The degree of grammaticalization of gotta, gonna, wanna and better: A corpus study
The paper studies the degree of grammaticalization of the structures gotta, gonna, wanna and better. The study presumes that the semantics of these structures – more precisely their modal polyfunctionality (i.e. the ability to express deontic and epistemic meaning at the same time) – has an impact o...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra
2015-06-01
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| Series: | Topics in Linguistics |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.2478/topling-2015-0005 |
| _version_ | 1827295983291072512 |
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| author | Machová Dagmar |
| author_facet | Machová Dagmar |
| author_sort | Machová Dagmar |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The paper studies the degree of grammaticalization of the structures gotta, gonna, wanna and better. The study presumes that the semantics of these structures – more precisely their modal polyfunctionality (i.e. the ability to express deontic and epistemic meaning at the same time) – has an impact on their morphosyntactic properties. Using corpora (predominantly the British National Corpus and the Corpus of Contemporary American English) and web forums, the paper studies in detail the level of independence of gotta, gonna, wanna and better from their respective auxiliaries (have and be) and the development of the operator properties of these structures typical for central modals (i.e. inversion in questions, compatibility with clausal negation and occurrence in elliptical contexts). It demonstrates that gonna and gotta are partially grammaticalized, especially with respect to the independence of their auxiliaries, but they do not syntactically behave as modals. The verb wanna behaves as a modal morphologically but not syntactically. On the other hand, better is grammaticalized to a high degree, and it does demonstrate both the morphology and syntax of central modal verbs. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-24T14:31:31Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-c68c6bfc2eeb4cde98843b3dc152ddea |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2199-6504 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-24T14:31:31Z |
| publishDate | 2015-06-01 |
| publisher | Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Topics in Linguistics |
| spelling | doaj.art-c68c6bfc2eeb4cde98843b3dc152ddea2024-04-03T02:33:06ZengConstantine the Philosopher University in NitraTopics in Linguistics2199-65042015-06-0115110.2478/topling-2015-0005topling-2015-0005The degree of grammaticalization of gotta, gonna, wanna and better: A corpus studyMachová Dagmar0Tomas Bata University in Zlín, Czech RepublicThe paper studies the degree of grammaticalization of the structures gotta, gonna, wanna and better. The study presumes that the semantics of these structures – more precisely their modal polyfunctionality (i.e. the ability to express deontic and epistemic meaning at the same time) – has an impact on their morphosyntactic properties. Using corpora (predominantly the British National Corpus and the Corpus of Contemporary American English) and web forums, the paper studies in detail the level of independence of gotta, gonna, wanna and better from their respective auxiliaries (have and be) and the development of the operator properties of these structures typical for central modals (i.e. inversion in questions, compatibility with clausal negation and occurrence in elliptical contexts). It demonstrates that gonna and gotta are partially grammaticalized, especially with respect to the independence of their auxiliaries, but they do not syntactically behave as modals. The verb wanna behaves as a modal morphologically but not syntactically. On the other hand, better is grammaticalized to a high degree, and it does demonstrate both the morphology and syntax of central modal verbs.https://doi.org/10.2478/topling-2015-0005grammaticalizationoperator propertiesagreementgottagonnawannahad better |
| spellingShingle | Machová Dagmar The degree of grammaticalization of gotta, gonna, wanna and better: A corpus study Topics in Linguistics grammaticalization operator properties agreement gotta gonna wanna had better |
| title | The degree of grammaticalization of gotta, gonna, wanna and better: A corpus study |
| title_full | The degree of grammaticalization of gotta, gonna, wanna and better: A corpus study |
| title_fullStr | The degree of grammaticalization of gotta, gonna, wanna and better: A corpus study |
| title_full_unstemmed | The degree of grammaticalization of gotta, gonna, wanna and better: A corpus study |
| title_short | The degree of grammaticalization of gotta, gonna, wanna and better: A corpus study |
| title_sort | degree of grammaticalization of gotta gonna wanna and better a corpus study |
| topic | grammaticalization operator properties agreement gotta gonna wanna had better |
| url | https://doi.org/10.2478/topling-2015-0005 |
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