Comparisons and its variations in La plaça del Diamant from a Construction Grammar approach: between usage and creativity

Abstract

Construction Grammar has brought about a significant change in the understanding of the phenomenon of idiomaticity by means of one of the major tenets of constructionist approaches, the notion of “grammatical construction”. As form-meaning pairings, such a notion allows the language to be understood as a continuum of idiomaticity. This study aims to apply the basic notions of Construction Grammar to explain the creative use of the comparative construction [ADJ com Y] used in the novel La plaça del Diamant. From the unifying approach of form and meaning of idiomatic expressions a sample of comparative constructions used by the Catalan writer is analysed by means of a corpus and phraseological dictionaries as tools which help us give a detailed panorama of speakers’ use of language. This study hence highlights the fine line between what is common and what is lexicalized, and the creative use of the idiomatic intensifying comparative construction. This line would correspond to the dynamic lexicon-grammar continuum. A detailed analysis of many constructions demonstrates that it is a highly productive construction, and such creativity is perfectly suited to the notion of entrenchment, which explains the modifications of phraseological units, as well as the creation of new ones.