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Pure grammaticalization: The development of a teenage intensifier

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 August 2006

Ronald Macaulay
Ronald Macaulay
Affiliation:
Pitzer College
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Abstract

For the past fifty years, sociolinguistic studies of linguistic change have focused mainly on phonological variables, but recently some attention has been paid to other features, particularly discourse features used by younger speakers that may change within a relatively brief period. This article deals with the appearance of an unusual intensifier “pure” in the speech of adolescents in Glasgow, Scotland. This usage suggests that the Glasgow working-class adolescents have developed a set of norms for their speech community that owes little to adult or outside influence. Grammaticalization is a process that is normally investigated on the basis of historical documents but recent developments in methodology provide an opportunity to explore changes in progress. Intensifiers have historically been unstable and there is evidence that teenagers have recently been developing their own preferences for such items. The range of uses that the Glasgow adolescents have developed for pure suggests a process of grammaticalization that may still be in progress.The project in which the recordings were made was supported by ESRC grant no. R000239757. I am deeply indebted to Jane Stuart-Smith for providing the transcripts and allowing me to make use of them for this article. The sessions were arranged and conducted by the research assistant on the project, Claire Timmins. It is clear from the transcripts that part of the success of the project was the result of her good rapport with the adolescents. There are many joking references to her in the sessions, although the adolescents knew that she would hear these remarks. All the names in the transcripts have been replaced with pseudonyms. I am grateful for helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper from Elizabeth Traugott, Lee Munroe, and the anonymous reviewers for LVC.

Type
Research Article
Information
Language Variation and Change , Volume 18 , Issue 3 , October 2006 , pp. 267 - 283
Copyright
© 2006 Cambridge University Press

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