C’est quoi, le truc ?

This paper presents a lexical and syntactic study of the polysemy of the noun truc ‘thing’ in French, which displays (at least) five different types of uses, some of which bring it close to unspecific and/or general nouns. The analysis is based on a large corpus of attested data and on a set of synt...

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Main Author: Estelle Moline
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Cercle linguistique du Centre et de l'Ouest - CerLICO
Series:Corela
Subjects:
Online Access:https://journals.openedition.org/corela/13789
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author Estelle Moline
author_facet Estelle Moline
author_sort Estelle Moline
collection DOAJ
description This paper presents a lexical and syntactic study of the polysemy of the noun truc ‘thing’ in French, which displays (at least) five different types of uses, some of which bring it close to unspecific and/or general nouns. The analysis is based on a large corpus of attested data and on a set of syntactic patterns allowing us to both distinguish and characterize the relevant uses of the noun truc. It is shown that each type of use of truc as an unspecific noun can be characterized by preferably selecting one favored syntactic pattern, while allowing one or more others. More precisely, it turns out that each of the five meanings of the noun truc can be defined by virtue of a conjunction of several discriminant syntactic and semantic features.
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spelling doaj.art-2d4dac2d1b1e4e87a1f5937f1758252e2024-02-13T13:51:35ZengCercle linguistique du Centre et de l'Ouest - CerLICOCorela1638-573X3410.4000/corela.13789C’est quoi, le truc ?Estelle MolineThis paper presents a lexical and syntactic study of the polysemy of the noun truc ‘thing’ in French, which displays (at least) five different types of uses, some of which bring it close to unspecific and/or general nouns. The analysis is based on a large corpus of attested data and on a set of syntactic patterns allowing us to both distinguish and characterize the relevant uses of the noun truc. It is shown that each type of use of truc as an unspecific noun can be characterized by preferably selecting one favored syntactic pattern, while allowing one or more others. More precisely, it turns out that each of the five meanings of the noun truc can be defined by virtue of a conjunction of several discriminant syntactic and semantic features.https://journals.openedition.org/corela/13789polysemygeneral nounsunspecific nounstruc
spellingShingle Estelle Moline
C’est quoi, le truc ?
Corela
polysemy
general nouns
unspecific nouns
truc
title C’est quoi, le truc ?
title_full C’est quoi, le truc ?
title_fullStr C’est quoi, le truc ?
title_full_unstemmed C’est quoi, le truc ?
title_short C’est quoi, le truc ?
title_sort c est quoi le truc
topic polysemy
general nouns
unspecific nouns
truc
url https://journals.openedition.org/corela/13789
work_keys_str_mv AT estellemoline cestquoiletruc