Reflexes of grammar in patterns of language change Export

@article{kroch89reflexesGrammar, abstract = {n this paper we present evidence from various linguistic changes, most significantly the rise of the periphrastic auxiliary do in early Modern English, that the time course of syntactic change is tightly constrained by the grammar of the changing language. Specifically, we give evidence that when one grammatical option replaces another with which it is in competition across a set of linguistic contexts, the rate of replacement, properly measured, is the same in all of them. This effect we call the ``Constant Rate Hypothesis.'' The contexts generally differ from one another at each period in the degree to which they favor the spreading form, but they do not differ in the rate at which the form spreads. This result is surprising since one might have expected the change to proceed faster in contexts where the advancing form is more common. Indeed, Bailey (1973), in developing his theory of language change, assumes that different rates must characterize different contexts, as have other scholars. We have, however, found quantitative evidence in several cases of syntactic change, which we present in the paper, for the Constant Rate Hypothesis. In addition, our results show that the grammatical analysis which defines the contexts of a change is quite abstract. We find that the set of contexts that change together is not defined by the sharing of a surface property, like the appearance of a particular word or morpheme, but rather by a shared syntactic structure, whose existence can only be the product of an abstract grammatical analysis on the part of speakers. Indeed, in some of the cases we discuss, the competition reflected in the changes under study occurs between entire grammatical subsystems. These competing subsystems have been proposed by syntacticians, on the basis of synchronic analyses, to characterize earlier and later stages of the languages in question, so that the results of our investigation of process turn out to be consistent with independently motivated structural analyses. In our central case, the rise of periphrastic do, the richness of the available database (Elleg\r{a}rd's well-known study) allows us to see in detail the shaping of the process of change by the grammatical systems in competition.}, author = {Kroch, A.}, citeulike-article-id = {801182}, citeulike-linkout-0 = {http://www.sfb441.uni-tuebingen.de/veranstaltungen/reflexes.pdf}, journal = {Language Variation and Change}, keywords = {language\_change}, pages = {199--244}, posted-at = {2006-08-14 19:21:50}, priority = {0}, title = {Reflexes of grammar in patterns of language change}, url = {http://www.sfb441.uni-tuebingen.de/veranstaltungen/reflexes.pdf}, volume = {1}, year = {1989} }

TY - JOUR ID - kroch89reflexesGrammar L3 - citeulike-article-id:801182 N2 - n this paper we present evidence from various linguistic changes, most significantly the rise of the periphrastic auxiliary do in early Modern English, that the time course of syntactic change is tightly constrained by the grammar of the changing language. Specifically, we give evidence that when one grammatical option replaces another with which it is in competition across a set of linguistic contexts, the rate of replacement, properly measured, is the same in all of them. This effect we call the ``Constant Rate Hypothesis.'' The contexts generally differ from one another at each period in the degree to which they favor the spreading form, but they do not differ in the rate at which the form spreads. This result is surprising since one might have expected the change to proceed faster in contexts where the advancing form is more common. Indeed, Bailey (1973), in developing his theory of language change, assumes that different rates must characterize different contexts, as have other scholars. We have, however, found quantitative evidence in several cases of syntactic change, which we present in the paper, for the Constant Rate Hypothesis. In addition, our results show that the grammatical analysis which defines the contexts of a change is quite abstract. We find that the set of contexts that change together is not defined by the sharing of a surface property, like the appearance of a particular word or morpheme, but rather by a shared syntactic structure, whose existence can only be the product of an abstract grammatical analysis on the part of speakers. Indeed, in some of the cases we discuss, the competition reflected in the changes under study occurs between entire grammatical subsystems. These competing subsystems have been proposed by syntacticians, on the basis of synchronic analyses, to characterize earlier and later stages of the languages in question, so that the results of our investigation of process turn out to be consistent with independently motivated structural analyses. In our central case, the rise of periphrastic do, the richness of the available database (Ellegård's well-known study) allows us to see in detail the shaping of the process of change by the grammatical systems in competition. JF - Language Variation and Change EP - 244 TI - Reflexes of grammar in patterns of language change VL - 1 SP - 199 KW - language_change AU - Kroch, A PY - 1989/// UR - http://www.sfb441.uni-tuebingen.de/veranstaltungen/reflexes.pdf ER -