<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>The purpose of this paper is twofold; first, it aims to explore the variety of interpretations of the partially schematic Hebrew construction <italic>kexol</italic> as in <italic>kexol she’ratsiti</italic> (‘as much as I wanted’) within the framework of construction grammar; second, it aims to account for this variety through a demonstration of the interrelation between the grammaticalization of the construction and the process of (inter)subjectification or speech-act orientation. The analysis will show that this interrelation has resulted in considerable internal variation in meaning and function in the present day. Corpus findings reveal that initially <italic>kexol</italic> functioned as a compound consisting of a preposition and a universal quantifier to denote a relation of similarity and comparison. As a result of speaker orientation, the construction has come to exhibit a higher degree of grammaticality in its function as a scalar modifier. Additional schematic and procedural meanings which developed later seem to be the result of hearer-orientation and discourse-orientation tendencies all subsumed under the cover term speech-act orientation</p></abstract>

The purpose of this paper is twofold; first, it aims to explore the variety of interpretations of the partially schematic Hebrew construction kexol as in kexol she’ratsiti (‘as much as I wanted’) within the framework of construction grammar; second, it aims to account for this variety through a demonstration of the interrelation between the grammaticalization of the construction and the process of (inter)subjectification or speech-act orientation. The analysis will show that this interrelation has resulted in considerable internal variation in meaning and function in the present day. Corpus findings reveal that initially kexol functioned as a compound consisting of a preposition and a universal quantifier to denote a relation of similarity and comparison. As a result of speaker orientation, the construction has come to exhibit a higher degree of grammaticality in its function as a scalar modifier. Additional schematic and procedural meanings which developed later seem to be the result of hearer-orientation and discourse-orientation tendencies all subsumed under the cover term speech-act orientation

The meaning and development of the Hebrew scalar modifier <italic>kexol</italic>

Topics in Linguistics

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 License.

The meaning and development of the Hebrew scalar modifier 

The purpose of this paper is twofold; first, it aims to explore the variety of interpretations of the partially schematic Hebrew construction kexol as in kexol...

The meaning and development of the Hebrew scalar modifier kexol

Published Online: Dec 24, 2018

Page range: 38 - 56

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/topling-2018-0009

Keywords
Construction grammar, (inter)subjectivity, compositionality, scalar modifier, speech-act orientation, grammaticalization

© 2018 Hagit Shefer, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 License.

The meaning and development of the Hebrew scalar modifier kexol

Published Online: Dec 24, 2018

Page range: 38 - 56

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/topling-2018-0009

KeywordsConstruction grammar, (inter)subjectivity, compositionality, scalar modifier, speech-act orientation, grammaticalization

© 2018 Hagit Shefer, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 License.

Keywords
Construction grammar, (inter)subjectivity, compositionality, scalar modifier, speech-act orientation, grammaticalization