Chapter published in:
Questioning Theoretical Primitives in Linguistic Inquiry: Papers in honor of Ricardo Otheguy
Edited by Naomi Shin and Daniel Erker
[Studies in Functional and Structural Linguistics 76] 2018
► pp. 7–34

Categories of grammar and categories of speech

When the quest for symmetry meets inherent variability

| University of Ottawa
This chapter tracks the response to morphosyntactic variability in a massive corpus of prescriptive grammars of French dating from the 16 th century through the present, and relates it to current mainstream approaches. Analysis shows that although variant forms have been recognized since the earliest times, only rarely have they been acknowledged as variant expressions of the same meaning or function. Instead three major strategies are marshaled to factor variability out. Their aim is not to prescribe or even describe, but simply to associate each form with a dedicated context of occurrence, in keeping with the dictates of the traditional grammatical categories from which they derive. This state of affairs is encapsulated in the Doctrine of Form-Function Symmetry. Although it fails to account for the data of spontaneous speech (which reveals asymmetry in the form of robust variability subject to regular conditioning instead), it continues to mold both prescriptive and formal linguistic treatments of variability, contributing to the growing gulf between prescription, description, and actual usage.
Keywords: prescription, praxis, variability, form-function symmetry, French, grammatical tradition, variationist sociolinguistics, Columbia School, linguistic variable, usage data
Published online: 06 December 2018
https://doi.org/10.1075/sfsl.76.02pop
References

References

Abouda, L.
(2002) Négation, interrogation et alternance indicatif-subjonctif. Journal of French Language Studies, 12, 1–22.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Baunaz, L., & Puskás, G.
(2014) On subjunctives and islandhood. In M.-H. Côté & E. Mathieu (Eds.), Variation within and across Romance Languages: Selected papers from the 41st Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages (LSRL), Ottawa, 5–7 May 2011 (pp. 233–253). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Bergeron, R.
(1972) Code essentiel du français parlé et écrit. Montréal: Beauchemin.Google Scholar
Bescherelle, L.-N.
(1877) Grammaire nationale. Paris: Garnier Frères.Google Scholar
Blondeau, H.
(2007) L’épreuve du temps réel et la variation pronominale à la première personne du pluriel en français québécois du XIXe et XXe siècles. In Actes du colloque Phénomènes de changement en français, Verbum (pp. 53–64). Nancy: Presses Universitaires de Nancy.Google Scholar
Bolinger, D.
(1977) Meaning and form. London and New York, NY: Longman.Google Scholar
Bouhours, D.
(1675) Remarques nouvelles sur la langue françoise. Paris: S. Mabre.Google Scholar
Bruneau, C., & Heulluy, M.
(1950) Grammaire française. Paris: Delagrave.Google Scholar
Brunot, F.
(1965) La pensée et la langue: méthode, principes et plan d’une théorie nouvelle du langage appliquée au français. Paris: Masson et Cie.Google Scholar
Brunot, F., & Bruneau, C.
(1969) Précis de grammaire historique de la langue française. Paris: Masson et Cie.Google Scholar
Carpentier, N. J.
(1860) Dictionnaire du bon langage: contenant les difficultés de la langue française, les règles et les fautes de prononciation, les locutions vicieuses, les wallonnismes, les flandricismes, etc. Liège: L. Grandmont-Donders.Google Scholar
Charaudeau, P.
(1992) Grammaire du sens et de l’expression. Paris: Hachette.Google Scholar
Clark, E. V.
(1987) The principle of contrast: A constraint on language acquisition. In B. MacWhinney (Ed.), Mechanisms of language acquisition (pp. 1–33). Mahwah, NJ: L. Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Confais, J.-P.
(1995) Temps, mode, aspect: les approches des morphèmes verbaux et leurs problèmes à l’exemple du français et de l’allemand (2nd ed.). Toulouse: Presses Universitaires du Mirail.Google Scholar
Crouzet, P., Berthet, G., & Galliot, M.
(1912) Grammaire française simple et complète pour toutes les classes (garçons et filles). Toulouse: E. Privat.Google Scholar
Dauzat, A.
(1943) Le génie de la langue française. Paris: Payot.Google Scholar
Elsig, M., & Poplack, S.
(2006) Transplanted dialects and language change: Question formation in Québec. University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics, 12, Papers from NWAV 34, 77–90.Google Scholar
(2009) Synchronic variation in diachronic perspective: Question formation in Québec French. In A. Dufter, J. Fleischer, & G. Seiler (Eds.), Describing and modeling variation in grammar, trends in linguistics: Studies and monographs (pp. 255–270). Berlin & New York, NY: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Fischer, M., & Hacquard, G.
(1959) À la découverte de la grammaire française. Paris: Librairie Hachette.Google Scholar
Giannakidou, A.
(1999) Affective dependencies. Linguistics and Philosophy, 22, 367–421.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Giorgi, A.
(2009) Toward a syntax of the subjunctive mood. Lingua, 119, 1837–1858.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Girard, abbé G.
(1747/1982) Les vrais principes de la langue françoise . Genève: Droz.Google Scholar
Goldberg, A.
(1995) Constructions: A Construction Grammar approach to argument structure. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Grevisse, M.
(1998) Le français correct: guide pratique (5th ed.) (Michèle Lenoble-Pinson). Bruxelles: De Boeck & Larcier.Google Scholar
Huffman, A.
(2001) The linguistics of William Diver and the Columbia school. Word, 52, 29–68.Google Scholar
Labov, W.
(1972) Sociolinguistic patterns. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
(1978) Where does the linguistic variable stop?: A response to Beatriz Lavandera. Working Papers in Sociolinguistics, 44. Southwest Educational Development Laboratory.Google Scholar
Laurence, J. M.
(1957) Grammaire française: grammaire raisonnée et code grammatical. Montréal: Centre de psychologie et de pédagogie.Google Scholar
Lavandera, B. R.
(1978) Where does the sociolinguistic variable stop? Language in Society, 7, 171–182.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
LeBidois, G., & LeBidois, R.
(1971) Syntaxe du français moderne: ses fondements historiques et psychologiques. Paris: Éditions A. et J. Picard.Google Scholar
Lemay, A.
(2009) Le rôle de l’école et de la communauté dans l’acquisition de la compétence sociolinguistique par rapport à l’utilisation des pronoms forts à Gatineau: une perspective diachronique (Unpublished master’s mémoire). University of Ottawa, Ottawa.Google Scholar
Leroux, M.
(2007, October 11–14). Something old, something new, something borrowed, something true: What are null subjects in French? Paper presented at NWAV 36, University of Pennsylvania.Google Scholar
Martinon, P.
(1950) Comment on parle en français: la langue parlée correcte comparée avec la langue littéraire et la langue familière. Paris: Librairie Larousse.Google Scholar
Maupas, C.
(1632) Grammaire et syntaxe françoise (3rd ed). Rouen: Jacques Cailloué.Google Scholar
de. Mauvillon, E.
(1754) Cours complet de la langue françoise distribué par exercices: à l’usage des personnes pour qui cette langue est étrangère. Dresde: G. C. Walther.Google Scholar
Miller, K.
(2007) La possession dans le français de l’Outaouais: le rôle de l’école et de la communauté (Unpublished master’s mémoire). University of Ottawa, Ottawa.Google Scholar
Miller, K., & Dion, N.
(2009) Measuring the effectiveness of proscription: Possessive prepositions in French. Paper presented at NWAV 38, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, October 22-25.Google Scholar
Nyrop, K.
(1935) Grammaire historique de la langue française. Copenhagen: Gyldendalske Boghandel, Nordisk Forlag.Google Scholar
Otheguy, R.
(2002) Saussurean anti-nomenclaturism in grammatical analysis: A comparative theoretical perspective. In W. Reid, R. Otheguy, & N. Stern (Eds.), Signal, meaning, and message: Perspectives on sign-based linguistics (pp. 373–403). Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Poplack, S.
(1989) The care and handling of a mega-corpus. In R. Fasold & D. Schiffrin (Eds.), Language change and variation (pp. 411–451). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(1990) Prescription, intuition et usage: le subjonctif français et la variabilité inhérente. Langage et société, 54, 5–33.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(1992) The inherent variability of the French subjunctive. In C. Laeufer & T. Morgan (Eds.), Theoretical analyses in Romance linguistics (pp. 235–263). Amsterdam: Benjamins.Google Scholar
(2015) Norme prescriptive, norme communautaire et variation diaphasique. In K. A. Jeppesen Kragh & J. Lindschouw (Eds.), Variations diasystématiques et leurs interdépendances dans les langues romanes: Actes du colloque DIA II à Copenhague (pp. 293–319). Strasbourg: Éditions de linguistique et de philologie (Travaux de linguistique romane).Google Scholar
Poplack, S., & Bourdages, J. S.
(2005) Corpus du français en contexte: milieux scolaire et social. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Sociolinguistics Laboratory.Google Scholar
Poplack, S., & Dion, N.
(2009) Prescription vs. praxis: The evolution of future temporal reference in French. Language, 85, 557–587.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Poplack, S., Jarmasz, L.-G., Dion, N., & Rosen, N.
(2015) Searching for “Standard French”: The construction and mining of the Recueil historique des grammaires du français . Journal of Historical Sociolinguistics, 1, 13–56.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Poplack, S., Lealess, A., & Dion, N.
(2013) The evolving grammar of the French subjunctive [Special issue]. Probus, 25, 139–195.Google Scholar
Poplack, S., & St-Amand, A.
(2007) A real-time window on 19th century vernacular French: The Récits du français québécois d’autrefois . Language in Society, 36, 707–734.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Poplack, S., Torres Cacoullos, R., Dion, N., Berlinck, R. de Andrade, Digesto, S., Lacasse, D., & Steuck, J.
Variation and grammaticalization in Romance: A cross-linguistic study of the subjunctive. In W. Ayres-Bennett & J. Carruthers Eds. Manuals in Linguistics: Romance sociolinguistics pp. 217 252 de Gruyter
Riegel, M., Pellat, J.-C., & Rioul, R.
(1998) Grammaire méthodique du français. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.Google Scholar
Romaine, S.
(1981) On the problem of syntactic variation: A reply to Beatriz Lavandera and William Labov. Working Papers in Sociolinguistics, 82. Southwest Educational Development Laboratory.Google Scholar
Sankoff, D.
(1988) Sociolinguistics and syntactic variation. In F. J. Newmeyer (Ed.), Linguistics: The Cambridge survey (pp. 140–161). Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Schlenker, P.
(2005) The lazy Frenchman’s approach to the subjunctive: Speculation on reference to worlds and semantic defaults in the analysis of mood. In T. Geerts, I. Van Ginneken, & H. Jacobs (Eds.), Romance languages and linguistic theory 2003. Selected papers from ‘Going Romance’ 2003, Nijmegen, 20–22 November (pp. 269–309). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Smyth, H. W.
(1920) Greek grammar. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Sternon, W.
(1954) Petite grammaire classique de la langue française contemporaine. Namur: Ad. Wesmael-Charlier.Google Scholar
Vallart, Abbé J.
(1744) Grammaire françoise. Paris: Desaint & Saillant.Google Scholar
de. Wailly, N. F.
(1768) Principes généraux et particuliers de la langue françoise, confirmés par des exemples choisis, instructifs, agréables & tirés des bons auteurs. Paris: J. Barnou.Google Scholar
Weiner, E. J., & Labov, W.
(1983) Constraints on the agentless passive. Journal of Linguistics, 19, 29–58.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Willis, L.
(2000) Être ou ne plus être: Auxiliary alternation in Ottawa-Hull French (Unpublished master’s thesis). University of Ottawa, Ottawa.Google Scholar