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Article published In: The Quality of Quantity, the Quantity of Quality
Edited by Steven Schoonjans
[Nota Bene 2:1] 2025
► pp. 167–199

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Qualitative and quantitative methods in the field of semantics

Comparing French dynamic prepositions à travers and au travers de with their Dutch intuitive equivalent door

 | Vrije Universiteit Brussel
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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 Vrije Universiteit Brussel.

Published online: 26 September 2025
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https://doi.org/10.1075/nb.00027.hoe
Abstract
This paper shows that the combination of qualitative and (basic) quantitative methods is a fruitful approach in the case of a semantic analysis of comparable and parallel corpus data. This point is illustrated through a comparison of two close French dynamic prepositions with a medial polarity, i.e. à travers and au travers de ‘across, through, by means of’ (often considered to be synonyms) with their intuitive equivalent in Dutch, door ‘through, by’. The study relies on corpus data stemming from the Dutch Parallel Corpus 2.0. The results offer new insights (i.e. an important difference in distribution of concrete and abstract uses in French and Dutch) and contradict some existing (lexicographic) descriptions and intuitions, viz. a nonexistent mutual correspondence between au travers de and door, and an unexpected preference for Dutch via as equivalent for French à travers in abstract configurations.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Descriptions of French à travers/au travers (de) and Dutch door
  • 3.Equivalents in lexicographic descriptions
  • 4.Data and methodology
    • 4.1Collecting the data
    • 4.2Methodological remarks
  • 5.Features of à travers/au travers de and door in comparable data
    • 5.1French à travers/au travers de
      • 5.1.1Concrete and abstract uses
      • 5.1.2Type of motion expressed
      • 5.1.3Ground-entities in concrete uses
    • 5.2Dutch door
      • 5.2.1Concrete and abstract uses
      • 5.2.2Type of motion expressed
      • 5.2.3Ground-entities in concrete uses
    • 5.3Comparing the behavior of à travers/au travers de and door
  • 6.Translation of à travers/au travers de and door in parallel data
    • 6.1Equivalents of French à travers
      • 6.1.1General observations
      • 6.1.2Concrete configurations
      • 6.1.3Abstract configurations
    • 6.2Equivalents of French au travers de
    • 6.3Equivalents of Dutch door
      • 6.3.1Prepositional equivalents
      • 6.3.2Verbal equivalents
      • 6.3.3Concrete configurations
      • 6.3.4Abstract configurations
  • 7.Discussion
    • 7.1Mutual correspondence
    • 7.2Congruent constructions
    • 7.3Alternative equivalents
    • 7.4Concluding remarks
  • 8.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
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