¿Gramaticalización o desgramaticalización? El reanálisis y subjetivación de verbos como marcadores discursivos en la historia del español

Abstract

The paper analyzes the syntactic and semantic properties of subjectification processes, and posses the theoretical problem whether subjectification is a grammaticalization, defined in the traditional way as a change from lexicon to grammar, or is a degrammaticalization. The paper makes explicit that there exists quite a transparent inverse correlation between the quantity of syntax a form needs and the subjective meaning that form conveys: more syntax = objectivity, or less subjectivity, and, on the contrary, less, or even zero syntax = subjectivity; structural weight is inversely proportional to pragmatic subjective weight. The paper examines the verbs that evolved into discourse markers in the history of Spanish, and focuses on their syntactic and semantic features: weakening of referencial meaning, loss of the agent's control, fronting and broadening of the predication scope, atelicity, high frequency, etc. The mechanism allowing the path full verb > discourse marker is always a reanalys. The paper also shows that frequency of use is a fundamental symptom of change in progress.