Variation and Grammaticalization of Verbal Constructions

Abstract

Construction grammar – most notably Cognitive Construction Grammar (Goldberg 2006), Radical Construction Grammar (Croft 2001) and Cognitive Grammar (Langacker 2008) – has been extremely inspiring in providing tools for modelling gradience in variation and change. Verbal constructions have been investigated within the paradigm of construction grammar from a number of angles including idiomaticization processes as well as argument structure constructions (Boas 2003; Engelberg 2009; Faulhaber 2011; Goldberg 1995; Rostila 2007). Usage-based approaches (Barlow & Kemmer 2000; Bybee & Hopper 2001; Diessel 2015, 2019; Langacker 1988; Tomasello 2003) have pointed out that usage is the place to look for variation and change. Data-driven, corpus-based approaches have introduced quantitative methods for analyzing constructional functionality and variety synchronically (Stefanowitsch & Gries 2003; Gries 2006; Glynn 2014) and diachronically (Hilpert 2006). These techniques have given rise to detailed studies of verbal constructions, lexicalization and idiomaticization. This volume presents papers which in their majority have arisen in connection with the workshop “Variation and Grammaticalization of Verbal Constructions”, held at the 51st SLE Annual Meeting at Tallinn, 29th August – 1st September 2018. Its focus is on verbal constructions in Germanic languages, constructional variation and degrees of polyfunctionality between lexical, idiomatic and grammaticalized usages. The major object of this volume is to investigate the conditions and interdependencies of such variations and polyfunctionalities. The theoretical and conceptual foundations of the studies united here rest upon grammaticalization theory, usage-based constructional approaches, and frame semantics, allway in combination with empirical testing. The scope of interest comprises synchronic as well as diachronic phenomena in various registers and communicative types.