Constructions in Contact 2. Language change, multilingual practices, and additional language acquisition
Abstract
The last few years have seen a steadily increasing interest in constructional approaches to language contact. This volume builds on previous constructionist work, in particular Diasystematic Construction Grammar (DCxG) and the volume Constructions in Contact (2018) and extends its methodology and insights in three major ways. First, it presents new constructional research on a wide range of language contact scenarios including Afrikaans, American Sign Language, English, French, Malayalam, Norwegian, Spanish, Welsh, as well as contact scenarios that involve typologically different languages. Second, it also addresses other types of scenarios that do not fall into the classic language contact category, such as multilingual practices and language acquisition as emerging multilingualism. Third, it aims to integrate constructionist views on language contact and multilingualism with other approaches that focus on structural, social, and cognitive aspects. The volume demonstrates that Construction Grammar is a framework particularly well suited for analyzing a wide variety of language contact phenomena from a usage-based perspective.
Steffen Höder is a Full Professor of Scandinavian Linguistics at the Institute of Scandinavian Studies, Frisian Studies and General Linguistics at Kiel University . He has a PhD from University of Hamburg (Scandinavian Studies) and his main research interest regards Language contact, Areal linguistics, Language change and variation, Construction Grammar. Professor Höder is the author of several articles in international peer-reviewed journals and some of his current researches are about the Diasystematic Construction Grammar model. The present interview offers explanations that reveal mature reflections on the cognitive representation of grammar in a diasystematic perspective, contributing to interpretations of acquisition and descriptive phenomena of languages. Steffen Höder é professor titular de Linguística Escandinava no Instituto de Estudos Escandinavos, Estudos Frísios e Linguística Geral da Universidade de Kiel. Ele possui PhD pela Universidade de Hamburgo (Estudos Escandinavos) e seus principais interesses de pesquisa dizem respeito ao contato linguístico, à linguística regional, à mudança e variação linguísticas, à Gramática de Construções. Professor Höder é autor de vários artigos em periódicos internacionais revisados por pares e algumas de suas pesquisas atuais são sobre o modelo da Gramática de Construções Diassistêmica. A presente entrevista traz explicações que revelam maduras reflexões sobre a representação cognitiva da gramática em perspectiva diassistêmica, a contribuírem para interpretações de fenômenos aquisicionais e descritivos das línguas.
Over the past decades, research on the linguistic impact of globalization has foregrounded the socio-pragmatic meaning potential and mental categorization of anglicisms, looking for signs of agentivity and contextual sensitivity in the way receptor language users incorporate borrowed English resources into their speech, both in form and in function. This brought attention to understudied phenotypes of contact-induced variation and change that go beyond the borrowing of individual lexical items (loanwords) from English. This paper aims to contribute to this endeavor, illustrating the potential of construction grammar to uncover the integration of borrowed chunks. In focus is the emergence of the verb pimpen “to pimp” in Dutch, a rapid innovation from the English proper name Pimp My Ride . A sample of 4,561 Dutch tweets containing (strings of) pimp posted between January 2007 and April 2020 was coded manually for formal and semantic properties. This allowed us to calculate an aggregate score of “deconstructionalization” both within and outside of the target construction [ pimp POSS N]. Results indeed reveal a gradual blurring of the sharp contours of the construction, but also indicate that this process mainly affects the instantiations closest to the original. Linked up with the mediatized origin of the construction, our results add to our understanding of the relationship between media, language contact, and what is referred to as glocalization.
The global spread of English, manifest in multiple Englishes around the world, and its role as a global language continue to be dynamically evolving areas of investigation. A range of studies have emerged along related strands of research concerned with the global spread and creation of Englishes (World Englishes); the use of English as an additional language, international language, and lingua franca; and the functions of English as the language of globalization mediating global cultural flows. An explicit and implicit corollary of the global spread of English is the contact that Englishes have with other languages and the influences that emerge from this contact.
This Research Topic aims at foregrounding the effects that surface from the interplay of Englishes with other languages. The interaction scenarios may differ widely, ranging from remote language contact (e.g. English influence being mediated) to the presence of English in everyday multilingual practices - both individually (as emerging from multilingual minds) and socially (e.g. English impacting on the communal use of other languages). By showcasing current research that investigates different contexts in which Englishes interact with other languages, this Research Topic aims at furthering our understanding of the processes of language contact and multilingualism in various domains of language use, including their social implications for speakers of Englishes and other languages.
Steffen Höder is a Full Professor of Scandinavian Linguistics at the Institute of Scandinavian Studies, Frisian Studies and General Linguistics at Kiel University. He has a PhD from University of Hamburg (Scandinavian Studies) and his main research interest regards Language contact, Areal linguistics, Language change and variation, Construction grammar. Professor Höder is the author of several articles in international peer-reviewed journals and some of his current researches are about the Diasystematic Construction Grammar model. The present interview offers explanations that reveal mature reflections on the cognitive representation of grammar in a diasystematic perspective, contributing to interpretations of acquisition and descriptive phenomena of languages.
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