Hovmark, Henrik

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u n i ve r s i t y  o f  co pe n h ag e n  Københavns UniversitetDirectional adverbs and the encoding of path in Danish - a diachronic perspectiveHovmark, HenrikPublication date:2015Document versionPeer reviewed versionDocument license:UnspecifiedCitation for published version (APA):Hovmark, H. (2015). Directional adverbs and the encoding of path in Danish - a diachronic perspective. Abstractfrom International Conference of Historical Linguistics, Naples, Italy.Download date: 03. Feb. 2020Directional adverbs and the encoding of path in Danish - a diachronic perspective  Henrik Hovmark Associate professor, ph.d. Department of Nordic Research Dialectology Section University of Copenhagen Njalsgade 136 DK-2300 Copenhagen S hovmark@hum.ku.dk  In Danish (as well as Swedish and Norwegian, cf. also English) path is readily encoded using prepositions: hun rejste til Italien ‘she travelled to Italy’. However, the preposition is often preceded by an adverb, usually a directional adverb: hun rejste op/ned/over/hjem/… til Italien ‘she travelled up/down/over/home/… to Italy’. A smaller group of about 12-14 adverbs is able to fulfil this specific function of path encoding in Danish, henceforth referred to as Danish directional adverbs, DDA. As a matter of fact, the adverb - in Talmy’s (2000) now classic terminology referred to as a satellite - plays a prominent role: it conveys important spatial information about the path; it receives stress in complex predicates and is, thus, highlighted prosodically as well as attentionally compared to the preposition (cf. Harder et al. 1996); and last, it has different forms and enters into a small paradigm that encodes aspectual semantics: (1) hun rejste ned-Ø til Italien ‘she travelled down to Italy’ (dynamic) (2) han er ned-e i gården ’he is down in the courtyard’ (static) (3) vandet løber ned-ad mod huset ‘the water is running downwards towards the house’ (progressive) This means that Danish explicitly (contrary to English) encodes a distinction between dynamic and static (and progressive) states of affairs in the satellite (cf. Harder et al. 1996, Hovmark 2013). Within a cognitive linguistic framework a common base conceptualizing a goal-oriented transition from p to q, a path event frame (cf. Talmy 2000), can be presupposed for all forms in the paradigm. For instance: the relationship between the dynamic and the static DDA can be compared with the derivational and causal/force-dynamic relationship between break and broken (cf. Langacker 1998; cf. also Croft 2012): børnene gik ind-Ø i huset (kl. 10) og er nu ind-e i huset (kl. 10+) ‘the children walked into the house (at 10 o’clock) [profiling of the full transition from p to q] and are now inside the house (at 10+ o’clock) [profiling of the end-point or the resultative state of the transition from p to q]’ (cf. Hansen 1980). In this presentation I focus on the development of static forms and the establishing of a stative-locative paradigmatic encoding. The double encoding of path in DDA + PREP and the development of static forms date back to Old Norse (cf. Falk & Torp 1900:109f.). The “original” DDAs were directional adverbs that added a case-like suffix -i (> -e) encoding locative: inni, úti, uppi, niđri, frammi. bortæ ‘away’ and heima ‘home’ also have locative elements, but slightly special etymologies. Later, from about 1300-, but especially in early Modern Danish from about 1600-, a number of prepositions (and the adverb hen ‘[in horizontal direction]’) entered the paradigm by analogy. However, not with equal success: fra(e) ‘off’ and especially af(e) ‘off’ developed early and have been widely used in spoken language until recently; over/ovre ‘over/across’ and om(me) ‘around’ came later but gained full access to not only spoken but also written Danish; på(e) ‘on’, i(e) ‘in’ and forbi(e) ‘past’ are only attested in dialects from the 19th century. However, I also wish to discuss why some prepositions had more success than others, a development hitherto described as arbitrary or haphazard (Pedersen 2001). In particular I wish to discuss if the cognitive linguistic approach above, i.e. an analysis of the instructional semantic constraints (cf. Harder 2007) in the basic path event frame and in the different prepositions, provides an explanation: do some of the prepositions fit better than others into the paradigm (the path event frame) and its conceptual structure and constraints? I suggest that the prepositions do cluster according to how well they go together with the basic semantics in the path event frame, especially the encoding of transition or change of state. For instance: prepositions that are dynamic and imply a transition or passing of a boundary of some kind: fra(e) ‘off’ and af(e) ‘off’; over/ovre ‘over/across’ and om(me) ‘around’ - have much greater success than prepositions that are neutral with respect to dynamicity or are considered to be static or purely locative rather than dynamic: på(e) ‘on’, i(e) ‘in’. On one hand fra(e) ‘off’ and af(e) ‘off’ prompt the incorporation of their opposites på(e) ‘on’, i(e) ‘in’ into the paradigm (cf. that the paradigm tends to favour oppositional pairs: op-ned ‘up-down’ etc.); on the other hand the basic logic in the development of the paradigm is one of dynamic forms getting a derivative static form, and this runs counter to the fact that på(e) ‘on’, i(e) ‘in’ are primarily thought of as static, and in any case able to function as both dynamic and static. However, the cognitive-instructional approach is not able to account for all the developments: the preposition forbi(e) ‘past’ would seem to align with the constraints in over/ovre ‘over/across’ and om(me) ‘around’ (passing of a boundary or point), but it never gained proper access to the paradigm. Thus, other explanatory factors should be considered along with more detailed studies of each preposition.  Croft, W. (2012): Verbs. Aspect and Causal Structure. Oxford: OUP.  Falk, H. & Torp, A. (1900): Dansk-Norskens Syntax. Kristiania: Aschehoug. Hansen, E. (1980): Motorik und Lokalbestimmung in einiger hochfrequenter verba ponendi im Dänischen. M. Dyhr et al. (eds.): Kopenhagener Beiträge zur Germanistischen Linguistik, Sonderband 1. Copenhagen: Universität Kopenhagen. 189-198. Harder, P. (2007): Shaping the interactive flow. Language as input, process and product. Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 37:7-36. Harder, P. et al. (1996): Danish directional adverbs. Content syntax and complex predicates: a case for host and co-predicates. E. Engberg-Pedersen et al. (eds.): Content, Expression and Structure. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 159-198. Hovmark, H. (2013): Danish directional adverbs. Ways of profiling a motion event. C. Paradis et al. (eds.): The Construal of Spatial Meaning. Oxford: OUP. 169-193. Langacker, R. (1998): On subjectification and grammaticization. J.-P. Koenig (ed.): Discourse and Cognition. Bridging the Gap. Stanford, CA: CSLI. 71-89. Pedersen, K.M. (2001): Præpositioner med dynamisk og statisk form. P. Jarvad et al. (eds.): Sproglige åbninger. Copenhagen: Hans Reitzels Forlag. 164-171. Talmy, L. (2000): Toward a Cognitive Semantics I-II. Cambridge, MA: MIT.  

Directional adverbs and the encoding of path in Danish - a diachronic perspective

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Directional adverbs and the encoding of path in Danish - a diachronic perspective

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