Cover not available

Article published In: Studies in Language
Vol. 46:1 (2022) ► pp.220–257

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF
EPUB logo with download linkDownload EPUB
authorization required

The development of locative relative markers

From typology to sociolinguistics (and back)

ORCiD logo with link | University of Bologna
 | KU Leuven
Published online: 21 May 2021
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/sl.20013.bal
Abstract
The accessibility hierarchy was first proposed by Keenan, Edward & Bernard Comrie. 1977. Noun phrase accessibility and Universal Grammar. Linguistic Inquiry 81. 63–99.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar to describe the cross-linguistic distribution of relative markers in terms of likelihood of relativization of different syntactic roles. The hierarchy is also commonly believed to reflect constraints on possible changes in the domain of relativization. For example, the hierarchy predicts that locative relatives that develop into general relativizers should expand their functional range in a step-by-step fashion from lower to higher roles. In this paper, we revise existing claims about the diachrony of locative relatives. In doing so, we survey known cases of locative relatives that develop into general relativizers and we also discuss data from linguistic variation in non-standard varieties in European languages, with a focus on social variation in Italian. As we argue, data from Italian suggests that another possible cline of development of locative relatives should be acknowledged, that is, locative > concern > subject.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The typology of relative clauses
    • 2.1Definition and parameters of variation
    • 2.2The accessibility hierarchy
  • 3.Locative relatives cross-linguistically
    • 3.1The encoding of locative relatives and the AH
    • 3.2The origin of locative relatives
    • 3.3The functional extension of locative relatives
  • 4.From interlinguistic to intralinguistic variation
    • 4.1Standard and non-standard uses of locative relatives in the languages of Europe
    • 4.2Dove in social varieties of Italian
      • 4.2.1Data and methods
      • 4.2.2Results
  • 5.From locative to subject (via concern): A possible pathway of change
    • 5.1.1Stage I: locative > concern
    • 5.1.2Stage II: concern > subject
    • 5.1.3Revising the locative > relative development
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
References (88)
References
Ahland, Coleen Anne. 2012. A grammar of Northern and Southern Gumuz. Eugene: University of Oregon PhD dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Auer, Peter & Pfänder, Stefan. 2007. Multiple retractions in spoken French and spoken German. A contrastive study in oral performance styles. Cahiers de praxématique 481. 57–84. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Alfonzetti, Giovanna. 2002. La relativa non-standard. Italiano popolare o italiano parlato? Palermo: Centro di Studi Filologici e Linguistici Siciliani.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Andrews, Avery. 2007. Relative clauses. In Timothy Shopen (ed.), Language typology and syntactic description. Vol. 2, Complex constructions, 2nd edn, 206–236. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ballarè, Silvia & M. Silvia Micheli. 2018. Usi di dove nell’italiano contemporaneo: costruzioni relative e dinamiche di ristandardizzazione. Linguistica e Filologia 381. 29–56.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ballarè, Silvia, Massimo Cerruti & Eugenio Goria. 2019. Variazione diastratica nel parlato di giovani: il caso delle costruzioni relative. In Bruno Moretti, Aline Kunz, Silvia Natale & Etna Krakenberger (eds.), Le tendenze dell’italiano contemporaneo rivisitate. Atti del 52esimo congresso internazionale di studi della Società di Linguistica Italiana (SLI), Bern, 6–8 September 2018, 75–94. Milano: Officinaventuno.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bernini, Giuliano. 1989. Tipologia delle frasi relative italiane e Romanze. In Fabio Foresti, Elena Rizzi & Paola Benedini (eds.), L’italiano tra le lingue romanze. Atti del XX Congresso Internazionale della Società di Linguistica Italiana (Bologna, 25–27 settembre 1986), 85–98. Roma: Bulzoni.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Berruto, Gaetano. 1983. L’italiano popolare e la semplificazione linguistica. Vox Romanica 421. 38–79.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Berruto, Gaetano & Massimo Cerruti. 2015. Manuale di sociolinguistica. Torino: UTET.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Brook, Marisa. 2011. One of those situations where a relative pronoun becomes a complementizer: A case of grammaticalization in progress… again. In Lisa Armstrong (ed.), Proceedings of the 2011 Annual Meeting of the Canadian Linguistic Association, 1–7.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cerruti, Massimo. 2017. Changes from below, changes from above. Relative constructions in contemporary Italian. In Massimo Cerruti, Claudia Crocco & Stefania Marzo (eds.), Towards a new standard. Theoretical and empirical studies on the restandardization of Italian, 32–61. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cerruti, Massimo & Silvia Ballarè. 2020. Parlato: corpus del parlato di Torino. Bollettino dell’Atlante Linguistico Italiano 441. 13–38.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cinque, Guglielmo. 1988. La frase relativa. In Lorenzo Renzi, Giampaolo Salvi & Anna Cardinaletti (eds.), Grande grammatica italiana di consultazione, Vol. 11, 443–503. Bologna: Il Mulino.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Comrie, Bernard & Tania Kuteva. 2013. Relativization Strategies. In Matthew S. Dryer & Martin Haspelmath (eds.), The World Atlas of Language Structures Online, Chapter s8. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. Available at Available online at [URL] (last access 10 April 2021).
Crahe, Maxime-Morvan. 2013. Le breton de Languidic: étude phonétique, morphologique et syntaxique d’un sous-dialecte du breton vannetais. Rennes: Université Rennes 2 PhD dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cristofaro, Sonia. 2003. Subordination. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2017. Implicational universals and dependencies. In Nick J. Enfield (ed.), Dependencies in language: On the causal ontology of linguistic systems, 9–22. Berlin: Language Science Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cristofaro, Sonia & Anna Giacalone Ramat. 2007. Relativization strategies in the languages of Europe. In Paolo Ramat & Elisa Roma (eds.), Europe and the Mediterranean as linguistic areas: Convergencies from a historical and typological perspective, 63–93. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cristofaro, Sonia & Fernando Zúñiga. 2018. Synchronic vs. diachronic approaches to typological hierarchies. In Sonia Cristofaro & Fernando Zúñiga (eds.), Typological hierarchies in synchrony and diachrony, 4–27. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
D’Achille, Paolo. 1990. Sintassi del parlato e tradizione scritta della lingua italiana. Analisi di testi dalle origini al secolo XVIII. Roma: Bonacci.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
de Vries, Mark. 2002. The syntax of relativization. Amsterdam: University of Amsterdam PhD dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2005. The fall and rise of universals on relativization. Journal of Universal Language 61. 125–157. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
DeLancey, Scott. 2002. Relativization and Nominalization in Bodic. In Patrick Chew (ed.), Proceedings of the Twenty-Eighth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society: Special Session on Tibeto-Burman and Southeast Asian Linguistics, 55–72. Berkeley: Berkeley Linguistics Society. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
De Roberto, Elisa. 2008. Le proposizioni relative con antecedente in italiano antico. Roma / Sorbonne: Università Roma Tre / Université Paris IV, Sorbonne PhD dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Diessel, Holger, & Michael Tomasello. 2005. A new look at the acquisition of relative clauses. Language 81(4). 882–906. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Enfield, Nick J. 2007. A grammar of Lao. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fleischer, Jürg. 2004. A typology of relative clauses in German dialects. In Bernd Kortmann (ed.), Dialectology meets typology: Dialect grammar from a cross-linguistic perspective, 211–244. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2005. Relativsätze in den Dialekten des Deutschen: Vergleich und Typologie. Linguistik online 24(3). 171–186.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fox, Barbara A. 1987. The Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy reinterpreted: Subject primacy or the absolutive hypothesis? Language 63(4). 856–870. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Givón, Talmy. 1987. Beyond background and foreground. In Russel S. Tomlin (ed.), Coherence and Grounding in Discourse, 175–188. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2012. Toward a diachronic typology of relative clause. In Bernard Comrie & Zarina Estrada-Fernández (eds.), Relative clauses in languages of the Americas: A typological overview, 1–26. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Götze, Lutz & Ernest W. B. Hess-Lüttich. 1999. Grammatik der deutschen Sprache. Munich: Bertelsmann.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haspelmath, Martin. 2019a. Differential place marking and differential object marking. Language Typology and Universals (STUF) 72(3). 313–334. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2019b. Can cross-linguistic regularities be explained by change constraints? In Karsten Schmidtke-Bode, Natalia Levshina, Susanne Maria Michaelis & Ilja A. Seržant (eds.), Explanation in typology: Diachronic sources, functional motivations and the nature of the evidence, 1–23. Berlin: Language Science Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hawkins, John A. 1999. Processing complexity and filler-gap dependencies across grammars. Language 75(2). 244–285. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Heine, Bernd & Tania Kuteva. 2002. World lexicon of grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Himmelmann, Nikolaus P. 2004. Lexicalization and grammaticization: opposite or orthogonal? In Walter Bisang, Nikolaus P. Himmelmann & Björn Wiemer (eds.), What makes grammaticalization: A look from its fringes and its components, 21–42. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Holmstedt, Robert D. 2002. The relative clause in Biblical Hebrew: A linguistic analysis. Madison: University of Wisconsin PhD dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Holton, Gary. 2006. The relational noun marker in Tobelo (Northeast Halmaheran). In Tenth International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics. [URL]
Hopper, Paul J. & Elizabeth C. Traugott. 2003. Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Huddleston, Rodney, Geoffrey K. Pullum & Peter Peterson. 2002. Relative constructions and unbounded dependencies. In Rodney Huddleston & Geoffrey K. Pullum (eds.), The Cambridge grammar of the English language, 1031–1096. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Huehnergard, John. 1997. A grammar of Akkadian. Winona Lake (Indiana): Eisenbrauns.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Joseph, Brian D. 1983. Relativization in Modern Greek: another look at the accessibility hierarchy constraints. Lingua 60(1). 1–24. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Keenan, Edward. 1985. Relative clauses. In Timothy Shopen (ed.), Language typology and syntactic description. Vol. 2, Complex constructions, 141–170. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Keenan, Edward & Bernard Comrie. 1977. Noun phrase accessibility and Universal Grammar. Linguistic Inquiry 81. 63–99.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1979. Noun phrase accessibility revisited. Language 55(3). 649–664. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Keenan, Edward & Sarah Hawkins. 1987. The psychological validity of the accessibility hierarchy. In Edward Keenan (ed.), Universal grammar: 15 essays, 60–88. London/Sydney: Croom Helm.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Klamer, Marian. 1998. A grammar of Kambera. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kruspe, Nicole. 2004. A grammar of Semelai. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kullavanijaya, Pranee. 2008. A Historical Study of /thîi/ in Thai. In Anthony V. N. Diller, Jerold A. Edmonson & Yongxian Luo (eds.), The Tai-Kadai languages, 445–467. London: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kuteva, Tania, Bernd Heine, Bo Hong, Haiping Long, Heiko Narrog, Seongha Rhee. 2019. World lexicon of grammaticalization. 2nd, extensively revised & updated edn. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Labov, William. 1972. Sociolinguistic patterns. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1994. The study of change in progress: observations in real time. In William Labov (ed.), Principles of linguistic change: Internal factors, 73–112. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lambrecht, Knud. 1994. Informative structure and sentence form. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Larrivée, Pierre & Marie Skrovech. 2016. Les relatives en français vernaculaire. SHS Web of Conferences, Vol. 271, 2016, 5e Congrès Mondial de Linguistique Française. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lehmann, Christian. 1986. On the typology of relative clauses. Linguistics 241. 663–680. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lidz, Liberty A. 2010. A descriptive grammar of Yongning Na (Mosuo). Austin: University of Texas at Austin PhD dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Luraghi, Silvia. 2016. The mapping of space onto the domain of benefaction and some unpredicted trends in semantic change. Linguistics 54(2). 339–379. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Luzi, Eleonora. 2012. Relativization strategies in SLA. Second Language Research 24(4). 443–476. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mackridge, Peter. 1985. The Modern Greek language. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Matthiessen, Chrisitan & Sandra A. Thompson. 1988. The structure of discourse and ‘subordination’. In John Haiman & Sandra A. Thompson (eds.), Clause combining in grammar and discourse, 275–329. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Maxwell, Dan. 1982. Implications of NP accessibility for diachronic syntax. Folia Linguistica Historica 31. 135–152. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Michaelis, Suzanne, Martin Haspelmath & the APiCS consortium. 2013. Subject relative clauses. In Susanne Michaelis, Philippe Maurer, Martin Haspelmath & Magnus Huber (eds.), The atlas of pidgin and creole language structures, Chapter 92. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Available at [URL] (last access 10 April 2021).
Mithun, Marianne. 2018. Deconstructing teleology: The place of synchronic usage patterns among processes of diachronic development. In Sonia Cristofaro & Fernando Zúñiga (eds.), Typological hierarchies in synchrony and diachrony, 111–128. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Murelli, Adriano. 2011. Relative constructions in European non-standard varieties. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nicholas, Nick. 1998. The story of pu: The grammaticalisation in space and time of a Modern Greek complementiser. Melbourne: University of Melbourne.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Poletto, Cecilia & Emanuela Sanfelici. 2017. Relative clauses. In Andreas Dufter & Elizabeth Stark (eds.), Manual of Romance morphosyntax and syntax, 804–846. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Price, Glanville. 2008. A comprehensive French grammar. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Radford, Andrew. 2019. Relative clauses: Structure and variation in everyday English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Romaine, Suzanne. 1984. Towards a typology of relative-clause formation strategies in Germanic. In Jacek Fisiak (ed.), Historical Syntax, 437–470. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rubin, Aaron D. 2005. Studies in Semitic grammaticalization. Winona Lake (Indiana): Eisenbrauns. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Serianni, Luca. 2006 [1989]. Grammatica italiana: italiano comune e lingua letteraria. Suoni, forme, costrutti. Torino: UTET.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shagal, Ksenia. 2019. Participles: A typological study. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shibatani, Masayoshi. 1991. Grammaticization of topic into subject. In Elizabeth C. Traugott & Bernd Heine (eds.), Approaches to grammaticalization, Vol. 2, Types of grammatical markers, 93–134. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shirai, Yasuhiro & Hiromi Ozeki. 2007. The acquisition of relative clauses and the noun phrase accessibility hierarchy: A universal in SLA? Introduction. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 29(2).155–167.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Smits, Helena J. 2017. A grammar of Lumun. Leiden: Rijksuniversiteit te Leiden PhD dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Song, Jae Jung. 2002. Linguistic typology and language acquisition: The accessibility hierarchy and relative clauses. Language Research 38(2). 729–756.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Stolz, Thomas, Sander Lestrade & Stolz Christel. 2014. The crosslinguistics of zero-marking of spatial relations. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Topping, Donald M. 1973. Chamorro reference grammar. Honolulu: University of Hawaii. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wang, Peter, Robert Hunt, Jeff McGriff & Richard E. Elkins. 2006. The Grammar of Matigsalug Manobo. The Summer Institute of Linguistics and the University of Texas at Arlington. Available at [URL] (last access 10 April 2021).
Watke, Bruce K. & Michael P. O’Connor. 1990. An introduction to Biblical Hebrew syntax. Winona Lake (Indiana): Eisenbrauns.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wheeler, Max, Alan Yates & Nicolau Dols. 1999. Catalan: A comprehensive grammar. London: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yap, Foong Ha, Karen Grunow-Hårsta & Janick Wrona. 2011. Introduction. In Foong Ha Yap, Karen Grunow-Hårsta & Janick Wrona (eds.), Nominalization strategies in Asian languages, 1–60. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Corpora
American National Corpus: [URL]
Enquêtes Sociolinguistiques à Orléans (ESLO Corpus): [URL]
ParlaTO Corpus: [URL]
Santa Barbara Corpus of Spoken American Eglish (SBC): [URL]
Cited by (5)

Cited by five other publications

Abunya, Levina Nyameye
2025. The grammaticalization path of the Kaakye relative clause marker. Folia Linguistica DOI logo
Cattafi, Eleonora
2025. 209The Accessibility Hierarchy in Post-Classical Greek between Syntax and Sociolinguistics. In Subordination and Insubordination in Post-Classical Greek, ► pp. 209 ff. DOI logo
Hagemeijer, Tjerk, Rita Gonçalves & Nélia Alexandre
2024. Spatial Locative Relativization in Three African Varieties of Portuguese: Unity in Diversity and Diversity in Unity. Languages 9:3 ► pp. 83 ff. DOI logo
Almeida, Milena Aparecida, Rosane Andrade Berlinck & Stephen Levey
2023. Confronting Grammatical Ideology with Usage: Toward a Socially Realistic Account of Spoken Portuguese. In Understanding Linguistic Prejudice, ► pp. 85 ff. DOI logo
Moser, Ann-Marie
2023. The ups and downs of relative particles in German diachrony. Journal of Historical Linguistics 13:3 ► pp. 461 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 2 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.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue