Cover not available
Part of
Corpora and the Changing Society: Studies in the evolution of English
Edited by Paula Rautionaho, Arja Nurmi and Juhani Klemola
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 96] 2020
► pp. 223–250

Analyzing change in the American English amplifier system in the fiction genre

| University of Queensland

This study examines the diachronic development of amplification of adjectives in American English (AmE), specifically in the fiction section of the Corpus of Historical American English (COHA). The results show that amplifier use in attributive contexts remains stable, while, in predicative contexts, so has increased significantly since the 1980s and has replaced very as the dominant amplifier. This development contrasts with ongoing change in other regional varieties of English where really, rather than so, has become the dominant amplifier of adjectives during the latter half of the 20th century. The results show that so and very are semantically highly similar and that the increase in so is mostly based on its co-occurrence with good.

Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Previous research
  • 3.Data and methodology
  • 4.Results
  • 5.Discussion and outlook
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 8 April 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/scl.96.09sch
References

Corpora and software

COHA = Davies, Mark
2010 The Corpus of Historical American English: 400 million words, 1810–2009. [URL]> (30 November 2018).
Corpusdata
= [URL]> (3 June 2019).
Hornik, Kurt
2016 Package “OpenNLP” – Apache OpenNLP Tools Interface. [URL]> (30 November 2018).
R Development Core Team
2008 R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. ISBN 3-900051-07-0, [URL] (30 November 2018).

Other references

Aijmer, Karin
2011 Are you totally spy? A new intensifier in present-day American English. In Marqueurs discursifs et subjectivité, Sylvie Hancil (ed.), 155–172. Rouen: Universités de Rouen et du Havre.Google Scholar
2018a That’s well bad. Some new intensifiers in spoken in British English. In Corpus Approaches to Contemporary British English, Vaclav Brezina, Robbie Love & Karin Aijmer (eds), 60–95. London: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2018b Intensification with ‘very’, ‘really’ and ‘so’ in selected varieties of English. In Corpora and Lexis, Sebastian Hoffmann, Andrea Sand, Sabine Arndt-Lappe & Lisa Marie Dillmann (eds.), 106–139. Leiden: Brill. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Barnfield, Katie & Buchstaller, Isabelle
2010 Intensifiers on Tyneside: Longitudinal developments and new trends. English World-Wide 31(3): 252–287. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bauer, Laurie & Bauer, Winifred
2002 Adjective boosters in the English of young New Zealanders. Journal of English Linguistics 30(3): 244–257. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Biber, Douglas, Johansson, Stig, Leech, Geoffrey, Conrad, Susan & Finegan, Edward
2007 Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English, 6th edn. Harlow: Pearson.Google Scholar
Bolinger, Dwight
1972 Degree Words. The Hague: Mouton. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Borst, Eugene
1902 Die Gradadverbien im Englischen [Anglistische Forschungen 10]. Heidelberg: Winter.Google Scholar
Breban, Tine & Davidse, Kristin
2016 The history of very: the directionality of functional shift and (inter)subjectification. English Language and Linguistics 20(2): 221–249. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Brinton, Laurel J. & Arnovik, Leslie K.
2006 The English Language. A Linguistic History. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Bybee, Joan L., Perkins, Revere D. & Pagliuca, William
1994 The Evolution of Grammar: Tense, Aspect and Modality in the Languages of the World. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Calle-Martín, Javier
2014 On the history of the intensifier wonder in English. Australian Journal of Linguistics 34(3): 399–419. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
D’Arcy, Alexandra F.
2015 Stability, stasis and change – The longue durée of intensification. Diachronica 32(4): 449–493. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fettig, Adolf
1934 Die Gradadverbien im Mittelenglischen [Anglistische Forschungen 79]. Heidelberg: Winter.Google Scholar
Fuchs, Robert
2016 Register variation in intensifier usage across Asian Englishes. In Discourse-Pragmatic Variation and Change: Insights from English, Heike Pichler (ed.), 185–213. Cambridge: CUP. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2017 Do women (still) use more intensifiers than men? Recent change in the sociolinguistics of intensifiers in British English. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 22(3): 345–374. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gries, Stefan T. & Stefanowitsch, Anatol
2004 Extending collostructional analysis: A corpus-based perspectives on ‘alternations’. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 9(1): 97–129. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hilpert, Martin
2006 Distinctive collexeme analysis and diachrony. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 2(2): 243–256. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ito, Rika & Tagliamonte, Sali
2003  Well weird, right dodgy, very strange, really cool: Layering and recycling in English intensifiers. Language in Society 32, 257–279. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
de Klerk, Vivian
2005 Expressing levels of intensity in Xhosa English. English World-Wide 26(1): 77–95. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
König, Ekkehard
2017 The comparative basis of intensification. In Exploring Intensification. Synchronic, Diachronic and Cross-linguistic Perspectives [Studies in Language Companion Series 189], Maria Napoli & Miriam Ravetto (eds), 15–32. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Labov, William
1966 The Social Stratification of English in New York City. Washington DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.Google Scholar
1985 Intensity. In Meaning, Form and Use in Context: Linguistic Applications, Deborah Schiffrin (ed.), 43–70. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.Google Scholar
Levshina, Natalia
2015 How to do Linguistics with R: Data Exploration and Statistical Analysis. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lorenz, Gunter R.
2002 Really worthwhile or not really significant: A corpus-based approach to the delexicalisation and grammaticalisation of adverbial intensifiers in Modern English. In New Reflections on Grammaticalization [Typological Studies in Language 49], Ilse Wischer & Gabriele Diewald (eds), 143–161. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Macaulay, Ronald
2002 Extremely interesting, very interesting, or only quite interesting: Adverbs and social class. Journal of Sociolinguistics 6(3): 398–417. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2006 Pure grammaticalization: The development of a teenage intensifier. Language Variation and Change 18(3): 267–283. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mair, Christian
2004 Corpus linguistics and grammaticalisation theory. Statistics, frequencies and beyond. In Corpus Approaches to Grammaticalization in English [Studies in Corpus Linguistics 13], Hans Lindquist & Christian Mair (eds), 121–150. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Méndez-Naya, Belén
2003 On intensifiers and grammaticalization: The case of swiþe . English Studies 84(4): 372–391. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2008 Introduction. Special issue on English intensifiers. English Language and Linguistics 12(2): 213–219. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Méndez-Naya, Belén & Pahta, Päivi
2010 Intensifiers in competition: The picture from early English medical writing. In Early Modern English Medical Texts: Corpus Description and Studies, Irma Taavitsainen & Päivi Pahta (eds), 191–214. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Mustanoja, Tauno F.
1960 A Middle English Syntax, Part 1: Parts of Speech. Helsinki: Société Néophilologique.Google Scholar
Nevalainen, Terttu
2008 Social variation in intensifier use: Constraint on -ly adverbialization in the past? English Language and Linguistics 12(2): 289–315. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Nevalainen, Terttu & Rissanen, Matti
2002 Fairly pretty or pretty fair? On the development and grammaticalization of English downtoners. Language Sciences 24: 359–380. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Núñez-Pertejo, Paloma & Palacios Martínez, Ignacio
2014  That’s absolutely crap, totally rubbish. The use of intensifiers absolutely and totally in the spoken language of British adults and teenagers. Functions of Language 21(2): 210–237. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Palacios Martínez, Ignacio & Núñez-Pertejo, Paloma
2012 He’s absolutely massive. It’s a super day. Madonna, she is a wicked singer. Youth language and intensification: A corpus-based study. Text and Talk 32(6): 773–796. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Paradis, Carita
1997 Degree Modifiers of Adjectives in Spoken British English. Lund: Lund University Press.Google Scholar
2008 Configurations, construals and change: Expressions of DEGREE. English Language and Linguistics 12(2): 317–343. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Partington, Alan
1993 Corpus evidence of language change: The case of intensifiers. In Text and Technology: In Honour of John Sinclair, Mona Baker, Gill Francis & Elena Tognini-Bonelli (eds), 177–192. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Peters, Hans
1992 English boosters: Some synchronic and diachronic aspects. In Diachrony within Synchrony: Language History and Cognition, Günter Kellermann & Michael D. Morrissey (eds), 529–545. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
1993 Die englischen Gradadverbien der Kategorie booster. Tübingen: Narr.Google Scholar
1994 Degree adverbs in Early Modern English. In Studies in Early Modern English, Dieter Kastovsky (ed.), 269–288. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Quirk, Randolph, Greenbaum, Sydney, Leech, Geoffrey & Svartvik, Jan
1985 A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Rickford, John, Wasow, Thomas, Zwicky, Arnold & Buchstaller, Isabelle
2007 Intensive and quotative all: Something old, something new. American Speech 82(1): 3–31. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rissanen, Matti
2008 From ‘quickly’ to ‘fairly’: On the history of rather . English Language and Linguistics 12(2): 345–359. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Schweinberger, Martin
2017a Using intensifier-adjective collocations to determine mechanisms of change. Paper presented at ICAME 38 (International Computer Archive of Modern and Medieval English). Prague, Czech Republic, 24–28.05.2017. [URL]> (30 November 2018).
2017b Modelling intensification in New Zealand English data. Paper presented at Methods in Dialectology XVI. Tokyo, Japan, 7–11.08.2017. [URL] (November 30 2018).
Stange, Ulrike
2017 “You’re so not going to believe this”: The use of Genx so in constructions with future going to in American English. American Speech 92(4): 487–524. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stefanowitsch, Anatol
2010 Empirical cognitive semantics: Some thoughts. In Quantitative Cognitive Semantics: Corpus-driven Approaches, Dylan Glynn & Kerstin Fischer (eds), 355–380. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stefanowitsch, Anatol & Gries, Stefan T.
2003 Collostructions: Investigating the interaction between words and constructions. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 8(2): 209–243. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2005 Covarying collexemes. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 1(1): 1–43. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stenström, Anna-Brita
1999 He was really gormless – she’s bloody crap: Girls, boys and intensifiers. In Out of Corpora: Studies in Honour of Stig Johansson, Hilde Hasselgård & Signe Oksefjell (eds), 69–78. Amsterdam: Rodopi.Google Scholar
Stoffel, Cornelis
1901 Intensives and Downtoners [Anglistische Forschungen 1]. Heidelberg: Winter.Google Scholar
Tagliamonte, Sali A.
2008 So different and pretty cool! Recycling intensifiers in Toronto, Canada. English Language & Linguistics 12(2): 361–394. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2011 Variationist Sociolinguistics. Change, Observation, Interpretation. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar
Tagliamonte, Sali A. & D’Arcy, Alexandra
2009 Peaks beyond phonology: Adolescence, incrementation, and language change. Language 85(1): 58–108. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tagliamonte, Sali A. & Denis, Derek
2014 Expanding the transmission/diffusion dichotomy: Evidence from Canada. Language 90(1): 90–136. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tagliamonte, Sali & Roberts, Chris
2005 So weird; so cool; so innovative: The use of intensifiers in the television series Friends. American Speech 80(3): 280–300. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tao, Hongyin
2007 A corpus-based investigation of absolutely and related phenomena in spoken American English. Journal of English Linguistics 35(1): 5–29. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Wagner, Susanne
2017 Totally new and pretty awesome: Amplifier-adjective bigrams in GloWbE. Lingua 200: 63–83. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Xiao, Richard & Tao, Hongyin
2007 A corpus-based sociolinguistic study of amplifiers in British English. Sociolinguistic Studies 1(2): 241–273. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Hiltunen, Turo
2021. Intensification in Eighteenth Century Medical Writing. Journal of English Linguistics 49:1 ► pp. 90 ff. DOI logo
Stratton, James M.
2022. Old English intensifiers. Journal of Historical Linguistics 12:1 ► pp. 31 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 9 march 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.