Article In: Studies in Language: Online-First Articles
Anticausativization and lability in Late Latin
The effect of usage frequency on their distribution
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Abstract
This paper investigates the effect of usage frequency on the
alternation between anticausativization and lability in Late Latin. For many
verbs entering the causal–noncausal alternation (‘John opens the door’ vs. ‘The
door opens’), the intransitive alternant is either unmarked in lability or
marked by the mediopassive voice or a reflexive pronoun. Previous research
suggested that factors such as control, telicity, and Aktionsart influence the
selection among these strategies. Drawing on a representative sample of Latin
texts dating from 200 to 600 CE, this study offers corpus-based evidence on how
these parameters align with the form–frequency correspondence principle. The
data show that verbs with higher semantic transitivity tend to occur more
frequently in their transitive alternant, and that control is a subject property
more associated with transitive uses. I therefore argue that usage frequency
plays a pivotal role in shaping transitivity in the diachrony of
anticausativization and lability.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Theoretical remarks
- 2.1Anticausativization: Diathesis and semantic constraints
- 2.2Anticausativization in Latin
- 2.2.1Mediopassive
- 2.2.2Reflexivity
- 2.2.3Lability
- 2.3Variation in anticausativization: Two hypotheses
- 2.3.1Transitivity as a continuum
- 2.3.2Form-frequency correspondence
- 3.Methodological remarks
- 3.1Corpus and data collection
- 3.2Annotation
- Strategy
- Event
- Aktionsart
- Telic, Dynamic, Durative
- Animacy
- Control
- Causalness
- 3.3Hypotheses
- 3.4Statistical approach
- 4.Semantic variation in anticausativization
- 4.1Statistical analysis
- 4.1.1Bivariate analysis
- 4.1.2Multivariate analysis
- 4.2Aktionsart and causalness
- 4.2.1Actionality
- 4.2.2Causalness in the diachrony of Latin
- 4.2.3Frequency and actionality
- 4.3Relational properties and anticausativization: Control
- 4.3.1Control and the encoding of anticausativization
- 4.3.2Frequency and control
- 4.4Frequency, semantic transitivity and encoding
- 4.1Statistical analysis
- 5.Conclusions
- Acknowledgments
- Data availability
- Notes
- Abbreviations
- Author queries
References
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