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Article published In:
Constructions and Frames
Vol. 12:2 (2020) ► pp.239–271

The growth of the transitivising Reaction Object Construction

| University of the Balearic Islands

This paper explores the growth of the Reaction Object Construction (ROC) as in Pauline smiled her thanks, offering new insights into its characterisation and historical development from the perspective of Construction Grammar (Goldberg 1995, 2006, 2019) and its application to patterns of language change (Hilpert 2013; Traugott & Trousdale 2013). It is argued that the modern ROC qualifies as a traditional form-meaning pairing and, at a deeper level, as a polysemous construction that follows the path of development of other transitivising constructions such as the way-construction (Israel 1996), and of processes of constructionalisation in general. Once the ROC imposes a coreferential constraint on its object argument, acquiring in this way its status as a form-meaning pairing over the Early Modern English period (1500–1700), the construction increases its productivity and schematicity; at the same time it decreases its compositionality since the link between the form/syntax and the overall meaning of the construction becomes less transparent, as in The door jingled a welcome. The ROC can thus be argued to be part and result of a broader development in the grammar of English, namely the historical trend towards transitivisation.

Keywords: Reaction Object Construction, transitivising construction, polysemous construction, constructionalisation, history of English
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Characterisation of the ROC
    • 2.1Definition: The ROC as a form-meaning pairing
    • 2.2Subtypes of ROs: Delocutive, deverbal illocutionary and predicative expressive nouns
      • 2.2.1Delocutive nouns
      • 2.2.2Deverbal illocutionary nouns
      • 2.2.3Predicative expressive nouns (or attitudinal nouns)
    • 2.3Subtypes of ROCs: A monotransitive and a ditransitive ROC
    • 2.4The ROC as a polysemous construction with a means and a manner interpretation
  • 3.Data sources and methodology
  • 4.The growth of the ROC
    • 4.1Distribution
      • 4.1.1Distribution across verbs: From less to more intransitive-like verbs
      • 4.1.2Distribution across RO types: From more to less compositional ROCs
    • 4.2Development: Reanalysis, fixation and host-class expansion via analogisation and coercion
    • 4.3Directionality of change: Increase in productivity and schematicity and decrease in compositionality
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 30 October 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/cf.00041.bou
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