Cover not available
Part of
New Directions in Grammaticalization Research
Edited by Andrew D.M. Smith, Graeme Trousdale and Richard Waltereit
[Studies in Language Companion Series 166] 2015
► pp. 187–208

The diachrony of subjective amenazar ‘threaten’

On Latin-induced grammaticalization in Spanish

ORCID logo | KU Leuven
| Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen
In the functional-linguistic literature, amenazar and other ‘threaten’ verbs have been accounted for in terms of grammaticalization and subjectification of the lexical construction/reading of amenazar + infinitive into a subjective construction/reading of amenazar + infinitive. On the basis of diachronic corpus data we show that this view does not hold: the syntactic schema of subjective amenazar + infinitive starts from a construction of the Latin verb minari ‘threaten’ with a deverbal noun. The origin of the subjective construction with amenazar and the pace of the extension of the new construction depend heavily on the contact with humanist, Latin-based discourse traditions. The proposed analysis suggests the need of revisiting earlier accounts of ‘threaten’ verbs that were based on conceptual and pragmatic criteria only.
Published online: 8 April 2015
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.166.09cor
References (31)
References
Abraham, Werner. 2003. ‘Epistemic creationism’: Myths vs. profunda facie explanatory irrefutables on modal verbs in German and in General. In Grammar in Focus. Festschrift for Christer Platzack, Vol. II, Lars-Olof Delsing, Cecilia Falk, Gunlög Josefsson & Halldór Ármann Sigurðsson (eds), 1-8. Lund: Lund University, Department of Scandinavian Languages.Google Scholar
Askedal, John Ole. 1997. Drohen und versprechen als sog. 'Modalitätsverben' in der deutschen Gegenwartssprache. Deutsch als Fremdsprache 34: 12-19.Google Scholar
. 2005a. Agentivity and subjectivity in Spanish prometer and amenazar. A study of constructional and diatopical variation. Revista Internacional de Lingüística Iberoamericana 5: 171-196.Google Scholar
. 2005b. A paradigmatic view of Spanish amenazar ‘to threaten’ and prometer ‘to promise’. Folia Linguistica 39(3-4): 385-415.Google Scholar
. 2007. Evidentiality and Epistemic Modality in Spanish (Semi-)Auxiliaries. A Cognitive-Functional Approach. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Diewald, Gabriele. 2001. Scheinen-Probleme: Analogie, Konstruktionsmischung und die Sogwirkung aktiver Grammatikalisierungskanäle. In Modalität und Modalverben im Deutschen, Reimar Müller & Marga Reis (eds), 87-110. Hamburg: Buske.Google Scholar
Diewald, Gabriele & Smirnova, Elena. 2010. Evidentiality in German. Linguistic Realization and Regularities in Grammaticalization. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heine, Bernd & Miyashita, Hiroyuki. 2004. Drohen und versprechen -– zur Genese von funktionalen Kategorien. Neue Beiträge zur Germanistik 3(2): 9-33.Google Scholar
. 2008. Accounting for a functional category: German drohen ‘to threaten’ . Language Sciences 30: 53-101. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heine, Bernd & Kuteva, Tania. 2006. The Changing Languages of Europe. Oxford: OUP. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hernanz, María Lluïsa. 1999. El infinitivo. In Gramática descriptiva de la lengua española, Ignacio Bosque & Violeta Demonte (eds), 2195-2356. Madrid: RAE - Espasa Calpe.Google Scholar
Hopper, Paul J. 1991. On some principles of grammaticalization. In Approaches to Grammaticalization, Vol. I., Elizabeth Closs Traugott & Bernd Heine (eds), 17–36. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kabatek, Johannes (ed.). 2008. Sintaxis histórica del español y cambio lingüístico: Nuevas perspectivas desde las Tradiciones Discursivas, Frankfurt & Madrid: Vervuert & Iberoamericana.Google Scholar
Kissine, Mikhail. 2010. Metaphorical projection, subjectification and English Speech Act verbs. Folia Linguistica 44(2) : 339-370. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Koch, Peter & Oesterreicher, Wulf. 2011. Gesprochene Sprache in der Romania. Französisch, Italienisch, Spanisch, 2nd edn. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Langacker, Ronald W. 1995. Raising and transparency. Language 71: 1-62. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2000. Subjectification and grammaticization. In Grammar and Conceptualization, Ronald W. Langacker, 297–315. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Metzger, Kai. 2003. Die Lesarten von drohen und versprechen und ihre Konstruktionsarten. eine korpusanalytische Untersuchung. Zulassungsarbeit zur Staatsprüfung für das Lehramt an Gymnasien. Universität Tübingen. Ms.Google Scholar
Reis, Marga. 2004. Modals, so-called semi-modals, and grammaticalization in German. Paper delivered at Berkeley Germanic Linguistics Roundtable, April 2-3.
Rooryck, Johan. 1997. On the interaction between Raising and Focus in sentential complementation. Studia Linguistica 50: 1-49. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2000. Configurations of Sentential Complementation: Perspectives from Romance Languages. Routledge: London. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ruwet, Nicolas. 1972. Théorie syntaxique et syntaxe du français. Paris: Éditions du Seuil.Google Scholar
. 1983. Montée et contrôle. Une question à revoir. Revue Romane 24. 17-37.Google Scholar
Sánchez González de Herrero, Mª Nieves 2011. La importancia de la lengua de partida en las traducciones medievales al castellano del De Proprietatibus Rerum de Bartolomé Anglico”. In Así se van las lenguas variando. Nuevas tendencias en la investigación del cambio lingüístico en español, Mónica Castillo & Lola Pons Rodríguez (eds), 411-435. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Traugott, Elizabeth Closs. 1997. Subjectification and the development of epistemic meaning: The case of promise and Threaten . In Modality in Germanic Languages, Toril Swan & Olaf Jansen Westvik (eds), 185-210. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Vázquez-Laslop, María Eugenia. 2001. Epistemic prometer and full deontic modal verbs. Belgian Journal of Linguistics 207-241.Google Scholar
Verhagen, Arie. 1995. Subjectification, syntax, and communication. In Subjectivity and Subjectivisation in Language, Dieter Stein & Susan Wright (eds), 103-128. Cambridge: CUP. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 1996. Sequential conceptualization and linear order. In Cognitive linguistics in the Redwoods: The Expansion of a New Paradigm in Linguistics, Eugene H. Casad, (ed.), 793-817. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2000. 'The girl that promised to become something': An exploration into diachronic subjectification in Dutch. In The Berkeley Conference on Dutch Linguistics 1997: The Dutch Language at the Millennium, Thomas F. Shannon & Johan P. Snapper (eds), 197-208. Lanham MD: University Press of America.Google Scholar
Vliegen, Maurice. 2006. The relation between lexical and epistemic readings: The equivalents of promise and threaten in Dutch and German. In Topics in Subjectification and Modalization [Belgian Journal of Linguistics 20], Bert Cornillie & Nicole Delbecque (eds), 73-95. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by (1)

Cited by one other publication

Molenaers, Marie
2023. On the survival of the Spanish absolute construction: a qualitative diachronic study based on a corpus of translations from Latin. Folia Linguistica 57:s44-s1 ► pp. 117 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 26 september 2024. 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.