Subordination and word order change in the history of English

Stockwell, Robert P.; Minkova, Donka

doi:10.1515/9783110863314.367

Cited by 30 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 6 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…If, as we contend, In¯to Comp movement was not involved in the later middle English EN construction, we would not expect a matrix clause/that clause dissociation. Conversely, for Stockwell and Minkova's (1991) V2 analysis of there sentences to be preferable, we would expect a dissociation between these clause types to have continued into LME.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 90%

“…Since we analyse the EME sentence (6) as involving verb movement to Comp, giving rise to verb-second, we might suggest doing the same for the LME sentence (7). And indeed, there expletive sentences in pre-modern English were analysed by Stockwell & Minkova (1991) as instances of verb-second (V2) structures. If there occupied Spec CP, preceding a ®nite verb in C, a negated subject would need to follow it, making the EN just a subcase of a more general structure with a negated subject in Spec IP.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The Development of Middle English Expletive Negative Sentences

Ingham

2003

Trans of the Philol Soc

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The late Middle English expletive negative (EN) construction, as in:(1) er wull no man gewe so myche for them Paston 209, 12 (1471) has been analysed in Ingham (1998Ingham ( , 2000 as involving movement of a negated subject NP from Spec VP to Spec NegP, thus appearing to the right of the ®nite verb. The pre®nite position was occupied by expletive there. In the present study two questions are addressed: (a) whether the construction in (1) was an idiosyncratic feature of the Paston correspondents, and (b) whether it existed in earlier stages of Middle English. Three 15th century religious works (Middle English Sermons, Book of Margery Kempe, and Dives et Pauper I) were searched for this construction, as were eight early 13th century South-Eastern and West Midland religious prose texts. The EN construction was common in all three 15th century texts, in both matrix and embedded clauses. In the 13th century prose texts, however, the EN construction was non-existent. Post®nite subjects were found, but almost exclusively in matrix clauses, as in:(2) Ne mei nan uvel hearmen e HM 68 (a.1225)Expletive there was always lacking in such cases. We analyse (2) in terms of movement of the ®nite verb to C, with the negated subject in Spec IP. An alternative analysis in which pro stood in Spec IP, and the negated subject moved to, but

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 90%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Development of Middle English Expletive Negative Sentences

Ingham

2003

Trans of the Philol Soc

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…As I have suggested, such a system is already a minority option in OE in main clauses and is well-established with respect to infinitive constructions, and in tensed subordinates and main clauses subjecthood is already signalled morphosyntactically. This does not necessarily mean that the establishment in early Middle English of SVX in tensed subordinates may not in turn have reinforced the status of the syntactic subject over the prime in main clauses (Stockwell & Minkova 1991). And already in OE there are examples of SVX order in tensed subordinates that cannot be entirely accounted for in terms of`heaviness' of the element concerned.…”

Section: (7)mentioning

confidence: 98%

On Variability in Old English Syntax, and Some Consequences Thereof

Anderson¹

1997

Trans of the Philol Soc

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Various instances of system variation in Old English syntax are described. Old English main clauses alternate between a subject-based and a prime-based (`V2') system, with many sentences being ambivalent. Old English tensed subordinate clauses often involve neither of these, and are claimed here to be syntactically non-finite, this being reflected in`verb-late/-final' syntax. Particularly tensed subordinates which include infinitives may show subject formation, however. Infinitives and other untensed non-finites may take their complements to the left as well as to the right: this is allowed for by an extension of one of the two basic clause word-order rules. The same rules account for an otherwise unexplained gap in the possible sequences of tensed subordinate, infinitive and infinitive-complement. In allowing for these syntactic possibilities no recourse need be had to synchronic`movement'. Finally, the (non-) interaction between the unmarked`V2' construction and syntactic auxiliarisation is examined in the light of the preceding. IntroductionWhat follows presents an analysis of various syntactic phenomena in Old English (OE) that it is suggested show the results of variation in the system, or co-existent systems.* The description is couched in a

show abstract

“…Les donnees statistiques fournies ici ne sont basees que sur des textes en prose (le cas echeant, les textes en vers ont ete exclus des moyennes). Adams (1987) ou Stockwell et Minkova (1991) justifient l'utilisation indifferenciee de textes en prose ou en vers en affirmant que les poetes ne font pas usage de sequences de constituants jamais attestees en prose et que seule la frequence varie entre les deux types d'oeuvres. Or, devolution syntaxique-et surtout son analyse-repose autant sur des variations de proportions des differentes structures que sur leur apparition ou disparition.…”

Section: Contre {'Analyse Asymetrique: Les Subordonnees Xv(s)unclassified

“…II faut alors preciser quels types de donnees sont pertinents et necessaires 30 Je me demarque ici de Lightfoot (1991), qui base l'acquisition sur la notion d'apprehensibilite de degre-0 (degree-0 learnability), selon laquelle les donnees presentes dans les propositions principales et independantes (et non les subordonnees) seraient les seules pertinentes pour la fixation des valeurs parametriques. Cette hypothese rejoint et formalise la croyance, repandue en syntaxe diachronique, du conservatisme des propositions subordonnees (voir les citations dans Stockwell et Minkova 1991). A l'encontre de ce principe et dans une direction parallele a la mienne, ces auteurs montrent l'importance des subordonnees dans le passage de l'ordre de base SOV a SVO et la perte de la structure V2 en anglais.…”

Section: Conditions D'apprehensibility Et Concurrence Grammaticaleunclassified

Concurrence structurale, conditions d’appréhensibilité et changement syntaxique: la chute de la structure V2 en français

Côté

1995

Can. J. Linguist.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article proposes a solution to two unresolved issues regarding the V2 structure in the history of French: to which type of V2 languages — symmetrical or asymmetrical—does Old French belong, and why did V2 later disappear? It appears that Old French is not homogeneous with respect to V2: it is symmetric up to the 12th century and then goes through a period of grammatical competition between the two types of V2 structure. This indicates a syntactic change in progress, from a symmetrical to an asymmetrical structure. But French never completed this transition and lost V2 after the period of competition, contrary to Continental Scandinavian which underwent the same change. This contrast follows from the fact that Old French failed to meet the learnability conditions of the asymmetrical V2 structure. This analysis thus raises the issue of the relation between syntactic change and learnability.

show abstract

Subordination and word order change in the history of English

Cited by 30 publications

References 6 publications

The Development of Middle English Expletive Negative Sentences

The Development of Middle English Expletive Negative Sentences

On Variability in Old English Syntax, and Some Consequences Thereof

Concurrence structurale, conditions d’appréhensibilité et changement syntaxique: la chute de la structure V2 en français

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About