A new perspective on the Luxembourgish genitive
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Caroline Döhmer
Abstract
This paper deals with genitive constructions in the Luxembourgish language. It is often assumed that the Luxembourgish genitive has only survived in idioms and archaic structures (Russ 1996: 74, Schanen & Zimmer 2012: 64), but I will investigate this claim in more detail. Based on a qualitative corpus analysis of spoken and written Luxembourgish (over 62 million tokens), different constructions will be systematically compiled and analyzed. Due to the rising interest in morphosyntactic variation and the improved data situation, this descriptive analysis investigates the current status of the genitive within a single system of grammar, i.e. Luxembourgish. The paper explores six main areas that are relevant for Luxembourgish genitives: attributes, genitive complements of verbs and adjectives, prepositions, adverbials, family names, and partitives. The structures obtained from the corpus will then be discussed from a formal and a functional perspective in order to illustrate Luxembourgish case typology. As the data shows, the genitive behaves differently according to the different areas that have been selected beforehand. On the one hand, genitives can be found in lexicalized structures, i.e. adverbials. On the other hand, different genitives occasionally appear as verb or adjective complements. This phenomenon is partly caused by the expansion of the Luxembourgish language into the written domain. Another main finding is that Luxembourgish makes full use of an independent set of partitive pronouns and determiners that have been derived from former genitives.
Abstract
This paper deals with genitive constructions in the Luxembourgish language. It is often assumed that the Luxembourgish genitive has only survived in idioms and archaic structures (Russ 1996: 74, Schanen & Zimmer 2012: 64), but I will investigate this claim in more detail. Based on a qualitative corpus analysis of spoken and written Luxembourgish (over 62 million tokens), different constructions will be systematically compiled and analyzed. Due to the rising interest in morphosyntactic variation and the improved data situation, this descriptive analysis investigates the current status of the genitive within a single system of grammar, i.e. Luxembourgish. The paper explores six main areas that are relevant for Luxembourgish genitives: attributes, genitive complements of verbs and adjectives, prepositions, adverbials, family names, and partitives. The structures obtained from the corpus will then be discussed from a formal and a functional perspective in order to illustrate Luxembourgish case typology. As the data shows, the genitive behaves differently according to the different areas that have been selected beforehand. On the one hand, genitives can be found in lexicalized structures, i.e. adverbials. On the other hand, different genitives occasionally appear as verb or adjective complements. This phenomenon is partly caused by the expansion of the Luxembourgish language into the written domain. Another main finding is that Luxembourgish makes full use of an independent set of partitive pronouns and determiners that have been derived from former genitives.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
-
Introductory overview
- Genitives in Germanic 3
-
Portraits of lesser studied languages
- A new perspective on the Luxembourgish genitive 15
- Frisian genitives 37
-
Genitive markers and their destinies
- On the motivation of genitive‑ s omission in Contemporary German 65
- From genitive suffix to linking element 91
- The development of non-paradigmatic linking elements in Faroese and the decline of the genitive case 115
-
‘Genitives’ in nominal configurations
- The Genitive Rule and its background 149
- From genitive inflection to possessive marker? 189
- Yiddish possessives as a case for genitive case 231
-
Genitives and their functional competitors
- Genitives and proper name compounds in German 275
- On the role of cases and possession in Germanic 301
- Index 325
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
-
Introductory overview
- Genitives in Germanic 3
-
Portraits of lesser studied languages
- A new perspective on the Luxembourgish genitive 15
- Frisian genitives 37
-
Genitive markers and their destinies
- On the motivation of genitive‑ s omission in Contemporary German 65
- From genitive suffix to linking element 91
- The development of non-paradigmatic linking elements in Faroese and the decline of the genitive case 115
-
‘Genitives’ in nominal configurations
- The Genitive Rule and its background 149
- From genitive inflection to possessive marker? 189
- Yiddish possessives as a case for genitive case 231
-
Genitives and their functional competitors
- Genitives and proper name compounds in German 275
- On the role of cases and possession in Germanic 301
- Index 325
