Language in Society 30, 443–478. Printed in the United States of America From lexical to grammatical to social meaning RENATORRESCACOULLOS Department of Spanish and Portuguese, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131-1146,
[email protected] ABSTRACT It is argued that a grammaticization perspective affords insights on the prob- lem of functional equivalence in variables “above and beyond phonology.” This is a study of variation between aspectual expressions involving Spanish estar ‘be located’and andar ‘go around’ϩ gerund. An analysis of Mexican oral corpora shows both linguistic and social conditioning: Each auxiliary is favored by certain classes of main verbs, and andar is favored in popular varieties. Semantic bleaching along parallel paths results in layering in the domain of progressive aspect, while retention results in synchronic distri- bution patterns congruent with the original meaning of the source construc- tions. Thus, once meaningful aspectual differences become distributional routines. At the same time, the patterning of verbs denoting outdoor activi- ties with andar leads to social differences and the association of this variant with rural and popular varieties. (Grammaticization, sociolinguistic varia- tion, progressives, gerundial periphrases, Spanish, Mexico.)* GRAMMATICIZATIONANDSOCIOLINGUISTICVARIABLES This study draws on grammaticization to account for sociolinguistic patterns of variation in the domain of progressive aspect in Spanish. The extension of varia- tion theory to variables “above and beyond phonology” (G. Sankoff 1986[1973]) has been a contentious issue, revolving around the problem of functional equiv- alence among various forms (e.g. Lavandera 1978, Labov 1978, Romaine 1984, García 1985, Cheshire 1987, Milroy 1987, D. Sankoff 1988,Winford 1996, Silva- Corvalán 1997).