Emerging English Modals: A Corpus-Based Study of Grammaticalization

349 Pages·2000·58.634 MB·English

by  Manfred G. Krug

Emerging English Modals
W
DE
G
Topics in English Linguistics
32
Editors
Bernd Kortmann
Elizabeth Closs Traugott
Mouton de Gruyter
Berlin · New York
Emerging English Modals
A Corpus-Based Study of Grammaticalization
by
Manfred G. Krug
W
Mouton de Gruyter
DE
G
Berlin · New York 2000
Mouton de Gruyter (formerly Mouton, The Hague)
is a Division of Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin.
® Printed on acid-free paper which falls within the guidelines of the
ANSI to ensure permanence and durability.
Gedruckt mit Unterstützung der
Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft. D 25
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication-Data
Krug, Manfred G., 1966-
Emerging English modals : a corpus-based study of gram-
maticalization / Manfred G. Krug.
p. cm. - (Topics in English linguistics ; 32)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 3-11-016654-2 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. English language - Modality. 2. English language -
Discourse analysis. 3. English language - Grammaticaliza-
tion. I. Title. II. Series.
PE1315.M6K782000
425-dc21
00-056234
Die Deutsche Bibliothek — Cataloging-in-Publication-Data
Krug, Manfred G., 1966-
Emerging English modals : a corpus-based study of grammati-
calization / Manfred G. Krug. — Berlin ; New York : Mouton
de Gruyter, 2000
(Topics in English linguistics ; 32)
Zugl.: Freiburg (Breisgau), Univ., Diss., 1999
ISBN 3-11-016654-2 ISBN 978-3-11-016654-5
© Copyright 2000 by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, D-10785 Berlin
All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this
book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Printing: Werner Hildebrand, Berlin - Binding: Lüderitz & Bauer GmbH, Berlin.
Cover design: Christopher Schneider, Berlin.
Printed in Germany.
ut silvae foliis pronos mutantur in annos,
prima cadunt, ita verborum vetus interit aetas,
et iuvenum rituflorent modo nata vigentque. (...)
multa renascentur quae iam cecidere cadentque
quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus,
quern penes arbitriwn est et ins et norma loquendi.
Horace, arspoetica, 60-72
[As the trees full of leaves change as years go by
and the earliest are falling, so an older generation of expressions falls out of use.
And new ones, just born, flourish and grow vigorous like youth itself.
Many expressions will be born again that have become obsolete, and many will
drop out of use that are now prominent - if usage wants it so.
For with usage lies the judgement and the norm and the standard of language.]
Translation by M.K.

Preface
Many people have contributed in one way or another to this book,
which is a slightly revised version of my PhD thesis, submitted to the
University of Freiburg in February 1999. I am particularly grateful to
my supervisor Bernd Kortmann, whose support has been truly
exceptional throughout this project. I would also like to extend my
gratitude to Christian Mair, who took on the role of deputy supervisor.
Their work and continual feedback have had a pervasive influence on
this study, and without them, my interest in grammaticalization would
probably never have been triggered in the first place.
There are various other members in the department whom I would
also like to thank. Their support is just one indicator of the stimulating
and cooperative working environment I am privileged enough to be a
part of. For discussions and valuable comments on earlier drafts, I
would like to thank in particular Verena Haser, Marianne Hundt and
Richard Matthews. Lieselotte Anderwald's company in the office was
also of great benefit. We regularly exchanged ideas, research methods
and home-made biscuits. I believe I was the main beneficiary, certainly
as far as the biscuits were concerned! I wish to thank Lowri Williams
and Neale Laker for discussions on (and occasional distractions from)
emerging modals. Thanks are further due to Susanne Wagner for her
help with the index and layout and also to Allison Felmy for spotting
what I hope were the last couple of typos in the manuscript.
I gratefully acknowledge a grant from the German Academic
Research Council (DAAD) for a two-month research trip to the United
States and heartfelt thanks go to Patricia Slatin for putting me up for
several weeks in the Maybeck house on the Berkeley Hills. This
research trip had a great impact on the direction of my project and
enabled me to discuss my approach and several results with Douglas
Biber, Joan Bybee and Elizabeth Traugott. For their interest, support
and later comments on the manuscript, I am extremely grateful.
Elizabeth Traugott has become the co-editor of this book, and her
comments were of great use during the revisions. By granting me access
to the unpublished ARCHER corpus at Flagstaff, it was Douglas Biber
who made it possible for me to include quantitative long-term
investigations in this study. His comments on Chapters 5 and 6 were
also much appreciated.
viii Preface
In addition, I gratefully acknowledge a grant from the 'Friends of
Freiburg University' for the trip to a symposium on 'Frequency Effects
and Emergent Grammar' at Carnegie-Mellon University. Thanks go
again to Joan Bybee for inviting me back and for her invaluable
feedback on my paper. The discussions with Paul Hopper and other
participants at the symposium proved to be most helpful for the present
work too. This study has also profited from discussions at various other
conferences and talks where preliminary results were presented. Thanks
go to the audiences at Albuquerque, Berkeley, Göttingen, lasi, Kassel
and Växjö. I still owe Lucian Anderwald a couple of pints for scanning
Peter Trudgill's map of English modern dialects onto the computer, and
I thank Peter Trudgill himself for allowing me to plot my distributions
of emerging modals on his original map.
Special thanks also go to three old friends. Kathrin Lüddecke's
comments on a draft chapter showed me the value of a classicist's views
in the field of linguistics; Armin Schüler proved to be just the expert I
needed on statistical matters; and the comments from my physics expert
Dirk Rudolph led me to refine my ideas relating to the analogy between
gravitation theory and developments in the English auxiliary domain. In
addition, I would like to thank all those, too numerous to list, who were
involved in the compilation of the corpora which I used. It goes without
saying that - despite the great help which I have received from so many
colleagues and friends - the remaining inadequacies are entirely my
own.
My dearest thanks, finally, go to Sandra, whose support and en-
couragement have played more than an auxiliary role in the completion
of this work. In the last three years haftas and gottas perhaps too seldom
gave way to wannas. I dedicate this book to her.
Freiburg, May 2000
Contents
Preface vii
List of figures xii
List of tables xiii
List of maps xv
1 Introduction 1
1.1 Subject-matter and central claims 1
1.2 Emerging modals and emergent grammar 4
1.3 Organization of the individual chapters 5
2 Theoretical, methodological and empirical foundations 7
2.1 Chapter outline 7
2.2 Functionalism, economy, frequency 7
2.3 Grammaticalization 11
2.3.1 Early proponents of grammaticalization theory 12
2.3.2 The Cologne project: Lehmann, Heine and associates 13
2.3.3 Recent developments 15
2.4 Contact-induced change and sociolinguistic dialectology 18
2.5 A corpus-based approach 21
2.6 Scope and aims 22
2.6.1 Scope 22
2.6.2 Aims 28
2.7 The sources of the present study 29
2.7.1 Historical corpora 30
2.7.2 Corpora of contemporary English 33
2.7.3 Methodological caveats 37
2.8 Defining modality and auxiliarihood 39
2.8.1 Definitional issues 39
2.8.2 Properties of English auxiliaries and modals 43
2.9 The relevance of the history of English central modals to the
study of emerging modals 44
2.10 Previous research on emerging modals 45
2.10.1 Largely descriptive approaches 46
2.10.2 The contraction debate 47