Grammatikalisering i nutid - utvecklingen av typ fram till 2009

Henrik Rosenkvist, Sanna Skärlund

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1322 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

In modern Swedish, the word typ has a number of functions and meanings. Until about 1930, typ had, however, only a nominal function, and the other uses of typ have accordingly developed successively during the 20th century. In this article, which is based on a paper by Skärlund (2010), we track the grammaticalization of typ by utilizing electronic corpora, mainly comprising Swedish newspaper texts from 1838 to 2009. Contexts where typ was preceded by the preposition av (‘of’) allowed for a reanalysis which gave rise to the two-word preposition av typ, which notably first was used only to designate different types of military aircraft. The next step in the grammaticalization is the univerbation of av typ, where av is dropped and typ appears in isolation as a preposition. This usage becomes frequent during the 1970s, and about two decades later typ also appears as an adverb. In the beginning of the 21th century, we then find the first instances of typ used as a discourse particle. The grammaticalization of typ is a recent phenomenon and can as such be followed
in great detail in the written sources. This case study is hence both valid and reliable, in comparison with grammaticalization research focussing on older languages or languages without extant written records, and we argue that the grammaticalization of typ gives support to the view that this type of language change depends on interaction between syntactic reanalyses and semantic reinterpretations, as suggested by Rosenkvist (2005).
Original languageSwedish
Pages (from-to)5-25
JournalSpråk och stil
Volume21
Publication statusPublished - 2011

Bibliographical note

The information about affiliations in this record was updated in December 2015.
The record was previously connected to the following departments: Swedish (015011001)

Subject classification (UKÄ)

  • Languages and Literature

Free keywords

  • grammaticalization
  • Swedish

Cite this