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1 results

  • 8 - Modal Particles: The Enigmatic Category

  • from III - Adverbial Modality
  • Werner Abraham, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, The Netherlands
  • Book:
    Modality in Syntax, Semantics and Pragmatics
    Published online:
    06 February 2021
    Print publication:
    17 September 2020, pp 213-237

  • Summary

    German (and Dutch) modal particles are distinct discourse particles separate from other discourse elements on account of their specific grammatical status: they look like lexical items, but behave like grammatical morphemes and thus are true end results of grammaticalizing processes. As such their modern function still reflects semantic and syntactic properties of their etymological origins. Modal particles have the syntactic status of the about-topic category. Compared to their lexical pregrammaticalized origin, their modern semantics is highly underspecified.