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Article published In:
Journal of Historical Linguistics
Vol. 8:3 (2018) ► pp.356–387

Four directionalities for grammaticalization

Evidence for new diachronic paths

| Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

This article offers an analysis and systematization of the relationship between directionality and grammaticalization and develops an innovative proposal regarding a new type of directionality. The article proposes four types of directionality in grammaticalization: A. down, B. up, C. neither down nor up, and D. up and down. The first three types are very well studied, but the last has been overlooked in the theoretical literature. The article analyzes directionality D in depth. It is a directionality that is very similar to a round trip: an up in the cline is followed by a down in the cline. First, the form or construction leaves sentence grammar and enters into periphery grammar, acquiring a new category and a discourse meaning, generally a subjective one; later, the form comes back into sentence grammar, but always re-enters as a different category from the etymological source. This process appears to be round trip directionality. This round trip process constitutes a fourth type of directionality in grammaticalization. Directionality D requires its own status, distinct from the sum of directionalities A and B, due to its specific source and due to the fact that the reinsertion into the sentence grammar is in a specific category. It has its own individual distribution and a characteristic and innovative circular path. The evidence of this directionality presented in this article comes from Spanish, but this path very likely also generalizes to other languages.

Keywords: directionality, grammaticalization, round trip directionality, cline
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Brief state of the art: Grammaticalization and directionality
  • 3.Four directionalities for grammaticalization
  • 4.Four directionalities for grammaticalization
    • 4.1Down in the cline
    • 4.2Up in the cline
    • 4.3Neither down nor up
    • 4.4Up and down, round trip: A new directionality in grammaticalization
      • 4.4.1Full (di)transitive verb decir ‘to tell’ / ‘to say’ > evidential discourse marker of doubt dizque ‘supposedly’ > adjective dizque ‘supposed’
      • 4.4.2Noun Phrase + relative sentence que + copulative sentence > Discourse marker of evidentiality quesque > Adjective quesque
    • 4.5Round trip directionality and paradigmatization
  • 5.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
Published online: 13 March 2019
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https://doi.org/10.1075/jhl.17032.com
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