Project

From mass noun to count noun in French and Dutch. A contrastive corpus-based study on the nature and productivity of coercion

Code

01N02710

Duration

01 February 2010 → 30 September 2015

Funding

Regional and community funding: Special Research Fund

Promotor

Peter Lauwers

Research disciplines

Humanities and the arts
- Language studies
- Linguistics
- Literary studies

Keywords

coercive measure dutch corpus contrastive experimental countable french uncontountable usage-based

Project description

This project proposes a detailed corpusbased contrastive analysis (French vs.Dutch) of a case of coercion, viz. the occasional use of mass nouns in constructions typical of count nouns, including also a limited experimental psycholinguistic verification. Besides the descriptive question (frequency, semantic effetcs, conditions/restrictions), the project addresses the question of the nature and relevance of coercion as a theoretical concept.