Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dzt6s Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T15:13:19.376Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Help vs help to: a multifactorial, mixed-effects account of infinitive marker omission1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 October 2011

ARNE LOHMANN
ARNE LOHMANN*
Affiliation:
University of Vienna, Department of English, Spitalgasse 2–4, A-1090 Vienna, [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article presents an analysis of the alternation between the bare and the full infinitive with the verb help in English. In particular, the influence of three general principles proposed to underlie this case of variation is investigated and discussed, viz. the complexity principle, the distance principle and avoidance of identity effects. A multifactorial analysis of corpus data from the BNC, which allows for the determination of the different strengths of determinants, reveals that the present alternation is governed to a large degree by horror aequi, the avoidance of identity on the lexical level.

Type
Research Article
Information
English Language & Linguistics , Volume 15 , Issue 3 , November 2011 , pp. 499 - 521
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Baayen, R. Harald. 2008. Analyzing linguistic data: A practical introduction to statistics using R. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berg, Thomas. 2004. Similarity and contrast in segmental phonology. Linguistics 42 (6), 1049–1103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berlage, Eva. Forthcoming. Complex noun phrases in English (Studies in English Language). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Bock, Kathryn. 1982. Towards a cognitive psychology of syntax: Information processing contribution to sentence formulation. Psychological Review 89, 1–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bresnan, Joan, Cueni, Anna, Nikitina, Tatiana & Baayen, R. Harald. 2007. Predicting the dative alternation. In Bouma, Gerlof, Kraemer, Irene & Zwarts, Joost (eds.), Cognitive foundations of interpretation, 69–94. Amsterdam: Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.Google Scholar
Crawley, Michael J. 2005. Statistics: An introduction using R. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dixon, Robert M. W. 1991. A new approach to English grammar on semantic principles. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gelman, Andrew & Hill, Rebecca. 2007. Data analysis using regression and multilevel/hierarchical models. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gries, Stefan Thomas. 2003. Multifactorial analysis in corpus linguistics: A study of particle placement. New York: Continuum.Google Scholar
Gries, Stefan Thomas. 2009. Quantitative corpus linguistics with R: A practical introduction. London and New York: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gries, Stefan Thomas & Hilpert, Martin. 2010. Modeling diachronic change in the third person singular: A multifactorial, verb- and author-specific exploratory approach. English Language and Linguistics 14 (3), 293–320.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haiman, John. 1983. Iconic and economic motivation. Language 59 (4), 781–819.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hawkins, John. 2003. Why are zero-marked phrases close to their heads? In Rohdenburg, & Mondorf, (eds.), 175–204.Google Scholar
Hilpert, Martin. 2008. The English comparative – language structure and language use. English Language and Linguistics 12 (3), 395–417.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hinrichs, Lars & Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt. 2007. Recent changes in the function and frequency of Standard English genitive constructions: A multivariate analysis of tagged corpora. English Language and Linguistics 11 (3), 437–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kjellmer, Göran. 1985. Help to/help 0 revisited. English Studies 66, 156–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kjellmer, Göran. 2000. Auxiliary marginalities: The case of try. In Kirk, John M. (ed.), Corpora galore: Analyses and techniques in describing English. Papers from the 19th International Conference on English Language Research on Computerised Corpora, 115–24. Amsterdam: Rodopi.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lee, David. 2001. The BNC index, http://ucrel.lancs.ac.uk/bncindex/form.html (10 Nov. 2010).Google Scholar
Lind, Age. 1983. The variant forms of help to / help 0. English Studies 64, 263–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lohmann, Arne. 2010. Book review of Britta Mondorf (2009), More support for more-support: The role of processing constraints on the choice between synthetic and analytic forms. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 6 (2), 301–11.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacKay, Donald G. 1987. The organization of perception and action: A theory for language and other cognitive skills. New York: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mair, Christian. 1995. Changing patterns of complementation and concomitant grammaticalisation of the verb help in Present-Day British English. In Aarts, Bas (ed.), The verb in contemporary English: Theory and description. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mair, Christian. 2002. Three changing patterns of verb complementation in Late Modern English. English Language and Linguistics 6, 105–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McEnery, Anthony & Xiao, Zhonghua. 2005. HELP or HELP to: What do corpora have to say? English Studies 86 (2), 161–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mondorf, Britta. 2003. Support for more-support. In Rohdenburg, & Mondorf, (eds.), 251–304.Google Scholar
Mondorf, Britta. 2009. More support for more-support: The role of processing constraints on the choice between synthetic and analytic forms. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quirk, Randolph, Greenbaum, Sidney, Leech, Geoffrey & Svartvik, Jan. 1972. A grammar of contemporary English. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Quirk, Randolph, Greenbaum, Sidney, Leech, Geoffrey & Svartvik, Jan. 1985. A comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Rohdenburg, Günter. 1995. On the replacement of finite complement clauses by infinitives in English. English Studies 76, 367–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rohdenburg, Günter. 1996. Cognitive complexity and increased grammatical explicitness in English. Cognitive Linguistics 7, 149–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rohdenburg, Günter 2009. Grammatical divergence between British and American English in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In Tieken-Boon van Ostade, Ingrid & van der Wurff, Wim (eds.), Current issues in Late Modern English (Linguistic Insights 77), 301–30. Bern etc.: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Rohdenburg, Günter & Schlüter, Julia. 2000. Determinanten grammatischer Variation im Früh- und Spätneuenglischen. Sprachwissenschaft 25 (4), 443–96.Google Scholar
Rohdenburg, Günter & Mondorf, Britta (eds.). 2003. Determinants of grammatical variation in English. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schlüter, Julia. 2003. Phonological determinants of grammatical variation in English: Chomsky's worst possible case. In Rohdenburg, Günter & Mondorf, Britta (eds.), 305–28. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Schlüter, Julia. 2005. Rhythmic grammar: The influence of rhythm on grammatical variation and change in English. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schlüter, Julia. 2009. All beginnings are light: A study of upbeat phenomena at the syntax–phonology interface. Journal of English Linguistics 37 (1), 61–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stefanowitsch, Anatol & Gries, Stefan Thomas. 2004. Extending collostructional analysis: A corpus-based based perspective on ‘alternations’. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 9 (1), 97–129.Google Scholar
Stemberger, Joseph Paul. 1985. An interactive activation model of language production. In Ellis, Andrew W. (ed.), Progress in the psychology of language, 143–86. London and Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt. 2004. On operationalizing syntactic complexity. In Purnelle, Gérard, Fairon, Cédrick & Dister, Anne (eds.), Le poids des mots. Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Textual Data Statistical Analysis. Louvain-la-Neuve, 10-12 March, 2004, vol. 2, 1032–9. Louvain-la-Neuve: Presses universitaires de Louvain.Google Scholar
Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt. 2006. Morphosyntactic persistence in spoken English. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt. Forthcoming. The great regression: Genitive variability in Late Modern English news texts. In Börjars, Kersti, Denison, David & Scott, Alan (eds.), Morphosyntactic categories and the expression of possession. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Vosberg, Uwe. 2003. The role of extractions and horror aequi in the evolution of -ing complements in Modern English. In Rohdenburg, & Mondorf, (eds.), 305–28.Google Scholar
Vosberg, Uwe. 2006. Die große Komplementverschiebung: Außersemantische Einflüsse auf die Variation satzwertiger Ergänzungen im Neuenglischen (Language in Performance 34). Tübingen: Gunter Narr.Google Scholar
Wasow, Thomas. 2002. Postverbal behavior. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Wood, Frederick. 1962. Current English usage. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Zaenen, Annie, Carlette, Jean, Garretson, Gregory, Bresnan, Joan, Koontz-Garboden, Andrew, Nikitina, Tatiana, O'Connor, M. Catherine & Wasow, Tom. 2004. Animacy encoding in English: Why and how. In Byron, D. and Webber, B. (eds.), Proceedings of the 2004 ACL Workshop on Discourse Annotation, 118–25.Google Scholar