptions
  • 4.Constructional emergence
    • 4.1Data
    • 4.2Analysis
  • 5.Discussion
  • 6.Concluding remarks
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 13 May 2020
https://doi.org/10.1075/cal.27.01fla
References
Börjars, K., Vincent, N., & Walkden, G.
(2015) On constructing a theory of grammatical change. Transactions of the Philological Society, 113(3), 363–382. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bybee, J.
(2006) From usage to grammar: The mind’s response to repetition. Language, 82(4), 711–733. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Croft, W.
(2000) Explaining language change: An evolutionary approach. Harlow: Longman.Google Scholar
Dąbrowska, E.
(2015) Language in the mind and in the community. In J. Daems, E. Zenner, K. Heylen, D. Speelman, & H. Cuyckens (Eds.), Change of paradigms – New paradoxes: Recontextualizing language and linguistics (pp. 221–235). Berlin: De Gruyter.Google Scholar
Davies, M.
(2008) The Corpus of Contemporary American English: 450 million words, 1990-present. Late 2015 offline version.Google Scholar
(2010) The Corpus of Historical American English: 400 million words, 1810–2009. Late 2015 offline version.Google Scholar
(2012) Some methodological issues related to corpus-based investigations of recent syntactic changes in English. In T. Nevalainen & E. C. Traugott (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of the history of English (pp. 157–174). New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Davies, M., & Kim, J.-B.
(2019) Historical shifts with the into-causative construction in American English. Linguistics, 57(1), 29–58. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
De Smet, H.
(2008) Functional motivations in the development of nominal and verbal gerunds in Middle and Early Modern English. English Language and Linguistics, 12(1), 55–102. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
De Smet, H., Flach, S., Tyrkkö, J., & Diller, H.-J.
(2015) The Corpus of Late Modern English (CLMET), version 3.1: Improved tokenization and linguistic annotation. KU Leuven, FU Berlin, U Tampere, RU Bochum.Google Scholar
Diewald, G.
(2006) Konstruktionen in der diachronen Sprachwissenschaft. In K. Fischer & A. Stefanowitsch (Eds.), Konstruktionsgrammatik I. Von der Anwendung zur Theorie (pp. 79–103). Tübingen: Stauffenburg.Google Scholar
(2015) Elizabeth Closs Traugott & Graeme Trousdale: Constructionalization and constructional changes . Beiträge Zur Geschichte Der Deutschen Sprache Und Literatur, 137(1), 108–182. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Diewald, G., & Smirnova, E.
(2012) “Paradigmatic integration”: The fourth stage in an expanded grammaticalization scenario. In K. Davidse, T. Breban, L. Brems, & T. Mortelmans (Eds.), Grammaticalization and language change: New reflections (pp. 111–134). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Duffley, P. J.
(2018)  Talk into vs convince to: Talking as a cause leading to containment, convincing as a cause leading to a result. In M. Kaunisto, M. Höglund, & P. Rickman (Eds.), Changing structures: Studies in constructions and complementation (pp. 15–30). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Fanego, T.
(2004) On reanalysis and actualization in syntactic change: The rise and development of English verbal gerunds. Diachronica, 21(1), 5–55. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Flach, S.
to appear). From movement into action to manner of causation: Changes in argument mapping in the into-causative. Accepted for publication in Linguistics.
Fonteyn, L.
(2019) Categoriality in language change: The case of the English gerund. New York: Oxford University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Goldberg, A. E.
(1995) Constructions: A Construction Grammar approach to argument structure. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
(2006) Constructions at work: The nature of generalization in language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gries, S. Th., & Stefanowitsch, A.
(2004) Covarying collexemes in the into-causative. In M. Achard & S. Kemmer (Eds.), Language, culture, and mind (pp. 225–236). Stanford, CA: CSLI.Google Scholar
Hilpert, M.
(2013) Constructional change in English: Developments in allomorphy, word formation, and syntax. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2015) From hand-carved to computer-based: Noun-participle compounding and the upward strengthening hypothesis. Cognitive Linguistics, 26(1), 113–147. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2018) Three open questions in Diachronic Construction Grammar. In E. Coussé, P. Andersson, & J. Olofsson (Eds.), Grammaticalization meets Construction Grammar (pp. 21–39). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Hilpert, M., & Diessel, H.
(2016) Entrenchment in Construction Grammar. In H. J. Schmid (Ed.), Entrenchment and the psychology of language learning: How we reorganize and adapt linguistic knowledge (pp. 57–74). Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.Google Scholar
Hunston, S., & Francis, G.
(2000) Pattern grammar: A corpus-driven approach to the lexical grammar of English. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Kim, J.-B., & Davies, M. A.
(2016) The into-causative construction in English: A construction-based perspective. English Language and Linguistics, 20(1), 55–83. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Kroch, A., Santorini, B., & Delfs, L.
(2004) The Penn-Helsinki Parsed Corpus of Early Modern English (PCEME), tagged version. Department of Linguistics: University of Pennsylvania.Google Scholar
Langacker, R. W.
(2008) Cognitive grammar: A basic introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Rohdenburg, G.
(2006) The role of functional constraints in the evolution of the English complementation system. In C. Dalton-Puffer, D. Kastovsky, & N. Ritt (Eds.), Syntax, style and grammatical norms (pp. 143–166). Vienna: Peter Lang. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Rudanko, J.
(2000) Corpora and complementation: Tracing sentential complementation patterns of nouns, adjectives, and verbs over the last three centuries. Lanham: University Press of America.Google Scholar
(2005) Lexico-grammatical innovation in current British and American English: A case study on the transitive into -ing pattern with evidence from the Bank of English Corpus. Studia Neophilologica, 77(2), 171–187. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2011) Changes in complementation in British and American English: Corpus-based studies on non-finite complements in recent English. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2015) “Wheedled me into lending him my best hunter”: Comparing the emergence of the transitive into -ing construction in British and American English. In M. Höglund, P. Rickman, J. Rudanko, & J. Havu (Eds.), Perspectives on complementation: Structure, variation and boundaries (pp. 128–140). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Sag, I. A., & Pollard, C.
(1991) An integrated theory of complement control. Language, 67(1), 63–113. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Schmid, H.-J.
(2016) Introduction. In H.-J. Schmid (Ed.), Entrenchment and the psychology of language learning: How we reorganize and adapt linguistic knowledge (pp. 9–35). Berlin: De Gruyter.Google Scholar
Smirnova, E.
(2015) Constructionalization and constructional change: The role of context in the development of constructions. In J. Barðdal, E. Smirnova, L. Sommerer, & S. Gildea (Eds.), Diachronic Construction Grammar (pp. 81–106). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Stefanowitsch, A.
(2014) Collostructional analysis: A case study of the English into-causative. In T. Herbst, H.-J. Schmid, & S. Faulhaber (Eds.), Constructions collocations patterns (pp. 217–238). Berlin: De Gruyter.Google Scholar
Stefanowitsch, A., & Gries, S. Th
(2005) Covarying collexemes. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory, 1(1), 1–43. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Torrent, T. T.
(2015) The constructional convergence and the construction network reconfiguration hypotheses. In J. Barðdal, E. Smirnova, L. Sommerer, & S. Gildea (Eds.), Diachronic Construction Grammar (pp. 173–211). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Traugott, E. C.
(2015) Towards a coherent account of grammatical constructionalization. In J. Barðdal, E. Smirnova, L. Sommerer, & S. Gildea (Eds.), Diachronic Construction Grammar (pp. 51–80). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Traugott, E. C., & Trousdale, G.
(2013) Constructionalization and constructional changes. Oxford: Oxford University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Trousdale, G.
(2014) On the relationship between grammaticalization and constructionalization. Folia Linguistica, 48(2), 557–578. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Vosberg, U.
(2006) Die große Komplementverschiebung: Außersemantische Einflüsse auf die Entwicklung satzwertiger Ergänzungen im Neuenglischen. Tübingen: Gunter Narr.Google Scholar
Wulff, S., Stefanowitsch, A., & Gries, S. Th
(2007) Brutal Brits and persuasive Americans: Variety-specific meaning construction in the into-causative . In G. Radden, K.-M. Köpcke, T. Berg, & P. Siemund (Eds.), Aspects of meaning construction in lexicon and grammar (pp. 265–281). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

No author info given
2022.  In Discourse Structuring Markers in English [Constructional Approaches to Language, 33], Crossref logo
Flach, Susanne
2021. From movement into action to manner of causation: changes in argument mapping in the into-causative. Linguistics 59:1 ► pp. 247 ff. Crossref logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 01 april 2022. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.