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Verbs of motion and intermediate source domains of modality: the understudied case of Italian occorrere ‘to be necessary, to be needed’

Verbs of motion and intermediate source domains of modality: the understudied case of Italian... AbstractThough the emergence of modality from verbs of motion is a well-attested phenomenon, the assessment of cross-linguistically valid pathways still remains a desideratum. In this paper I offer an outline of the pathway followed by the understudied Italian modal verb occorrere ‘to happen; to be necessary/needed’ (from Latin occurrere, originally ‘to run towards, into something or someone’). Based on the analysis of two large corpora, this paper reconstructs the emergence of the impersonal constructions ‘occorre + INF’ and ‘occorre che + SBJV’ vis-à-vis the personal one (‘to be needed’). The data and their analysis confirm the complexity of the pathway: in fact, the emergence of modality is strongly interlaced with the co-presence of the ancient meaning ‘to happen’, but also with the emergence of a deontic construction in which occorrere assumes the function of the auxiliary essere (‘to be’) as well as with the later evolution of another construction with negative polarity and in which occorrere is a telic metaphoric verb of motion. Though the pathway followed by Italian occorrere could be idiosyncratic in a cross-linguistic perspective, its in-depth study sheds new light on the question of how modality emerges and in particular on its source domains and their relations. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Folia Linguistica de Gruyter

Verbs of motion and intermediate source domains of modality: the understudied case of Italian occorrere ‘to be necessary, to be needed’

Folia Linguistica , Volume 56 (s43-s1): 31 – Nov 1, 2022

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Publisher
de Gruyter
Copyright
© 2022 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
ISSN
0165-4004
eISSN
1614-7308
DOI
10.1515/flin-2022-2017
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

AbstractThough the emergence of modality from verbs of motion is a well-attested phenomenon, the assessment of cross-linguistically valid pathways still remains a desideratum. In this paper I offer an outline of the pathway followed by the understudied Italian modal verb occorrere ‘to happen; to be necessary/needed’ (from Latin occurrere, originally ‘to run towards, into something or someone’). Based on the analysis of two large corpora, this paper reconstructs the emergence of the impersonal constructions ‘occorre + INF’ and ‘occorre che + SBJV’ vis-à-vis the personal one (‘to be needed’). The data and their analysis confirm the complexity of the pathway: in fact, the emergence of modality is strongly interlaced with the co-presence of the ancient meaning ‘to happen’, but also with the emergence of a deontic construction in which occorrere assumes the function of the auxiliary essere (‘to be’) as well as with the later evolution of another construction with negative polarity and in which occorrere is a telic metaphoric verb of motion. Though the pathway followed by Italian occorrere could be idiosyncratic in a cross-linguistic perspective, its in-depth study sheds new light on the question of how modality emerges and in particular on its source domains and their relations.

Journal

Folia Linguisticade Gruyter

Published: Nov 1, 2022

Keywords: auxiliarization; diachrony; eventive meaning; goal-orientedness; Italian; Latin; source domains of modality; verbs of motion

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