The Development Of English Freestanding Maximizers:from Responses To Discourse Markers

The classification and ranking of English adverbs of degree are strict and clear.As a subgroup of intensifiers,maximizers express the upper extreme of the degree scale.Not only can maximizers be used as intensifiers,but also as responses in conversations.On this occasion,maximizers are presented as freestanding forms by which speakers can express their attitudes and points of view.Based on the classification of English adverbs of degree proposed by Quirk et al.(1985: 589-590),the six maximizers in possession of the freestanding form are selected as research objectives,including absolutely,totally,quite,completely,extremely,and entirely.To date,freestanding adverbs have attracted little attention at home and abroad,and the motivations and mechanisms of this phenomenon are expected to be explored.Therefore,with the synchronic and diachronic approaches,based on the spoken data of COCA and BNC,a self-build corpus of American and British TV series and films,this thesis is attempted to describe discourse functions of freestanding maximizers.In addition,based on the historical data of OED and the theories including unidirectionality in semantic change,constructional change and constructionalization,semantic interaction of lexical collocating constructions,lexical strengthening and priming,and(inter)subjectification,this paper is aimed at exploring the motivations and mechanisms in the development of freestanding maximizers.The results are shown as follows.Firstly,freestanding maximizers can be used as responses or discourse markers.Specifically,the former performs the functions of confirming response,accepting response,approving response,promising response,and ironic response.The latter serves the textual functions of ending a turn or a topic and the metatextual functions of enhancing confirmation or negation,mitigating disagreement,and back-channeling.However,different freestanding maximizers can fulfill different functions.More concretely,with the highest frequency in the six maximizers,absolutely can employ all the functions above.Additionally,totally and quite are relatively common and have a variety of discourse functions,while completely,extremely,and entirely appear less frequently and own fewer discourse functions.Secondly,the development of freestanding maximizers is motivated by the context of culture,the context of situation,and cognitive context,which are specifically manifested in principles of economy in language,immediacy of information exchange,and selective prominence of information.With respect to the mechanisms,absolutely,totally,and quite carry the epistemic meaning of emphatic affirmation in the responsive functions.In these three maximizers,the mechanisms in semantic change are composed of constructional change,constructionalization,and subjectification.Specifically,the mechanisms in semantic change of absolutely and quite also involve semantic interaction for lexical collocating constructions,and the semantic change of totally is affected by lexical strengthening and lexical priming.Moreover,the functions of discourse markers presented by freestanding maximizers are the results of pragmaticalization and intersubjectification.The highest frequency of absolutely,as a response or a discourse marker among these freestanding maximizers,shows that its meaning is coerced by the context.Furthermore,absolutely is featured in the highest degree of semantic bleaching,pragmaticalization,and subjectification among these freestanding maximizers.Finally,this thesis is expected to shed light on further studies on freestanding forms of adverbs and foreign language teaching.