Semantic bleaching as an indicator of degrees of periphrasticity: An experimental approach

Abstract

We propose to measure the degree of periphrasticity of verbal periphrases in terms of the strength of the cognitive link between the representation of a grammaticalized auxiliary verb in the speaker’s mind, and the corresponding lexical verb (so-called “semantic bleaching”). We analyze the Spanish verbal periphrases estar ‘to be’, ir ‘to go’ and andar ‘to walk’ + gerund, which exhibit differences in terms of periphrasticity and grammaticalization. Using a self-paced reading experiment, we demonstrate that blocking the lexical interpretation by semantic antipriming is more likely to cause processing and interpretation problems for the less grammaticalized andar + gerund than for the more grammaticalized ir + gerund. We take these results as evidence for a description of periphrases as a prototypically organized category, in which adscription to the category depends on the degree of routinized semantic integration between the finite and non-finite verb.