Grammaticalising constructions: to death as a peripheral degree modifier
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Hélène Margerie
The degree modifier to death is generally left out of the paradigm of English intensifiers. The article analyses this modifier within the framework of grammaticalisation and subjectification. This corpus-driven study suggests an unusual grammaticalisation path. In contrast to numerous intensifiers grammaticalising from adverbs, to death developed its booster function (i.e. high degree) from various constructions np1verb np2to death / np be adjective to death, often occurring in bridging contexts. The multiplicity of source constructions is what makes this case study of special interest. It is also shown that the semantic change from a (potential or actual) result sense to a high degree meaning results from the interplay of metaphor, hyperbole and metonymic inferencing.
© 2011 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Note from the editor
- Inflectional suppletion in Turkic languages
- From typology to diachrony: synchronic and diachronic aspects of predicative possessive constructions in Akkadian
- The Northern Subject Rule in first-person singular contexts in early Modern English
- Grammaticalising constructions: to death as a peripheral degree modifier
- Developmental paths of interrogative particles: the case of Estonian
- On the resilience of Edgerton's Law
- Grammaticalization and prototype effects: A history of the agentive reflexive passive in Italian
- Book Reviews
Articles in the same Issue
- Note from the editor
- Inflectional suppletion in Turkic languages
- From typology to diachrony: synchronic and diachronic aspects of predicative possessive constructions in Akkadian
- The Northern Subject Rule in first-person singular contexts in early Modern English
- Grammaticalising constructions: to death as a peripheral degree modifier
- Developmental paths of interrogative particles: the case of Estonian
- On the resilience of Edgerton's Law
- Grammaticalization and prototype effects: A history of the agentive reflexive passive in Italian
- Book Reviews
