Free and bounded variation in grammar. Diachrony and diatopic of auxiliary variation in German.

• Applicants: Professorin Dr. Melitta Gillmann; Professor Dr. Alexander Werth
• Subject Area: Individual Linguistics, Historical Linguistics ; General and Comparative Linguistics, Experimental Linguistics, Typology, Non-European Languages
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 509137817

The project aims to extend the 41 factors influencing perfect auxiliary choice with polysemous verbs in German, which we identified in the first project phase, by adding the categories of concrete and abstract or figurative meaning, and to examine whether and if so in which ways they interact with register and region/diachrony. To this end, the project aims to identify verb- and verb class-specific image schemas, which we understand to be the conceptual building blocks of spatio-temporal event structures that can structure human thinking and guide linguistic action on the basis of embodied experiences. In a second step, the categories of meaning developed will be operationalized for corpus linguistic analysis and their influence on auxiliary variation will be tested. The following questions will be investigated: Can similar categories of meaning be identified within a verb class and do they interact with the choice of auxiliary in a comparable way for all verbs, or are the image-schematic meanings expressed in individual lexemes? (To what extent) are the identified image schemas and their reflexes on auxiliary choice diachronically and diatopically stable, and when did they emerge historically? In order to study the interaction of register with image schemes and auxiliary choice, our current data base (diachronic written language as well as dialectal spoken language) will be expanded to include data from intended standard language (local and regional sections of German-language newspapers and records of German state parliaments). Where possible and useful, the annotations will be enriched with additional sociolinguistic categories. By combining image schemes, register, and auxiliary choice, the follow-up project offers important insights for the study of the language system and research on language change and variation, as well as for cognitive linguistics.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants