TY - JOUR

T1 - A construction grammar account of possessive constructions in Lancashire dialect : some advantages and challenges.

AU - Hollmann, Willem B.

AU - Siewierska, Anna

N1 - The final, definitive version of this article has been published in the Journal, English Language and Linguistics, 11 (2), pp 407-424 2007, © 2007 Cambridge University Press.

PY - 2007/7

Y1 - 2007/7

N2 - This study investigates reduction of 1SG possessives in possessive–noun constructions in Lancashire dialect. On the basis of a corpus of twenty-six interviews we show that reduction patterns according to (in)alienability. This dialectal evidence runs counter to the normal assumption about English, i.e. that there is no such effect. Following work by Haspelmath (2006b) that reinterprets iconicity effects in terms of frequency, we proceed to show that frequency may indeed underlie alienability/iconicity in our data as well. Relative frequency seems more useful in capturing the correlation with reduction than absolute frequency. For a few [1SG POSS-N] combinations the reduction facts are problematic for the frequency-based account we offer. These difficulties might seem to disappear in the light of the construction grammar notion of schemas, but we point out that this notion itself has serious theoretical problems associated with it. Future theory-driven work on dialect grammar may help resolve these issues.

AB - This study investigates reduction of 1SG possessives in possessive–noun constructions in Lancashire dialect. On the basis of a corpus of twenty-six interviews we show that reduction patterns according to (in)alienability. This dialectal evidence runs counter to the normal assumption about English, i.e. that there is no such effect. Following work by Haspelmath (2006b) that reinterprets iconicity effects in terms of frequency, we proceed to show that frequency may indeed underlie alienability/iconicity in our data as well. Relative frequency seems more useful in capturing the correlation with reduction than absolute frequency. For a few [1SG POSS-N] combinations the reduction facts are problematic for the frequency-based account we offer. These difficulties might seem to disappear in the light of the construction grammar notion of schemas, but we point out that this notion itself has serious theoretical problems associated with it. Future theory-driven work on dialect grammar may help resolve these issues.

U2 - 10.1017/S1360674307002304

DO - 10.1017/S1360674307002304

M3 - Journal article

VL - 11

SP - 407

EP - 424

JO - English Language and Linguistics

JF - English Language and Linguistics

SN - 1469-4379

IS - 2

ER -