Matthias Hüning

• Prof. Dr.
• Professor at Freie Universität Berlin

The rise of new derivational affixes can be analyzed adequately as a case of “constructionalization” within the framework of Construction Morphology as developed by Booij (2010). We review some aspects and problems of previous accounts that view the emergence of derivational affixes as a case of grammaticalization or as a case of lexicalization, re...

Multi-word expressions (MWEs) are complex lexical units, for example verbal idioms ('bite the bullet') or frozen adverbials ('all at once'). Others, such as particle verbs ('stick out') or complex nominals ('day-care center'), indicate a close relationship between MWEs and word-formation units. Focusing on this relation, the present article discuss...

This paper discusses some problems and questions related to the study of foreign word-formation. German verbs in -ier(en) are used as a case study and as a testing ground for an output-oriented and exemplar-based approach to morphology. I will try to show that Construction Morphology is conceptually and with respect to its central notions very appr...

Most postcolonial societies make use of the language(s) of the former colonial power(s) and, additionally, of one or several local or Creole languages. This article analyses the complex linguistic relationships within postcolonial societies. As a hypothesis, we assume that the language ideologies in former colonies take a shape similar to those in...

The paper presents a corpus-based comparative study of denominal adjectives in Dutch, German, and English. It aims at clarifying the notion of approximation. More specifically, it focuses on investigating the relation between approximation and comparison as semantic categories in word-formation. Drawing on equivalent patterns, we study both the rel...

Open Access: https://www.aup-online.com/content/journals/10.5117/IN2022.1.001.HUNI

This article deals with the powerful role of metaphors in the process of Language Making throughout the history of linguistics. It departs from the assumption that metaphors play an essential role both in the formation of scientific theories and in common conceptions of language. We want to illuminate to what extent metaphors are involved in langua...

Morphology, the science of words, is a complex theoretical landscape, where a multitude of frameworks, each with their own tenets and formalism, compete for the explanation of linguistic facts. The Oxford Handbook of Morphological Theory is a comprehensive guide through this jungle of morphological theories. It provides a rich and up-to-date overvi...

Variation and change are essential for any human language, but at the same time they form a challenge for theoretical models of grammar. This chapter discusses some notions and phenomena encountered in word-formation change that should be relevant to any morphological theory. It focuses on the notion of reanalysis and on phenomena related to this n...

Dutch is an official language not only in the Netherlands and Belgium, but also in Suriname, a country in South-America. Before its independence, Suriname was a colony of the Netherlands, starting as early as 1667. After its independence in 1975, the multilingual Republic of Suriname maintained Dutch as its official language, the language of educat...

In this study, we address the ways in which nouns can give rise to new adjectives in Dutch and German. More specifically, the focus is on words with an evaluative meaning that can be used in a wide range of morphological and syntactic constructions in recent (and informal) language. For example, the German noun Hammer ‘hammer’ can be used in Hammer...

Veel Europese talen beschikken over constructies van het type [P (Det) N P] (zoals 'aan de hand van' of 'met betrekking tot'), die qua functie zeer vergelijkbaar zijn met 'gewone' preposities. Ze vertonen diverse typische kenmerken van grammaticalisatieprocessen, zoals 'semantic bleaching', een betekenisverandering waardoor ze geschikt worden voor...

Mijmering, alweer. Vorig jaar begon mijn kroniek (IN 50/1) met een mijmering, waarin ik aandacht heb besteed aan de gevolgen van het toenemende gebruik van het Engels als lingua franca voor het Nederlands, voor het taalkundig onderzoek naar het Nederlands en voor ons onderwijs. In een recent verschenen artikel heeft Marc van Oostendorp (2012a) de g...

Nach landläufiger Auffassung wird unter einer Sprache in der Regel eine (nationale) Standardsprache verstanden. Dieses Sprachkonzept hat weitreichende Folgen für unser Verständnis von Sprache, sprachlicher Vielfalt und sprachlicher Variation. Dieser Zusammenhang soll in diesem Beitrag anhand mehrerer Beispiele illustriert werden. Insbesondere werde...

The case of the Dutch diminutive nicely illustrates the development from a diachronic and etymological perspective to a more synchronic and descriptive approach in morphology and linguistics in general during the first half of the 20th century. The discussion of the origin of the Dutch diminutive suffix -tje led to an extensive controversy at the b...

This book addresses the meanings and implications of multilingualism and its uses in a context of rapid changes, in Europe and around the world. All types of organisations, including the political institutions of the European Union, universities and private-sector companies must rise to the many challenges posed by operating in a multilingual envir...

This volume explores the roots of Europe's struggle with multilingualism. It argues that, over the centuries, the pursuit of linguistic homogeneity has become a central aspect of the mindset of Europeans. In its extreme form, it became manifest in the principle of 'one language, one state, one people'. Consequently, multilingualism came to be viewe...

Im vorliegenden Beitrag werden einige zentrale Aspekte der kontrastiven Wortbildungsforschung anhand von Beispielen aus dem niederländisch-deutschen Sprachvergleich besprochen. Als nah verwandte Sprachen zeigen das Niederländische und das Deutsche zwar vergleichbare Strukturen der Komposition und der Derivation, bei näherem Hinsehen sind es aber vo...

Toen ik deze kroniek heb overgenomen van Joop van der Horst heb ik mijn opdracht geïnterpreteerd als ‘Kroniek van de Nederlandse taalkunde’. Het was mijn bedoeling mijzelf en u te wijzen op nieuwe boeken, tijdschriften, websites, cd’s over de Nederlandse taal en de Nederlandse taalkunde. Daarbij heb ik me vooral gericht op die publicaties waarvan n...

In this article the linguistic situation in Belgium and its historical development is discussed. The country has often been called a role model for the linguistic future of Europe because of its alleged success in granting equal rights to its French and Dutch language communities while preserving political unity. This paper, however, argues that Be...

Even leek het erop dat de Europese meertaligheid een net zo serieus onderwerp zou kunnen zijn als het verkeer, het klimaat of misschien zelfs als de visserij. Vanaf 2007 had de EU immers een heuse ‘commissaris voor meertaligheid’, de Roemeen Leonard Orban. Voor die tijd maakte dit onderwerp altijd deel uit van de portefeuille van de commissaris voo...

De wetenschappelijke beoefening van de neerlandistiek heeft ook buiten het Nederlandse taalgebied een lange geschiedenis. In sommige landen waren er al in de eerste helft van de negentiende eeuw taal- en letterkundigen die zich met de Nederlandse taal en de Nederlandstalige literatuur bezighielden. De geschiedenis van de internationale neerlandisti...

This paper deals with compounding in Dutch and German. After giving an overview of the forms and subclasses of compounds in present-day Dutch and German, we discuss A+N-compounds and N+past participle-compounds in two case studies in order to explore divergence and convergence in the word formation of both languages. We argue that although Contrast...

The notion of ‘productivity’ is one of the key concepts in morphological research. Its use, however, is largely theory-dependent and there is no generally accepted definition. In the generative tradition, the notion has been tightly connected to the concept of morphological rules. In this paper I will point out some of the problems of this approach...

Word formation, like other lexical phenomena, seems to be a difficult terrain for contrastive linguistics since it hardly allows for significant and insightful generalizations about the differences between two languages, as has been stated in the literature more than once. This paper investigates one factor leading to morphological differences and...

In this paper we examine the semantic and pragmatic properties of German A+N compounds and the corresponding phrases (e.g. 'Altpapier' vs. 'altes Papier'). We argue that, although there is a clear and unambiguous formal difference between compounds and phrases in German, no such distinction can be made concerning their semantics and pragmatics. For...

Reciprocity is expressed in many different ways in the languages of the world. Dutch, like other Germanic languages, mainly uses an anaphoric reciprocal word: the reciprocal pronoun elkaar (< elkander < elc...ander). This article describes the emergence of elkaar and its (spoken) variant mekaar in Middle Dutch from a variety of linguistic means for...

Soon after the break-in at the Democratic Party's headquarters in the Watergate building in 1972, journalists began to coin neologisms with gate. Recent examples are Monicagate or Zippergate. Many of the English coinages were readily borrowed by other languages. In Dutch this led to the possibility of own coinages like kippengate or Bolkgate. In th...