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Article published In:
Studies in Language
Vol. 42:2 (2018) ► pp.389–417

Existentials and possessives in Modern Hebrew

Variation and change

| The Open University of Israel

This paper considers the relationship between synchronic variation and language change in the context of the existential and possessive constructions in Modern Hebrew, which exhibit a normative – colloquial alternation. The study examines usage patterns across age groups and time periods, as represented in spoken-language corpora. It shows that the non-normative construction is used extensively in the contemporary speech of adults. Moreover, a comparison of the use of the normative – colloquial alternations by two populations, children and adults, in different time periods, provides evidence to suggest that these constructions are undergoing language change. A cross-linguistic perspective lends additional support: across languages the expression of existence involves non-canonical structures, which are particularly susceptible to language variation and, possibly, language change.

Keywords: Modern Hebrew, language change, variation, existentials, possessives, corpus, agreement, subjecthood
Article outline
  • 1.Overview
  • 2.Language change in Modern Hebrew
  • 3.Existence and possession in Modern Hebrew
    • 3.1Background
    • 3.2Subject-verb agreement: Deviations from norms
  • 4.The study
    • 4.1Overview
    • 4.2The corpora
    • 4.3Methodology
    • 4.4The existentials and possessives in contemporary adult speech
      • 4.4.1Findings
      • 4.4.2Usage patterns
      • 4.4.3Summary
    • 4.5The existentials and possessives from a diachronic perspective
      • 4.5.1Introduction
      • 4.5.2Corpus data
      • 4.5.3Adult speech across time
      • 4.5.4Variability in children’s speech
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Non-canonicity, variability and instability
    • 5.2The subject properties of the existential pivot
    • 5.3The possessive construction and subject properties
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 6 June 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/sl.17041.mel
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