The aim of this study is to delineate the functional category of English secondary determiners more precisely than in current reference grammars and in my own previous work. To provide a principled basis for a functional typology of secondary determiners, I firstly develop a typology of primary determiner (or ‘grounding’) types within the framework of Cognitive Grammar. Following Langacker, four main types are distinguished, and their referential and discursive properties are characterized: indefinite grounding, relative quantification, possessive grounding, and definite grounding. This typology then forms the starting point for drawing up a typology of the main types of instructions given by secondary determiners, i.e. to retrieve the type specifications of an instance newly introduced by an indefinite NP, to identify the correct antecedent of a definite NP, to relate a referent to another instance of the same type, or to refer to a generalized referent. Thirdly, modifier types that had been confused with secondary determiners in earlier work are distinguished from them on the basis of their semantics and formal behaviour, viz. focus markers, nominal aspectual modifiers, modal and temporal modifiers, and metadesignatives.
Article outline
1.Introduction
2.Functions fulfilled by elements in the English NP
3.Primary grounding types
3.1Indefinite grounding
3.1.1Indefinite NPs with specific reference
3.1.2Indefinite NPs with non-specific and generalized reference
3.2Relative quantification
3.3Possessive grounding
3.4Definite grounding
3.5Summary
4.A typology of the meanings expressed by secondary determiners
4.1Secondary determiners used in NPs designating non-retrievable and first mention referents
4.1.1Secondary determiners expressing specificity
4.1.2Secondary determiners indicating discursively retrievable type specifications
4.2Secondary determiners used in NPs designating retrievable referents
4.2.1Secondary determiners used with definite first mentions
4.2.2Secondary determiners used in co-referential definite NPs
4.2.3Secondary determiners used in definite NPs with associative anaphora
4.3Generalized reference
4.3.1Secondary determiners in NPs conveying reference to a generalization
4.3.2Secondary determiners aiding implied reference to discourse-new instances of a generalization
4.4Secondary determiners used in NPs designating instances of a reference mass
4.4.1Secondary determiners used in NPs designating parts of a given reference mass
4.4.1.1Secondary determiners used in NPs designating non-identifiable parts of a given reference mass
4.4.1.2Secondary determiners used in NPs designating identifiable parts of a given reference mass
4.4.2Secondary determiners relating instances to other instances of an inductively inferable reference mass
4.4.2.1Secondary determiners relating non-identifiable instances to other instances of an inductively inferable reference mass
4.4.2.2Secondary determiners coding instances as retrievable via other instances of an inductively inferable reference mass
4.5Conclusion
5.Modifier types confused with secondary determiners
2008The grammaticalization and subjectification of English adjectives expressing difference into plurality/distributivity markers and quantifiers. Folia Linguistica 42(2): 259–306.
Breban, Tine
2010aReconstructing paths of secondary grammaticalization of same from emphasizing to phoric and nominal-aspectual postdeterminer uses. Transactions of the Philological Society 108(1): 68–87.
Breban, Tine
2010bEnglish adjectives of comparison: Lexical and grammaticalized uses. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Breban, Tine
2011Secondary determiners as markers of generalized instantiation in English noun phrases. Cognitive Linguistics 22(3): 511–533.
Breban, Tine
2014Beyond mere syntactic change: A micro-analytical study of various and numerous. In Late Modern English Syntax, Marianne Hundt (ed.), 113–132. Cambridge: CUP.
1978Reference to Kinds in English. Bloomington IN: Indiana University Linguistics Club.
Chafe, Wallace
1987Cognitive constraints and information flow. In Coherence and Grounding in Discourse [Typological Studies in Language 11], Russell S. Tomlin (ed.), 21–51. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Cinque, Guglielmo
2010The Syntax of Adjectives: A Comparative Study. Cambridge MA: The MIT Press.
Close, Reginald A.
1975A Reference Grammar for Students of English. London: Longman.
Davidse, Kristin
1999The semantics of cardinal versus enumerative existential constructions. Cognitive Linguistics 10(3): 203–250.
Davidse, Kristin
2001Postdeterminers: Their secondary identifying and quantifying functions. Leuven: KUL, Dept. of Linguistics.
Davidse, Kristin
2004The interaction of quantification and identification in English determiners. In Language, Culture and Mind, Michel Achard & Suzanne Kemmer (eds), 507–533. Stanford CA: CSLI.
Davidse, Kristin, Breban, Tine & Van linden, An
2008Deictification: The development of secondary deictic meanings by adjectives in the English NP. English Language and Linguistics 12(3): 475–503.
Davidse, Kristin & Breban, Tine
2019A cognitive-functional approach to the order of adjectives in the English noun phrase. Linguistics 57(2): 327–371.
Davidse, Kristin & Ghesquière, Lobke
2016Content-purport, content-substance and structure: Focusing mere and merely. Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 48(1): 85–109.
De Smedt, Liesbeth, Brems, Lieselotte & Davidse, Kristin
2007NP-internal functions and extended uses of the ‘type’ nouns kind, sort, and type: towards a comprehensive, corpus-based description. In Corpus Linguistics 25 Years On, Roberta Fachinetti (ed.), 225–255. Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Declerck, Renaat
1991A Comprehensive Descriptive Grammar of English. Tokyo: Kaitakusha.
Denison, David
2002History of the sort of construction family. Paper presented at the Second International Conference on Construction Grammar, Helsinki, 6–8 September.
Du Bois, John
1980Beyond definiteness: The trace of identity in discourse. In The Pear Stories: Cognitive, Cultural and Linguistic Aspects of Narrative Production, Wallace L. Chafe (ed.), 203–274. Norwood NJ: Ablex.
2009Dynamicity, factivity and scanning. The imaginative basis of logic and linguistic meaning. In Grounding Cognition: The Role of Perception and Action in Memory, Language and Thinking, Diane Pecher & Rolf Zwaan (eds), 164–197. Cambridge: CUP.
2012Text Analysis, Wang Zhenhua (ed.). Shanghai: Shanghai Jiao Tong University Press.
Mackenzie, Lachlan
1997Grammar, discourse and knowledge: The use of such. In Studies in English Language and Teaching. In Honour of Flor Aarts, Jan Aarts, Inge de Mönnink & Herman Wekker (eds), 85–105. Amsterdam: Rodopi.
McGregor, William
1997Semiotic Grammar. Oxford: Clarendon.
McGregor, William
2003The nothing that is, the zero that isn’t. Studia Linguistica 57: 75–119.
Milsark, Gary
1976Existential Sentences in English. Bloomington IN: Indiana University Linguistics Club.
Prince, Ellen
1981Towards a taxonomy of given-new information. In Radical Pragmatics, Peter Cole (ed.), 223–255. New York NY: Academic Press.
Quirk, Randolph, Greenbaum, Sidney, Geoffrey Leech, Geoffrey & Svartvik, Jan
1985A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language. London: Longman.
Sinclair, John
1990The Collins COBUILD English Grammar. London: Collins.
Van Praet, Wout & Davidse, Kristin
2019Rethinking predicative clauses with indefinite predicate and specificational clauses with indefinite variable: A cognitive-functional account. Leuven Working Papers in Linguistics 38: 1–36.
Vandelanotte, Lieven
2002Prenominal adjectives in English: Structures and ordering. Folia Linguistica 36(3–4): 219–259.
1995Definiteness and the English existential. Language 71(4): 722–742.
Wardhaugh, Ronald
1997Understanding English Grammar: A Linguistic Approach. Oxford: Blackwell.
Wierzbicka, Anna
1988The Semantics of Grammar [Studies in Language Companion Series 18]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Willemse, Peter
2005Nominal Reference-point Constructions: Possessive and Esphoric NPs in English. PhD dissertation, University of Leuven.
Willemse, Peter
2007Indefinite possessive NPs and the distinction between determining and nondetermining genitives in English. English Language and Linguistics 11(3): 537–568.
2009English possessives as reference-point constructions and their function in the discourse. In The Expression of Possession, William McGregor (ed.), 13–50. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
2023. Structural Assemblies and Semantics of the Four Existential Constructions with Relative Clause. In Specificational and Presentational There-Clefts, ► pp. 75 ff.
2023. Determiners of Existent NPs in the Four Existential Constructions with Relative Clause. In Specificational and Presentational There-Clefts, ► pp. 123 ff.
2023. Different Antecedent–Relative Clause Relations. In Specificational and Presentational There-Clefts, ► pp. 55 ff.
Keizer, Evelien
2022. Modifier-numeral word order in the English NP: An FDG analysis. Open Linguistics 8:1 ► pp. 545 ff.
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 20 march 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.