Cover not available
Part of
Adjective Adverb Interfaces in Romance
Edited by Martin Hummel and Salvador Valera
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 242] 2017
► pp. 257–286

Chapter 9
Adverbial adjectives and -mente adverbs face to face

Diachronic evidence from Spanish

| Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
The paper compares five minimal pairs of adverbial adjectives (aa) and -mente adverbs in two periods of Spanish, the 18th and the 21st centuries. The hypothesis is that aa keeps “traces” or “memory” of its original adjective category, and for that reason, to recategorize as an adverb, aa needs to exhibit more cohesion with the verb, a rigid relative v-aa order, appearing in contexts having a greater number of nominals than -mente, and appearing in sentences or paragraphs with lesser event complexity, as compared to -mente forms. -Mente has surpassed the np status from old times, it is a true adverb, able to enter in more contexts than aa, and able to enter in more complex sentences and event relationships.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction: An intriguing relation
  • 2.State of the art
    • 2.1Synchronic grammar
      • 2.1.1Category
      • 2.1.2Types of adverbial adjective
      • 2.1.3Scope
      • 2.1.4Cohesion and distribution
      • 2.1.5Grammaticality
      • 2.1.6Lexical restrictions
      • 2.1.7Basic meaning, polysemy and the role of context
      • 2.1.8Morphological and semantic problems
    • 2.2Diachrony
      • 2.2.1Historical depth
      • 2.2.2Status of -mente adverbs
      • 2.2.3Type of change
      • 2.2.4Capacity to subjectivize
    • 2.3Sociolinguistics, text genre and register
    • 2.4Dialectology
    • 2.5Summary
  • 3.Corpus
  • 4.Research questions and hypothesis
  • 5.Analysis
    • 5.1Adjacency
    • 5.2Relative order of verb and adverb
    • 5.3Nominality binding
    • 5.4Complexity of the event
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 21 December 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.242.10com
References
Abeillé, Anne & Godard Danielle
2004 Les adjectifs invariables comme compléments légers en français. In L’adjectif en français et á travers les langues, Jacques François (ed.), 209–224. Caen: Presses Universitaires de Caen.Google Scholar
Abeillé, Anne & Mouret, François
2010 Les compléments adjectivaux des verbes transitifs en français, in Les Tables. La grammaire par le menu, Cahiers du Cental 6: 1–10.Google Scholar
Büring, Daniel
1999 Topic. In Focus. Linguistic, Cognitive and Computational Perspectives, Peter Bosch and Rob van der Sandt (eds), 142–165. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar
Bassols de Climent, Mariano
1956 Sintaxis Latina, 2 Vols. Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas.Google Scholar
Company Company, Concepción
2008 Gramaticalización, género discursivo y otras variables en la difusión del cambio sintáctico. In Sintaxis histórica del español y cambio lingüístico. Nuevas perspectivas desde las tradiciones discursivas, Johannes Kabatek (ed.), 17–52. Frankfurt & Madrid: Iberoamericana & Vervuert.Google Scholar
2012 Condicionamientos textuales en la formación de los adverbios en -mente. Una tensión diacrónica del español. Revista de Filología Española 92(1): 9–42. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2014a Adverbios en -mente . In Sintaxis histórica de la lengua española. Tercera parte: Adverbios, preposiciones y conjunciones. Relaciones interoracionales, Concepción Company (ed.), 457–612. México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México-Fondo de Cultura Económica.Google Scholar
2014b Principios teóricos vs. datos de corpus: ¿diálogo o enfrentamiento? Los adverbios en -mente como marcadores de discurso. In Marcadores de discurso. Perspectivas y contrastes, María Marta García Negroni (ed.), 13–34. Buenos Aires: Santiago Arcos.Google Scholar
2016 Sintaxis histórica y tradiciones discursivas. El género textual como macrolocus del cambio sintáctico. In El español a través del tiempo. Estudios ofrecidos a Rafael Cano Aguilar, Araceli López Serena (ed.), 385–415. Sevilla: Publicaciones de la Universidad de Sevilla.Google Scholar
Givón, Talmy
1988 The pragmatics of word order. In Topic Continuity in Discourse: A Quantitative Cross-language Study [Typological Studies in Language 3], T. Givón (ed.), 1–43. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Giegerich, Heinz J.
2012 The morphology of -ly and the categorial status of ‘adverbs’ in English. English Language and Linguistics 16(3): 341–359. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hengeveld, Kees
1992 Non-Verbal Predication. Theory, Typology, Diachrony. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hummel, Martin
2000 Adverbale und adverbialisierte Adjektive im Spanischen. Tübingen: Gunter Narr.Google Scholar
2007 Adjetivos adverbializados y otros atributos directos del verbo en el habla oral informal de Chile. In Vernetzungen. Bedeutung in Wort, Satz und Text. Festschrift für Gerd Wotjak zum 65. Geburtstag, Juan Cuartero & Martina Emsel (eds), 221–233. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
2012 Polifuncionalidad, polisemia y estrategia retórica. Los signos discursivos con base atributiva entre oralidad y escritura. Acerca de esp. bueno, claro, total, realmente, etc. Berlin: De Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2013a Polyfunctionality, polysemy, and rhethorical strategy. The functional, semantic and pragmatic motivation of discourse functions. Grazer Linguistische Studien 79: 63–91.Google Scholar
2013b Attribution in Romance: Reconstructing the oral and written tradition. Folia Linguistica Historica 34: 1–42. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2013c La dimensión intercultural de la expansión diacrónica de los adverbios en -mente . In Los adverbios con función discursiva: Procesos de formación y evolución, María Pilar Garcés (ed.), 15–41. Frankfurt & Madrid: Vervuert & Iberoamericana. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2014 Adjetivos adverbiales. In Sintaxis histórica de la lengua española. Tercera parte: Adverbios, preposiciones y conjunciones. Relaciones interoracionales, Concepción Company (ed.), 613–732. México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México y Fondo de Cultura Económica.Google Scholar
2015 Baseline elaboration at the adjective-adverb interface in French and English: The event-modification-structure of the structure ‘verb + adjective’. Ms.Google Scholar
Jacobs, Joachim
1999 Informational autonomy. In Focus. Linguistic, Cognitive and Computational Perspectives, Peter Bosch & Rob van der Sandt (eds), 56–81. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar
Karlsson, Keith E.
1981 Syntax and Affixation. The Evolution of -mente in Latin and Romance. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Katz, Graham
2008 Manner modification of state verbs. In Adjectives and Adverbs. Syntax, Semantics and Discourse, Louise McNally & Christopher Kennedy (eds), 220–248. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Kovacci, O.
1999 El adverbio. In Gramática descriptiva de la lengua española, Ignacio Bosque & Violeta Demonte (eds), 705–786. Madrid: Espasa Calpe.Google Scholar
Kühner, Raphael & Stegmann, Carl
1912–1914 Ausführliche Grammatik der lateinischen Sprache, 2 Vols. Hannover: Hahnsche.Google Scholar
Ledgeway, Adam
2011 Adverb agreement and split intransitivity: Evidence from Southern Italy. Archivo Glottologico Italiano 96: 31–66.Google Scholar
Medina Gómez, Lorena & Alarcón Neve, Josefina
2013 El adverbio de manera corto en el español formal de México. Verba Hispánica 21: 55–74. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Medina Gómez, Lorena, Alarcón Neve, Josefina & De la Mora Gutiérrez, Juliana
2014 Descriptive and functional analysis of the pair sólo and solamente in oral Mexican Spanish. Paper read in the International Conference The interfaces of adjective and adverb in Romance and English , Universität Graz, June, 5–7.
Moreno Cabrera, Juan Carlos
1998 Adverbial quantification in the languages of Europe: Theory and typology. In Adverbial Constructions in the Languages of Europe, Johann van der Auwera (ed.), 147–185. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Paradis, Carita
2001 Adjectives and boundedness. Cognitive Linguistics 12(1): 47–65. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Real Academia Española-Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española
2009 Nueva gramática de la lengua española. Madrid: Espasa.Google Scholar
2013 Diccionario de la lengua española. Madrid: Planeta.Google Scholar
Ricca, Davide
2010 Adverbs. In New Perspectives on Historical Latin Syntax, 2: Constituent Syntax: Adverbial Phrases, Mood, Tense, Philip Baldi & Pierluigi Cuzzolin (eds), 109–191. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.Google Scholar
Rodríguez Ramalle, Teresa María
2003 La gramática de los adverbios en -mente o cómo expresar maneras, opiniones y actitudes a través de la lengua. Madrid: Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.Google Scholar
Suñer, Ave lina & Di Tullio, Angela
2001 Los adjetivos desnudos y la cuantificación adverbial. Paper read at the 11º Coloquio de Gramática Generativa, Universidad of Zaragoza.Google Scholar
Tarriño Ruiz, Eusebia
2009 El adjetivo. In Sintaxis del latín clásico, José Miguel Baños Baños (coord), 251–272. Madrid: Liceus.Google Scholar
Torner, Sergi
2005 On the morphological nature of Spanish adverbs ending in -mente . Probus 17: 115–144. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Traugott, Elizabeth Closs
1995 The role of the development of discourse markers in a theory of grammaticalization. Paper read at the 12th International Conference on Historical Linguistics, Manchester.
Trousdale, Graeme
2012 Grammaticalization, constructions and the grammaticalization of constructions. In Grammaticalization and Language Change. New Reflections [Studies in Language Companion Series 130], Kristin Davidse, Tine Breban, Lieselotte Brems & Tanja Mortelmans (eds), 167–198. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Waltereit, Richard
2012 On the origins of grammaticalization and other types of language change in discourse strategies. In Grammaticalization and Language Change. New Reflections [Studies in Language Companion Series 130], Kristin Davidse, Tine Breban, Lieselotte Brems & Tanja Mortelmans (eds), 51–72. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Hummel, Martin
2017. La structure “verbe + adjectif”. Revue Romane. Langue et littérature. International Journal of Romance Languages and Literatures ► pp. 261 ff. DOI logo
Métairy, Justine
2022. Verb Classes in the Resultative Construction in Germanic and Romance Languages. Transactions of the Philological Society 120:2 ► pp. 246 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 28 september 2023. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.