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THE USE of VERB-INITIAL WORD ORDER in OLD ENGLISH PROSE: a CORPUS-BASED STUDY Karoline Aastrup

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THE USE of VERB-INITIAL WORD ORDER in OLD ENGLISH PROSE: a CORPUS-BASED STUDY Karoline Aastrup View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by NORA - Norwegian Open Research Archives THE USE OF VERB-INITIAL WORD ORDER IN OLD ENGLISH PROSE: A CORPUS-BASED STUDY Karoline Aastrup Master’s Thesis in English Linguistics Department of Foreign Languages University of Bergen May 2015 SUMMARY IN NORWEGIAN Denne masteroppgaven tar for seg ordstillingen V1 i gammelengelsk, det vil si setninger som innledes av det finitte verbet. Studien undersøker hvordan ulike språklige faktorer, som nekting, sideordning, modus, verb-frasens struktur og semantikk/pragmatikk, samt ikke-språklige faktorer, som når tekstene ble skrevet og hvorvidt de er oversatt, påvirker bruken av V1-strukturer i gammel-engelsk prosa. Videre spør studien hvilke pragmatiske funksjoner V1-ordstillingen har her. V1 forekommer i en liten, men betydelig, andel av gammelengelske setninger; likevel er denne setningsstrukturen understudert, og ett problem med studiene som har blitt gjort at de ikke opererer med samme definisjon av V1. Enkelte studier utelukker nektende setninger, andre utelukker subjunktive setninger eller sideordnede setninger (som følger konjunksjonen). Andre studier, igjen, teller setninger uten uttrykt subjekt som V1; disse vil enkelte lingvister analysere som V2. I definisjonen av V1 som jeg bruker i denne studien, utelukker jeg spørresetninger, imperativ-setninger og setninger uten uttrykt subjekt, men inkluderer nektende setninger, sideordnede setninger og subjunktive setninger – det siste er kanskje mest kontroversielt. Både nekting, sideordning og modus ansees dermed som faktorer som potensielt kan påvirke bruken av V1. Studien kaster lys på hittil understuderte sider ved V1-fenomenet, og erkjenner samtidig at det er rom for mer forskning på temaet. i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my supervisor, Kristian A. Rusten, for his invaluable guidance throughout the process of researching and of writing this master’s thesis; it has been much appreciated. I would not have been able to write this master’s thesis without your good advice and help. I would furthermore like to thank Kari Elaine Haugland for her helpful input early in the writing process, including her suggestion that I write about V1 word order. ii CONTENTS SUMMARY IN NORWEGIAN ........................................................................................ i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................. ii LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................... v LIST OF FIGURES ......................................................................................................... vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................................ vii General abbreviations ............................................................................................................... vii Primary sources used in the study ........................................................................................... vii 1. INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................ 1 1.1 Aim and scope ...................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 Previous research ................................................................................................................. 2 1.3 Methodology ......................................................................................................................... 4 1.4 The structure of the thesis ................................................................................................... 5 2. PREVIOUS RESEARCH ............................................................................................. 6 2.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 6 2.2 Factors relevant for V1 word order ................................................................................... 6 2.2.1 Time of composition and translation status ............................................................. 7 2.2.2 Negation of the finite verb ....................................................................................... 9 2.2.3 Coordination ............................................................................................................ 9 2.2.4 Type of verb and semantic weight ......................................................................... 10 2.2.5 Other factors .......................................................................................................... 13 2.3 Pragmatic functions of V1 ................................................................................................ 13 2.3.1 V1 in other languages ............................................................................................ 13 2.3.2 Turning point ......................................................................................................... 15 2.3.3 Emphasis ................................................................................................................ 16 2.4 Concluding comments ....................................................................................................... 18 2.5 Summary ............................................................................................................................. 18 3. METHODOLOGY ..................................................................................................... 19 3.1 Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 19 3.2 Methodological implications of the previous research in terms of defining V1 ....... 19 3.2.1 V1 in negated clauses ............................................................................................ 20 3.2.2 Mood ...................................................................................................................... 20 3.2.3 Coordination .......................................................................................................... 22 3.2.4 Expression of the subject ....................................................................................... 22 3.2.5 The order of the other clause elements .................................................................. 23 3.2.6 Verb types and V1 frequency ................................................................................ 24 3.3 Selection of primary sources ............................................................................................ 25 3.4 Searching the corpus .......................................................................................................... 26 3.4.1 Finding relevant clauses and all V1 structures ...................................................... 27 3.4.2 Extracting clauses with and without negation of the finite verb ........................... 29 3.4.3 Mood ...................................................................................................................... 32 3.4.4 Non-conjunct, non-negated indicative V1 clauses ................................................ 33 3.4.5 Verb types, verb function and V1 frequency ......................................................... 34 3.4.6 Extracting clauses for lexico-functional grouping of verb and qualitative analysis of pragmatic function ............................................................................................ 36 iii 3.5 Summary ............................................................................................................................. 37 4. RESULTS ................................................................................................................... 38 4.1 Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 38 4.2 Extra-linguistic factors for V1 .......................................................................................... 38 4.2.1 The texts ................................................................................................................ 38 4.2.2 Time of composition and translation status ........................................................... 40 4.3 Syntactic factors ................................................................................................................. 42 4.3.1 Coordination .......................................................................................................... 42 4.3.2 Negation ................................................................................................................ 44 4.3.3 Mood ...................................................................................................................... 48 4.3.4 Syntactic definition of V1 and calculation of V1 frequency ................................. 51 4.4 V1 and the principle of end weight .................................................................................. 56 4.4.1 The distribution of verb types in V1 clauses and in all finite clauses ................... 56 4.4.2 Verb types and V1 frequency ................................................................................ 58 4.4.3 V1 and the structure of the verb phrase ................................................................
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