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From Verbal Periphrases to Complex Predicates
Edited by Mar Garachana Camarero, Sandra Montserrat Buendia and Claus Dieter Pusch
[IVITRA Research in Linguistics and Literature 31] 2022
► pp. 189–209

Degrammaticalisation indices in Iberian complex predicates?

ORCID logo | State University of Campinas
ORCID logo | University of Hamburg
This chapter presents evidence for a loss in auxiliary status of Iberian complex predicate verbs, focusing on Catalan and European Portuguese. This change in structural status can be assessed by criteria such as: the decreasing occurrence of clitic climbing; the increasing use of subcategorised prepositions; the loss of complement fronting; and the change in the class of intervening adverbs (see Jones 1988), exemplified by means of a comparison of old and modern varieties of these languages. We argue that the motivation for this change can be found in the general word-order changes in Old Iberian languages, especially those of informational-structural marked expressions, with reflex on the creation of significant variability in the occurrence of clitic climbing. Finally we entertain the idea that, instead of interpreting this change as a true case of degrammaticalisation, it should be better considered as an epiphenomenon; in fact, some changes point out to grammaticalisation paths, inferrable either as loss of movement or as the result of selection of a smaller complement.
Keywords: grammaticalisation, degrammaticalisation, periphrasis, old Catalan, old Portuguese, clitic climbing, intervening adverbs
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.An overview of complex predicates in the history of Catalan and Portuguese
    • 2.1Clitic climbing
    • 2.2Bare infinitives
    • 2.3Intervening adverbials
    • 2.4Complement fronting
    • 2.5Negating the infinitival complement
  • 3.The nature and motives of change in clitic climbing and Stylistic Fronting
  • 4.Reinterpreting an Old Iberian variation: Complete vs. reduced complements
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • Primary sources
  • References
Published online: 1 December 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ivitra.31.10and
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