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Historical Linguistics 2017: Selected papers from the 23rd International Conference on Historical Linguistics, San Antonio, Texas, 31 July – 4 August 2017
Edited by Bridget Drinka
[Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 350] 2020
► pp. 205–228

Remotivating inflectional classes

An unexpected effect of grammaticalization

In Titsch, a Walser German dialect spoken in the Aosta Valley, a remodeling of the old strong/weak verb classes found in the rest of the Germanic languages has taken place, whereby verbs belonging to the strong class turn out to display both strong and weak past participles. This outcome results from the reuse or exaptation of the original morphological differentiation based on a purely lexically-governed distribution which has been remotivated by associating the morphological features with specific constructional schemas resulting from several processes of grammaticalization.

Keywords: morphology, verb, inflection, grammaticalization, exaptation
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Grammaticalization as an adaptive change
    • 2.1Grammaticalization and the complexity mismatch
    • 2.2Grammaticalization and decategorialization
  • 3.The complexity mismatch in Walser German
    • 3.1Conservative and innovative features in the Titsch verbal complex
    • 3.2Remodeling the complexity mismatch
  • 4.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • Bibliography
Published online: 9 July 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/cilt.350.10gae
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