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Article published In: Linguistics in the Netherlands 2024
Edited by Marco Bril and Kristel Doreleijers
[Nota Bene 1:2] 2024
► pp. 261–275

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Dutch willen’s steps towards a future marker

 | University of Groningen
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Open Access publication of this article was funded through a Transformative Agreement with University of Groningen.

Published online: 24 January 2025
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https://doi.org/10.1075/nb.00016.van
Abstract
Desire verbs commonly change into markers of future events. Bybee, Joan, Revere Dale Perkins & William Pagliuca. 1994. The evolution of grammar: Tense, aspect, and modality in the languages of the world. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar report of the common pattern in language change in which verbs like want become future markers. Dooren, Annemarie van, Nick Huang & Gesoel Mendes. 2019, November 15. Polysemous want: Language change from a synchronic perspective [Conference presentation]. Formal Diachronic Semantics 41. Columbus, OH: Ohio State University. observe that Dutch willen ‘want’ shows indications that it is currently on the path from desire to future: A sentence like Het wil nog wel regenen vandaag ‘It will probably rain today’ (lit. It wants particle particle rain today) indicates that rain might happen later today. The desire element has disappeared. In this short paper, we will further specify and explain van Dooren et al.’s semantic analysis of the future use of Dutch willen. We will argue that it is a root modal, which is pragmatically always future-oriented (extending Condoravdi, Cleo. 2002. Temporal interpretation of modals: modals for the present and for the past. In David Beaver, Luis Casillas, Brady Clark & Stefan Kaufmann (eds.), The construction of meaning, 59–88. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar).
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.A three-way ambiguity in willen ‘want’
    • 2.1Ambiguity vs. generality (van Dooren et al. 2019)
    • 2.2Desire vs. non-desire uses (van Dooren et al. 2019)
    • 2.3Future vs. habitual willen
    • 2.4Interim summary
  • 3.The future of future willen
    • 3.1More and less temporal uses of zullen ‘will’
    • 3.2Negative contexts
    • 3.3Intermediate summary
  • 4.A root modal analysis
    • 4.1Counterfactual interpretations
    • 4.2Future willen as a root modal
  • 5.Steps towards a future marker
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgments
  • Notes
  • References
References (22)
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