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Part of
Innovative Approaches to Research in Hispanic Linguistics: Regional, diachronic, and learner profile variation
Edited by Sara Fernández Cuenca, Tiffany Judy and Lauren Miller
[Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 38] 2023
► pp. 58–80

Chapter 3
Exploring future-in-the-past variation in Seville and Caracas

¿Cambiaría o Iba a Cambiar?

| University of Pittsburgh
| University of Pittsburgh
| University of Pittsburgh

Research on Spanish future-time expression has revealed a diachronic rise for the periphrastic future. However, future-in-the-past expression remains understudied. Two common variants are the periphrastic future in the imperfect (e.g., iba a bailar ‘I was going to dance’) and the conditional (e.g., bailaría ‘I would dance’). Our study is unique in assessing future-in-the-past expression through a controlled task able to elicit greater token counts and its consideration of data beyond Spain. In this exploratory study, we analyzed residents of Seville, Spain and Caracas, Venezuela via a written contextualized task, examining linguistic predictors (temporal distance, polarity, and verb type). Results echo research on future-time expression: the periphrastic form has gained traction and has developed through analogous predictors. Moreover, findings reveal notable cross-variety similarity.

Keywords: future-in-the-past, morphosyntactic variation, grammaticalization, Peninsular Spanish, Venezuelan Spanish
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Research context
    • 2.1Grammaticalization theory
    • 2.2Future-time expression in Spanish
    • 2.3Spanish future-in-the-past expression and remaining gaps
  • 3.Research questions and hypotheses
  • 4.Method
    • 4.1Participants
    • 4.2Tasks and predictors
    • 4.3Analysis
  • 5.Results
    • 5.1Rates of selection
    • 5.2Mixed-effects regressions
  • 6.Discussion
  • 7.Limitations, future directions, and conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
  • Appendix
Published online: 7 June 2023
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.38.03swa
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