Skip to main content

ETHNOS_APP

Home • Search • Journals • List 0

Modal grammaticalization and the pragmatic field

A case study

Bibliographic Data

ID20344886
AuthorsVirginia Hill (0000-0001-5850-1666, University of New Brunswick – Saint John, corresponding author)
Year2011
Volume28
Issue1
Pages25-53
Publication date2011-06-08
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueDiachronica (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0176-4225 • E-ISSN: 1569-9714
PublisherJohn Benjamins Publishing Company (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1075/dia.28.1.02hil
OpenAlexW2092242161
LanguageEN
Citations received4

This paper proposes a diachronic syntactic analysis of the Romanian verb putea “can”. It is argued that the grammaticalization of putea consists of several upward reanalyses, and the gradual stripping of semantic features set off its reclassification as control verb > raising verb > auxiliary > pragmatic marker. This analysis accounts for ambiguous epistemic/deontic readings on the modal, which were considered mysterious under lexical/semantic approaches; it also explains why infinitive verbs are so productive as complements to the modal; and it points out that conversational pragmatic features must be factored in as triggers of syntactic reanalysis

Deontic logic · Grammaticalization · Infinitive · Linguistics · Modal · Modal verb · Natural language processing · Romanian · Verb · Computer Science · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Mathematics · Philosophy · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation · Artificial Intelligence

  • The emergence of the Romanian subjunctive

    Virginia Hill•The Linguistic Review•2013

  • Modal meanings become discourse-oriented

    Open Access•Heiko Narrog•The Canadian Journal of…•2026

  • Istro-Romanian Subjunctive Clauses

    Open Access•Cătălina Ramona Corbeanu, Virginia Hill•Languages•2024

  • Pragmatics or morpho-syntax? The encoding of indirect evidentiality in Romanian

    Open Access•Monica Alexandrina Irimia•Journal of Pragmatics•2018

Unique citing works4
Citations per year0,31
Citation span2013 - 2026 (14)
Citation velocitycurrent
Highly citedNo
Citation typesNeutral: 3

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub
Ethnos_APP • Open Source Project • MIT License • Frontend v2.0.0 • Privacy and Cookies • API Documentation: api.ethnos.app/docs • API Source Code: GitHub • DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17049435 • Frontend Source Code: GitHub • DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17050053 • cruz.rio.br • Expectantes Misericordiae