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Gehen as a new auxiliary in German

  • Katharina Paul , Maik Thalmann , Markus Steinbach and Marco Coniglio
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Language Change at the Interfaces
This chapter is in the book Language Change at the Interfaces

Abstract

This paper aims to investigate the so-called gehen+infinitive construction in German, in which an inflected form of the (movement) verb gehen ‘go’ is combined with the infinitive of another main verb and, thus, seems to behave like an auxiliary syntactically. Supported by two questionnaire studies, we will argue that (i) this construction undergoes a currently observable grammaticalization process, and that (ii) it is generally used to encode an aspectual reading, namely ingressivity. Finally, we provide a proposal for the diachronic development of the gehen+infinitive construction, arguing for a transition from a biclausal structure to a monoclausal one, and discuss the consequence of this shift at the syntax-semantics-interface.

Abstract

This paper aims to investigate the so-called gehen+infinitive construction in German, in which an inflected form of the (movement) verb gehen ‘go’ is combined with the infinitive of another main verb and, thus, seems to behave like an auxiliary syntactically. Supported by two questionnaire studies, we will argue that (i) this construction undergoes a currently observable grammaticalization process, and that (ii) it is generally used to encode an aspectual reading, namely ingressivity. Finally, we provide a proposal for the diachronic development of the gehen+infinitive construction, arguing for a transition from a biclausal structure to a monoclausal one, and discuss the consequence of this shift at the syntax-semantics-interface.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Acknowledgments vii
  4. Interface phenomena and language change 1
  5. Part I. Interface phenomena at the intrasentential level
  6. Information structure and Jespersen’s cycle 35
  7. The object position in Old Norwegian 61
  8. Bare quantifiers and Verb Second 95
  9. On the role of information structure in the licensing of null subjects in Old High German 123
  10. Part II. Interface phenomena at the intersentential level
  11. Gehen as a new auxiliary in German 165
  12. Discourse-driven asymmetries between embedded interrogatives and relative clauses in West Germanic 189
  13. Discourse relations and the German prefield 215
  14. Informational aspects of the extraposition of relative clauses 235
  15. Index 253
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.275.05pau

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Acknowledgments vii
  4. Interface phenomena and language change 1
  5. Part I. Interface phenomena at the intrasentential level
  6. Information structure and Jespersen’s cycle 35
  7. The object position in Old Norwegian 61
  8. Bare quantifiers and Verb Second 95
  9. On the role of information structure in the licensing of null subjects in Old High German 123
  10. Part II. Interface phenomena at the intersentential level
  11. Gehen as a new auxiliary in German 165
  12. Discourse-driven asymmetries between embedded interrogatives and relative clauses in West Germanic 189
  13. Discourse relations and the German prefield 215
  14. Informational aspects of the extraposition of relative clauses 235
  15. Index 253
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