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In:Information Structure and Syntactic Change in Germanic and Romance Languages
Edited by Kristin Bech and Kristine Gunn Eide
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 213] 2014
► pp. 141–172

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Referential properties of the full and reduced forms of the definite article in German

A diachronic survey

 | Humboldt University Berlin
 | Humboldt University Berlin
Published online: 7 May 2014
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https://doi.org/10.1075/la.213.06con
In the following paper, we deal with the properties of the definite article in German. Starting from the existing literature on Present-day German, we show that, in combination with prepositions, two forms of the definite article may be used, namely a full one and a reduced one. They are used in contexts of anaphoric reference or in cases of semantic uniqueness, respectively. We then describe the phenomenon from a diachronic perspective, based on data from Old High German and Middle High German. Only a few, unsystematic studies are available on this topic. In particular, we investigate the properties of the two forms of the article from a semantic/pragmatic perspective, from a cognitive perspective, and finally in syntax
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Cited by (3)

Cited by three other publications

Schlachter, Eva
2020. A complex grammaticalization scenario for the definite article. In Walking on the grammaticalization path of the definite article [Studies in Language Variation, 23], ► pp. 17 ff. DOI logo
Weiß, Helmut
2019. Rebracketing (Gliederungsverschiebung) and the Early Merge Principle. Diachronica 36:4 ► pp. 509 ff. DOI logo
Kinn, Kari
2017. Null arguments in old Norwegian. Linguistic Variation 17:2 ► pp. 309 ff. DOI logo

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