Nikki van de Pol
List of John Benjamins publications in which Nikki van de Pol is involved.
2018 Adapting to survive: The English absolute and its new functional niche Functions of Language 25:3, pp. 363–391 | Article
This paper traces the semantic development of the English absolute construction from Old to Present-day English on the basis of extensive corpus data. It is observed that the absolute construction developed from a solely adverbial, strictly subordinate construction into a construction with a… read more
2015 Why is there a Present-Day English absolute? Studies in Language 39:1, pp. 199–229 | Article
This paper examines the divergent evolutions of the Absolute Construction (AC) in the history of the Germanic languages, with a focus on English and Dutch, and provides an explanation of why only the English AC retained its frequency and productivity rate. Three language-internal factors are… read more
2014 The diffusion of English absolutes: A diachronic register study Corpus Interrogation and Grammatical Patterns, Davidse, Kristin, Caroline Gentens, Lobke Ghesquière and Lieven Vandelanotte (eds.), pp. 265–294 | Article
The present paper addresses the register diffusion of the English absolute, a non-finite construction functioning as an adverbial (an example from Present-day-English is: One of the cheap cigars to which she was addicted burns ignored between her fingers, the skin of her face dragging down with… read more
2013 Gradualness in change in English (augmented) absolutes Synchrony and Diachrony: A dynamic interface, Giacalone Ramat, Anna, Caterina Mauri and Piera Molinelli (eds.), pp. 341–366 | Article
This paper investigates the gradual semantic and syntactic development of Absolute Constructions (AC) in English (an example from Present-day English is: With the teacher refusing to comply, Barry took the matter to the dean (Berent 1975: 11)). On the basis of a comprehensive study of ACs in the… read more