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An Amphichronic Analysis of Modals of Necessity in Cuban Spanish

Leow, James A.
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4896-8438
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1594994490255345

Abstract Details

2020, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Spanish and Portuguese.
The present study is an analysis of two innovative uses of grammatical forms in the future domain of expression in Cuban Spanish: the past prospective construction 'iba a,' acquiring uses as a hypothetical marker, and the obligation construction 'tener que,' acquiring uses as a future marker. Two naturally-occurring examples of these phenomena are exemplified below. [Context: Yuleidys calls a bed and breakfast to confirm a reservation:] Estoy llamando por mi hermano que tiene que quedarse en tu casa. `I'm calling on behalf of my brother who is going to stay in your house.' [Context: Odaisy is discussing her young son’s eating preferences. He only eats crackers and juice for breakfast:] `Que bueno que todavia hay jugo. Si no, iba a pasarla mal. `It's good that there is still juice. If not, he would have a hard time.’ The present study will take an amphichronic semantic approach, which has roots in grammaticalization theory (Bybee et al., 1994; Traugott & Dasher, 2001) and is closely related to the emerging field of diachronic semantics (Deo, 2015). This approach combines historical corpus analysis, experimental study, and formal semantic theory to develop a precise definition of the meaning of the grammatical phenomena under study at each relevant stage in their history and understand how and why these changes take place. The principle semantic contribution of the present work is a constraint on the Kratzerian ordering source, such that all propositions in an ordering source are biconditional generalizations. I also propose that there are two principle categories of generalizations: Universal Generalizations and Action-oriented Preferences. From these two categories and a subsetting of these categories called an Environmental State, all modal necessity meanings for the grammatical elements under study can be derived. To test this framework, I conducted semantic interviews with Spanish speakers in Cuba (n=44). Acceptability ratings and comments from speakers confirmed that 'tener que' is recruited into the future domain to mark (reasonably) absolute statements and to express future statements based on the characteristic behavior of agents. A historical variationist corpus analysis (Tagliamonte, 2012) of 'ir a' revealed that, when both semantic and morphosyntactic factors were taken into account, the evolution of the Spanish Periphrastic Future did not consist of an intention stage of meaning—a conclusion that runs contrary to the hypotheses of prior research. Instead, futurate readings enabled reanalysis to take place as an Environmental State future construction. Through an acceptability judgment task, I demonstrate that Cuban speakers are recruiting 'iba a'—the past form of the Periphrastic Future— into the hypothetical domain in order to express environmental state readings: expressions of premeditated choices and choices that are constrained by external factors. Taken together these analyses suggest that the future domain of meaning is, in fact, bifurcated into two readings: (1) generalization future and (2) environmental state. The innovations studied in this dissertation demonstrate the utility of the amphichronic approach and show that speakers are sensitive to the relevant distinctions when recruiting new grammatical material into the future and hypothetical domains of meaning.
Terrell Morgan (Advisor)
Ashwini Deo (Committee Member)
Scott Schwenter (Committee Member)
305 p.
Language; Linguistics
Cuban Spanish; Hispanic linguistics; diachronic semantics; semantics; pragmatics; historical linguistics; tense; aspect; modality; future; conditionals

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Leow, J. A. (2020). An Amphichronic Analysis of Modals of Necessity in Cuban Spanish [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1594994490255345

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Leow, James. An Amphichronic Analysis of Modals of Necessity in Cuban Spanish. 2020. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1594994490255345.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Leow, James. "An Amphichronic Analysis of Modals of Necessity in Cuban Spanish." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2020. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1594994490255345

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1594994490255345
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