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Reflexivity and Intensification in English
A Study of Texts and Contexts
Series:
Claudia Lange
Present-Day English is unique among the Germanic languages in employing the same forms (
himself,
herself etc.) both as reflexive pronoun and intensifier. While a lot of attention has been directed at the grammaticalization of the compound reflexive, the emergence of the compound intensifier has remained largely mysterious. This study is a detailed investigation of the domains of reflexivity and intensification throughout the history of English. It provides a comprehensive analysis of the possible source contexts for SELF-forms in Old and Middle English. Backed up with a wide range of data from early Middle English, the compound intensifier is traced to discourse-pragmatic motivations: expressive strategies linked to specific discourse traditions become rapidly grammaticalized once the former Old English standard gave way to large-scale variation in Middle English.
Contents: Explanation in historical linguistics – X-SELF: a synchronic analysis – From SELF to x-SELF: previous approaches
– Reflexivity and intensification in Old English - Reflexivity and intensification in Middle English and beyond – The grammaticalization
of SELF.