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In:New Vistas in Research on Metaphor and Metonymy: Their contexts and interaction across discourse types and modalities
Edited by Robert Kiełtyka, Mario Brdar, Marcin Kudła and Goran Milić
[Human Cognitive Processing 82] 2027
► pp. 79–121

Chapter 3
A handful of grammaticalization

The development of quantifying -ful

 | University of Cordoba
This content is being prepared for publication; it may be subject to changes.
Abstract
A particular subset of lexical quantifiers in English involves derived nouns ending in -ful, such as handful and spoonful. The suffix -ful transforms these base words into quantifiers that specify an amount related to the base noun, such as a handful of seeds or a spoonful of sugar. The aim of this study is twofold. First, the derivational process involved is regarded as triggered by a metonymic association whereby a quantity is accessed via different types of containers. The second aim is to examine the development in the current usage of these quantifiers by examining corpus data. Through this analysis, I hope to fill a gap in the existing research on English lexical quantifiers in -ful and their evolution
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Theoretical preliminaries
    • 2.1Quantifiers in -ful: A case of metonymy
    • 2.2Lexical quantifiers and grammaticalization
  • 3.Methodology
    • 3.1Data collection
    • 3.2Analytical procedure
  • 4.Analyzing English quantifiers in -ful
    • 4.1Introduction: Preliminary results
    • 4.2Semantic analysis and discussion
      • 4.2.1Container-based quantifiers
      • 4.2.2Body part-based quantifiers
        • 4.2.2.1Quantifying a small amount of entities
        • 4.2.2.2Quantifying a large amount of an entity: Negative load quantifiers
        • 4.2.2.3Quantifying mental, perceptual and speech events
        • 4.2.2.4Further body-part based quantifiers
      • 4.2.3Tool-based quantifiers
      • 4.2.4Vehicle-based quantifiers
      • 4.2.5Building-based quantifiers
      • 4.2.6Clothing-based quantifiers
      • 4.2.7Furniture-based quantifiers
      • 4.2.8Quantifiers with information container-based quantifiers
      • 4.2.9Nature-based quantifiers
    • 4.3Summary of findings
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Author queries
  • Notes
  • References
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