A real-time analysis of morphosyntactic variability

U. Toronto
2002 11 15
Continuity and change in Québec French:
A real-time analysis of morphosyntactic variability
Shana Poplack
University of Ottawa
(1)
La Corriveau ça, c’était une femme qu’avait été pris, qu’avait été accusée d’avoir tué son mari, dans SaintTite-des-Caps icitte là, voilà astheure bien longtemps de deça. Ça fait que elle a passé un procès puis ils ont
pas été capables de lui trouv-- de prouver que c’était elle. Au bout d’une couple d’années elle s’est
remariée en seconde noce. Au bout d’un an, ils ont trouvé encore son mari mort le long de la route avec la
tête écrasée, pareil comme le premier. (Vincent Goulet, born 1881) (XIX/014/687)1
‘La Corriveau, she was a woman who had been caught, who had been accused of having killed her husband
in Saint-Tite-des-Caps around here. That was a long time ago now. So she was tried and they couldn’t findthey couldn’t prove that it was her. After a couple of years, she got married again. A year later, again, they
found her husband by the side of the road, dead, with his head smashed in, just like the first one.’
(2)
[IVer]: Qu’est-ce c’est qu’un sabourin?
[FJ]: Le sabourin c’était un os de viande, quand la viande a venu rare à force, savez-vous, d’en- d’end’en tuer. Ça a venu qu’il y en avait… pas tant il y en avait quand ils avaient arrivé, bien ils prenaient un
os, puis ils se le passaient un à l’autre pour faire de la soupe. (Francine Jobin, born 1846) (XIX/020/821)
‘[Iver]: What’s a sabourin?
[FJ] : A sabourin was a meat bone, when meat became very rare, you know, because so much was killed.
What heppened was that there was… not as much as there was when they had come, so they took a bone and
they passed it around from one to the other to make soup.’
(3)
“Le subjonctif est employé quand le locuteur ne s’engage pas sur la réalité du fait.” (Grevisse et Goosse,
1989: 319)
(4)
“[le subjonctif s’emploie] après les verbes […] vouloir, ordonner, demander, commander, exiger,
défendre, empêcher, garder, prendre garde, éviter, permettre, accepter, consentir, agréer, approuver,
trouver bon, désapprouver, trouver mauvais, souffrir, endurer, tolérer, proposer, désirer, souhaiter,
attendre, aimer mieux, préférer, faire obtenir, avoir soin, ne pas se soucier, haïr, détester, regretter,
désespérer, craindre, redouter, appréhender, avoir peur, trembler, etc.” (Martinon, 1950: 399)
(5)
a.
Mais j’aimerais qu’elle soit (S) plus ouverte, mais on dirait qu’en vieillissant sont plus gênés… Je
trouve qu’en viellissant tu sais, j’aimerais qu’elle serait (C) plus proche. (XX/040/1021-1032)
But I would like her to be more open, but it seems as though they get more shy when they get
older…I find that being older, I would like her to be closer.
b.
Fallait qu’elle répond (I) “oui, tu peux faire trois pas de géant”. Fallait qu’elle réponde (S) la
phrase complète. (XX/025/2186)
She had to answer “yes, you can take three giant steps”. She had to answer the entire sentence.
(6)
1 1
Factors considered in the analysis of variant choice in subjunctive-selecting contexts
Modal: Indicators of non-factual
Syntactic: Presence of complementizer, Distance
modality, Structure of main clause,
between main and embedded verb
“Semantic” class of main verb
Lexical identity: Main verb, Embedded verb
Morphological: Tense of embedded verb Frequency
Codes refer to the corpus (XIX =Récits du français québécois d’autrefois (Poplack & St-Amand ms.); XX =Corpus du
français parlé à Ottawa-Hull (Poplack, 1989)), and speaker and line numbers. Examples are reproduced verbatim from audio
recordings. All names are pseudonyms. Corpora are housed at the Sociolinguistics Laboratory, University of Ottawa.
POPLACK 2
(7)
Contribution of factors to the selection of the subjunctive:
XIXth and XXth centuries
falloir
Other verbs
Corrected mean:
XXth
XIXth
XXth
XIXth
.934
.614
.526
.487
“SEMANTIC” CLASS OF MAIN VERB
Volition (vouloir)
.77
.59
N/A
Emotion (aimer)
.66
—
Opinion (penserneg)
.09
.11
Range
68
48
TENSE OF MAIN VERB
Imperfect
.65
.17
.65
.39
Present
.52
.66
.51
.68
Passé composé
.54
—
.42
—
Future
.51
—
.38
—
Conditional
.10
.03
.25
.04
Range
55
63
40
64
MORPHOLOGICAL FORM OF EMBEDDED VERB
Irregular
.65
.60
.56
.60
Regular
.29
.13
.36
.05
Range
36
47
20
55
PRESENCE OF COMPLEMENTIZER
Present
[ ]
[ ]
.52
[ ]
Absent
[ ]
[ ]
.39
[ ]
Range
13
DISTANCE BETWEEN MAIN AND EMBEDDED VERBS
None
.53
[ ]
[ ]
[ ]
Word
.47
[ ]
[ ]
[ ]
Parenthetical
.17
[ ]
[ ]
[ ]
Range
36
(8)
a.
Faudrait (C) qu’il serait (C) mis en prison pour lui montrer qu’est-ce qu’il a faite de tort, ces
affaires-là. (XX/032/1476)
‘He should be put in prison to show him what he’s done wrong, things like that.’
b.
Elle dit à son père, “il y a pas moyen”, elle dit, “faut que vous m’achetez (I) le petit cochon.”
(XIX/037/107)
‘’She says to her father, “there’s no way”, she says, “you have to buy me the little pig.” ’
c.
Je comprends, parce qu’après ça faut [toute tu classes ça], tu mets (I) toute ça ensemble.
(XX/025/1114)
‘I understand, because after that, you have to [classify all that], put everything together.’
POPLACK 3
(9)
Rate of subjunctive by lexical identity
XXth
XIXth
% of verbs
% of
subjunctive
% of verbs
% of
subjunctive
MAIN
falloir
vouloir
croirenég
Other verbs
62
10
1
27
89
91
13
47
59
18
3
20
62
53
14
61
EMBEDDED
aller
faire
Other verbs
14
13
72
87
86
73
22
13
65
73
66
53
(10)
a.
Le docteur dit, “faudrait (C) ”, il dit, “que j’aurais (C) de ton urine.” (XIX/009/2176)
‘The doctor says, “I would need”, he says, “to have some of your urine.” ’
b.
Il dit, “oui”, il dit, “il a dit que quand j’avais sept ans, fallait (IMP) que j’allais (IMP) le trouver.”
(XIXe/021/268)
‘He says, “yes”, he says, “he said that when I was seven, I would have to go find him” ’
c.
Dans un an et un jour, faut (P) que je suis (P) là. (XIX/038/1351)
‘In a year and a day, I have to be there.’
(11)
a.
“Mais” il dit, “mon petit cheval me l’a dit! Faut (P) bien je le prenne (S)!” (XIX/018/2180)
‘ “But”, he says, “my little horse told me! I have to take it!” ’
(12)
a.
J’ai dit, “laisse faire, on ira (IF) à messe demain matin”. (XX/070/686)
‘I said, “forget it, we’ll go to Mass tomorrow morning”.’
b.
Bien demain, tu vas aller (PF) au Bingo, tu vas gagner (PF). (XX/065/2301)
‘Tomorrow you’re going to go to Bingo and you’re going to win.’
c.
Il dit, “j’y vas (P) demain matin chez vous”. (XX/119/861)
‘He says, “I’m going to your house tomorrow”.’
(13)
(14)
Factors considered in the analysis of variant choice in future temporal reference contexts
Factors relating to the verb: lexical identity,
Semantic factors: temporal distance,
conjugation class, frequency, stativity
imminence, contingency, polarity
Syntactic factors: clause type, adverbial
Factors relating to the subject: person and
specification, tense concordance, polarity
number, animacy
POPLACK 4
th
Contribution of the factors contributing to the selection of future variants : XIX and
XXth centuries
XXth
XIXth
IF
Corrected mean:
Total N
.145
725
PF
.727
2627
TYPE OF ADVERBIAL SPECIFICATION
Non-specific
.85
.19
No adverb
.47
.56
Specific
.37
.23
Range
45
37
GRAMMATICAL PERSON
Formal Vous
.81
.22
Others
.49
.51
Range
28
29
POLARITY
Negative
.99
.01
Affirmative
.36
.65
Range
63
64
TEMPORAL DISTANCE
Distal
[]
[]
Proximal
[]
[]
Range
(15)
P
IF
PF
P
.052
242
.268
1677
.514
2630
.133
398
.58
.46
.78
.77
.48
.53
29
.25
.52
.45
[]
[]
[]
[]
[]
.65
.49
16
.39
.51
12
[]
[]
[]
[]
.91
.43
48
.01
.64
63
.69
.48
21
[]
[]
.62
.45
17
.43
.53
10
.45
.52
7
32
27
Tôt ou tard ils reviendront (IF). (023/659)
‘’Sooner or later they’ll come back’.
(16)
Il dit, “Monsieur Rémillard, on est douze, vous passerez (IF) pas”. (XX/082/196)
‘He says, “Mr. Rémillard, there are 12 of us. You won’t get by.” ’
(17)
C’est comme qu'ils disent, hein? ‘Qui a bu boira (IF).’ (XX/101/1315)
It's like they say, eh? “A leopard can’t change its spots”.’
(18)
Dire que dans quatre cents ans d'ici il va avoir (PF) encore des Asselin puis ils vont encore parler (PF)
français! Qu'ils parleront (IF) pas l'anglais. (XX/004/3611)
‘To think that in 400 years from now, there will still be Asselins, and they’ll still speak French. That they
won’t speak English.’
(19)
a.
protasis [Si ils en feraient (COND) un peu plus]
apodosis [il reviendrait]. (XX/025/536)
‘If they would do a little more, he would come back.’
b.
protasis [Si j’aurais resté (PAST COND) au couvent]
apodosis [maintenant je serais correct]. (XX/015/5)
‘If I would have stayed in the convent, I would be OK now.’
POPLACK 5
(20)
(21)
Factors considered in the analysis of variant choice in protases of hypothetical si-clauses:
Location of conditional complex, linear order of protasis and apodosis, grammatical person of
subject of protasis, distance between protasis and apodosis, polarity of protasis, polarity of
apodosis, conjugation class of verb in protasis, semantic reading
Possible conditions
Si ça viendrait (C) que de même, bien là je prendrais l’autobus. (XX/092/1458)
If it would get to that point, well I would take the bus.’
Si je pourrais l’avoir (C), ça ferait une damnée de belle femme pour moi. (XIX/017/1379)
‘If I would be able to have her, she would make a damn good wife for me’.
(22)
Counterfactual conditions
Si j’étais (IMP) au Citizen, je vivrais bien. (XXe/118/2240)
“If I worked at the Citizen, I would be well off.’
Si il avait voulu (PLUP), il l’aurait portée. (XIX/004/2133)
‘If he had wished to, he would have carried her’.
(23)
Factors contributing to the choice of conditional in protases of
hypothetical si-clauses: XIXth and XXth centuries
Corrected mean
Total N
XXth
XIXth
.486
633
.109
191
SEMANTIC READING
Potential
.62
Counterfactual
.44
Range:
18
GRAMMATICAL PERSON
Second Formal
.87
Other persons
.50
Range:
37
VERBAL MORPHOLOGY (PROTASIS)
Regular (r + IMP)
.64
Irregular
.46
Range:
18
[.60]
[.40]
[.39]
[.52]
[.55]
[.42]
(24)
a.
Si tu entendrais (C) (<entendre), quelqu’un crier, tu l’entendrais bien.
(XX/076/1011)
‘If you would hear someone yelling, you’d really hear it well.’
b.
Si vous seriez (C) employeur, peut-être vous feriez la même chose. (XX/078/776)
‘If you would be an employer, maybe you would do the same thing.’