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Age grading in the Montréal French inflected future

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 December 2011

Suzanne Evans Wagner  and
Gillian Sankoff
Suzanne Evans Wagner
Affiliation:
Michigan State University
Gillian Sankoff
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania
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Abstract

The rise of the periphrastic future (PF) at the expense of the inflected future (IF) is an established historical trend in Québécois French over at least the past 150 years. Previous research has also found higher rates of PF among younger speakers, many displaying categorical use in affirmative contexts. Because an apparent time interpretation of the synchronic data fits the historical record, we expected concomitant speaker stability across the lifespan. On the contrary, our panel study of 60 Montréal speakers (1971–1984) reveals age grading in a retrograde direction. As they aged, two-thirds of the speakers we studied increased their frequency of IF, an effect heightened for members of higher socioprofessional groups. Though not sufficiently robust to stem the historical tide, increased IF use by older speakers may retard the change somewhat, providing continuing IF input to child L1 acquisition. Rather than vitiating an apparent time interpretation, these results indicate that the rate of change may be slightly overestimated if age grading acts in a retrograde direction.

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Type
Research Article
Information
Language Variation and Change , Volume 23 , Issue 3 , October 2011 , pp. 275 - 313
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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