Chapter 8
Quotative que constructions in
Spanish
A constructional variational approach
Construction Grammar is a theoretical approach
amenable to accommodating any conventional feature of the meaning or
form of a construction as part of its description, including lectal
information. This paper provides a constructional analysis of the
quotative que construction in
Spanish, focusing on discourse and geographical variation. It
demonstrates that a model based on different levels of
generalization (parent schemas vs. subschemas) allows us not only to
describe the specific contexts in which constructions are used
(subschemas), but also to incorporate geographical and discourse
variation that could not be captured at a higher level of
abstraction (parent schema).
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Quotative que constructions in
Spanish
- 2.1Description of quotative que
constructions
- 2.2Formalist approaches
- 2.3Functionalist approaches
- 2.4A constructional approach
- 3.Construction Grammar and language variation
- 4.Research questions, data and methodology
- 5.Results
- 5.1Geographical variation
- 5.2Discourse variation
- 5.3The interaction of geographical and discourse
variation
- 6.Discourse and geographical variation in the constructional
network
- 7.Conclusions
-
Notes
-
Abbreviations
-
References
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