Cover not available
Part of
Communicating Certainty and Uncertainty in Medical, Supportive and Scientific Contexts
Edited by Andrzej Zuczkowski, Ramona Bongelli, Ilaria Riccioni and Carla Canestrari
[Dialogue Studies 25] 2014
► pp. 13–30

Subjectivity in modality, and beyond

| University of Antwerp, Belgium
This conceptual paper reflects on the role of ‘subjectivity’ in the analysis of the semantic domain of modality. It offers a critical review of the traditional notions of subjectivity vs. objectivity (including Lyons’ 1977), and it elaborates further on an alternative notion, labeled (inter)subjectivity, as proposed in earlier work (Nuyts 2001b; 2012). The paper spends particular attention to the question of the precise range of applicability of the category of (inter)subjectivity (which extends beyond the modal categories), and to the question of its status in a cognitive semantic theory.
Published online: 26 November 2014
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ds.25.01nuy
References (38)
References
Aikhenvald, Alexandra. 2004. Evidentiality. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Benveniste, Émile. 1958. “De la subjectivité dans le langage.” Journal de Psychologie normale et pathologique 55: 257–265.Google Scholar
Coates, Jennifer. 1983. The Semantics of the Modal Auxiliaries. London: Croom Helm.Google Scholar
DeLancey, Scott. 1997. “Mirativity.” Linguistic Typology 1: 33–52. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2001. “The Mirative and Evidentiality.” Journal of Pragmatics 33: 369–382. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fortuin, Egbert. 2008. “The Construction of Degree in Russian.” In Dutch Contributions to the Fourteenth International Congress of Slavists, ed. by Peter Houtzagers, Janneke Kalsbeek, and Jos Schaeken, 45–108. Amsterdam: Rodopi.Google Scholar
Hengeveld, Kees. 1988. “Illocution, Mood and Modality in a Functional Grammar of Spanish.” Journal of Semantics 6: 227–269. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 1989. “Layers and Operators in Functional Grammar.” Journal of Linguistics 25: 127–157. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kiefer, Ferenc. 1984. “Focus and Modality.” Groninger Arbeiten zur Germanistischen Linguistik 24: 55–81.Google Scholar
Langacker, Ronald. 1990. “Subjectification.” Cognitive Linguistics 1: 5–38. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 1999. Grammar and Conceptualization. Berlin: De Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
López-Couso, María José. 2010. “Subjectification and Intersubjectification.” In Historical Pragmatics, ed. by Andreas H. Jucker, and Irma Taavitsainen, 127–163. Berlin: De Gruyter.Google Scholar
Lyons, John. 1977. Semantics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
. 1982. “Deixis and Subjectivity.” In Speech, Place and Action, ed. by Robert J. 
Jarvella, and Wolfgang Klein, 101–124. New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Matthews, Richard. 2003. “Modal Auxiliary Constructions, TAM and Interrogatives.” In Modality in Contemporary English, ed. by Roberta Facchinetti, Manfred G. Krug, and 
F. Robert Palmer, 47–70. Berlin: De Gruyter.Google Scholar
Meier, Cecile. 2003. “The Meaning of Too, Enough and So…that.” Natural Language Semantics 11: 69–107. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Nuyts, Jan. 2001a. Epistemic Modality, Language, and Conceptualization. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2001b. “Subjectivity as an Evidential Dimension in Epistemic Modal Expressions.” Journal of Pragmatics 33: 383–400. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2005. “The Modal Confusion.” In Modality, ed. by Alex Klinge, and Henrik Hoeg Müller, 5–38. London: Equinox.Google Scholar
. 2006. “Modality.” In The Expression of Modality, ed. by William Frawley, 1–26. 
Berlin: Mouton.Google Scholar
. 2008. “Qualificational Meanings, Illocutionary Signals, and the Cognitive Planning of Language Use.” Annual Review of Cognitive Linguistics 6: 185–207. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2009. “The ‘One-Commitment-per-Clause’ Principle and the Cognitive Status of Qualificational Categories.” Linguistics 47: 141–171. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2012. “Notions of (Inter)Subjectivity.” English Text Construction 5: 53–76. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. In print. “Analyses of the Modal Meanings.” In The Oxford Handbook of Mood and Modality, ed. by Jan Nuyts, and Johan van der Auwera. Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI logo
. In prep. Modal and Other Qualifications in Language and Thought. Book ms.
Nuyts, Jan, Pieter Byloo, and Janneke Diepeveen. 2010. “On Deontic Modality, Directivity, and Mood.” Journal of Pragmatics 42: 16–34. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Palmer, Frank Robert. 1979. Modality and the English Modals. London: Longman.Google Scholar
. 1986. Mood and Modality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Perkins, Michael. 1983. Modal Expressions in English. London: Pinter.Google Scholar
Schwarzschild, Roger. 2008. “The Semantics of Comparatives and Other Degree Constructions.” Language and Linguistics Compass 2: 308–331. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Smet, Hendrik De, and Jean-Christophe Verstraete. 2006. “Coming to Terms with Subjectivity.” Cognitive Linguistics 17: 365–392. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Traugott, Elizabeth. 1989. “On the Rise of Epistemic Meanngs in English.” Language 65: 31–55. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2010. “(Inter)Subjectivity and (Inter)Subjectification.” In Subjectification, Intersubjectification and Grammaticalization, ed. by Kristin Davidse, Lieven Vandelanotte, and Hubert Cuyckens, 29–71. Berlin: De Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Traugott, Elizabeth, and Richard Dasher. 2002. Regularity in Semantic Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Verhagen, Arie. 2005. Constructions of Intersubjectivity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Verstraete, Jean-Christophe. 2007. Rethinking the Coordinate-Subordinate Dichotomy. Berlin: De Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Watts, Richard. 1984. “An Analysis of Epistemic Possibility and Probability.” English Studies 65: 129–140. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Willett, Thomas. 1988. “A Cross-Linguistic Survey of the Grammaticalization of Evidentiality.” Studies in Language 12: 51–97. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by (5)

Cited by five other publications

Mélac, Eric
2024. The links between evidentiality, modality, and grammaticalization. Studies in Language 48:3 ► pp. 513 ff. DOI logo
Peng, Bingzhuan & Zijing Lin
2024. Cognitive Contrastive Study on Subjectivity in Political Discourse. Applied Mathematics and Nonlinear Sciences 9:1 DOI logo
Van Olmen, Daniël
2021. Chapter 9. Second person parentheticals of unintentional visual perception in British English. In Pragmatic Markers and Peripheries [Pragmatics & Beyond New Series, 325], ► pp. 251 ff. DOI logo
Medadian, Gholamreza & Dariush Nejadansari Mahabadi
2018. A More Explicit Framework for Evaluating Objectivity and (Inter)Subjectivity in Modality Domain. Research in Language 16:1 ► pp. 65 ff. DOI logo
[no author supplied]
2024. Revisiting Modality [Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics, 40], DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 14 july 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.