Skip to main content

Lund University Publications

LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

Swedish predicative oblique case : default or not?

Sigurdsson, Halldor Armann LU and van de Weijer, Joost LU orcid (2021) In Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 53(2). p.191-206
Abstract
This article describes and discusses an ongoing change of case marking, NOM(inative) > OBL(ique), in certain predicates in Swedish (type “Then you can be I” > “Then you can be me”). This change has gone largely unnoticed hitherto. The discussion is based on a large-scale online survey, conducted in May 2016. It was tested whether the change relates to finiteness or to semantics. The results strongly indicate that the latter is the case. The change is found in predicates that express role semantics but nondetectable in predicates with plain identity readings (type “It is I”). In addition, there are strong indications that the change is closely related to another change that is also taking place in Swedish, NOM > OBL in comparative... (More)
This article describes and discusses an ongoing change of case marking, NOM(inative) > OBL(ique), in certain predicates in Swedish (type “Then you can be I” > “Then you can be me”). This change has gone largely unnoticed hitherto. The discussion is based on a large-scale online survey, conducted in May 2016. It was tested whether the change relates to finiteness or to semantics. The results strongly indicate that the latter is the case. The change is found in predicates that express role semantics but nondetectable in predicates with plain identity readings (type “It is I”). In addition, there are strong indications that the change is closely related to another change that is also taking place in Swedish, NOM > OBL in comparative phrases (type “She is bigger than I” > “She is bigger than me”). The results speak against the hypothesis that OBL is becoming default in Swedish. Instead, it seems that many speakers are reanalyzing role predicates as well as comparative phrases such that they contain a head that is a case assigner, an overt one in comparatives but a silent one in role predicates. The article concludes that Swedish is largely retaining its basic NOM-OBL case system. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Acta Linguistica Hafniensia
volume
53
issue
2
pages
191 - 206
publisher
Routledge
external identifiers
  • scopus:85117240782
ISSN
1949-0763
DOI
10.1080/03740463.2021.1949677
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
7eab99f4-b381-4b54-a2b9-5622d50ce06c
date added to LUP
2021-03-06 19:58:14
date last changed
2022-04-27 00:38:05
@article{7eab99f4-b381-4b54-a2b9-5622d50ce06c,
  abstract     = {{This article describes and discusses an ongoing change of case marking, NOM(inative) > OBL(ique), in certain predicates in Swedish (type “Then you can be I” > “Then you can be me”). This change has gone largely unnoticed hitherto. The discussion is based on a large-scale online survey, conducted in May 2016. It was tested whether the change relates to finiteness or to semantics. The results strongly indicate that the latter is the case. The change is found in predicates that express role semantics but nondetectable in predicates with plain identity readings (type “It is I”). In addition, there are strong indications that the change is closely related to another change that is also taking place in Swedish, NOM > OBL in comparative phrases (type “She is bigger than I” > “She is bigger than me”). The results speak against the hypothesis that OBL is becoming default in Swedish. Instead, it seems that many speakers are reanalyzing role predicates as well as comparative phrases such that they contain a head that is a case assigner, an overt one in comparatives but a silent one in role predicates. The article concludes that Swedish is largely retaining its basic NOM-OBL case system.}},
  author       = {{Sigurdsson, Halldor Armann and van de Weijer, Joost}},
  issn         = {{1949-0763}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{2}},
  pages        = {{191--206}},
  publisher    = {{Routledge}},
  series       = {{Acta Linguistica Hafniensia}},
  title        = {{Swedish predicative oblique case : default or not?}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03740463.2021.1949677}},
  doi          = {{10.1080/03740463.2021.1949677}},
  volume       = {{53}},
  year         = {{2021}},
}