Semanticke skaly a skalarni modifikatory v cestine)

• Authors: Radek Ocelak

Title variants

EN

SEMANTIC SCALES AND SCALAR MODIFIERS IN CZECH

• Languages of publication: CS

Abstracts

EN

The article aspires to provide a detailed semantic classification and description of scalar modifiers in contemporary Czech (e.g. velmi, skoro, celkem, poněkud, alespoň, přibližně). Words of this class are seen as operating on semantic scales of two basic types – continuous scales, primarily represented by gradable adjectives, and discrete scales, primarily represented by numerals. The function of scalar modifiers is to state some degree(s) of these scales as valid. As a precondition of the final description and classification, the semantics of gradable adjectives is broadly addressed with respect to the problem of semantic vagueness and pragmatic imprecision. The well-known division into the categories of relative, maximal and minimal adjectives is applied to Czech and some tests based on inferential schemes are shown. The diachronic origin of scalar modifiers is discussed on the basis of grammaticalization theory. After that, the actual semantic classification and description of Czech scalar modifiers is presented, based not on mere semantic intuition but supported by corpus co-occurence data.

Keywords

EN

SCALARITY; SCALAR MODIFIERS; DEGREE WORDS; GRADABLE ADJECTIVES; ADJECTIVAL SCALES; VAGUENESS; IMPRECISION; GRAMMATICALIZATION

Discipline

• PHILOLOGY_&_LINGUISTICS: PHILOLOGY & LINGUISTICS

• Publisher: Institute of the Czech Language, Czech Academy of Sciences
• Journal: Slovo a slovesnost: časopis pro otázky teorie a kultury jazyka (Slovo a slovesnost: A journal for the theory of language and language cultivation)
• Year: 2013
• Volume: 74
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 110-135

Contributors

author

Radek Ocelak

• Slovo a slovesnost, redakce, Ústav pro jazyk český AV ČR, v.v.i., Letenská 4, 118 51 Praha 1, Czech Republic