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Article published In:
Cognitive Linguistic Studies
Vol. 1:2 (2014) ► pp.171–196

Scandinavian pancake constructions as a family of constructions

| Ivar Aasen Institute for Language and Literature, Volda University College (Norway)
| Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies, University of Oslo (Norway)

This paper deals with a classical problem in Scandinavian grammar, so-called ‘pancake sentences’, nicknamed after examples like Pannekaker er godt ‘Pancakes are good’ where there seemingly is disagreement between the plural subject and the predicative adjective in the neuter singular. Our aim is twofold. From the theoretical point of view, we shall argue that there are advantages with a construction-based approach, and that such an approach is superior to previous analyses within various generative frameworks.The main reason for this is that the data require generalizations over combinations of subjects and predicative adjectives at a rather specific level. From a more empirical point of view, we shall argue that Scandinavian displays a range of different, but related pancake constructions. For the first time, corpus data are brought into the debate. We show that a construction type that has not received much attention previously is in fact the most frequent type, namely constructions where the subject is a deverbal noun.

Keywords: agreement, pancake sentences, Scandinavian, constructions, adjective valency
Published online: 3 April 2015
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https://doi.org/10.1075/cogls.1.2.01hau
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Cited by 2 other publications

CORBETT, GREVILLE G. & SEBASTIAN FEDDEN
2016. Canonical gender. Journal of Linguistics 52:3 ► pp. 495 ff. DOI logo
Haugen, Tor Arne & Hans-Olav Enger
2019. The semantics of Scandinavian pancake constructions. Linguistics 57:3 ► pp. 531 ff. DOI logo

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