Frequency as a cause of semantic change
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Reijirou Shibasaki
Abstract
This study argues for a reinterpretation of the linguistic evolution of personal pronouns in the history of Japanese, with special focus on the second person form omae. While prior research has found certain syntactic and semantic differences between Japanese pronouns and Western counterparts, no research projects have analyzed Japanese pronouns from the perspective of grammatical distribution. This study takes a frequency-based approach to reveal the distributional patterns of omae at several historical stages, and shows that frequency serves as a cause of semantic change, providing evidence for the correlations between referential shifting and grammatical roles on the one hand and between frequency and semantic depreciation on the other.
Abstract
This study argues for a reinterpretation of the linguistic evolution of personal pronouns in the history of Japanese, with special focus on the second person form omae. While prior research has found certain syntactic and semantic differences between Japanese pronouns and Western counterparts, no research projects have analyzed Japanese pronouns from the perspective of grammatical distribution. This study takes a frequency-based approach to reveal the distributional patterns of omae at several historical stages, and shows that frequency serves as a cause of semantic change, providing evidence for the correlations between referential shifting and grammatical roles on the one hand and between frequency and semantic depreciation on the other.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledgements vii
- Introduction 1
- On problem areas in grammaticalization 17
- Grammaticalization within and outside of a domain 43
- Delexicalizing di 63
- Should conditionals be emergent … 93
- From manner expression to attitudinal discourse marker 137
- Grammaticalization and lexicalization effects in participial morphology 191
- Frequency as a cause of semantic change 225
- The role of frequency and prosody in the grammaticalization of Korean -canh- 245
- Emergence of the indefinite article 275
- To dare to or not to 289
- Author index 327
- Index of languages and language families 331
- Subject index 333
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledgements vii
- Introduction 1
- On problem areas in grammaticalization 17
- Grammaticalization within and outside of a domain 43
- Delexicalizing di 63
- Should conditionals be emergent … 93
- From manner expression to attitudinal discourse marker 137
- Grammaticalization and lexicalization effects in participial morphology 191
- Frequency as a cause of semantic change 225
- The role of frequency and prosody in the grammaticalization of Korean -canh- 245
- Emergence of the indefinite article 275
- To dare to or not to 289
- Author index 327
- Index of languages and language families 331
- Subject index 333
