Hochfrequenz und Irregularität – zur Stammallomorphie bei (a)frz. al(l)er/(a)it. andare, (a)frz. venir/(a)it. venire und afrz. ester/(a)it. stare

2021 ◽  
Vol 137 (4) ◽  
pp. 961-1013
Author(s):  
Sabine Heinemann
Keyword(s):  
Old French ◽  
Token Frequency ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Over Time

Abstract Normally, verbs showing allomorphy due to phonological changes become more regular over time through intraparadigmatic analogy. There are verbs, though, such as auxiliaries, modals or basic verbs of movement which stay irregular, obviously due to their extremely high token frequency. Especially studies with reference to Germanic languages show that irregularity often relates to a development leading to a clear(er) distinction of single forms within a paradigm. The article examines the applicability of the concept of relevance developped by Bybee (1985), the significance of token frequency and other factors discussed in studies anchored in the usage based approach with regard to the French and Italian verbs aller/andare, venir/venire and – for Old French – ester (cf. the suppletive paradigm of être) and Italian stare, considering the development from Latin to modern French and Italian.

Blame the Barbarians

2021 ◽  
pp. 39-82
Author(s):  
Arika Okrent ◽  
Sean O’Neill
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
Old English ◽  
North Sea ◽  
Religious Texts ◽  
The North ◽  
The People ◽  
Latin Language ◽  
The North Sea ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Over Time

This chapter tells the story of how English got to be the weird way it is, which begins with the Germanic languages and the barbarians who spoke them. During the 5th century, an assortment of them poured across the North Sea, from what is today Denmark, the Netherlands, and Northern Germany, and conquered most of England. After about a century of the Germanic tribes taking over and settling in, the Romans returned. This time it was not soldiers but missionaries who arrived. The monks who came to convert the island to Christianity brought their Latin language with them, and they also brought the Latin alphabet. They set about translating religious texts into the language of the people they encountered, a language that by this time had coalesced into something that was Old English. However, there is another group of barbarians to blame: the Vikings. Their language was similar enough to Old English that they could communicate with the Anglo-Saxons without too much difficulty, and over time their own way of speaking mixed into the surrounding language, leaving vocabulary and expressions behind that do not quite fit the rest of the pattern at the old Germanic layer.

scholarly journals The nature of V2 in Old French: Evidence from subject inversion in embedded clauses

2017 ◽  
Vol 63 (2) ◽  
pp. 288-308 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurie Zaring
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Old French ◽  
Structure Change ◽  
Embedded Clauses ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Annotated Corpora

AbstractOld French (OF) is often characterized as a Germanic-style asymmetric V2 language, although this characterization is often questioned. The present study evaluates the nature of OF V2 from a quantitative perspective. An extensive set of data provided by syntactically annotated corpora shows that both IP and CP structure change over the OF period. Focusing on Germanic inversion – XVS word order – I argue that most of the attested inversion in OF occurs within an elaborated IP structure and that this type of subject inversion dwindles over time due to the decreasing use of null expletives. True Germanic-style embedded V2 does not appear until the late 12thcentury, and is only rarely used throughout the 13thcentury. Thus, OF is an asymmetric V2 language, but with a difference, namely in having an IP field that allows for apparent V2 orders and a CP field that is only marginally employed.

Contrastive linguistics and language change

2012 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-46
Author(s):  
Wayne Harbert
Keyword(s):  
Language Change ◽  
Initial Conditions ◽  
Full Understanding ◽  
Standard Language ◽  
Language Varieties ◽  
Contrastive Linguistics ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Relative Pronouns ◽  
Modern Standard

Contrastive linguistic studies have focused almost exclusively on contrasting the synchronic grammars of modern standard language varieties. There may be some merit in expanding the scope of the enterprise to include contrastive investigations of grammatical systems with respect to how they change over time. Full understanding of some contrasts between grammars requires reference to the diachronic axis. This paper illustrates the point with one particular case in the Germanic languages, involving parallel instances of reanalysis of relative pronouns as relative complementizers in Yiddish, Afrikaans and Gothic. These parallel changes, operating on grammatical systems with slight differences in initial conditions, yield sharply different outcomes.

Finnish -Ariderivatives: A diachronic study of a new word-formation pattern

2016 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-63
Author(s):  
Kirsi-Maria Nummila
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Category ◽  
Word Formation ◽  
Very Old ◽  
European Languages ◽  
Formation Pattern ◽  
Diachronic Study ◽  
Characteristic Features ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Over Time

Among the characteristic features of the Finnish language is the use of numerous derivational affixes and diverse word-formation options. Although Finnish has very old derivational elements, fairly recent suffixes and even completely new ways of forming words are also found. It is typical of word-formation options that they change, and that their frequency and popularity varies over time. In this diachronic study, the focus is on one of the most recent suffixes used in the Finnish language, the agentive-Arisuffix (e.g.kaahari‘reckless driver’,kuohari‘gelder of animals’). What makes the-Ariderivatives special is that the type has been adopted on the model of words borrowed from the Germanic languages. Historically these are descended from the Latin derivational element -ārius, which was adopted widely in the European languages. The main purpose of the present study was to find out whether, from a diachronic perspective, the -Ari-derived agent nouns actually represent an independent derived semantic category in Finnish. Another purpose was to characterize the process whereby the-Arisuffix was adopted in Finnish: at what point do these derived forms actually first occur in Finnish, and how has the use of the derivational element been manifested at different times. A final significant task of the study was to clarify the potential reasons and motivations for this morphological borrowing.

Old French nasalization and universals of sound change

1993 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 145-164 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Hajek
Keyword(s):  
Alternative Hypothesis ◽  
Old French ◽  
Sound Change ◽  
Vowel Quality ◽  
Changing Patterns ◽  
French Texts ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Vowel Height

AbstractChanging patterns of assonance in early Old French texts have traditionally provided the basis for the claim that vowel height has a universally predictable effect on the development of distinctive nasalization over time. However, the results of recent studies cannot be accounted for by such a hypothesis. Furthermore, an alternative hypothesis suggests that the same patterns of assonance reflect modifications in vowel quality rather than nasality. Additional cross-linguistic and phonetic data examined here further undermine the purportedly universal character of the development of distinctive nasalization in Old French.

Jean de Joinville and the Old French rhotic consonant

2018 ◽  
Vol 134 (4) ◽  
pp. 985-1007
Author(s):  
Peter Chekin
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Old French ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
French Language ◽  
Saint Louis ◽  
Current State ◽  
Vie De Saint Louis ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Prevailing View

Abstract Based on textual evidence from Jean de Joinville’s Vie de saint Louis, this article argues that the Old French rhotic consonant /r/ had a dorsal pronunciation for at least some groups of medieval Francophones. This argument counters the prevailing view that medieval French /r/ was uniformly apical, and that the now-standard dorsal pronunciation only emerged in the early modern period. The article then develops the hypothesis that dorsal /r/ came into Old French as a result of Germanic influence, and not as a spontaneous development. For this purpose, it first surveys the current state of the debate about the origins of dorsal /r/ in the Germanic languages and evaluates the merits of its principal arguments in the light of Joinville’s testimony. The article then advances a sociolinguistic argument in favor of the Germanic-origins hypothesis. Using the available evidence for the interactions between Germanic- and Romance-speakers at the dawn of the written French language, it proposes that Carolingian-era nobles who were native speakers of Franconian dialects brought this pronunciation of /r/ into Old French, and that this sound subsequently persisted in some Old French aristocratic speech as part of a prestige accent.

scholarly journals Variation and Change in the Use of Hesitation Markers in Germanic Languages

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 199-234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martijn Wieling ◽  
Jack Grieve ◽  
Gosse Bouma ◽  
Josef Fruehwald ◽  
John Coleman ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Quantitative Analysis ◽  
American English ◽  
British English ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Over Time

In this study, we investigate crosslinguistic patterns in the alternation between UM, a hesitation marker consisting of a neutral vowel followed by a final labial nasal, and UH, a hesitation marker consisting of a neutral vowel in an open syllable. Based on a quantitative analysis of a range of spoken and written corpora, we identify clear and consistent patterns of change in the use of these forms in various Germanic languages (English, Dutch, German, Norwegian, Danish, Faroese) and dialects (American English, British English), with the use of UM increasing over time relative to the use of UH. We also find that this pattern of change is generally led by women and more educated speakers. Finally, we propose a series of possible explanations for this surprising change in hesitation marker usage that is currently taking place across Germanic languages.

Letter-writing in French Louisiana

2002 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sylvie Dubois
Keyword(s):  
Old French ◽  
Letter Writing ◽  
Migrant Populations ◽  
Founding Population ◽  
History Of ◽  
Linguistic Behavior ◽  
French Louisiana ◽  
Over Time

This article reports a sociolinguistic analysis of the French spelling system in newly discovered, authentic personal letters written by literate settlers living in Louisiana during the 18th and 19th centuries. After showing that French and non-French vernaculars were very much alive among the Louisiana founding population, the paper examines the use of old and new French norms in Louisiana for three socio-economic classes over time: the elite, planter, and military/merchant populations. Socio-demographic pressures are described that could have led to the maintenance of old French features or the expansion of some French varieties. It is shown that the history of French spelling in France, the origins of diverse migrant populations that settled in colonial Louisiana, and the powerful socio-economic events that shape the expansion of a socially well-delineated population not only explain the linguistic behavior of both French settlers and Louisiana-born writers, but also provide many hints to determining the sociolinguistic attributes of the illiterate French vernacular-speaking population.

Social transmission bias and the cultural evolution of folk-economic beliefs

2018 ◽  
Vol 41 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Hirshleifer ◽  
Siew Hong Teoh
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Social Transmission ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
Economic Problems ◽  
Economic Attitudes ◽  
The Social ◽  
Economic Beliefs ◽  
Over Time

AbstractEvolved dispositions influence, but do not determine, how people think about economic problems. The evolutionary cognitive approach offers important insights but underweights the social transmission of ideas as a level of explanation. The need for asocialexplanation for the evolution of economic attitudes is evidenced, for example, by immense variations in folk-economic beliefs over time and across individuals.

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