Cyclic Change in Grammar and Discourse

Abstract

This volume explores the long-held assumption that language change may proceed in a cyclical fashion. Cyclic change has recently attracted renewed interest, notably with respect to the evolution of negation (viz. the famous Jespersen Cycle) but also in relation to a wide range of other phenomena. Individual contributions take as their point of departure the hypothesis that cyclic change is pragmatically driven and analyse forms of cyclicity in morpho-syntax, the lexicon, and semantics and pragmatics, as well as interaction between these levels. They discuss the epistemological status of cycles; explore their relationship with other forms of change; examine the limits of the notion of cycles in language change; and discuss cyclicity from a cognitive-pragmatic and sociopragmatic perspective. The contributions form two clusters, with some overlap. The first cluster (Cyclic Change in Grammar) concentrates on changes to sentence grammar, whereas the second cluster of chapters (Cyclic Change in Discourse) looks at cyclic phenomena at the level of discourse grammar, as well as sociopragmatic phenomena. Both clusters feature a diverse range of case studies. The object languages are mainly Indo-European languages and language families, but Semitic, Sinitic, and Austronesian languages are also included. The contributions cover change involving negative constructions, demonstratives, possessives, modals, conditionals, aspectual adverbs, forms of coordination, modal particles, discourse connectives, address terms, and farewell routines. At the theoretical level, contributions are concerned with the place of cycles of pragmaticalization within a broader typology of change, with different forms of cyclicity, and with the cross-linguistic mechanisms that trigger cyclic and related changes.