We are happy to announce a talk by Heidi Klockman (University of Agder) in the Historical Linguistics Colloquium. The talk will take place online and in English.
Date: February 5th, 2026
Time: 2pm – 4pm c.t.
Place: https://uni-frankfurt.zoom-x.de/j/68838298277?pwd=e8ONY8oIWw7ani8jprI3bkhdUD8FCy.1
Title: „The noun-to-quantifier shift in English and Polish quantificational pseudopartitives„
Abstract:
This talk will reflect on the process by which a noun becomes a quantifier, drawing empirically on ongoing corpus work into English and Polish quantificational pseudopartitives (QPsPs). The QPsP refers to a binominal construction in which one noun (N1) quantifies over another noun (N2), as in English an ocean of ideas and lots of money or Polish kupaNOM robotyGEN ‘a heap/lot of work’.
The QPsP has been a source of interest for cognitive-functional and generative linguists alike: how does a quantificational meaning arise? What changes do the N1 and QPsP undergo as grammaticalization progresses? What is the underlying syntactic structure producing the morphosyntactic properties of QPsPs? Work on English has investigated such questions primarily through advanced N1s such as lot, bunch, heap, and pile (e.g. Keizer 2007; Langacker 2009; Traugott 2008; Brems 2011; Klockmann 2017). The QPsP has been identified as a locus of change, where the construction undergoes a semantic shift from concrete (e.g. a heap of gravel) to abstract (e.g. a heap of ideas), coinciding with a shift in headedness (from N1 to N2) and changes in the morphosyntax (e.g. verbal agreement with N2) (e.g. Keizer 2007, Brems 2011, Gardelle 2024). In some cases, grammaticalization into a degree adverbial is possible, e.g. a lot nicer (Traugott 2008). Work by Herda (2018, 2019) suggests a similar process may occur in Polish, but the nature of morphosyntactic changes differs.
Previous work paints a fairly coherent picture of the grammaticalization process, but it is limited in scope (primarily advanced N1s) and formalism. In this talk, I discuss ongoing research which attempts to address these gaps. I compare English and Polish QPsPs, focusing on understudied early or mid-stage N1s, such as English ocean and wave or Polish fala ‘wave’ and kupa ‘heap’. These will be shown to vary in terms of having more “noun-like” or “quantifier-like” morphosyntactic properties, and I will present formalisms which attempt to capture the grammaticalization path from noun to quantifier. I will end by reflecting on the consequences of the approach for our understanding of linguistic categories in general.