Mood, modals and modification The imperative in English and Dutch
Daniël Van Olmen
Lancaster University
46th Annual Meeting of the Societas Linguistica Europaea
Split, 18-21 September 2013 – Workshop 9
Introduction
• earlier research into the imperative in English and Dutch
• many formalist studies (e.g. Potsdam 1998, Rupp 2003, Mastop 2005, Van der Wurff 2007, Kaufmann 2012), fewer functionalist ones (e.g. Davies 1986, Takahashi 2012)
• only a few corpus-based investigations of English (e.g. De Rycker 1990, De Clerck 2006), none of Dutch
Introduction
• present paper
• complementing the corpus-based work on English
• questions
• the imperative’s distribution?
• its illocutionary profile?
• its correlation with modifiers?
• its ‘alternatives’ in the other language?
Introduction
• two issues in the limited contrastive literature
• modification (e.g. Vismans 1995, Hendriks 2002)
• fewer modifiers in English than in Dutch
• also used less often
• English preference for indirectness? (see House 1996 too)
• here: corpus evidence to verify/refute these hypotheses
Introduction
• alternatives and modals in particular (e.g. Hendriks 2002, Nuyts et al. 2010, Mortelmans 2010)
• on the one hand: due to the relative lack of modifiers, fewer ‘permissive’ imperatives in English and more permissive modals?
• on the other hand: moeten more multifunctional than must, including a highly grammaticalized, speaker-oriented type of modality?
• here: corpus evidence from the perspective of the imperative
Preliminaries
• imperative
• excluding cases (cf. De Clerck 2006)
• with little or no illocutionary flexibility
• allowing little or no formal variation
• i.e. idiomatic phrases, DMs, etc.
• including cases
• with explicit subjects (cf. De Schutter & Van Hauwermeiren 1983 vs Fortuin 2004)
• such as good wishes in English, success imperatives in Dutch, etc.
Preliminaries
• modification
• utterance-internal elements which mitigate or boost the force with which the point of the imperative is made (cf. Holmes 1984)
• these elements do not necessarily have mitigation or boosting as its primary meaning, though
• including
• MPs
• tags
• courtesy subjuncts
• emphatic do
• subjects
• vocatives
Preliminaries
• corpora
• comparable corpus
• British English
• private dialogues of ICE-GB (Survey of English Usage 2006)
• 205,627 words
• Northern Dutch
• similar selection of the syntactically annotated spontaneous face-to-face conversations and phone calls in CSD (Dutch Language Union 2004)
• 100,048 words
Preliminaries
• parallel corpus
• drama texts
• high frequency of imperatives (cf. Vismans 1994)
• ‘similar’ to private dialogues (cf. Culpeper & Kytö 2000)
• ‘recent’ BrE plays written by different authors & translated by different NoD translators + vice versa
• size
• SE 96,452 words – SD 70,280 words
• TE 73,503 words – TD 99,113 words
Preliminaries
• methodological remarks
• translationese? (cf. Teubert 1996 vs Mauranen 2002)
• “make it possible to investigate how the same content is expressed in two languages” (Aijmer & Altenberg 1996: 13)
Preliminaries
• analytical framework (cf. De Rycker 1990, De Clerck 2006)
• speech act theory (Austin 1962, Searle 1979, Verscheuren 1985)
• criticized for (e.g. Ervin-Tripp 1987, Du Bois 1993)
• focus on isolated sentences
• inapplicability to non-Western languages
• disregard of multifunctionality
• too speaker-oriented
Preliminaries
• parameters here
• Searlean notions of illocutionary point, illocutionary strength, psychological state and direction of fit
• benefit, power, …
• remarks beforehand
• grouping together similar functions
• recognizing hybridity
• ‘only’ attempt at capturing the imperative
Preliminaries
Type Description Examples
wilful directive
strong appeal to A to do what S wants and what is usually to the benefit of the latter
demand, order, …
non-wilful directive
weaker appeal to A to do what S thinks is to the benefit of the former
suggestion, advice, …
commissive directive
commitment of S to do something which is often to the benefit of S and A and which usually also involves some action by A
permission, offer, …
expressive directive
appeal to A in which S primarily expresses his or her attitude toward A
challenge, apology, …
mixed expressive
‘appeal‘ through which S hopes to bring about a SoA that A does not control and that shows S’s attitude toward A
imprecation, wish, …
non-directive
general truths and beliefs or descriptions of certain habits and specific properties, i.e. representatives
conditional
Modification
• percentage of modified imperatives
• in comparable corpus and source corpus
• English imperative much less frequently modified than its Dutch counterpart
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
CC-E CC-D SC-E SC-D
UnM
M
Modification
• range of modifiers
• MPs
• tags
0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%
100%
MPs
no MPS
97%
97%
98%
98%
99%
99%
100%
100%
tags
no tags
Modification
• courtesy subjuncts
• emphatic do
91%
92%
93%
94%
95%
96%
97%
98%
99%
100%
CSs
no CSs
97%
97%
98%
98%
99%
99%
100%
100%
CC-E SC-E
do
no do
Modification
• subjects
• vocatives
90%
91%
92%
93%
94%
95%
96%
97%
98%
99%
100%
CC-E CC-D SC-E SC-D
S
no S
92%
93%
94%
95%
96%
97%
98%
99%
100%
VOC
no VOC
Modification
• some conclusions
• indeed
• fewer modifiers in English than in Dutch
• but mostly: imperative typically unmodified in English and modified in Dutch
• other types of modification in English?
• DMs?
• intonation?
• …
Mood
• relative frequency
• in comparable corpus and source corpus
• plays ≈ private dialogues
• comparative “English love of imperatives”
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
CC SC
per
10
,00
0 w
ord
s
E
D
Mood
• functions
• similar illocutionary
‘potential’
• usage
• Dutch: typically WD
• English: more multifunctional & strikingly higher rate of N-WDs 0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
WD
N-W
D
CD ED ME
N-D ?
pe
r 1
0,0
00
wo
rds
E
D
Mood & modification
• loose relationship between specific functions and specific modifiers
• e.g. emphatic do
But anyway do send him my best regards.
Work at that and do listen to your pitch.
Oh do sit down.
• e.g. even ‘briefly’
En bel me eventjes als je wat weet.
Bekijk anders effe de notities.
Mood & modification
• some ‘weaker’ correlations in Dutch, though
• warnings, orders, demands, good wishes and instructions often without MPs (see Fortuin 2004 too)
• requests typically with (nou ‘now’) eens ‘once’ /even
• permissions typically with maar ‘only’
• suggestions typically with (gewoon ‘ordinarily’) eens
Mood & modification
• some tentative conclusions
• to some extent …
• Dutch seems to require modifiers and in particular MPs to ‘force’ certain readings of the imperative
• while English doesn’t
• evoking Hawkins (1986) and research on the ‘Germanic Sandwich’, in a way …
• Dutch is more explicit at the surface
• while English is relatively implicit or vague
Mood & modals
• translational correspondences
• not unexpectedly
• E → D less than 70%
• D → E nearly 90%
• impact of target language/culture; pace translationese
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
SE >TD
TE >SD
E > D SD >TE
TD >SE
D > E
zero
other
=
Mood & modals
• functions
• D → E
• E → D
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
zero
other
=
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
zero
other
=
Mood & modals
• modals
• D → E
• just 10 of 73 ‘other’ correspondences (906 in total)
• 3x necessity modal
Blijf nou liggen. (S) - You have to lie down. (T)
• 7x possibility modal
Ga maar weer zitten. (S) - You can sit down again. (T)
• still, 57 ‘=‘ correspondences for permissions
Zeg maar wat tegen haar. (T) – Speak to her. (S)
Mood & modals
• E → D
• 84 of 322 ‘other’ correspondences (1231 in total)
• 17x possibility modal
Go, my boy. (T) – Je mag nu weg, jongen. (S)
• 67x necessity modal
Take life as it comes. (T) – Je moet het leven gewoon nemen zoals het komt. (S)
Never be ashamed of your red hair! (T) – Je hoeft je heus niet te schamen omdat je nou toevallig rood bent. (S)
Conclusions
• validity & usefulness of parallel corpora (in combination with comparable corpora)
• ‘paradox’ (cf. Hawkins 1986, Vismans 1995, House 1996, Hendriks 2002, Nuyts et al. 2010)
• more modifiers in Dutch than in English
• but a more frequent and multifunctional imperative in English than in Dutch
• difference in the distribution of labor between mood and modals in English and Dutch (cf. Nuyts et al. 2010, Mortelmans 2010)
Thanks for your attention! Questions/comments?
Daniël Van Olmen
Lancaster University County South C68
Bailrigg Lancaster
United Kingdom LA1 4YL
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