Project

Neutralization in lexicon, grammar, and discourse

Code
3F015407
Duration
01 October 2007 → 30 September 2011
Funding
Regional and community funding: Special Research Fund, Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO)
Research disciplines
  • Humanities
    • Language studies
    • Linguistics
    • Literary studies
    • Theory and methodology of linguistics
    • Other languages and literary studies
Keywords
semantics neutralization markedness
 
Project description

In a first phase, an overview will be given of the various senses in which the term "neutralization" has been used in 20th-century linguistics. At the same time, attention will be paid to the relation between the notion "neutralization" and other notions such as syncretism, metaphor, idiomatic norm reference, neutrality, etc. Also the relation "neutralization"-"markedness" will be discussed. In a second phase, lexical and grammatical neutralization will be empirically tested in German. Concrete examples will be taken from COSMAS II.