Paradigms as triggers of semantic change: Demonstrative adverbs in Catalan and Spanish

Abstract

This paper sets out to analyse the development of demonstrative adverbs of place in Catalan and Spanish. The main questions dealt with in this study are the following: (i) why two-term and three-term deictic systems often display a certain lack of stability so that diachronically two-term systems sometimes become three-term (as in old Catalan and Spanish) or, the other way round, three-term systems become two-term (like in late Latin and in Catalan during the modern era); (ii) if the most normal and expected development is for deictic systems to take on anaphoric values, why in the case of the adverb aquí ('near the speaker and/or addressee') in Catalan and the adverb ahí ('near the addressee') in Spanish the opposite process happens; (iii) what role is played in these changes by the functional and formal relations set up within the paradigms of nominal and adverbial demonstratives in each language.Keywords: spatial deictic systems; adverbial demonstratives; anaphora; grammaticalisation, paradigm relationships. Resum. El paradigma com a motor del canvi semàntic: els adverbis demostratius en català i castellàL'objectiu d' aquest article és analitzar l'evolució dels adverbis demostratius de lloc del català i l'espanyol. Les principals preguntes que es plantegen en aquest treball són les següents: (i) per què els sistemes díctics binaris i ternaris mostren sovint una certa inestabilitat i diacrònicament els sistemes binaris es converteixen a vegades en ternaris (com s'esdevingué en el català i l'espanyol antics) o, a l'inrevés, els ternaris passen a ser binaris (com en el llatí tardà i en el català durant l'edat moderna); (ii) si allò més habitual i esperable és que els díctics assumeixin valors anafòrics, per què en el cas de l'adverbi aquí del català i l'adverbi ahí de l'espanyol es produí el procés invers; (iii) quin paper juguen en aquests canvis les relacions funcionals i formals que s'estableixen dins els paradigmes de demostratius nominals i adverbials de cada llengua.

The semantics of spatial demonstratives in Spanish: a Demonstrative Choice Task study

“…In contexts where conveying precise information on the referent's physical location is not necessary, the distinction between medial and distal forms could: a) disappear, leading to a collapse onto a binary near/far opposition. If this were the case, we would expect to see either a random distribution of the two non-proximal demonstratives, or a diminished use of one of the two non-proximal demonstratives, most probably the distal form aquel/la (that) in favour of the medial form ese/a (thisthat), in line with a trend of reduction already identified in Argentinian Spanish (Pérez-Saldanya, 2015) and the Majorcan Catalan (Todisco, et al, 2021).The Argentinian Spanish three-term system (este, this/ese, this-that/aquel, that) is in fact characterized by the coexistence of the two forms ese/a and aquel/la for the same dimension (the medial/distal space), where the distal demonstrative aquel/la is considered more formal than the medial demonstrative ese/a (Pérez-Saldanya, 2015, p. 116) but semantically equivalent. Majorcan Catalan demonstratives system (aquest/aqueix/aquell) presents a reduction to two-terms (aquest/aquell) when information about physical distance is conveyed (Todisco et al, 2021).…”

“…Our observations that ese/a (this-that) and aquel/la (that) may be used to code for semantic distinctions are in line with observations from Argentinian Spanish, where patterns of usage of medial versus distal terms are also consistently driven by nonspatial dimensions (here, aquel/la is used only in formal contexts). Another parallel is Majorcan Catalan -where the medial term aqueix/a has dropped out of the system when conveying physical distance, but can be used to mark social distance (Pérez-Saldanya, 2015;Todisco et al, 2021). A general description of the relationship between expressiveness and complexity (i.e., number of forms) of demonstrative systems goes beyond the scope of the present studies, but it is an extremely interesting research avenue.…”

Children’s use of demonstrative words: spatial deictics beyond infancy

“…These inconsistencies may in turn lead to a shifting of the mapping between demonstrative terms and referents and make demonstratives semantically elastic but potentially opaque for children learning Spanish as a first language. Furthermore, following Pérez-Saldanya (2015), the adverb aquí (here) can denote the speaker's space in contrast with that of the addressee ('Aquí donde estoy sentado' Here, where I am sitting), but also a wider place including them both ('Aquí, donde estamos, hace mucho calor' Here, where we are, it's very hot'; Pérez-Saldanya, 2015: 129). The function of the flexibility of the "boundary" between what is proximal and what is distal in general and the constant remapping between deictic expressions and referents might lead to a restructuring of the deictic system itself in accordance with the parameter affecting its use, which has been, to our knowledge, understudied in terms of the acquisition of Spanish.…”

Presència i absència del clític locatiu «hi»

“…El sistema de dixi de lloc ternari, que distingeix tres graus de proximitat, està representat pels «adverbis demostratius» de (10): ací (proximitat immediata, espai vinculat a l'emissor), ahí 1 (proximitat mediata, espai vinculat al receptor) i allà [o allí] (llunyania, espai no vinculat als participants). Vegeu Pérez Saldanya (2015), Pérez Saldanya & Rigau (2011). Actualment el sistema ternari és sobretot el del valencià i parlars de la Franja, però el català antic també presentava tres graus.…”