Dar + gerund in Ecuadorian Highland Spanish: Contact-induced grammaticalization?

Olbertz, Hella

doi:10.1075/sic.5.1.06olb

Article published In: Spanish in Context
Vol. 5:1 (2008) ► pp.89–109

Get fulltext from our e-platform

Download PDF

Dar + gerund in Ecuadorian Highland Spanish

Contact-induced grammaticalization?

Hella Olbertz

Published online: 6 June 2008

https://doi.org/10.1075/sic.5.1.06olb

The benefactive construction dar + gerund is used in the North Andean region only and is unknown elsewhere in the Spanish-speaking world. Based on the analysis of spontaneous data from Ecuadorian Highland Spanish, this paper provides a linguististic description of dar + gerund and of the social and pragmatic conditions of its use. Departing from this description, I explain that the construction originates through contact with Ecuadorian Quechua. It is shown that the geographical restriction of the use of dar + gerund is directly related to the specific characteristics of Ecuadorian Quechua.

Keywords: gerund periphrasis, grammaticalization, benefactive, Ecuadorian Highland Spanish, Ecuadorian Quechua, language contact

Cited by (14)

Cited by 14 other publications

Order by:

Del Carpio, Leslie

2023. First person singular subject pronoun expression of young Spanish speakers from Quito, Ecuador. Spanish in Context 20:3 ► pp. 574 ff.

Guerra, Kathleen S.

2023. Metalinguistic discourse and dialect performance. Spanish in Context 20:1 ► pp. 208 ff.

Guerra, Kathleen S.

2023. Context-specific use and ideology: perception of appropriate domains for dar + gerund. Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 16:2 ► pp. 447 ff.

WILSON, DAMIÁN VERGARA

2023. Grammaticalization and Usage‐Based Approaches. In The Handbook of Usage‐Based Linguistics, ► pp. 233 ff.

Floyd, Simeon

2022. Ecuadorian Highland Quichua and the Lost Languages of the Northern Andes. International Journal of American Linguistics 88:1 ► pp. 1 ff.

Floyd, Simeon

2025. Multimodal Existential Negation in Ecuadorian Highland Kichwa. Languages 10:6 ► pp. 138 ff.

Garachana Camarero, Mar, Sandra Montserrat Buendia & Claus D. Pusch

2022. From verbal periphrases to complex predicates. In From Verbal Periphrases to Complex Predicates [IVITRA Research in Linguistics and Literature, 31], ► pp. 1 ff.

García, Christina

2021. Variation and pragmatic enrichment. In Aspects of Latin American Spanish Dialectology [Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics, 32], ► pp. 69 ff.

González, Paz & Martine Bruil

2021. The Ecuadorian Spanish benefactive and its inherent aspect. Spanish in Context 18:3 ► pp. 459 ff.

Moreano, Santiago Sánchez

2018. Negociación de posicionamientos sociales (stances) a través del debilitamiento del fonema /s/ en el español hablado por los quichuas ecuatorianos en Cali (Colombia) . Pragmática Sociocultural / Sociocultural Pragmatics 6:1 ► pp. 33 ff.

Jaeyong Kwak

2016. The Derivational Condition of Dative Clitic of the Benefactive Applicative Periphrase in Ecuadorian Highland Spanish. The Korean Journal of Hispanic Studies 9:2 ► pp. 1 ff.

Lipski, John M.

2014. Syncretic discourse markers in Kichwa-influenced Spanish: Transfer vs. emergence. Lingua 151 ► pp. 216 ff.

Lipski, John M.

2016. On the tenacity of Andean Spanish. In Spanish Language and Sociolinguistic Analysis [Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics, 8], ► pp. 109 ff.

Escobar, Anna María

2011. Spanish in Contact with Quechua. In The Handbook of Hispanic Sociolinguistics, ► pp. 321 ff.

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 1 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.