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Diachronic Corpora, Genre, and Language Change
Edited by Richard J. Whitt
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 85] 2018
► pp. 195–218

Concessive conjunctions in written American English

Diachronic and genre-related changes in frequency and semantics

| University of Bamberg

Based on the Corpus of Historical American English (COHA; Davies 2010–), this chapter inspects the frequencies and semantics of the concessive conjunctions although, though and even though from the 1860s to the present day. In the data, although and though predominantly express what Sweetser (1990) has called speech-act concessives, while even though mainly expresses content concessives. However, there is a general development towards a higher proportion of speech-act concessives. Further, although and even though increase in frequency, while though decreases over time. Semantic properties and the double function of though (conjunction and conjunct) are proposed as explanations. Frequency changes progress equally through all genres, but the semantic change seems to have pervaded all genres only as far as although is concerned.

Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Research background
    • 2.1Three semantic types of concessives
    • 2.2The stylistics of concessive conjunctions
    • 2.3Research questions
  • 3.Methodology
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1Corpus examples
    • 4.2Frequencies
    • 4.3Semantics
  • 5.Summary and outlook
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 8 November 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/scl.85.09sch
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Gast, Volker
2019. Chapter 6. A corpus-based comparative study of concessive connectives in English, German and Spanish. In Empirical Studies of the Construction of Discourse [Pragmatics & Beyond New Series, 305], ► pp. 151 ff. DOI logo
Schützler, Ole
2019. Variation and change at the interface of syntax and semantics. In Developments in English Historical Morpho-Syntax [Current Issues in Linguistic Theory, 346], ► pp. 247 ff. DOI logo

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