The Syntax of Early English - Cryptm.org

Grammaticalization and grammar change 289The ‘weight’ or substance of a lexical item involved in a grammaticalizationprocess is reduced (in contrast to similar, but non-grammaticalized itemswithin the same field or paradigm), through semantic and phonetic erosion.As a result, the element becomes syntactically less dominant, e.g. a full lexicalverb such as be going in example (2) becomes an auxiliary, a modifier of theVP headed by the infinitive. Similarly, in (1), mente could at first have two coordinatedadjectives in its scope (as shown in stage (iic)), but at stage (iii), it needsto be repeated, indicating that its scope has been reduced to the immediatelypreceding element; it has in fact become a bound morpheme.Concerning ‘cohesion’, the more grammaticalized a linguistic element is,the less choice there is within the paradigm of forms that have a similar function.Thus, in the expression of a thematic role, a case ending is more paradigmatizedthan a preposition because usually only one choice exists withinthe paradigm of case forms, whereas often more than one preposition can beused to express the same function. Syntagmatically, cohesion is increased inthat the grammaticalized item fuses with other linguistic elements, e.g. mentein example (1) becomes a suffix.‘Paradigmatic variability’ refers to the degree to which a linguistic elementis obligatory within the clause. Thus, the past tense marker in English is ahighly grammaticalized element because it is obligatory within the clause,whereas adverbial markers of time can occur much more freely, their presencebeing determined by discourse rather than grammar. Syntagmatically, agrammaticalized element becomes less variable because it takes up a fixedposition in the clause. For example, the tense marker must follow the matrixverb, while the adverbial marker of time can occur in quite a number of positionswithin the clause.In this way, the parameters in table 9.1 provide some further elaboration ofthe notion of grammaticalization. More specifically, they can be used to determinethe degree to which a particular linguistic item has grammaticalized,making a comparison of different cases possible.9.2.3 Some core concepts ofgrammaticalization theoryGrammaticalization is generally seen as a gradual and unidirectionalprocess, i.e. it always shows the ‘evolution of substance from the morespecific to the more general and abstract’ (Bybee et al. 1994: 13). The unidirectionalityis said to apply at all levels: the semantic, the syntactic and thephonological. Unidirectionality is most strongly defended in Haspelmath(forthcoming), who indeed suggests that it is exceptionless. However, wehave some doubts about the necessity of unidirectionality in grammaticalization.Haspelmath (1999), for instance, is only able to adhere to this strong