On 2010-10-07, at 12:10 PM, Craig wrote:
> I don't have firsthand exposure to Jesperson's arguments, so I'm curious about ways in which they are both simpler and more robust than traditional accounts.
He explains them in The Philosophy of Grammar beginning on p. 87.
<http://books.google.ca/books?id=1WcXVIgc2bUC&lpg=PP1&dq=the%20philosophy%20of%20grammar&pg=PA87#v=onepage&q&f=false>
To summarize and add argument from the CGEL:
-The principle of Occam's razor dictates that "entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity," or in Newton's words, "to the same natural effects we must, so far as possible, assign the same causes." Under this principle, it is better to assign words like 'before' to a single part of speech than to three parts of speech unless we cannot reasonably incorporate them in the same category.
-The etymology of the word 'preposition' has mislead us into thinking that prepositions come only 'pre' a noun. It's important to remember that labels are not definitions.
-Why should prepositions be limited to taking nouns as complements? Nouns, verbs, and adjectives all take complements of different kinds (including no complement, noun complement, adj complement, and different kinds of clauses). The traditional analysis needs to explain this discrepancy.
-In fact, traditional grammar, tacitly acknowledges the possibility that prepositions take adjective complements (e.g., It is seen AS possible) or preposition complements (e.g., FROM behind the counter), without allowing for this in its descriptive/explanatory framework.
-The meaning of words like 'before' typically don't change when they're 'adverbs' or 'subordinating conjunctions'.
-Adverbs can't function as predicate complements. (e.g., *He is quickly.) But words like 'before' can, even when they have no complement. Traditional grammar needs an ad hoc rule to deal with this. Jespersen's conception doesn't.
-Prepositions can mostly modified by 'just' and 'right' where adverbs can't, except words like 'before', even when they have no complement.
In short, it's simpler because it requires less explanation to deal with a variety of phenomena, because it reduces the heterogeny of the adverb category and almost entirely does away with the subordinating conjunction category (leaving only the subordinators: 'that' as in "It's important that they are on time", 'for' as in "It's important for them to be on time", 'to' as in "it's time to go", 'how' as in "I know how it's done", 'if' as in "I wonder if it's true", and 'whether' as in "I wonder whether it's true"), and because it requires students to make fewer choices (i.e., 'before' is always a preposition). It's more robust because it has fewer exceptions.
> I think about a word like "down." The dictionaries seem to be saying that its adverbial meanings came first, the preposition meanings later.
I'm not sure what you mean by the difference between an adverbial meaning and prepositional meaning. The OED definitions for the adverb entry and the preposition entry are almost identical. Do you mean its use without an object came first followed later by its use with a object? If so, that has little bearing on Jespersen's argument. It doesn't need an object to be a preposition.
In fact, some of the earliest uses of 'down' are as predicate complements:
1340 HAMPOLE Pr. Consc. 1602 Žus es žis world turned up žat es doune. (My understanding of Old English is extremely limited, but I believe this translates to "Thus is this world turned up that is down.")
As I pointed out above, adverbs do not function as predicate complements. This is evidence that 'down' was a preposition from the beginning, even if it didn't originally license objects.
Best,
Brett
-----------------------
Brett Reynolds
English Language Centre
Humber College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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