Chapter 2
Life at the intersection
The lateral relations of han mannen, mannen, and
den mannen
In colloquial Norwegian, han ‘he’ and
hun ‘she’ can occur as a determiner with common nouns
with human reference (e.g., han mannen, lit. ‘he man-the’).
This study investigates the lateral relations of this construction
(henceforth: han mannen) and two other definite-referring
constructions with human reference: noun phrases that contain the adnominal
determiner den (i.e., den mannen) and those that
realize definiteness by a suffixed article (i.e., mannen). The
study argues that han mannen lives at the intersection of these two
constructions, i.e., that it is motivated by two constructions to which it
is laterally related. The lateral relations between the constructions are
evaluated by random forests, variable importance measures, and partial
dependence plots.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.The source constructions: mannen and den mannen
- 2.1mannen: a noun phrase with a suffixed definite
article
- 2.2den mannen: noun phrases with a prenominal
determiner
- 3.Theoretical background
- 4.The functions of han mannen
- 4.1Psychological distance or background deixis?
- 4.2Explaining psychological distance
- 5.Methodology
- 5.1Data and data selection
- 5.2Statistical methods
- 5.3The tested predictor variables
- Int
- N
- Premod
- Poss
- Rc
- Speaker
- 6.Sequential relations: results
- 6.1Comparing mannen and den mannen
- 6.2Comparing mannen and han mannen
- 6.3Comparing den mannen and han mannen
- 6.4Summary
- 7.The lexemes that occupy the noun slot
- 8.Conclusion
-
Notes
-
References
-
Appendix