He Was Angry Awful

Intertwining Paths of Development to New Degree Modifier Constructions in American English

Bibliographic Data

ID6032205
AuthorsHélène Margerie (corresponding author)
Year2014
Volume89
Issue3
Pages257-287
Publication date2014-09-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Speech (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0003-1283 • E-ISSN: 1527-2133
PublisherDuke University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1215/00031283-2848967
OpenAlexW2169436035
LanguageEN
References cited11

While historical approaches to degree modifier constructions in English are often conducted in the light of grammaticalization theory, this study of two intensifying constructions in American English, and in which awful/terrible/horrible function as degree adverbs, as in I was hungry awful or You are scaring me terrible, offers a somewhat different diachronic picture. Although these constructions display unusual morphosyntactic features, the interest here lies in the way(s) they emerged. Relying on data from historical corpora and the Internet, the author argues that the constructions embarked on intertwining pathways of development in which grammaticalization was not the only—and maybe also not the main—process of linguistic change at work. The study highlights a fundamental process of analogization that has strengthened a higher-level construction, , the productivity of which as an instantiation of the degree modifier construction seems to be on the increase in American English

Degree (music · Linguistics · Physics · History · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Philosophy · Psychology · Second Language Acquisition and Learning · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation

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