5 On the emergence of quotative bueno in Spanish: A dialectal view
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Malte Rosemeyer
Abstract
The Spanish discourse marker bueno, literally ‘good’, is a notoriously polyfunctional item that has been argued to serve several seemingly divergent functions, ranging from the expression of agreement to the expression of disagreement. It has also been observed that, as bueno frequently occurs at the beginning of reported speech, it may be grammaticalizing into a quotative marker, perhaps replacing other, more canonical markers like the verb decir ‘say’. In this paper we adopt a cross-dialectal view to the use of bueno as a discourse marker, mapping it with the expression of reported discourse (a notion subsuming both reported speech and thought) in a multi-dialect corpus of spoken Spanish. Our analysis provides quantitative and qualitative evidence for the assumption that bueno is grammaticalizing into a marker of reported discourse. We also show that reported speech and reported thought are not routinely distinguished from each other in Spanish: rather, reported thought is conceptualized as reported speech, recurring to the metaphor of thinking as speaking. Nevertheless, we find evidence for the assumption that in those dialects in which the use of bueno is particularly productive, some speakers seem to routinely associate the use of bueno with reported thought rather than speech.
Abstract
The Spanish discourse marker bueno, literally ‘good’, is a notoriously polyfunctional item that has been argued to serve several seemingly divergent functions, ranging from the expression of agreement to the expression of disagreement. It has also been observed that, as bueno frequently occurs at the beginning of reported speech, it may be grammaticalizing into a quotative marker, perhaps replacing other, more canonical markers like the verb decir ‘say’. In this paper we adopt a cross-dialectal view to the use of bueno as a discourse marker, mapping it with the expression of reported discourse (a notion subsuming both reported speech and thought) in a multi-dialect corpus of spoken Spanish. Our analysis provides quantitative and qualitative evidence for the assumption that bueno is grammaticalizing into a marker of reported discourse. We also show that reported speech and reported thought are not routinely distinguished from each other in Spanish: rather, reported thought is conceptualized as reported speech, recurring to the metaphor of thinking as speaking. Nevertheless, we find evidence for the assumption that in those dialects in which the use of bueno is particularly productive, some speakers seem to routinely associate the use of bueno with reported thought rather than speech.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- 1 Introduction 1
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Part I: Contrasting reported speech and reported thought
- 2 The morphosyntax of reported speech and reported thought: A preliminary survey 15
- 3 To want, to think, to say: The development of WANT in German from volitional to reportative modal 41
- 4 Reporting speech and thought in Upper Napo Kichwa 73
- 5 On the emergence of quotative bueno in Spanish: A dialectal view 107
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Part II: Pathways from saying to thinking
- 6 Thinking out loud? Je me suis dit ‘I said to myself’ and j’étais là ‘I was there’ in French talk-in-interaction 141
- 7 Self-quotations of speech and thought, and how to distinguish them 171
- 8 When saying becomes thinking: A case of the Georgian autonomous quotative metki 207
- 9 Reported thought embedded in reported speech in Thai news reports 239
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Part III: Reported thought as a category in its own right
- 10 Complementizer deletion in structures of reporting on thinking in Argentinian Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese 263
- 11 Towards a typology of reported thought 291
- Index 317
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- 1 Introduction 1
-
Part I: Contrasting reported speech and reported thought
- 2 The morphosyntax of reported speech and reported thought: A preliminary survey 15
- 3 To want, to think, to say: The development of WANT in German from volitional to reportative modal 41
- 4 Reporting speech and thought in Upper Napo Kichwa 73
- 5 On the emergence of quotative bueno in Spanish: A dialectal view 107
-
Part II: Pathways from saying to thinking
- 6 Thinking out loud? Je me suis dit ‘I said to myself’ and j’étais là ‘I was there’ in French talk-in-interaction 141
- 7 Self-quotations of speech and thought, and how to distinguish them 171
- 8 When saying becomes thinking: A case of the Georgian autonomous quotative metki 207
- 9 Reported thought embedded in reported speech in Thai news reports 239
-
Part III: Reported thought as a category in its own right
- 10 Complementizer deletion in structures of reporting on thinking in Argentinian Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese 263
- 11 Towards a typology of reported thought 291
- Index 317
