Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Dedication
- Preface
- Dedication
- 1 Methodology and aims
- 2 Methods for a sociolinguistic study of historical syntax
- 3 The history of the relative clause/markers in English with special reference to Middle Scots
- 4 The linguistic variables
- 5 The extralinguistic variables: methods for the reconstruction of language in its social context
- 6 Analysis of the data by two sociolinguistic techniques: cross-product analysis and implicational scaling
- 7 Variable rule analysis of the data
- 8 The bearing of sociolinguistic data on linguistic hypotheses
- 9 On the epistemological status of sociolinguistic theory
- Bibliography
- Index
3 - The history of the relative clause/markers in English with special reference to Middle Scots
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 May 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Dedication
- Preface
- Dedication
- 1 Methodology and aims
- 2 Methods for a sociolinguistic study of historical syntax
- 3 The history of the relative clause/markers in English with special reference to Middle Scots
- 4 The linguistic variables
- 5 The extralinguistic variables: methods for the reconstruction of language in its social context
- 6 Analysis of the data by two sociolinguistic techniques: cross-product analysis and implicational scaling
- 7 Variable rule analysis of the data
- 8 The bearing of sociolinguistic data on linguistic hypotheses
- 9 On the epistemological status of sociolinguistic theory
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
We are descended of ancient Families, and kept our Dignity and Honour many years till the Jacksprat that supplanted us.
Joseph Addison (1711)The origin of the relative clause in the Germanic languages: a problem of general syntax
In his discussion of the relative clause as a problem of general syntax, Benveniste (1971) has commented that a comparison of relativization in languages cannot be based on formal elements alone since there are not always any comparable units; it must instead be approached from a functional viewpoint. He observes that the typical Latin construction with the relative pronoun qui governing a verbal clause has been taken to be the model for all relative clause constructions.
Nowadays, we are well aware of the dangers of adopting a Graeco-Latin point of view when dealing with historical syntax, and we avoid ‘forcing’ linguistic data into already existing models of description. However, the influence of Greek and Latin models on some of the older scholars of comparative syntax has been so pervasive that it deserves some mention. For example, quite a number of scholars (e.g. Curme) have commented that in early Germanic two basic types of sentence structure or relations between structures can be distinguished: parataxis and hypotaxis. These terms represent relative notions which are often somewhat vaguely used in the literature. In both parataxis and hypotaxis successive clauses may occur in sequence with no formal connecting link between them. Some have claimed that parataxis is a property of ‘primitive’ languages and is the simpler construction of the two because of its presence in the early stages of many languages.
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- Socio-Historical LinguisticsIts Status and Methodology, pp. 53 - 80Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1982
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