Research

Andrea Abel (Eurac Research Bozen/Bolzano) | Aivars Glaznieks (Eurac Research Bozen/Bolzano) | Stefania Spina (Università per Stranieri di Perugia)

The study consists of a comparative study in which we analyzed the use of the intensified adjective construction [[x]_int [y]_ADJ]_AP ‘very Y’ by young learners of Italian and German from the multilingual region of South Tyrol (Italy). Italian and German share a wide range of intensifying constructions, relying both on morphological (e.g., the superlative prefix construction strapieno, superschön) and syntactic resources (e.g., the prototypical adverb + adjective construction molto bello, sehr schön). However, Italian and German also rely on language specific means, such as the Italian superlative suffix ‑issimo (bellissimo) and the German compound intensifying construction (spiegelglatt).

We adopted a Diasystematic Construction Grammar (DCxG) approach (Höder et al. 2021), a usage-based approach to language contact situations, which allowed us to distinguish idio- from diaconstructions of Italian and German: all constructions used in a multilingual community, whether language specific (idioconstructions) or unspecified for language use (diaconstructions) are stored in the constructicon of the community members. In such a context, learning an additional language implies a continuous reorganization of the individual constructicon.

Based on this approach, we partially replicated previous research from a different multilingual area (Van Goethem & Hendrikx 2021) and investigated the ways in which morphological intensifying constructions relate to syntactic intensifying constructions. Using mixed-effect models, we analyzed the use of the intensified adjective construction in the Italian and German sub-corpora of Kolipsi-1 (Glaznieks et al. forthcoming), a learner corpus of L2 German and Italian. The corpus consists of written essays (around 470,000 tokens) produced by ca. 1,250 students from Italian and German South Tyrolean upper secondary schools.

We found the main difference between learners of Italian and German on the most abstract level of analysis, where we investigated the effect of different variables (e.g., L1, linguistic environment) on the choice of morphological ([[x]_AFFIX [y]_ADJ]_ADJ) or syntactic intensification types (e.g., [[x]_ADV [y]_ADJ]_AP). For L2 Italian learners, the linguistic environment is a significant predictor for their choice (Spina et al., forthc.). L2 German learners prefer intensifying adverb constructions regardless of their L1 or linguistic environment.

Further reading:

• Glaznieks, Aivars, Jennifer-Carmen Frey, Andrea Abel, Lionel Nicolas & Chiara Vettori. Forthc. The Kolipsi Corpus Family. A collection of Italian and German L2 learner texts from secondary school pupils. Italian Journal of Computational Linguistics.
• Höder, Steffen, Julia Prentice & Sofia Tingsell. 2021. Additional language acquisition as emerging multilingualism. A Construction Grammar approach. In Hans C. Boas & Steffen Höder (eds.), Constructions in contact 2. Language change, multilingual practices, and additional language acquisition (Constructional Approaches to Language 30), 310–337. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.30.10hod].
• Spina, Stefania, Aivars Glaznieks & Andrea Abel. Forthc. Intensification in written L2 Italian: Insights from the multilingual region of South Tyrol.
• Spina, Stefania, Aivars Glaznieks & Andrea Abel. Under review. L’intensificazione dell’aggettivo in italiano L2: uno studio sugli studenti delle scuole dell’Alto Adige.
• Spina, Stefania. 2023.“Questo è veramente figo!”. Come gli adolescenti L2 aumentano il volume dei loro enunciati. L’intensificazione nell’italiano L2 scritto nelle scuole dell’Alto Adige/Südtirol. Bozen/Bolzano: Eurac Research [DOI: 10.57749/9v6y-cs14].
• Van Goethem, Kristel & Isa Hendrikx. 2021. Intensifying constructions in second language acquisition. A diasystematic-constructionist approach. In Hans C. Boas & Steffen Höder (eds.), Constructions in contact 2. Language change, multilingual practices, and additional language acquisition (Constructional Approaches to Language 30), 375–428. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.30.12van].

Keywords: adjective intensification, L2 Italian, L2 German, multilingual speakers, additional language learning

Marie Barking (Tilburg University), Maria Mos (Tilburg University), Ad Backus (Tilburg University)

In our project, we investigate language transfer by native German speakers living in the Netherlands. Due to the typological closeness of the two languages and their frequent use of Dutch, many of these speakers experience extensive transfer from their second language Dutch to their native language German. For example, they might start to use loan translations like *Hintername (‘behind name’ instead of Nachname ‘after name’ based on Dutch achternaam) or *Fliegfeld (‘flyfield’ instead of Flughafen ‘flyport’ based on Dutch vliegveld). They might also apply Dutch grammar patterns to their German, resulting in innovative uses of grammatical elements or word order patterns in German.

The results of our case studies align well with the theory of Diasystematic Construction Grammar. In particular, when it comes to the transfer of schematic patterns (such as the transfer of the Dutch complementizer om ‘to’ which is used more frequently than its German counterpart um), we find experimental evidence that speakers indeed form schematic diaconstructions (e.g., use um in German when om is used in Dutch), apply these diaconstructions during language production, and thereby both over-use the German complementizer um in contexts in which it is already used in standard German as well as use it in new, unconventional ways  (e.g., versuchen um ‘to try to’ based on Dutch proberen om).  At the same time, our results also show extensive individual variation: speakers differ in the extent to which they use Dutch in their daily lives, they differ in their attitudes towards language transfer, and in the strategies that they employ during language production. As a result, their language use greatly differs, also in regard to whether and what kind of diaconstructions they abstract from their Dutch-German language input. In the most extreme cases, this can result in different speakers showing signs of either stability, convergence, or divergence for the same linguistic construction.

Our project explores this individual variation, and the results suggest that language transfer is shaped by an interplay between speakers’ cognitively-determined automaticity and their socially-driven agency. On the one hand, language transfer happens largely automatically, but on the other hand, speakers also have agency and they can alter what is automatically activated for them, for example by closely monitoring their speech for any cases of language transfer in the case of negative attitudes towards cross-linguistic interference. As such, our results underline the importance of attending to the both cognitive and social mechanisms that drive speakers’ language use.

Further reading:

• Barking, Marie. 2024. A usage-based account of language transfer – a case study of German speakers in the Netherlands. Tilburg: Tilburg University. PhD thesis [Link: www.lotpublications.nl/documents/663_fulltext.pdf].
• Barking, Marie, Maria Mos & Ad Backus. 2024. Individual variation in contact effects – stability, convergence, and divergence. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism (online first) [DOI: 10.1075/lab.22067.bar].
• Barking, Marie, Maria Mos & Ad Backus. 2023. Investigating language transfer from a usage-based perspective. International Journal of Bilingualism (online first) [DOI: 10.1177/13670069231175629].
• Barking, Marie, Ad Backus & Maria Mos. 2022. Individual corpus data predict variation in judgments: testing the usage-based nature of mental representations in a language transfer setting. Cognitive Linguistics 33, 481–519 [DOI: 10.1515/cog-2021-0105].

Keywords: multilingualism, Dutch-German language transfer, individual variation

Kate Bellamy (Universiteit Leiden, F.R.S.-FNRS & Université catholique de Louvain)

We are all multilingual. We might speak two or more clearly definable languages, or draw on different varieties or registers of the same language. In all cases, our language repertoire is both dynamic and context-dependent. Sometimes different languages are used in distinct situations, while in others they may occur in the same conversation, a practice known as code-switching.

In this project I will investigate code-switching patterns in three multilingual communities where P’urhepecha, Spanish and English are spoken, two in homeland Mexico and two in the US diaspora. Using the Diasystematic Construction Grammar framework, I will model and compare actual language use in these communities, testing its foundational principle that grammar is indeed community-specific.

The project is novel in three important respects: (i) it will produce an open-access, explicitly multilingual corpus; (ii) it focuses on multilingual rather than bilingual code-switching patterns; and (iii) it will describe and analyse naturalistic multilingual speech from the same language triad across multiple communities, using a suitable theoretical framework: Diasystematic Construction Grammar. This innovative combination will enable a re-evaluation of existing theoretical models of code-switching, as well as advancing our wider understanding of the limits — and possibilities — of combining multiple languages.

Keywords: code-switching, P’urhepecha, Diasystematic Construction Grammar, multilingualism

Collaborators: Kristel Van Goethem (F.R.S.-FNRS & Université catholique de Louvain), Barbara de Cock (Université catholique de Louvain)

Samuel Bourgeois (Manchester Metropolitan University)

Discourse markers (DMs) in bilingual speech have received much attention in language contact studies because their semantic and syntactic detachability make them easy targets for being used bilingually. Though past studies on multilingual DM usage have provided rich insights, open questions remain with regard to non-salient examples and the emergence of mixed code DMs. This paper looks at the DM system of Cajun bilinguals in Louisiana using a Diasystematic Construction Grammar approach. The analysis demonstrates that the DM systems of Cajun bilinguals are simultaneously active. Besides using DMs outside oftheir native languages, evidence of the congruence of the two systems is further supported by the documentation of mixed code DMs such as na, yeah mais and mais yeah.

Further reading:

• Bourgeois, Samuel. 2021. ‘Ok, qui d’autre na, nobody on the line right now?’ A Diasystematic Construction Grammar approach to discourse markers in bilingual Cajun speech. In Hans C. Boas & Steffen Höder (eds.), Constructions in contact 2. Language change, multilingual practices, and additional language acquisition (Constructional Approaches to Language 30), 55−80. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.30.03bou].

Keywords: discourse markers, language contact, bilingualism, Cajun French, English

Roberto de Freitas Junior (Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro)

Research developed in this project follows theoretical assumptions of Usage-Based Construction Grammar (Goldberg 2006, Perek 2015) and  Diasystematic Construction Grammar – DCxG – (Höder 2021). Themes regarding language contact mainly under the scope of L1 and L2 acquisition (oral, written and sign modalities), language teaching, descriptive studies of formal and functional aspects of Argument and Information Structure constructions stand out in the research proposal. We are currently doing research on the emergence of the Nominal Construction (or the Noun Phrase Construction – [(esp) np]) – in the multilingual constructicon of native English speakers learners of L2 Brazilian Portuguese (BP). Based on the analysis of convergent and divergent data instantiating the Nominal diaconstruction, the present study aims to trace the incompatibilities – L1-L2 differences – that interfere in the representation of multilingual knowledge. To this end, theoretical assumptions of DCxG regarding the structuring of multilingual grammar as the result of the emergence of idio and diaconstructions is followed. We assume the hypothesis that the cognitive representations of the Nominal construction of BPL2 learners suggest, at the same time, convergences and divergencies materialized by diasystematic links between L1 and L2 and/or by the persistence of language-specific aspects. Research methodology consists of qualitative analyses of written texts of EL1 speakers learning PBL2. Divergent (and convergent) uses of the [(esp) np], like ungrammaticalities and acceptability problems associated with hypercorrection and/or overgeneralization, are observed. Initial results reveal five large groupings of deviations in the L2 related to: (i) nominal agreement, (ii) motivated insertions, (iii) random insertions, (iv) deletions and (v) categorial changes.

Keywords: second language acquisition, Brazilian Portuguese, nominal constructions

Linda Gerisch (Høgskolen i Innlandet)

This project aims at making Diasystematic CxG usable for the language classroom. For this purpose, I am looking at two distinct constructions in learner language. The first part of the project investigates interrogative constructions in German learners of English diasystematic construct-i-cons. The data for this research is a learner corpus that consists of 100 texts by German students who were 11–14 at the time of data collection.

The second part focuses on relative clauses in learner language. The Germanic languages Norwegian, German, and English all have a relative clause construction. Moreover, Norwegian appears to have an additional construction that the other two do not, namely relative clauses that modify pronouns. Based on this observation and previous research on relative clause constructions in the TRAWL corpus, this study investigates the production of relative clauses in Norwegian L2 learners’ English. In addition, relative clause constructions in their L1 Norwegian production and their L3 German production will be used for the investigation.

These two case studies both focus on horizontal or lateral relations in the construct-i-con (cf. Diessel 2019, 2023) and their role in the L2 acquisition of two distinct constructions (i.e. interrogative constructions and relative clauses).

Further reading:

• Research group English Language in Use

Keywords: interrogative constructions, relative clauses, second language acquisition

Sabrina Goll (Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel)

In my PhD-project (Goll forthc.), I investigate the multilingual speech of individuals from the Danish minority in South Schleswig, the northernmost part of Schleswig-Holstein (Germany). These individuals, mostly raised in German-speaking households and attending Danish-speaking institutions, are predominantly multilingual. Among this community, the Danish contact variety South Schleswig Danish (SSD) has emerged.

Employing Diasystematic Construction Grammar (DCxG; Höder 2014, 2018), I analyze the usage of diaconstructions and idioconstructions within one multilingual constructicon. My questionnaire data (n=144) focuses on morpho-syntactic SSD-structures, providing not only sociolinguistic but also theoretical insights. Specifically, my data supports the idea that SSD users tend to prefer diaconstructions over idioconstructions. Importantly, these (mostly schematic) diaconstructions result in diasystematically anchored innovations due to interlingual productivity (Höder 2014: 221, 2018: 59–60, 2019: 347). The key lies in junctions within this multilingual constructicon, where a schematic diaconstruction meets idioconstructions. These junctions offer room for innovations and can not only be modeled but are also predictable and empirically visible in the data.

Further reading:

• Goll, Sabrina. Forthc. Südschleswigdänisch. Eine strukturelle Bestandsaufnahme aus dialektologischer Perspektive.
• Höder, Steffen. 2014. Constructing diasystems. Grammatical organisation in bilingual groups. In Tor A. Åfarli & Brit Mæhlum (eds.), The sociolinguistics of grammar (Studies in Language Companion Series 154), 137–152. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/slcs.154.07hod].
• Höder, Steffen. 2018. Grammar is community-specific: Background and basic concepts of Diasystematic Construction Grammar. In Hans C. Boas & Steffen Höder (eds.), Constructions in contact. Constructional perspectives on contact phenomena in Germanic languages (Constructional Approaches to Language 24), 37–70. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.24.02hod]
• Höder, Steffen. 2019. Phonological schematicity in multilingual constructions: A diasystematic perspective on lexical form. Word Structure 12, 334–352 [DOI: 10.3366/word.2019.0152].

Keywords: Danish minority, South Schleswig Danish, multilingual constructicon, diaconstructions, diasystematically anchored innovations

Anna Hagel (Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel)

The project investigates how speakers acquire and make use of phonological schemas when they decode cognates from closely related languages (like in, e.g., Interscandinavian communication). While cognates, in theory, can establish a basis for mutual intelligibility between two languages, pronunciation differences can easily obscure these lexical similarities. However, it is being reported that speakers manage to bridge given phonological distances in intercommunication rather quickly. This is in part attributed to the use of so-called sound correspondence ‘rules’, i.e., the fact that speakers become aware of systematic phonological differences and exploit this knowledge in the decoding process.

The project explores how the corresponding acquisition process might look like from a usage-based constructionist perspective. Adopting the notion of phonological schematicity from DCxG, it analyses the acquisition of sound correspondence ‘rules’ as the identification of re-occuring submorphemic elements across different cognate pairs (involving intralinguistic and cross-lingistic comparisons). The result of this identification process is modelled as the emergence of a set of partially schematic constructions: two phonological language markers (PLMs) and a diacxn that captures the PLMs’ equivalence relation and defines them as members of a (mini-)paradigm.

In a series of psycholinguistic experiments, the project sets out to test the following hypotheses:

1. Do speakers identify sound correspondences at all?
2. How does type variability in the input impact the extensibility of phonological schemas in this context? (How far do speakers generalize?)

The results shall provide insights into how knowledge about systematic phonological variation (between languages or dialectal/sociolectal varieties) is integrated into speakers’ construct-i-cons.

Further reading:

• Bosma, Evelyn, Elma Blom, Eric Hoekstra & Arjen Versloot. 2019. A longitudinal study on the gradual cognate facilitation effect in bilingual children’s Frisian receptive vocabulary. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 22. 371–385 [DOI: 10.1080/13670050.2016.1254152].
• Diewald, Gabriele. 2020. Paradigms lost – paradigms regained. Paradigms as hyper-constructions. In Lotte Sommerer & Elena Smirnova (eds.), Nodes and networks in Diachronic Construction Grammar (Constructional Approaches to Language 27), 277–315. Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.27.08die].
• Hagel, Anna. 2023. One man’s [ɕoetː] is another man’s [kʰøð̞]: Sound correspondence constructions in Interscandinavian decoding. In Evie Coussé, Steffen Höder, Benjamin Lyngfelt & Julia Prentice (eds.), Constructional approaches to Nordic languages (Constructional Approaches to Language 37), 55–80. Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.37.03hag].
• Höder, Steffen. 2019. Phonological schematicity in multilingual constructions: A diasystematic perspective on lexical form. Word Structure 12, 334–352 [DOI: 10.3366/word.2019.0152].

Keywords: phonological schematicity, submorphemic elements, receptive multilingualism, Interscandinavian communication

Isa Hendrikx (Université de Liège) | Kristel Van Goethem (F.R.S.-FNRS & Université catholique de Louvain)

Several studies have demonstrated that Dutch has a stronger tendency towards compounding than French (e.g., Du. zoutwaterzwembad vs Fr. piscine d’eau salée ‘saltwater pool’), especially when adopting a restrictive approach of compounding in which the presence of prepositions and/or internal inflection in multi-word expressions is considered evidence for their syntactic formation. The example above illustrates that Dutch compounding differs from French in another important aspect: while Germanic compounding is by definition right-headed, French has a general tendency towards left-hand headed compounds and phrases.

Nevertheless, little attention has been paid so far to the impact of such cross-linguistic differences on the use of compounds in learner language,even though word-formation awareness has been proven crucial for learners’ proficiency and creativity.

In this project, we investigate the impact of these cross-linguistic differences on the acquisition of Dutch compounds by French-speaking learners in the context of multilingual Belgium. Moreover, we explore the impact of additional target-language input through CLIL programs (Content and Language Integrated Learning). The corpus data are drawn from the MulTINCo database and cover case studies in the field of Dutch and English intensifying constructions (Hendrikx 2019, Van Goethem & Hendrikx 2021) and Dutch nominal compounds (Hendrikx & Van Goethem forthc.).

The results are described and interpreted from the theoretical perspective of Diasystematic Construction Grammar (DCxG), which conceptualizes the linguistic competence of multilingual speakers as one integrated network of constructions, containing language-specific idioconstructions and shared diaconstructions.

Further reading:

• Hendrikx, Isa. 2019. The acquisition of intensifying constructions in Dutch and English by French-speaking CLIL and non-CLIL students: Cross-linguistic influence and exposure effects. Unpublished PhD thesis. Louvain-la-Neuve: Université catholique de Louvain [Link: hdl.handle.net/2078.1/212617].
• Hendrikx, Isa & Kristel Van Goethem. 2024. Dutch compound constructions in additional language acquisition: A diasystematic-constructionist approach. Constructions and Frames 16, 64–99 [DOI: 10.1075/cf.22023.hen].
• Van Goethem, Kristel & Isa Hendrikx. 2021. Intensifying constructions in second language acquisition. A diasystematic-constructionist approach. In Hans C. Boas & Steffen Höder (eds.), Constructions in contact 2. Language change, multilingual practices, and additional language acquisition (Constructional Approaches to Language 30), 375–428. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.30.12van].

Keywords: additional language acquisition, content and language integrated learning, compounding, intensification

Sivi Järvinen (Göteborgs universitet)

My PhD project focuses on the multilingual language usage within a community of Sweden Finns in Haparanda, a border town located in the Torne Valley of northern Sweden. Swedish and Finnish have coexisted for an extensive period in the Torne Valley (Elenius 2010).

The aim of this thesis is to get a more comprehensive understanding of the current language situation within a multilingual community comprising 18 participants who actively utilize Swedish and Finnish in their daily interactions. Specifically, the question posed is how is it possible, even though Swedish and Finnish are typologically dissimilar, that multilingual speakers of these languages tend to find adequate strategies for alternating effortlessly between them – both lexically and syntactically – in their everyday language use? Preliminary results suggests that the participants are innovative in their communication and that they succeed maintaining an unhindered interaction meanwhile using their whole linguistic repertoire. For example, the preliminary results illustrate that the alternation largely adheres to the grammatical structures of both languages, which is exemplified in (1), where the Swedish preposition phrase på havet (‘at sea’) is integrated into a Finnish clause:

The preliminary findings are in line with the assumption that the language system of multilingual speakers is an integrated network, referred to as a multilingual constructicon in the theory of Diasystematic Construction Grammar (Höder 2018). This constructicon includes both language-specific and language-unspecific constructions that are based on similarities between the languages involved.

Further reading:

• Elenius, Lars. 2010. Identiteter i Tornedalen. In Titta Kallio-Seppä & Henri Nordberg (eds.), Torniolaakson vuosikirja: Raja 200 vuotta, 329–353. Torneå: Tornedalsrådet – Torniolaakson maakuntamuseo.
• Höder, Steffen. 2018. Grammar is community-specific: Background and basic concepts of Diasystematic Construction Grammar. In Hans C. Boas & Steffen Höder (eds.), Constructions in contact. Constructional perspectives on contact phenomena in Germanic languages (Constructional Approaches to Language 24), 37–70. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.24.02hod]

Keywords: language contact, Swedish, Finnish, multilingual practices

Martin Konvička (Freie Universität Berlin)

I investigate the syntactic and morphological properties, development, and cross-linguistic spread of non-finite causal (NFC) constructions. The best-known example of these constructions is the so-called because X construction in English (1) (Bergs 2018), but formal and functional equivalents exist in a variety of languages such as German, Dutch, Danish, French, Czech, Slovak, or Finnish (see, e.g., Konvička & Stöcker 2022).

Cross-linguistically, NFC constructions consist of a matrix clause, a causal connector, and its complement. Unlike subordinate causal clauses, from which they have developed, no finite verb forms occur in the complement of the NFC constructions. Functionally, these constructions express a causal link between the matrix clause and the complement.

Against the backdrop of the framework of Diasystematic Construction Grammar, I investigate the cross-linguistic spread of NFC constructions as a combination of language-internal and contact-induced factors. Unlike in traditional language contact scenarios, however, I focus on language contact in online translocal spaces such as social media.

Further reading:

• Bailey, Laura. 2012. Because reasons. linguistlaura (16 August, 2022) [Link: linguistlaura.blogspot.com/2012/07/because-reasons.html].
• Bergs, Alexander. 2018. Because science! Notes on a variable conjunction. In Elena Seoane, Carlos Acuña-Fariña & Ignacio Palacios-Martínez (eds.), Subordination in English, 43–60. Berlin: De Gruyter [DOI: 10.1515/9783110583571-003].
• Konvička, Martin. 2019. De verborgen complexiteit van want/omdat X. Internationale Neerlandistiek 57, 161–183 [DOI: 10.5117/in2019.2.004.konv].
• Konvička, Martin. 2020. Protože změna: K české kauzální konstrukci protože X. Naše řeč 103, 243–263.
• Konvička, Martin. 2023. Category membership and category potential: The case of vague because. Lexis. Journal in English lexicology 22 [DOI: 10.4000/lexis.7418].
• Konvička, Martin. 2024. Because reasons. Non-finite causal constructions in English, German, Dutch, and Czech. Berlin: Freie Universität Berlin [DOI: 10.17169/refubium-43502].
• Konvička, Martin & Kristin Stöcker. 2022. (Non-)Ellipses in Dutch, English, and German: The case of because X. Nederlandse Taalkunde 27, 333–367 [DOI: 10.5117/nedtaa2022.3.003.konv].

Keywords: because X, non-finite causal constructions

Olga Lopopolo (Eurac Research Bozen/Bolzano & Università per Stranieri di Perugia)

All natural languages, whether or not they have a designated grammatical category conventionally referred to as progressive, can convey the idea that an event is progressing dynamically over a time frame opened up by an utterance (Mair 2012: 803). However, it is important to distinguish between a semantic-cognitive notion of progressive aspectuality, which is universal and transportable across languages, and the corresponding formal expression for this notion, i.e. the progressive aspect, found in various languages, which can be obligatory or optionally marked on lexical verbs or verb phrases. The present PhD project aims at exploring how multilingual learners of English as their third language express the universal semantic-cognitive concept of progressive aspectuality in language contact situations. The analysis is conducted on learner corpus data (Leonide – Glaznieks et al. 2022) composed by lower-secondary school students living in a multilingual environment, i.e. South Tyrol, in which they are exposed in different ways to the official languages of the environment, i.e. Italian and German, alongside English as a school subject. The framework that has been applied is the Diasystematic Construction Grammar (DCxG) (Höder 2012, 2014, 2021) which postulates the existence of shared constructions (“form-meaning-function constellations”, Goldberg 2003) which speakers view as similar across multiple languages, termed ‘diaconstructions,’ and language-specific constructions, termed ‘idioconstructions’. Learners’ multilingual constructicon with respect to the progressive aspectuality is modeled considering the three languages of the study, i.e. Italian, English and German, in an integrated network of dia- and idioconstructions organized along inheritance links connecting more specific and more schematic constructions to the supraordinate abstract concept of progressive aspectuality. A special attention is dedicated to cross-linguistic influence (CLI) phenomena, i.e. “the influence resulting from similarities and differences between the target language and any other language that has been previously acquired”, in light of the (possible) influence of learners’ background languages (Italian and German) when learning English. Since DCxG aims to model multilinguals’ linguistic knowledge in a socio-cognitively and dynamic realistic fashion (Höder et al. 2021: 314), the project considers learners’ repertoires as prototypical dominant language constellations (DLC) (Aronin 2006, 2016) embedded in the South Tyrolean environment.

Further reading:

• CROSSLIN3 website: https://www.eurac.edu/it/institutes-centers/istituto-di-linguistica-applicata/projects/crosslin3
• Aronin, Larissa. 2006. Dominant language constellations: An approach to multilingualism studies. In Muiris Ó Laoire (ed.), Multilingualism in educational settings, 140–159. Hohengehren: Schneider.
• Aronin, Larissa. 2016. Multi-competence and dominant language constellation. In Vivian Cook & Li Wei (eds.), The Cambridge handbook of linguistic multicompetence, 142–163. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [DOI: 10.1017/CBO9781107425965.007].
• Glaznieks, Aivars, Jennifer-Carmen Frey, Maria Stopfner, Lorenzo Zanasi & Lionel Nicolas. 2022. Leonide. A longitudinal trilingual corpus of young learners of Italian, German and English. International Journal of Learner Corpus Research 8, 97–120 [DOI: 10.1075/ijlcr.21004.gla].
• Goldberg, Adele E. 2003. Constructions: A new theoretical approach to language. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 7, 219–224 [DOI: 10.1016/s1364-6613(03)00080-9].
• Höder, Steffen. 2012. Multilingual constructions: a diasystematic approach to common structures. In Kurt Braunmüller & Christoph Gabriel (eds.), Multilingual individuals and multilingual societies (Hamburg Studies on Multilingualism 13), 241–257. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/hsm.13.17hod].
• Höder, Steffen. 2014. Constructing diasystems. Grammatical organisation in bilingual groups. In Tor A. Åfarli & Brit Mæhlum (eds.), The sociolinguistics of grammar (Studies in Language Companion Series 154), 137–152. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/slcs.154.07hod].
• Höder, Steffen, Julia Prentice & Sofia Tingsell. 2021. Additional language acquisition as emerging multilingualism. A Construction Grammar approach. In Hans C. Boas & Steffen Höder (eds.), Constructions in contact 2. Language change, multilingual practices, and additional language acquisition (Constructional Approaches to Language 30), 310–337. Amsterdam: Benjamins [DOI: 10.1075/cal.30.10hod].
• Mair, Christian (2012). Progressive and continuous aspect. In Robert Binnick (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of tense and aspect, 803–827. Oxford: Oxford University Press [DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780195381979.013.0028].

Keywords: progressive, multilingualism, learner corpus research, cross-linguistic influences

Julia Prentice (Göteborgs universitet) | Joel Olofsson (Högskolan Väst) | Gerlof Bouma (Göteborgs universitet)

Different languages use different linguistic patterns to express time. Such patterns are crucial for language use but often difficult to fully master in additional languages (AL) learned after the first language(s) (L1). They also are difficult to explain according to general grammatical rules or specific lexical items. Thus, time expressions are relevant for the investigation of the challenges that AL learners face when learning conventionalized linguistic patterns, as well as those teachers and linguists face when describing or explaining them. The project investigates how adult learners’ entrenchment (establishing linguistic patterns in the mental grammar of individuals) of Swedish time constructions is affected by various factors related to their conventionalization in general language use, as well as to other linguistic and individual factors, and the context of learning. The second goal is to use this new knowledge to develop a way of describing constructions that supports the learning of Swedish. The project consists of three parts; part 1 involves collecting and analyzing examples of time constructions and their use in a large set of textbook data. In part 2, we design and conduct an experimental study on what affects the entrenchment of temporal constructions in different groups of adult learners of Swedish, and finally, in part 3, we develop a description format based on the investigated temporal constructions that is aimed specifically at learners of Swedish. The theoretical framework for the project combines

Keywords: Swedish time constructions, additional language learning, EC Model, learner-targeted construction descriptions

Monique Rabé (North-West University)

Research on bilingual first language acquisition (BFLA) and code-switching in children acquiring two closely related languages simultaneously, such as Afrikaans and Dutch, remains sparse. To address this gap, this study examined code-switching patterns in eight preschool children (aged 2;3 to 6;4) raised bilingually in Afrikaans and Dutch in South Africa. Using the parent-report method, novel language data were collected and analysed over approximately two months, totalling 123 code-switching utterances. Diasystematic Construction Grammar (DCxG) was employed as a framework to analyse these code-switching constructions that serve to encapsulate the shared attributes of constructions that are present in both Afrikaans and Dutch. Findings revealed that code-switching among the Afrikaans-Dutch participants primarily comprised intra-sentential switches at the morpho-lexical level. Nouns were most affected by lexical-level code-switching, followed by verbs. Most code-switching constructions were structured in Afrikaans, with Afrikaans lexical items frequently substituted with Dutch counterparts, mainly non-identical cognates, non-cognates, and false friends, reflecting the linguistic overlap between the two languages.

Further reading:

• Rabé, Monique. 2021. Kodewisseling in Afrikaans-Nederlandse kinders se spraak. Master’s thesis. Potchefstroom: Noordwes-Universiteit [Link: hdl.handle.net/10394/38498].

Keywords: Afrikaans, bilingual first language acquisition, code-switching, Dutch

Monique Rabé (North-West University) | Gerhard B. van Huyssteen (North-West University)

One of the most recent sub-theories within construction grammar is Diasystematic Construction Grammar (DCxG). Presently, however, no formalism exists to capture information and insights from DCxG in a digital database, or to make such information and insights accessible to end-users. DCxG focuses on the constructionalisations in societies with multiple languages, making it particularly relevant for understanding constructionalisation and constructional change in Afrikaans, given its geographical and typological proximity to English. Specifically, there is potential for DCxG to shed light on the Afrikaans taboo constructicon, which has been notably influenced by English. This serves as one of the primary objectives of an ongoing PhD study focused on developing an authoritative, usage-based, encyclopaedic, digital constructicon of Afrikaans taboo language – referred to as a constructional database of taboo language (CDTL). This objective will result in a forthcoming publication in a Routledge handbook on Anglicisms titled “Anglicisms in taboo constructicons”. In this chapter, the focus is specifically on the nature and extent of the influence of English as an L2 on L1 taboo constructicons in the social media domain.

Keywords: Afrikaans, constructional database of taboo language (CDTL), constructionalisation, multilingualism

Lia Abrantes Soares Antunes (Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro)

The research project aims to explore the outcomes of the interaction between two or more languages spoken or written by deaf and hearing individuals of different age groups and proficiency levels. This investigation is based on Usage-Based Construction Grammar (Goldberg 2006) and Diasystematic Construction Grammar (Höder 2021) theories. The research themes focus on L1 and L2 acquisition (oral, written, and sign modalities), language teaching, L2 materials development, and descriptive analyses of formal and functional aspects of Argument Structure Constructions, taking into account language contact situations in Brazil.

Keywords: language contact, second language acquisition, deaf speakers

Eline Zenner (KU Leuven) | Stefano De Pascale (KU Leuven) | Kris Heylen (KU Leuven) | Dirk Pijpops (KU Leuven) | Freek Van de Velde (KU Leuven)

In our usage-based research on the influence of English on (Belgian) Dutch, Diasystematic Construction Grammar has provided us with a highly relevant theoretical framework do describe contact-induced variation located on the interface between prototypical lexical borrowing and prototypical code-switches. In particular, we have aimed to understand how certain (semi-)fixed source language expressions are progressively included in the receptor language.

1. Through three case-studies, we have charted the evolution of the denominal verb pimpen ‘to pimp’ in Dutch. Working with newspaper and twitter data, we have studied the trajectory from the first occurrence of verbal pimp in Pimp My Ride, thename of an MTV Show, to its status as productive verb pimpen ‘to pimp’ in Dutch, used inside as well as outside of the construction [pimp poss n].
2. We have investigated differentiation between [(det) adj_superlative n ooit (ptcp)] and [(det) adj_superlative n ever (ptcp)] in Dutch, e.g. beste film ooit or zaligste uitstap ever. We analyzed over 100,000 observations from a Twitter corpus from the Low Countries (period 2011–2016). Our results revealed that (1) the two constructional variants increase in frequency in the time period under study, (2) this increase is more pronounced for the ooit-variant; (3) the ever-variant undergoes specialization towards a pragmatically marked form.

More work is coming. Keep an eye out for our studies on the most flexible and versatile four-letter word of the English language, which has obviously also found its way into Dutch.

Further reading:

• De Pascale, Stefano, Dirk Pijpops, Freek Van de Velde & Eline Zenner. 2022. Reassembling the pimped ride: A quantitative look at the integration of a borrowed expression. Frontiers in Communication 7, 777312 [DOI: 10.3389/fcomm.2022.777312].
• Pijpops, Dirk, Stefano De Pascale, Freek Van de Velde & Eline Zenner. 2023. Big Pimpin’. Een big data-benadering van de verspreiding van het leenwoord pimpen in het Nederlands. Taal en Tongval 75, 73–113 [DOI: 10.5117/tet2023.1.005.pijp].
• Van de Velde, Freek & Eline Zenner. 2010. Pimp my Lexis: het nut van corpusonderzoek in normatief taaladvies. In Els Hendrickx, Karl Hendrickx, Willy Martin, Hans Smessaert, William Van Belle & Joop Van der Horst (eds.), Liever meer of juist minder? Over normen en variatie in taal, 51–68. Gent: Academia press.
• Zenner, Eline, Kris Heylen & Freek Van de Velde. 2018. Most borrowable construction ever! A large-scale approach to contact-induced pragmatic change. Journal of Pragmatics 133, 134–149. [DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2018.05.004].

Keywords: borrowed constructions, Dutch, English, conventionalization