Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T20:41:23.983Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 5 - Colloquialization I: Not-Contraction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 November 2021

Erik Smitterberg
Affiliation:
Uppsala Universitet, Sweden
Get access

Summary

The occurrence of not-contraction (e.g. she isn’t) in three genres in CONCE is examined in detail. In an overall quantitative analysis, not-contraction is compared with uncontracted forms as well as operator contraction (e.g. she’s not). Other potential factors accounted for include the operator itself, gender, word order (e.g. is she not vs. is not she), and no-negation as an alternative negating strategy. A multifactorial, variationist analysis of contexts where not-contracted and uncontracted forms are the main variants demonstrates the importance of factors such as genre and tense. The results provide solid evidence of colloquialization in Drama and Fiction, where not-contraction becomes more frequent; they also reveal that women may have used contraction less than men, which is expected considering the stigmatization of not-contraction, and that the uncontracted is not she pattern in questions may have been used as a more acceptable way of rendering spoken contractions in writing.

Type
Chapter
Information
Syntactic Change in Late Modern English
Studies on Colloquialization and Densification
, pp. 127 - 159
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×