Modality and Subordinators

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This book connects two linguistic phenomena, modality and subordinators, so that both are seen in a new light, each adding to the understanding of the other. It argues that general subordinators (or complementizers) denote propositional modality (otherwise expressed by moods such as the indicative-subjunctive and epistemic-evidential modal markers). The book explores the hypothesis both on a cross-linguistic and on a language-branch specific level (the Germanic languages). One obvious connection between the indicative-subjunctive distinction and subordinators is that the former is typically manifested in subordinate clauses. Furthermore, both the indicative-subjunctive and subordinators determine clause types. More importantly, however, it is shown, through data from various languages, that subordinators themselves often denote the indicative-subjunctive distinction. In the Germanic languages, there is variation in many clause types between both the indicative and the subjunctive and that and if depending on the speaker’s and/or the subject’s certainty of the truth of the proposition.

[Studies in Language Companion Series, 116] 2010. xvii, 341 pp.

Publishing status: Available
Published online on 21 January 2010

https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.116

Table of Contents

Preface and acknowledgements | pp. xiii–xiv

Abbreviations | pp. xv–xvii

Chapter 1. Introduction | pp. 1–12

Part I. Modality and subordinators in the language of the world

Chapter 2. Modality | pp. 15–54

Chapter 3. The morphosyntactic status of modality | pp. 55–90

Chapter 4. Subordinators and modality | pp. 91–110

Chapter 5. Investigation of semantic, functional, and notational similarities between propositional modality and subordinators in the languages of the world | pp. 111–124

Part II. Modality and subordinators in the Germanic languages

Chapter 6. The Germanic indicative and subjunctive as propositional modality markers | pp. 127–148

Chapter 7. Modal markers and word order in the Germanic languages | pp. 149–172

Chapter 8. General subordinators and propositional modality in the Germanic languages | pp. 173–224

Chapter 9. Speech-act modality | pp. 225–238

Chapter 10. Relative and adverbial subordinators | pp. 239–266

Chapter 11. Conclusion and final remarks | pp. 267–284

Appendix A. Two typological surveys of the morphosyntactic status of propositional modality | pp. 285–306

Appendix B. Sources for the typological surveys | pp. 307–322

Language index | pp. 337–338

Subject index | pp. 339–342

“The author of this book fearlessly approaches the seemingly chaotic mess of complementizers in Germanic languages. The study focuses in particular on Scandinavian, English and German, but provides examples from Dutch, Icelandic, Frisian, Romance and a number of other languages. Armed with data from a range of typological studies and also carrying out a couple of her own, the author defends the idea that Germanic complementizers come in three different varieties, where one of the types (consisting in complementizers like THAT and WHETHER) denotes propositional modality. This type of modality therefore bears crucial resemblance to propositional mood like subjunctive and indicative, according to the author, and is akin to verbal mood inflections as well as verb placement (verb-first and verb-second) in signifying the values Realis and Irrealis. The book contains a plethora of new data, providing a platform for the reader to entertain the quite innovative and fresh ideas put forth by the author. I would recommend this book to anyone working with mood, or modality, or complementizers; or anyone ready to take a fresh look at the semantics of verb placement.”

Kristin Melum Eide, The department of Scandinavian studies and comparative literature, NTNU, Trondheim

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Cited by 34 other publications

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2022. Chapter 1. Pseudo-Coordination and Multiple Agreement Constructions. In Pseudo-Coordination and Multiple Agreement Constructions [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 274], ► pp. 2 ff.

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2022. Türkçede Kip ve Kipliğe Sözdizimsel-Pragmatik Yaklaşım. IBAD Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi :12 ► pp. 70 ff.

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2021. 2021 IEEE 16th International Conference on Computer Sciences and Information Technologies (CSIT), ► pp. 81 ff.

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Abraham, Werner

2020. Chapter 1. Mood alternations in the history of German. In Brazilian Portuguese, Syntax and Semantics [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 260], ► pp. 34 ff.

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2020. Mood alternation in German: Negation as a specific case of epistemic weakening. Glottotheory 11:2 ► pp. 209 ff.

Aigro, Mari

2020. POLAR QUESTION PARTICLES AND THEIR SOURCES: A SEMANTIC APPROACH TO GRAMMATICALISATION1. Transactions of the Philological Society 118:2 ► pp. 237 ff.

Eide, Kristin Melum

2020. Modality in Germanic. In The Cambridge Handbook of Germanic Linguistics, ► pp. 567 ff.

Guerrero, Lilián

2019. Adverbial subordinators in Yaqui. In Diverse Scenarios of Syntactic Complexity [Typological Studies in Language, 126], ► pp. 109 ff.

Jesus, Alice, Rui Marques & Ana Lúcia Santos

2019. Semantic features in the acquisition of mood in European Portuguese. Language Acquisition 26:3 ► pp. 302 ff.

Ringstad, Tina Louise

2019. Distribution and function of embedded V–Neg in Norwegian: A corpus study. Nordic Journal of Linguistics 42:3 ► pp. 329 ff.

Jones, Howard & Morgan Macleod

2018. The Status of Passive Constructions in Old English. Transactions of the Philological Society 116:1 ► pp. 59 ff.

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2020. Semantics and syntax in Old English mood selection. Transactions of the Philological Society 118:2 ► pp. 304 ff.

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Mitkovska, Liljana, Eleni Bužarovska & Elena Ju. Ivanova

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Akihiro, Hisae, F. Neveu, G. Bergounioux, M.-H. Côté, J.-M. Fournier, L. Hriba & S. Prévost

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Bartley, Leanne & Encarnación Hidalgo-Tenorio

2016. “Well, I think that my argument is…,” or modality in a learner corpus of English. Revista Española de Lingüística Aplicada/Spanish Journal of Applied Linguistics 29:1 ► pp. 1 ff.

Lichtenberk, Frantisek

2016. Complementation in Oceanic: Focus on Complementizers*. Australian Journal of Linguistics 36:3 ► pp. 451 ff.

Orszulak, Marcin

2016. What does żeby introduce? Old and new research questions about the Polish żeby complementizer. Questions and Answers in Linguistics 3:1 ► pp. 1 ff.

Hopp, Holger & Michael T. Putnam

2015. Syntactic restructuring in heritage grammars. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 5:2 ► pp. 180 ff.

Schifano, Norma

2015. The paradigmatic instantiation of TAM. In Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 2013 [Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory, 8], ► pp. 85 ff.

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Lokmane, Ilze & Andra Kalnača

2014. Modal semantics and morphosyntax of the Latvian DEBITIVE. In Modes of Modality [Studies in Language Companion Series, 149], ► pp. 167 ff.

Vydrina, Alexandra

2014. From agent-oriented modality to sequential. In Modes of Modality [Studies in Language Companion Series, 149], ► pp. 379 ff.

Mugari, Victor

2013. Object marking restrictions on Shona causative and applicative constructions. Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 31:2 ► pp. 151 ff.

[no author supplied]

2011. Publications received in 2010. Nordic Journal of Linguistics 34:1 ► pp. 73 ff.

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