Personal Pronouns in the Dialects of England A Corpus Study of Grammatical Variation in Spontaneous Speech Inaugural-Dissertation zur Erlangung der Doktorwürde der Philologischen Fakultät der Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg im Breisgau vorgelegt von Nuria Hernández y Siebold aus Kehl am Rhein Sommersemester 2010 Ursprünglicher Titel: Personal Pronouns in the Dialects of England – A Corpus-Driven Study of Grammatical Variation in Spontaneous Speech Erstgutachter: Prof. Dr. Bernd Kortmann Zweitgutachter: Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Christian Mair Drittgutachter: Prof. Dr. Guido Seiler Vorsitzender des Promotionsausschusses der Gemeinsamen Kommission der Philologischen, Philosophischen und Wirtschafts- und Verhaltenswissenschaftlichen Fakultät: Prof. Dr. Hans-Helmuth Gander Datum der Disputation: 14. März 2011 Contents List of tables vi List of figures vii List of maps viii Abbreviations ix Acknowledgements xi I Background 1 Contents and definitions . 1 1.1 Approach and objectives. 1 1.2 Grammatical categorisation and terminology . 7 1.3 Structure of the study . 11 2 Spoken-language research . 13 2.1 Preserving data of speech . 13 2.2 Transcribing data of speech . 14 3 Pronoun variation in the history of English . 17 3.1 Some historical facts . 18 3.1.1 Old English (450–1150 AD) . 18 3.1.2 Middle English (1150–1470 AD) . 23 3.1.3 Early Modern English to Modern English (after 1470) . 26 3.2 Standard English and the ideology of Standard English . 30 3.2.1 Desire for (linguistic) order . 30 3.2.2 Appreciation of linguistic diversity . 33 3.3 The standard Modern English paradigm. 34 II Empirical study 4 Data and methodology . 39 4.1 The Freiburg Corpus of English Dialects (FRED) . 39 4.1.1 Corpus design . 39 4.1.2 Subcorpus size and area coverage . 42 4.1.3 Speakers . 45 4.1.4 Recordings and transcripts . 46 4.2 Data extraction, coding and statistics. 49 4.3 CD-ROM . 55 i 5 Preliminary remarks . 57 5.1 The functional versatility of S-, O- and self-forms in the corpus . 57 5.2 Speaker distribution patterns . 59 5.2.1 Rare features . 60 5.2.2 Speaker-specific features . 60 5.2.3 Generalised features . 61 6 Number and person features . 63 6.1 Plural forms with singular reference . 64 6.1.1 Singular us . 64 6.1.2 Third person plural forms with singular referent NPs . 65 6.1.3 Areal distribution . 68 6.2 Dummy objects: why not walk it? . 68 6.3 Existential it . 71 6.4 Generic question tags – innit? . 73 6.5 Summary . 77 7 Gendered pronouns . 79 7.1 Gendered pronouns in the literature . 80 7.2 Gendered pronouns in FRED . 81 7.2.1 Quantitative distribution . 82 7.2.2 Referent categories, topicality, and the speaker viewpoint . 84 7.2.3 Graphic representation on the Animacy Hierarchy . 91 7.2.4 Switches between gendered and non-gendered forms . 92 7.2.5 In-text distribution: semantic priming and semantic differentiation . 93 7.2.6 Syntactic positions . 94 7.2.7 Gendered pronouns and speaker sex . 95 7.2.8 Areal distribution . 97 7.3 Summary . 99 8 Pronoun exchange . 101 8.1 Traditional definition . 101 8.2 Subject forms in object function . 103 8.2.1 Object and prepositional complement function . 104 8.2.2 For–to and ECM constructions . 106 8.2.3 Areal distribution . 107 8.3 Object forms in subject function . 108 8.3.1 Subject and subject complement function . 111 8.3.2 Coordination . 114 8.3.3 Question tags . 115 8.3.4 No-verb utterances(1) . 116 8.3.5 Relative clauses and clefts . 119 8.3.6 Context hierarchy . 119 ii 8.3.7 Areal distribution . 120 8.4 Personal pronouns in reflexive function . 122 8.5 Independent self-forms . 124 8.5.1 Subject function . 126 8.5.2 Third person cases . 128 8.5.3 Subject complement function . 129 8.5.4 No-verb utterances(2) . 130 8.5.5 Object function . 131 8.5.6 Prepositional complement function . 131 8.6 Summary and revised definition . 133 9 Case variation in prepositional phrases . 135 9.1 Subject and self-forms in pronominal PPs . 135 9.2 ‛He’s as tall as me’ – as, like, than: prepositions or conjunctions? . 136 9.3 Snake sentences . 141 9.3.1 Discourse perspective . 143 9.3.2 Self-directed vs. other-directed verbs . 144 9.3.3 Corpus results . 145 9.4 Summary . 147 10 Gerunds and participles . 149 10.1 Structural and cognitive distinctions . 149 10.2 Distribution of case forms in the corpus . 153 10.3 Underlying differences in meaning . 154 10.3.1 Acting vs. action . 157 10.3.2 Hypothetical vs. actual . 159 10.3.3 ‛O-form + V-ing’ for a more vivid mode of expression . 161 10.4 Syntactic constraints . 162 10.5 Adverbial participles . 164 10.6 Summary . 167 11 Qualified pronouns . 169 11.1 Constructions with qualifier nouns and quantifiers . 169 11.1.1 Qualified vs. non-qualified NPs . 172 11.1.2 Synthetically vs. analytically qualified NPs . 176 11.2 Second person plurals . 179 11.3 ‛Oh deary me’: delexicalised exclamations. 182 11.4 Summary . 184 12 Pleonastic pronouns . 187 12.1 Overt you imperatives . 188 12.1.1 Structural subtypes . 188 12.1.2 Distribution in the corpus . 191 iii 12.2 Pleonastic reflexives after standard intransitive verbs . 192 12.2.1 Historical and typological perspective . 193 12.2.2 Pleonastic reflexives in FRED . 194 12.2.3 Possible explanations . 195 12.3 Benefactive objects . 199 12.3.1 Non-pleonastic occurrences . 200 12.3.2 Pleonastic occurrences . 201 12.4 Ethic datives and ethic PPs . 203 12.5 Disjunctive pronouns: emphasis, topicalisation, specification . 206 12.5.1 Disjunctive uses in FRED . 207 12.5.2 Preference for object case . 209 12.5.3 Disjunction and coordination – two distinct mechanisms . 211 12.5.4 Discourse functions . 212 12.5.5 Areal distribution . 215 12.6 Resumptive pronouns . 215 12.7 Summary . 218 13 Genitive variation . 221 13.1 The two genitives of English . 221 13.2 Quantitative distribution in the corpus, with focus on 3SGn cases . 225 13.3 Modifier–head relations . 234 13.3.1 Subjective vs. objective readings . 234 13.3.2 Relationality of the head noun . 236 13.4 Collocational preferences . 237 13.5 Summary . 242 14 Possessive function . 245 14.1 S-genitives: pronouns in possessive determiner function . 246 14.1.1 Possessive we and us . 246 14.1.2 Possessive thee . 250 14.2 Of-genitives: pronouns in possessive complement function . 251 14.3 Rare variants . 252 14.4 Summary . 254 15 Demonstrative function . 255 15.1 They and them demonstratives . 255 15.2 Syntactic environments . 257 15.3 Quantitative distribution in the corpus . 258 15.4 Areal distribution . 261 15.5 Applying collexeme analysis to dialect data . 262 15.5.1 Distinctive collexeme test . 262 15.5.2 Covarying collexeme test . 264 15.6 Summary . 266 iv III Synopsis and discussion 16 The major empirical results . 267 16.1 Areal distribution of non-standard pronouns . 267 16.2 Frequencies . 271 16.3 Case assignment . 273 17 Practical and theoretical implications . 277 17.1 Prioratisation of morphosyntactic categories . 277 17.2 Determinants of pronoun variation: a combined approach . 281 17.3 Pronoun pragmatics . 290 18 Conclusion and outlook . 295 Appendix A – Historical information 299 Appendix B – Coding information 301 Appendix C – Supplementary analysis data 303 Appendix D – Maps 308 References 311 Deutsche Zusammenfassung 335 v List of tables 3.1 Standard English paradigm of personal pronouns and reflexives . 34 4.1 Size and coverage of the FRED corpus and subcorpus . 42 4.2 Speaker distribution and text production by birth decade . 46 4.3 Speaker distribution and text production by speaker sex . 46 4.4 Spelling variants of the different pronouns in the corpus. 50 6.1 3SGn question tags . ..