Cover not available
Article published In:
The locus of linguistic variation
Edited by Constantine Lignos, Laurel MacKenzie and Meredith Tamminga
[Linguistic Variation 16:2] 2016
► pp. 183–220

An extension of the comparative sociolinguistics approach for sociosyntax

Comparing a single linguistic constraint across multiple sociolinguistic variables

This paper integrates aspects of both generative theory and variationist sociolinguistics. To compare the structure of two varieties of French (Acadian French and Laurentian French), I adapt the comparative sociolinguistics approach to compare the syntactic structure of these varieties. Specifically, I focus on the effects of a single linguistic constraint across multiple sociolinguistic variables. I argue that such a comparison provides insights into the underlying grammatical structures of the varieties under comparison, differences that may have remained hidden otherwise. To illustrate the approach, I focus on a single constraint, sentential polarity, and I analyze its effects on two sociolinguistic variables, yes/no questions and future temporal reference. Results show that the polarity constraint is operative in Laurentian French for both variables, but inoperative in Acadian French. To account for this difference, I argue that Laurentian French negative structures involve a negative head above the tense phrase while Acadian French does not.

Keywords: future temporal reference, yes/no question, negation, polarity, French, variation, comparative sociolinguistics, Acadian French, Laurentian French, sociosyntax
Published online: 27 January 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lv.16.2.02com
References
Adger, David
2006 Combinatorial variability. Journal of Linguistics 42(3). 503–530. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Adger, David & Jennifer Smith
2005 Variation and the minimalist program. In Leonie Cornips & Karen P. Corrigan (eds.), Syntax and variation: Reconciling the biological and the social, 149–178. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2010 Variation in agreement: A lexical feature-based approach. Lingua 120(5). 1109–1134. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ashby, William J
1977 Interrogative forms in Parisian French. Semasia 41. 35–52.Google Scholar
Auger, Julie
1996 Subject-clitic inversion in Romance: A morphological analysis. In Claudia Parodi, Carlos Quicoli, Mario Saltarelli, & Maria Luisa Zubizarretta (eds.), Aspects of romance linguistics: Selected papers from the Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages XXIV (March 10–13 1994), 23–40. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.Google Scholar
Bayley, Robert
2013 Variationist sociolinguistics. In Robert Bayley, Richard Cameron, & Ceil Lucas (eds.), The Oxford handbook of sociolinguistics, 11–30. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Beaulieu, Louise & Wladyslaw Cichocki
2008 La flexion postverbale -ont en français acadien: une analyse sociolinguistique. Canadian Journal of Linguistics 53(1). 35–62. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Blondeau, Hélène
2006 La trajectoire de l’emploi du futur chez une cohorte de Montréalais francophones entre 1971 et 1995. Canadian Journal of Applied Linguistics/Revue de l’Université de Moncton 9(2). 73–98. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chevalier, Gisèle
1996 L’emploi des formes du futur dans le parler acadien du sud-est du Nouveau-Brunswick. In Annette Boudreau & Lise Dubois (eds.), Les Acadiens et leur(s) langue(s): quand le français est minoritaire, 75–89. Moncton, NB: Éditions d’Acadie.Google Scholar
Chiasson-Léger, Mélissa
2014 Future temporal reference in New Brunswick Acadian French. Paper presented at the 43rd New Ways of Analyzing Variation conference . Chicago, IL: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and University of Illinois at Chicago.
Chomsky, Noam
1965 Aspects of the theory of syntax. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
1995 The Minimalist Program. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
2000a Minimalist inquiries: The framework. In Roger Martin, David Michaels, & Juan Uriagereka (eds.), Step by step: Essays on minimalist syntax in honor of Howard Lasnik, 89–156. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
2000b New horizons in the study of language and the mind. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2001 Derivation by phase. In Michael Kenstowicz (ed.), Ken Hale: A Life in Language, 1–52. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Comeau, Philip
2007 Pas vs. point: Variation in Baie Sainte-Marie Acadian French. Paper presented at the 36th New Ways of Analyzing Variation conference . Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania.
2011 A window on the past, a move toward the future: Sociolinguistic and formal perspectives on variation in Acadian French. Toronto, ON: York University doctoral dissertation.Google Scholar
2015 Vestiges from the grammaticalization path: The expression of future temporal reference in Acadian French. Journal of French Language Studies, 25(3), 339–365. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Comeau, Philip, Ruth King & Gary R. Butler
2012 New insignts on an old rivalry: The passé simple and the passé composé in spoken Acadian French. Journal of French Language Studies 22(3). 315–343. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Comeau, Philip, Ruth King & Carmen LeBlanc
2014 Dialect contact and the sociolinguistic history of Acadian French. Paper presented at the Methods in Dialectology XV Conference . Groningen, The Netherlands: University of Groningen.
Cornips, Leonie & Karen P. Corrigan
(eds.) 2005 Syntax and variation: Reconciling the biological and the social. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Coveney, Aidan
2002 Variability in spoken French: A sociolinguistic study of interrogation and negation. Bristol, UK: Intellect Books.Google Scholar
Deshaies, Denise & Ève Laforge
1981 Le futur simple et le futur proche dans le français parlé dans la ville de Québec. Langues et linguistique 71. 21–37.Google Scholar
Dewaele, Jean-Marc
1999 Word order variation in interrogative structures of native and non-native French. ITL – International Journal of Applied Linguistics 123–1241. 161–180. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Di Sciullo, Anne-Marie & Mireille Tremblay
1993 Négation et interfaces. Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics 12(1). 75–89.Google Scholar
Elsig, Martin & Shana Poplack
2006 Transplanted dialects and language change: Question formation in Québec. University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics: Papers from NWAV [New Ways of Analyzing Variation] 34 12(2). 77–90.Google Scholar
Embick, David & Rolf Noyer
2007 Distributed morphology and the syntax–morphology interface. In Gillian Ramchand & Charles Reiss (eds.), The Oxford handbook of linguistic interfaces, 289–324. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Emirkanian, Louisette & David Sankoff
1985 Le futur simple et le futur périphrastique. In Monique Lemieux, Henrietta J. Cedergren, & Fernande Dupuis (eds.), Les tendances dynamiques du français parlé à Montréal, 189–204. Montreal, QC: Office de la langue française.Google Scholar
Flikeid, Karin
1994 Origines et évolution du français acadien à la lumière de la diversité contemporaine. In Raymond Mougeon & Édouard Beniak (eds.), Les origines du français québécois, 275–326. Sainte-Foy, QC: Les Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar
Foulet, Lucien
1921 Comment ont évolué les formes de l’interrogation. Romania 471. 243–348. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fox, Cynthia A
1989 Syntactic variation and interrogative structures in Québécois. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University doctoral dissertation.Google Scholar
Gesner, B. Edward
1979 Étude morphosyntaxique du parler acadien de la Baie Sainte-Marie, Nouvelle-Écosse, Canada. Québec, QC: International Center for Research on Bilingualism.Google Scholar
Grimm, D. Rick
2010 A real-time study of future temporal reference in spoken Ontarian French. University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics: Selected Papers from NWAV [New Ways of Analyzing Variation] 38 16(2). 83–92.Google Scholar
Grimm, Rick & Terry Nadasdi
2011 The future of Ontario French. Journal of French Language Studies 21(2). 173–189. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Halle, Morris & Alec Marantz
1993 Distributed morphology and the pieces of inflection. In Kenneth Hale & Samuel Jay Keyser (eds.), The view from building 20: Essays in linguistics in honor of Sylvain Bromberger, 111–176. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Jarmasz, Lidia-Gabriela
2007 The future and negation in Canadian French. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto unpublished manuscript.Google Scholar
Jeanjean, Colette
1988 Le futur simple et le futur périphrastique en français parlé: étude distributionnelle. In Claire Blanche-Benveniste & André Chervel (eds.), Grammaire et histoire de la grammaire: hommage à la mémoire de Jean Stéfanini, 235–257. Marseille, France: Université de Provence.Google Scholar
Kayne, Richard S
1972 Subject inversion in French interrogatives. In Jean Casagrande & Bohdan Saciuk (eds.), Generative Studies in Romance Languages, 70–126. Cambridge, MA: Newbury House.Google Scholar
2000 Parameters and universals. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
King, Ruth
2005 Morphosyntactic variation and theory: Subject-verb agreement in Acadian French. In Leonie Cornips & Karen P. Corrigan (eds.), Syntax and variation: Reconciling the biological and the social, 199–229. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2013a Acadian French in time and space: A study in morphosyntax and comparative sociolinguistics. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
2013b Morphosyntactic variation. In Robert Bayley, Richard Cameron, & Ceil Lucas (eds.), The Oxford handbook of sociolinguistics, 445–463. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
King, Ruth & Terry Nadasdi
2003 Back to the future in Acadian French. Journal of French Language Studies 13(3). 323–337. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
King, Ruth, Terry Nadasdi & Gary R. Butler
2004 First-person plural in Prince Edward Island Acadian French: The fate of the vernacular variant je…ons. Language Variation and Change 16(3). 237–455. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kroch, Anthony S
1989 Reflexes of grammar in patterns of language change. Language Variation and Change 1(3). 199–244. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1994 Morphosyntactic variation. In Katharine Beals (ed.), Papers from the 30th regional meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society: Parasession on variation and linguistic theory, 180–201. Chicago, IL: Chicago Linguistic Society.Google Scholar
Kroch, Anthony, Ann Taylor & Donald Ringe
2000 The Middle English verb-second constraint: A case study in language contact and language change. In Susan C. Herring, Pieter van Reenen, & Lene Schøsler (eds.), Textual parameters in older language, 353–391. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Labov, William
1963 The social motivation of a sound change. Word 19. 273–309. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1969 Contraction, deletion, and inherent variability of the English copula. Language 45(4). 715–762. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1972 Sociolinguistic patterns. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Laurendeau, Paul
2000 L’alternance futur simple/futur périphrastique: une hypothèse modale. Verbum 22(3). 277–292.Google Scholar
LeBlanc, Carmen
2013 Les interrogatives totales en français madelinot: Continuité dans la filiation. In Alena Barysevich, Alexandra D’Arcy, & David Heap (eds.), Proceedings of Methods XIV: Papers from the fourteenth International Conference on Methods in Dialectology, 20111, 90–101. New York, NY: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Martineau, France
2005 Perspectives sur le changement linguistique: aux sources du français canadien. Canadian Journal of Linguistics 50(1/2/3/4). 173–213. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2011 Ne-absence in declarative and yes/no interrogative contexts: Some patterns of change. In Pierre Larrivée & Richard P. Inghan (eds.), The evolution of negation: Beyond the Jespersen cycle, 179–207. Boston, MA: De Gruyter Mouton. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Martineau, France & Raymond Mougeon
2003 A sociolinguistic study of the origins of ne deletion in European and Quebec French. Language 79(1). 118–152. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Martineau, France & Marie-Thérèse Vinet
2005 Microvariation in French negation markers: A historical perspective. In Montserrat Batllori, Mari-Lluïsa Hernanz, Carme Picallo, & Francesc Roca (eds.), Grammaticalization and parametric variation, 194–205. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Morin, Annick
2008 The Quebec French interrogative particle tu: A question of definiteness. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto unpublished manuscript.Google Scholar
Morin, Yves-Charles
1985 On the two French subjectless verbs voici and voilà. Language 61(4). 777–820. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Parott, Jeffrey K
2007 Distributed morphological mechanisms of labovian variation in morphosyntax. Washington, DC: Georgetown University dissertation.Google Scholar
Pohl, Jacques
1965 Observations sur les formes d’interrogation dans la langue parlée et dans la langue écrite non-littéraire. In Georges Straka (ed.), Linguistique et philologie romanes. Actes du Xe Congrès international de linguistique et de philologie romanes, 501–513. Paris, France: Klincksieck.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana
1989 The care and handling of a mega-corpus: The Ottawa-Hull French Project. In Ralph W. Fasold & Deborah Schiffrin (eds.), Language change and variation, 411–451. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Poplack, Shana & Nathalie Dion
2009 Prescription vs. praxis: The evolution of future temporal reference in French. Language 85(3). 557–587. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Poplack, Shana & Anne St-Amand
2007 A real-time window on 19th century vernacular French: The Récits du français québécois d’autrefois. Language in Society 36(5). 707–734. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Poplack, Shana & Sali A. Tagliamonte
2001 African American English in the diaspora. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell Publishers.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana & Danielle Turpin
1999 Does the Futur have a future in (Canadian) French? Probus 11(1). 133–164. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rizzi, Luigi
1990 Relativized minimality. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Rowlett, Paul
2007 The syntax of French. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sankoff, David, Sali A. Tagliamontre & Eric Smith
2005 Goldvarb X: A variable rule application for Macintosh and Windows. Toronto, ON: Department of Linguistics, University of Toronto.Google Scholar
Sankoff, Gillian & Diane Vincent
1977 L’emploi productif du ne dans le français parlé à Montréal. Le français moderne 45(3). 243–256.Google Scholar
Sankoff, Gillian, Suzanne Evans Wagner & Laura Jensen
2012 The long tail of language change: Québécois French futures in real time. University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics: Selected Papers from NWAV [New Ways of Analyzing Variation] 40 18(2). 107–116.Google Scholar
Seutin, Émile
1975 Description grammaticale du parler de l’Île-aux-Coudres. Montreal, QC: Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal.Google Scholar
Söll, Ludwig
1983 L’interrogation directe dans un corpus de langage enfantin. In Franz Josef Hausmann (ed.), Études de grammaire française descriptive, 45–54. Heidelberg, Germany: Groos.Google Scholar
Statistics Canada
1991 2A Profile, 1991 – NS – Southern Nova Scotia (21 areas) (table), 1991 (2A) basic questionnaire, Provinces to Municipalities (database), Using E- STAT (distributor). [URL]. (Accessed September 25, 2011)
Tagliamonte, Sali
2002 Comparative sociolinguistics. In J.K. Chambers, Peter Trudgill, & Natalie Schilling-Estes (eds.), The handbook of language variation and change, 729–763. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.Google Scholar
Terry, Robert M
1970 Contemporary French interrogative structures. Montreal, QC: Éditions Cosmos.Google Scholar
Thomas, Dominike
2010 Étude sociolinguistique historique du système interrogatif: les interrogatives dans le Journal de Jean Héroard. Ottawa, ON: University of Ottawa MA thesis.Google Scholar
Travis, Lisa
1984 Parameters and effects of word order variation. Cambridge, MA: MIT dissertation.Google Scholar
Vet, Co
1993 Conditions d’emploi et interprétation des temps futurs du français. Verbum 41. 71–84.Google Scholar
Vinet, Marie-Thérèse
2000a Feature representation and -tu (pas) in Quebec French. Studia Linguistica 54(3). 381–411. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2000b La polarité pos/nég, -tu (pas) et les questions oui/non. Revue québécoise de linguistique théorique et appliquée 28(1). 137–149. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Weinreich, Uriel, William Labov & Marvin I. Herzog
1968 Empirical foundations for a theory of language change. In Winfred P. Lehmann & Yakov Malkiel (eds.), Directions for historical linguistics, 95–195. Austin, TX: The University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Wagner, Suzanne Evans & Gillian Sankoff
2011 Age grading in the Montréal French inflected future. Language Variation and Change 23(3). 275–313. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zanuttini, Raffaella
1997 Negation and verb movement. In Lilian Haegeman (ed.), The new comparative syntax, 214–245. New York, NY: Longman.Google Scholar
Zeijlstra, Hedzer Hugo
2004 Sentential negation and negative concord. Amsterdam, The Netherlands: University of Amsterdam dissertation.Google Scholar
Zimmer, Dagmar
1994 Ça va tu marcher, ça marchera tu pas, je le sais pas » (71: 15): le futur simple et le futur périphrastique dans le français parlé à Montréal. Langues et linguistique 201. 213–226.Google Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 7 other publications

Auger, Julie & Anne-José Villeneuve
2019. Building on an old feature inlangue d’Oïl: interrogatives in Vimeu Picard. Journal of French Language Studies 29:2 ► pp. 209 ff. DOI logo
Auger, Julie & Anne-José Villeneuve
2021. Étude comparative des particules interrogatives en picard et dans deux variétés de français parlées au Canada. Langue française N° 212:4 ► pp. 57 ff. DOI logo
Bergeron-Maguire, Myriam, Gaétane Dostie & Florence Lefeuvre
2024. Les procédés (morpho-)syntaxiques de l’interrogation totale directe en français québécois des années 2000 : l’as-tu lu ?, tu l’as-tu lu ?, est-ce que tu l’as lu ?. Langue française N° 221:1 ► pp. 21 ff. DOI logo
Comeau, Philip, Ruth King & Carmen L. LeBlanc
2022. Continuity and change in the evolution of French yes-no questions. Diachronica 39:5 ► pp. 616 ff. DOI logo
Dion, Nathalie
2023. A question of change: Putting five complementary measures to the test with French polar interrogatives. Language Variation and Change 35:3 ► pp. 247 ff. DOI logo
Roussel, Basile
2023. Entre mode et variation : une étude variationniste de l’emploi du subjonctif dans un parler du français acadien. Journal of French Language Studies 33:1 ► pp. 82 ff. DOI logo
Tremblay, Mireille, Hélène Blondeau & Emmanuelle Labeau
2020. Texting the future in Belgium and Québec: Present matters. Journal of French Language Studies 30:1 ► pp. 73 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 5 april 2024. 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.