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In:New Trends in Grammaticalization and Language Change
Edited by Sylvie Hancil, Tine Breban and José Vicente Lozano
[Studies in Language Companion Series 202] 2018
► pp. 55–74

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Functional similarity despite geographical distance

On the grammaticalization of German mal and Chinese yíxià

 | FU Berlin | Universität Freiburg
 | Universität Freiburg
Published online: 6 December 2018
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https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.202.03koe
German mal is the reduced version of einmal, i.e. of a construction combining the numeral ‘one’ with a noun originally denoting a salient local unit and later salient temporal units (occasions, frequency). The final stage of the development was a process of desemanticization of the frequency use from ‘minimal frequency’ to ‘minimal effort’.
This article pursues the following goals:
i.
to analyze a discourse marker in German (i.e. mal), both diachronically and synchronically, that has never received a coherent and convincing analysis so far and has no clear counterpart in neighboring languages;
ii.
to show that a highly similar pattern and target of grammaticalization can be found in Mandarin Chinese (i.e. yíxià);
iii.
to argue that similarities in processes of grammaticalization may be due to cognitive principles, rather than to contact or genealogical affiliation.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.German mal : A historical reconstruction
  • 3.Previous views on mal
  • 4.From ‘minimal frequency’ to ‘minimal effort’
  • 5.Mandarin yíxià
  • 6.Historical development of 一下 yíxià
  • 7.Previous views on yíxià
  • 8.From ‘minimal frequency’ to ‘minimal duration/effort’
  • 9.Summary and conclusions
  • Examples in Chinese characters
  • Notes
  • References
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