First and corresponding author: Kristin Davidse
Second author: Simon De Wolf
Address: University of Leuven, Linguistics Department, Blijde-Inkomststraat 21, B3000 Leuven, Belgium
Tel. +32 [0]16 32 48 11
Fax: +32 [0]16 32 47 67
Email corresponding author: kristin.davidse@arts.kuleuven.be
Home phone corresponding author: +32 [0]16 62 29 25
Full title of article: Lexicalization and grammaticalization: the development of idioms
and grammaticalized expressions with no question
Short title of the article (for running head): Lexicalization and grammaticalization:
(there’s) no question
Word count (all inclusive): 7,996
Character count (with spaces): 52,760
Lexicalization and grammaticalization: the development of idioms and
grammaticalized expressions with no question1
1. Introduction
In Present-day English, the string no question is used mainly to modally qualify a
proposition, i.e. with grammatical meaning, either as adverbial (1) or as part of a
clause (2)-(3). As pointed out by Kjellmer (1998), there are two modal clausal
structures, expressing opposite polarity values. There’s no question followed by a
finite clause is always positive, as in (2), which can be paraphrased as ‘he definitely
must stay’. There’s no question of + gerund conveys negative polarity, as in (3),
which means ‘Her Majesty will NOT turn up unannounced on your doorstep’.
(1)
You have to be mentally strong but too many of our players jacked it in. There
will be changes on Saturday, no question.” (WB)2
(2)
He's better than our two former managers ... The best clubs have continuity at
the top. There is no question he must stay. (WB)
(3)
There’s no question of Her Majesty turning up on your doorstep unannounced.
(WB)
Less commonly, no question is also used lexically, as in the semi-fixed idioms
illustrated in (4) and (5). We identified two idioms with the form there be no/never
any/etc. question. In (4), the expression means ‘not be challenged’ (OED VIII: 48),
while in (5) it means ‘not be an issue’ (with question used in the sense of ‘subject of
discussion’, OED VIII: 48).
(4)
... for Tolkien, Rickettsia quintana proved a life-saver. The army was
notoriously suspicious about any attempt to `cry off sick', but there was no
question about Tolkien 's condition. (WB)
(5)
We also wanted to know if he wanted anything out of it, and because there was
no question of payment, ..., we felt reassured that he really was doing it for us.
(WB)
The synchronic presence of idiomatic and grammatical layers suggests that processes
of both lexicalization and grammaticalization took place. This article sets out to
reconstruct these processes on the basis of diachronic and synchronic data described
in Section 2.
Lehmann
(2002)
has
proposed that lexicalization often precedes
the
grammaticalization of periphrastic expressions. As we will show, the development of
the clausal structures with (no) question is a case in point. We will reconstruct the
formation of the two idioms, ‘be (un)challengeable’ and ‘be (not) at issue’, and we
will examine how they relate diachronically to the two grammaticalized modal
patterns, the positive and the negative one (Section 3). This requires us to spell out the
recognition criteria of lexicalized versus grammaticalized uses in the concrete analysis
of our data (Sections 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4). In these sections, we will focus mainly on
criterial syntagmatic features, taking a functional-structural approach as developed in
Langacker (1999), Halliday (1994), Hopper & Traugott (2003) and Boye & Harder
(2007). The history of the clausal patterns with (no) question also forms the occasion
for us to contribute a more personal position to the current theoretical debate about the
difference between lexicalization and grammaticalization. Taking our inspiration from
the (neo-)Firthian tradition (Firth 1951/1957), we will propose that lexicalization and
grammaticalization lead to different types of paradigmatic organization. A lexicalized
item imposes lexicosemantically motivated collocational and colligational relations,
while grammaticalizing elements come to express meaning options, with their typical
interdependencies, from grammatical systems (Section 3.5).
We will also study the origin and development of modal adverbial no question.
Simon-Vandenbergen’s (2007: 32) study of there is no doubt and no doubt found that
the chronology in which these expressions emerged is compatible with the hypothesis
that the adverbial developed by ellipsis from the clausal structures. As ellipsis could
also be considered the possible origin of no question, we will investigate whether this
adverbial resulted via ellipsis from the clausal structures (Section 4). Conclusions will
be formulated in Section 5.
2. Data
The noun question occurs from c.1300 in English, which made it necessary to collect
diachronic data from Middle English on. We used the Penn-Helsinki Parsed Corpus of
Middle English (PPCME), the Penn-Helsinki Parsed Corpus of Early Modern English
(PPCEME), and the Corpus of Late Modern English Texts (CLMETEV). As we
wanted to trace how the strong association of question with negative quantifier came
about, we included all nominal hits, manifesting all the early variation in the
expressions with question. In total, this diachronic dataset contained 5,289 tokens.
The synchronic dataset was compiled from WordbanksOnline corpus. For reasons
of comparability with the diachronic data, we extracted data from written British
English sources only. As our focus in Present-day English was on the uses of the
highly entrenched expressions with no question, we took a random sample of 250 hits,
obtained by the search string no question.
3. The lexicalization and grammaticalization of clauses with no question
3.1. Middle English (1150-1500)
The earliest examples in which question is followed by a complement are from
Middle English, occurring between 1350 and 1420. They are all instances of a now
obsolete composite predicate make + question. which meant ‘put a question’, ‘ask’
(OED XIII: 47). The different determiners that could precede question, a, Ø, this,
show that this was a semi-fixed idiom. It started out taking prepositional phrase
complements, e.g. (6), but, from 1420 on, the predicate is also attested with clausal
complements, as in (7).
(6)
And Joon was not git sent in to prisoun. Therfor a questioun was maad of
Jonys disciples with the Jewis, of the purificatioun. (PPCME, 1350-1420)
(7)
And tei tat were gadered to go with him, if tei mad question to what entent tei
schuld rise, ... (PPCME, 1420-1500)
We view the formation of this composite predicate as lexicalization in the sense of the
conventionalized association of a specific sense with a combination of words at the
level of the lexicon (Blank 2001: 1603). Make a/Ø question behaves as a lexical item
in that its meaning ‘ask’ constrains the complements it can take: either of / about +
NP (6) or indirectly reported question (7). It is also ‘addressable’ as the main point of
the utterance, e.g. was a question really made of the purification? (6). This is, as
argued by Boye & Harder (2007: 581-585), characteristic of the lexical use of
complement-taking predicates and correlates with its primary information status in
discourse usage.
3.2. Early Modern English (1500-1710)
In Early Modern English, the composite predicate make a/Ø question developed
another meaning. Example (8) can still be interpreted as the President asking
questions about the Earl of Ormond’s Liberties, but also, in the light of the contextual
clue bringe the Liberties into dispute, as ‘calling the Erle’s liberties into question’. In
other words, (8) is a bridging context in which we see make question develop the
meaning of ‘challenge’.
(8)
But the President tooke it in ill Part, and wrote a sharpe Letter … unto the
Erle’s Officers ... wherein he did sharpely reprend them, ... that being learned
and wise, would bringe the Liberties into dispute, by making of undue
Excuses. He did assure them that he had not byn yet of Mynd to make any
Question of the Erle of Ormonds Liberties; (PPCEME, 1570-1640)
Also in the Early Modern English period, between 1500 and 1570, the first
existential examples occur. They contain different verbs besides be, e.g. arise in (9)
and be proponed in (10), but all describe that ‘a question was asked’. These existential
expressions have the same two complementation types as make Ø/a question in its
‘ask’ sense: either a prepositional phrase, as in (9), or a reported question, as in (10).
(9)
And ther arose a question bitwene Iohns disciplines and the Iewes a bout
purifiynge. (PPCEME, 1500-1570)
(10)
After this were there certaine questions among his councell proponed, whether
the king needed in case to have any scruple at all, and if he had, what way
were best to be taken to deliver him of it. (PPCEME, 1500-1570)
We view these semi-fixed phrases as lexicalizations for the same reasons as adduced
for make Ø/a question in section 3.1, i.e. their sanctioning of specific complements
and their primary discourse status.
As was the case with make Ø/a question, the existential expressions also
shifted to a different meaning, illustrated in (11), where there hath ben question of his
safty means ‘his safety had been at stake’. In examples like (11) we see the emergence
of there be question as a semi-fixed idiom meaning ‘be at issue’, which has persisted
into Present-day English.
(11)
considering how many of ours, wee haue sacrificed for his sake, and how little
wee haue weighed Vtility, when there hath ben question of his safty.
(PPCEME, 1570-1640)
4.3. Late Modern English (1710-1920)
It is in the Late Modern English period that the clausal structures with question begin
to occur with some frequency. Table 1 gives the occurrences and relative frequencies
of the three structure types for the three historical periods. It shows that the Late
Modern English data turned up 139 tokens as opposed to 7 in Early Modern English.
Structure type
Existential
Copular
Make question
Adverb
TOTAL
Middle English
n
%
0
0%
0
0%
5
100%
0
0%
5
Early Modern English
n
%
4
40%
0
0%
3
30%
3
30%
10
Late Modern English
n
%
73
51.8%
44
31.2%
22
15.6%
2
1.4
141
Table 1: Absolute and relative frequencies of structure types across time periods
The make question pattern started off the whole development, but by Late Modern
English it had become the least common and the existential structures had become the
most frequent, while copular structures like it is no question were the second most
common pattern.
There are not only quantitative changes, the network of structures and meanings
associated with question is also amplified and diversified. Importantly, the two
idiomatic patterns, meaning ‘challenge’ and ‘be at issue’, both specialize towards
negative contexts with no question. It is then that they start on the road to
grammaticalization, one towards positive modal meaning and the other towards
negative modal meaning. The lexicalization processes not only precede and enable
grammaticalization by pre-forming the periphrastic grammaticalizing expressions,
but, as we will show, they also semantically determine the specific resulting modal
meanings.
3.3.1. From ‘be unchallengeable’ to positive modal marker
The meaning of ‘challenge’ expressed previously by make Ø/a question is now also
found in existential examples, e.g. (12). The idiom specializes for negative contexts,
and tends to be accompanied by intensifying elements, e.g. not the least in (12),
yielding the meaning ‘not be challengeable at all’.
(12)
There is not the least question of its being original: one might as well doubt the
originality of King Patapan! (CLMETEV, 1710-1780)
In (12), there is not the least question of its being original is addressable as the
utterance’s main claim (‘can one really not challenge its originality?’), which is reformulated and re-asserted by the following clause one might as well doubt the
originality. There is not the least question in (12) is thus a primary lexical use,
attesting to a second lexicalization process in which the form there be no question
came to be conventionally associated with the meaning ‘be not challengeable’.
This new idiom is always followed by a complement clause. Importantly, this
complementation construction is fundamentally different from the earlier one
meaning ‘ask’ illustrated in (10). In (10) we have an instance of reported speech,
consisting of a represented speech situation, were there certaine questions proponed,
and indirectly reported questions. By contrast, (12) is a factive construction: its being
original is a complement that is presupposed true (Kiparsky & Kiparsky 1971) and
the matrix there is not the least question of explicitly evaluates and emphasizes the
truth of this complement. With the shift from reported speech to factive construction,
the nature of the complement changes from question to statement. Non-finite its being
original is functionally a statement: there is not the least question that ‘it is original’.
It is this idiom with negative sense ‘be unchallengeable’ that grammaticalizes
into a positive emphatic modal marker, as illustrated in (13).
(13)
there is no question but the regard to general good is much enforced by the
respect to particular. … where the greatest public wrong is also conjoined with
a considerable private one, no wonder the highest disapprobation attends so
iniquitous a behaviour. (CLMETEV, 1710-1780)
Example (13) shows a reversal of the discursive nucleus-margin relation (Hopper &
Traugott 2003: 207-9). The primary point of the utterance is the regard to general
good is much enforced by respect for the particular, as shown by its addressability by
a really-query (is it really enforced?) and tag (is it?) (Boye & Harder 2007). The
structural matrix there is no question has become secondary in the discourse in that it
functions, as is typical of a grammatical element, as an operator or modifier of the
proposition. In contrast with examples (7) and (10), it is not addressable as the main
point of the utterance. It expresses he speaker’s modal comment, paraphraseable as
‘definitely’, on the content of what s/he is saying. This goes together with scope
expansion: whereas lexical uses of there be no question have a scopal relation to their
phrasal (7) or clausal complement (12) only, there is no question in (13) functions on
a global utterance level (Brinton 2008: 131). Its modal reading is contextually
supported by the following adverbial, no wonder, which modifies the statement
strongly condemning a public wrong because it is also a private wrong, i.e. a
reformulation of the proposition emphasized by there’s no question.
The same evolution towards modal marker takes hold of the other idiomatic
clausal structures meaning ‘be unchallengeable’. This development is illustrated in
(14) for the pattern with make (a/no) question.
(14)
Till I cried out: “You prove yourself so able,
Pity! You was not Druggerman at Babel;
For had they found a linguist half so good
I make no question but the tower had stood.” (CLMETEV, 1710-1780)
There is discursive reversal of the nucleus-margin relation, as shown by the fact that
the conditional clause in (14), for had they found a linguist half so good, clearly
relates to the complement rather than the matrix. I make no question but functions as
emphatic positive modal marker of the claim the tower had stood. Like a number of
emerging existential modal markers of that period, including (13) above, it has
complementizer but, a use sanctioned by the negation in the structural matrix (OED I:
1212). The no question but (that) pattern adds an emphatic meaning element.
The grammaticalization of the copular idiomatic pattern expressing ‘nonchallengeability’ progresses more slowly. For instance, in (15) it can be no question,
which echoes the primary assertion may be reasonably supposed, is still more
propositional than the other matrices in (13) and (14). The copular matrices continue
to take indirect questions, but some of these can be interpreted as rhetorical
statements. In (15), the indirect questions express the possible alternatives, but the
context signals that surely the only option is that ‘it be pressed forward’.
(15)
It may, therefore, be reasonably supposed that the propriety of a law to prevent
the exportation of victuals is admitted, and surely it can be no question,
whether it ought to be pressed forward, or to be delayed till it will be of no
effect. (CLMETEV, 1710-1780)
The pragmatic meaning of (15) is thus emphasis of a desired path of action, conveyed
by the deontic modal ought to. What is marked here as incontrovertible is not a truth
claim, but an obligation, i.e. a deontic statement.
Once the positive modal use of the clausal structures with no question was in
place, it extended quickly from qualifying truth-claims to qualifying desired actions.
From 1850 on, there be no question, is found with deontic statements, e.g. (16).
(16)
At present the receiving apparatus is fixed on only some 650 steamers of the
merchant marine ... . There is no question that it should be installed, along with
wireless apparatus, on every ship of over 1000 tons gross tonnage.
(CLMETEV, 1850-1920)
Summing up, the change from lexical matrix clause to positive modal marker
coincides with the extension of the ‘challenge’-idiom to other clausal structures (than
with make) and to negative contexts. After all, in the negative sense of ‘being
unquestionable’ for which it is specialized since Late Modern English, the lexicalized
clauses are very close to the meaning of the grammaticalized comment clauses
(‘definitely’). It is plausible, then, to assume that the negative idioms’ polarity
determined the polarity of the modal comment clauses as emphatically positive.
3.3.2. From ‘not be at issue’ to negative modal marker
The second idiomatized pattern, there be (no) question of in the sense of ‘be at issue’,
specializes for negative contexts and increases in frequency some 150 years later than
the ‘challenge’-idioms, between 1850 and 1920. Before, it was exclusively followed
by prepositional phrases, e.g. (17), but from 1850 on, the expression can take clausal
complements, in the form of non-finite clauses, e.g. (18) and (19). Some of these are
liable to modal inferences. In (18), for instance, inviting him was never raised as an
issue, as contextually supported by The latter never spoke of. At the same time, the
fact that inviting him was never spoken of invites the inference that there was no
willingness to invite him. Example (18) can pragmatically be interpreted as absence
of volition, with the negation in there was no question of transferred to the implied
modal notion of willingness. Likewise, there is no question of in (19) invites modal
meanings of impossibility (with the fallen horse surrounded by traffic one cannot first
debate how he came to fall) or absence of permission (pity with the overworked horse
ethically forbids not getting him up). Here too, the negation in the matrix applies to
the proposition in the complement clause. In fact, on their grammaticalized readings,
(18) and (19) have what is known as NEG-raising, i.e. the negation applies to the
complement clause. This “necessarily goes with grammatical, inherently nonaddressable CTP [complement-taking-predicate, K.D., SD] variants” (Boye & Harder
2007: 578).
(17)
There’s no question of the divine afflatus; that belongs to another sphere of
life. (CLMETEV, 1850-1920)
(18)
Marian, however, visited them at their lodgings frequently; now and then she
met Jasper there. The latter never spoke of her father, and there was no
question of inviting him to repeat his call. (CLMETEV, 1850-1920)
(19)
When in the streets of London a Cab Horse, weary or careless or stupid, trips
and falls and lies stretched out in the midst of the traffic there is no question of
debating how he came to stumble before we try to get him on his legs again.
(CLMETEV, 1850-1920)
These examples show how there is no question acquired negative value: it conveyed
(or allowed to infer) the negation of modal notions such as possibility, permission or
volition. The resulting reading is a statement in which a deontic-dynamic concept is
negated: all these examples pertain to possible or desirable actualization of actions
(Lyons 1977: 823).
In the emergence of the negative modal marker use, lexicalization and
grammaticalization are again tightly entwined. The meaning of the idiom ‘not be
raised as an issue’ shifted to negation of dynamic or deontic modality. Example (20)
shows that the negative modal marker use of there be no question could also be
followed by finite clauses in Late Modern English.
(20) there was no question that he personally was to capture and fight the great
machine. (CLMETEV, 1850-1920)
In (20), the proposition contains the dynamic modal was to expressing subjectinherent necessity (Palmer 2001), which is negated by there was no question.
3.4. Present-day English
For Present-day English, we follow up only the patterns with no question, as it was
these that acquired grammatical modal meaning in Late Modern English. The main
aim of this section is to systematize the functional-structural patterns realized by
clauses with no question in Present-day English, to complete the developmental
picture traced in the previous sections. Our 250 token random sample contained 228
clauses, with the existentials dominating strongly with 226 tokens. They appeared
almost exclusively sentence-initially, viz. in 97.3%. The remaining two clausal
structures contained I have no question followed by a prepositional phrase with about.
The discussion of the data sample will focus on the existential examples. Table 2
represents the distribution of lexical(ized) and grammaticalized uses across the
sample.
Uses
lexical noun + complement clause
lexical ‘unchallengeable’
lexical ‘not at stake’
positive modal: epistemic
positive modal: dynamic/deontic
negative modal: dynamic/deontic
negative modal: epistemic
TOTAL
n
2
28
40
76
10
44
25
226
%
1
12.5
17.5
34
4.5
19.5
11
100
Table 2: Uses of there-clauses in WB sample
The smaller proportion of existential examples, 74, or 33%, involve lexical uses. In
two, we find a pattern not attested in the historical data: the lexical noun question as
such (not as part of a composite predicate) sanctions a complement clause. Using
noun complement clauses, Example (21) from our sample describes an educational
policy document about maths teaching: it does not contain any question addressing
whether the child understands the concept, but merely statements about children
learning to read and recognize digits.
(21)
There are statements that a child will be able to read and recognise a four-digit
number for example but no question on whether the child understands the
concept." (WB)
All the other examples have the lexicalized semi-fixed idioms that emerged in Early
and Late Modern English. The ‘not be challengeable’-idioms, which appeared around
1700, form 12.5% of the sample. The notion or proposition potentially under
challenge is still expressed either by a prepositional phrase, as in (4) above, or a
clausal complement, e.g. (22). The primary status of the idiom in the utterance is
typically brought out by contrastive or equivalent assertions in the discourse context.
In (4) the army’s usual wariness of soldiers crying off sick is contrasted with their not
questioning Tolkien’s condition, which is hence addressable: was there really no
question of his condition? (Boye & Harder 2006: 581). In (22) the exclusion of doubt
expressed by there was no question is preceded by equivalent make certain.
(22)
To make certain, we continued until there was no question that what we were
looking at was the runway. (WB)
The ‘not be an issue’-idioms, which emerged around 1850, account for 17.5% of the
sample. They take nominal complements, as in (5), in a majority of cases (90%).
Clausal complements, as in (23), are very restricted (10%). In these examples, the
meaning of an idea not being (raised as) an issue is also supported by contextual
elements such as and there never was any question in (23).
(23)
He said: `Craig is under contract until the end of the next World Cup
campaign, and that won't change. There's absolutely no question of him
leaving, and there never was any question no matter what happened at
Wembley. (WB)
The grammaticalized modal uses of the existential pattern form, with 152 out of
226, the majority of our sample. They have come to realize in Present-day English a
full-fledged system of modality-cum-polarity. Their polarity value has crystallized in a
systematic association with complement types: there be no question + (that) + finite
clause functions as positive emphatic marker and there be no question of + gerund
functions as negative marker. These are the systematic correlations between polarity
and complement types identified by Kjellmer (1998) for Present-day English. The
fledgling extension of finite complements to the negative marker observed in Late
Modern English (example 20) seems not to have persisted.
Importantly, both polarity types can now modify either epistemic or deonticdynamic statements. The positive marker uses, which started off modifying truth
claims, had already extended to desired actions in Late Modern English, as in (16).
This extension is confirmed in our Present-day English data, with examples such as
(2) above, There is no question he must stay, even though epistemic claims remain the
more common option, viz. 76 tokens versus 10 dynamic-deontic statements. The
negative modal marker there be no question of + gerund, which had started off
conveying deontic-dynamic meanings, have come to also convey epistemic meanings,
as in (3) above, There’s no question of Her Majesty turning up on your doorstep
unannounced. Epistemic uses were not attested in our Late Modern English data, but
in the present-day sample total 25 tokens against 44 deontic-dynamic uses.
The two possessive clauses with prepositional phrase, e.g. (24), in our sample are
lexical uses in which have no question means ‘not challenge’, much like the there be
no question-idiom illustrated in (12). However, a quick search on the Internet reveals
that I have no question is also used in a secondary, grammaticalized way, in which it
approaches the status of a positive epistemic modifier, e.g. (25). The same holds for
copular matrices: the Internet contains examples like (26) in which they function as a
parenthetical expressing strong certainty.
(24)
I have met many homosexuals with equally unshakable masculine gender
identity. They have no question about their maleness. (WB)
(25)
Had he played a full year, I have no question he'd have been the consensus #1.
(http://forums.rotoworld.com/index.php?/topic/267200-kyrie-irving-20112012/page__st__40)
(26)
Christ suffered for us, it is no question, .. .(http://biblelight.net/gospel-2.htm)
Referring back to the historical data, we can see I have no question as the expression
that took over the grammaticalized uses from obsolete I make no question in (14).
And, whereas the copular clauses were still used mainly propositionally in Late
Modern English, e.g. (15), they have now established clearly grammaticalized uses. A
casual Internet search did not reveal any examples of possessives or copulars with no
question qualifying deontic statements and they are definitely not used with negative
polarity value. The possessive and copular clauses thus have not developed anything
approaching the extended system of polar and modal values of there’s no question.
3.5. Differences between lexicalization and grammaticalization
In the previous sectiosn we have seen that the distinction between lexicalization and
grammaticalization is crucial to the developmental paths of clausal expressions with
(no) question. There is a general consensus that grammaticalization and lexicalization
share many features, which makes it difficult to differentiate the one from the other
(Lehmann 2002, Brinton & Traugott 2005). Both affect larger syntagms, not
individual items, and involve semantic erosion, fusion and fixing of the component
elements. However, according to Lehmann (2002: 13), a grammaticalized unit is
accessed “analytically”, whereas lexicalized units are accessed “holistically”, because
its internal relations have “become irregular and get lost” (2002: 13). On this view,
‘lexicalization’ applies only to complex forms becoming unanalyzable wholes as in
fossilization and univerbation (Himmelmann 2004: 28).
A broader view of lexicalization can be based on the approach to idiomatic
patterns advocated by Sinclair (1991: 110), Nunberg, Sag & Wasow (1999) and
Langacker (1999: 344) amongst others. They point out that many idioms are only
semi-fixed and tend to keep a degree of analyzability and internal variability. These
insights bear, in our view, also on the diachronic process of lexicalization. To define
and recognize lexicalization, we take the result of the process of change as criterial. If
change produces a linguistic element with a specific contentful meaning, functioning
as a lexical item, we consider it lexicalization31. We have seen that in the formation of
idiomatic patterns with light verb and deverbal noun such as make a/Ø question, there
be a/Ø question, the NP keeps some of its modification possibilities (e.g. choice of
determiner), adverbs may be added, e.g. never any question, and the verb can vary
too, e.g. make/have no question.
In our discussion of the data, we have made the distinction between
grammaticalization and lexicalization mainly on the basis of differences on the
syntagmatic axis. We have followed Boye & Harder’s (2007) criteria for
distinguishing between lexical and grammaticalized uses of complement-taking
predicates on the basis of their having primary or secondary discourse usage status.
Giving full weight to the discourse context, we applied tests relating to
‘addressability’ such as really-queries, tags, NEG-raising, and modification by a
subordinate clause, e.g. (15), (25).
Useful as these syntagmatic tests are for distinguishing lexicalized from
grammaticalized uses, they do not constitute the whole picture. Linguistic patterning
is not only present on the syntagmatic, but also on the paradigmatic axis. We want to
argue that the fundamental differences between lexicalization and grammaticalization
lie, besides primariness and secondariness in discourse usage, in the different
paradigmatic relations contracted by elements that have become lexical or
grammatical. We therefore first have to elucidate the different types of paradigmatic
configurations that lexical items and grammatical elements are defined by.
We adhere to the (neo-)Firthian view that it is an essential feature of lexical items
that they impose collocational constraints on the lexical items they co-occur with,
1
This is the definition of lexicalization proposed by Blank (2001:1603). The main alternative approach
makes features of the process of change itself criterial (see Himmelmann 2004, Brinton & Traugott
2005). For Trousdale (forthc.), these are a decrease in generality, a decrease in productivity, and no
change, or decrease, in the compositionality of the construction.
and, as members of lexical sets, colligational constraints on specific syntactic
structures they pattern with. As rightly stressed by Sinclair (1991), lexical meaning
does not reside solely in the lexical ‘node’. Rather, the semantic structure of a lexical
item is determined by its coselection of specific (sets of) collocates. This is a
distributional view of lexical meaning, according to which the collocates are
diagnostic of a lexical item’s meaning. For instance, (partial) synonymy can be
established in terms of similarity between collocate clouds (e.g. De Deyne, Peirsman
& Storms 2009).
Petré, Davidse & Van Rompaey (forthc.) have applied this thinking to the strings
be on (the/one’s) way/road to, which have lexicalized composite predicate uses
(meaning ‘go to/head for + spatial goal’) and grammaticalized aspectual uses (which
mean ‘be going to + action/state/event’). Extensive corpus-based study showed that
the composite predicate uses clearly behave as lexical items in imposing the
coselection of spatial goals or coercing this meaning onto action-state-event goals
(such as be on one’s way to work/a party, etc). As is typical of (largely) synonymous
lexical items, they share many collocational restrictions while still displaying distinct
preferences. Be on the/one’s road to co-occurs mainly with names of towns and with
the fixed phrase road to nowhere. This can be explained by the persistence of road’s
very concrete lexical meaning of “An ordinary line of communication used by persons
passing between different places” (OED2). Be on the/one’s way to, by contrast,
collocates with more diversified spatial nouns, which may be towns, countries,
continents, or landmarks such as the airport, the coast and a quarter of their collocates
are action-state-event nouns such as incident, picnic, etc. This more diversified
distribution of collocates is probably motivated by the more abstract meaning of way,
viz. “course of travel or movement” (OED2).
In contrast with composite predicates such as be on the/one’s road/way to, whose
lexical semantics predispose them to spatial collocates, the semi-fixed idioms with
(no) question impose, like the corresponding simple predicates ask, question, clear
colligational restrictions, that is, they predict co-occurrence with specific syntactic
structures4. As is to be expected of lexical uses of complement-taking predicates
describing locutions, they take either prepositional phrases specifying the ‘matter’
(Halliday 1994: 157) being asked about or questioned, or clausal complements,
typically of the reported question type. These colligational patterns are motivated by a
general semantic feature in the predicate, e.g. ‘ask’, which needs to be completed by
the specific content of the complement (Langacker 1999: 28), e.g. ‘about x’, ‘whether
or not x’. In this respect, the idioms with (no) question behave wholly like the lexical
uses of simple complement-taking predicates, which argues for viewing their
formation as lexicalization5.
We now turn to the question what form of paradigmatic organization characterizes
grammatical elements. To answer this, we turn again to the Firthian tradition, more
specifically, Halliday’s (1992) thought about the paradigmatic organization of the
grammar. Halliday views the oppositions within a grammatical paradigm not so much
as obtaining between its members, as in the tradition of Jakobson (1971 [1939]), but,
at a more abstract level, as obtaining between semantic features associated with the
members. By conceiving of systemic oppositions in terms of features, it is possible to
capture the interdependencies between features from different systems. Which terms
of one system combine with the terms of another system is constitutive of the larger
grammatical system.
We noted in Section 3.4 that in Present-day English the positive and negative
modal markers have both come to combine with either epistemic or deontic-dynamic
modality. We are now in a position to explicate the systemic changes involved in this.
In Late Modern English, the grammaticalized clausal there-structures presented
language users with the possibility of expressing the following combinations of terms
from polarity and modality:
positive + epistemic
there’s no question (that)
external negation + dynamic/deontic
there’s no question of
Figure 1. Meaning options for there’s no question that/of in Late Modern English
There’s no question + finite clause realized a positive epistemic qualification of a
proposition, as in (13). There’s no question of + gerund conveyed external negation of
dynamic-deontic qualifications of non-actualized situations, e.g. (18), (19). The latter
combination illustrates a typical systemic interdependency. It is characteristic of the
dynamic-deontic notions of possibility, permission and volition that they take external
negation, which cancels the modality. As we saw, the modal reading of (18) There
was no question of inviting him is ‘there was no willingness to invite him’. The
negation is external in that it bears on and negates the modal notion of willingness.
In the period from the end of Late Modern English to Present Day English, the
grammaticalizing expressions extended to the modal types they had not previously
associated with. Positive marker there’s no question that extended to deontic
statements and negative marker there’s no question of to epistemic statements. As a
consequence, the latter was dis-sociated from its exclusive combination with external
negation. as illustrated by (3), There’s no question of Her Majesty turning up on your
doorstep (‘there is (near-)certainty that Her Majesty will not turn up on your
doorstep’).The negation is internal to the proposition being qualified as near-certain.
Moreover, there’s no question of is now also found taking complements with
negation, expressing by virtue of this double negation, emphatically positive dynamicdeontic notions, e.g. possibility in (27), or strongly positive truth claims, as in (29).
(27)
when they showed me the X-ray which revealed only a small break, I knew
there was no question of me not being able to play again. (WB)
(28)
I am certain David will have some strong races for us. There’s no question of
him not being given identical equipment to Kimi or the full backing of the
team. (WB)
Likewise, there’s no question that is now no longer exclusively associated with the
expression of positive modal values. It can be followed by a clause containing a
negation, expressing internally negated epistemic modality (29) or externally negated
dynamic modality, e.g. absence of volition (30).
(29)
... there is absolutely no question, we didn't deserve to win that match. (WB)
(30)
There’s no question, no question. I’ll not mince my words. (WB)
What we witness here by way of change is “the dissociation of associated variables”
and “their subsequent combination” (Halliday 1992: 30) into a richer paradigmatic
resource, providing the language user with semantic possibilities that have much
increased for both there’s no question that (Figure 2) and there’s no question of
(Figure 3).
epistemic*
dynamic/deontic
positive*
internal negation
negative
external negation
Figure 2: Meaning options for no question that in Present-day English
dynamic/deontic*
epistemic
negative
external negation*
internal negation
positive
Figure 3: Meaning options for no question of in Present-day English
The options available for the two grammaticalized there-clauses now
approximate the possible combinations of semantic features codable by core modal
expressions such as auxiliary will, which can express both epistemic and
dynamic/deontic meanings, positive and negative polarity, and within the latter,
internal and external negation. However, with there be no question that/of, a number
of the features are still marked and infrequently chosen. The most common, unmarked
meaning options are starred in Figures 2 and 3, revealing as default combinations
epistemic + positive for there’s no question that and dynamic/deontic + external
negation for there’s no question of, i.e. the grammatical meanings that first became
conventionally associated with the patterns. Time will have to tell whether the
probabilities of choice will eventually come to coincide with those of established
modal expressions.
In any case, the changes just outlined involve what one might call increased
‘systemicness’. The grammaticalizing strings come to code more and more the
abstract paradigmatic meaning potential of core grammatical expressions. In this
sense, they offer a particularly clear example of progressive grammaticalization. On
this view, grammaticalization is not only about an expression acquiring one particular
grammatical meaning, but coming to express more and more combinations of
grammatical features. Grammaticalization is then also revealed to be a process in
which the acquisition of coding possibilities in one system is tied up with the
acquisition of coding possibilities in other systems. If this sort of process of change
can be observed, we are clearly dealing with grammaticalization, not lexicalization.
Lexicalization does not have systemic effects, as noted by Brinton & Traugott (2005).
We thus propose that increased systemicness is constitutive of grammaticalization.6
5. The emergence of adverb no question
The modal adverbial no question appears in the period between 1570 and 1640. Their
meaning is epistemic, with this modal notion understood “not only ... from a
truthfunctional point of view ... but from a rhetorical point of view” (SimonVandenbergen 2007: 30). The speaker certainty attaching to the propositions is
variable, see-sawing between certainty, as in (31), and probability, as in (32), where
modal will and in probability support a probability reading. All the adverbials have
positive orientation.
(31)
he will trade at sea as a merchant and hath innobled thereby that qualytye and
will no question in probabilytye be much more powerfull at sea (PPCEME,
1570-1640)
(32)
the most active or busie man that hath been or can bee, hath no question many
vacant times of leisure (PPCEME, 1570-1640)
That the adverb emerges at this point pleads against the hypothesis of its
development out of clausal structures. At that time, as shown in section 3.2, the
different matrices with question did not show any specialization for negative contexts
yet. In fact, there is not one single instance of a matrix containing no question before
the first adverbial data. Hence, a more acceptable explanation for the adverb is a
contemporaneous emergence with other adverbials containing the same noun. Without
any question (33) and out of question (34) also occur for the first time between 1570
and 1640. They have a comparable meaning, signalling that the proposition they relate
to is very likely or even certain.
(33)
he that doth assemble Power, if the King doth command him upon his
Allegiance to dissolve his Company, and he continue it, without any question it
is High-Treason. (PPCEME, 1570-1640)
(34)
Out of question they be innumerable which receiue helpe by going to the
cunning men. (PPCEME, 1570-1640)
It therefore seems more plausible that no question, without question and out of
question emerged by analogy with adverbials like no doubt, without doubt and out of
doubt, as well as no way and no wonder, which are attested two to three centuries
earlier in the OED and which were already entrenched in Early Modern English. They
all instantiated the schema (Langacker 1999: 261-288) ‘negation + modal noun’.7 The
presence of this set of similar adverbial constructions may well have triggered
(Traugott 2008) the emergence of the adverbials with negation + question. The
relations with the entrenched adverbials and amongst the various adverbials with
question appear to have been complex. Without question and out of question all figure
sentence-initially, while no question occurs exclusively in medial position in Early
Modern English. It moved towards final position in Late Modern English, the position
it typically takes in Present-day English. There are indications of a more specific
relation of analogy between no doubt and no question on account of their similarity in
terms of position and meaning. In Early Modern English, when no question emerged
in medial position, no doubt had just moved to medial position from the initial
position it occupied in Middle English, and both could convey either probability or
certainty in that period (De Wolf 2010: 38).
In Present-day English, the adverbial form no question is relatively rare in
comparison with the clausal structures, accounting for only 8.8 % as opposed to 91.2
% of clauses in our 250 token sample. All 22 hits in the sample are sentence-final, the
position it had shifted to in Late Modern English. The majority of these examples are
added as parentheticals, as in There will be changes on Saturday, no question (WB)
(1). No question grants the proposition extra emphasis and in Present-day English
always has the meaning of certainty, as shown by paraphrases such as absolutely or
definitely.
6. Conclusion
We set out in this diachronic-synchronic study of (there’s) no question with two
descriptive research questions. Regarding the clausal structures, mainly existential
ones, our aim was to reveal the paths of change that led to their current idiomatic and
grammaticalized uses. For the adverbial, we wanted to find out if it developed via
ellipsis from the clausal structures.
Diachronic study of the adverbial forms with question revealed that the adverb
emerges later than the clauses. However, the absence of clauses with negation
invalidates the hypothesis that the adverb is the result of ellipsis of the matrix clause.
The first occurrence of the phrase no question is in fact in the adverbial form in Early
Modern English. We suggested that no question, without question and out of question
probably emerged by analogy with adverbials like no doubt, without doubt and out of
doubt, as well as no way and no wonder, which were already entrenched in Early
Modern English.
The first attestations of question with complement clauses in Middle English and
Early Modern English were in composite predicates such as make question and
lexicalized clauses such as there be question, which first meant ‘ask’ and then
‘challenge’. In addition, there be question also acquired the meaning ‘be at issue’. In
Late Modern English, these two idiomatic patterns specialized for negative contexts
with the senses ‘be unchallengeable’ and ‘not be at issue’. It was these idiomatic
patterns that grammaticalized, resulting in positive modal content clauses and
negative modal markers respectively. The existentials with no question thus clearly
show how lexicalization can be a crucial step towards grammaticalization, not only
structurally, but also semantically and pragmatically.
This diachronic reconstruction also showed the importance of distinguishing
lexicalized from grammaticalized uses, a theoretical issue high on the agenda in
current grammaticalization studies. In this debate it is essential, we argued, to spell
out differences both in syntagmatic and paradigmatic patterning. On the syntagmatic
axis, we followed Boye & Harder’s (2007) recognition criteria for distinguishing
lexica(lized) from grammaticalized uses on the basis of their having primary or
secondary status in discourse usage. On the paradigmatic axis, we proposed that a
lexicalized item imposes lexicosemantically motivated collocational and colligational
relations, while grammaticalizing elements come to express more and more meaning
options, with their typical interdependencies, from grammatical systems. The
grammaticalized no question clauses are a good example of Halliday’s claim that the
dissociation of associated variables and the recombination of the independent
variables is an important ‘semogenic’ process, i.e. a process of change creating coding
possibilities for an enriched semantic resource (Halliday 1992: 27).
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1
We sincerely thank the three anonymous referees for their generous suggestions and insightful
comments, which suggested many extra dimensions to this study in comparison with the first version.
We also thank Srikant Sarangi for his helpful handling of the editorial process. We gratefully
acknowledge the financial support from the Interuniversity Attraction Poles programme (Belgian
Science Policy Office, project P6/44) Grammaticalization and (Inter-)Subjectification and by the
GOA-project 12/007, The multiple functional load of grammatical signs, awarded by the Leuven
Research Council.
2
All examples followed by (WB) were extracted from WordbanksOnline and are reproduced here by
permission of HarperCollins.
3
This is the definition of lexicalization proposed by Blank (2001:1603). The main alternative approach
makes features of the process of change itself criterial (see Himmelmann 2004, Brinton & Traugott
2005). For Trousdale (forthc.), these are a decrease in generality, a decrease in productivity, and no
change, or decrease, in the compositionality of the construction.
4
Firth defined colligation as groups of words considered as members of word classes predicting a
relation of syntactic structure (Robins 1980: 178).
5
A partly different approach to composite predicates is proposed by Brinton & Traugott (2005). They
suggest that there are two classes of composite predicates: relatively lexical ones such as curry favor
with, cast doubt on, and relatively grammatical ones, e.g. make a remark, take a walk, give a kiss,
which involve aspect. This position is in keeping with Trousdale (forthc.) who views composite
predicates such as have a bath as resulting (more) from grammaticalization but ones such as give a
roasting, from lexicalization.
6
This proposal is comparable in spirit to, but also different from Diewald & Smirnova’s (forthc.) views
on paradigmatizatic integration, which they argue is what distinguishes grammaticalization from
lexicalization. Paradigmatic integration involves grammaticalizing items slotting into existing
grammatical paradigms, and also falling into the systemic oppositions and the unmarked-marked
contrasts between the members of the paradigm (Jakobson 1971 [1939]). By contrast, Halliday (1992)
views the opposing terms in the systems as the abstract features being encoded and focuses on the
interdependencies between systems.
7
Traugott (2008) refers to a set of similar substantive (partially lexically filled) constructions as a
mesoconstruction.