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dc.contributor.advisorVan Rooy, A.J.
dc.contributor.authorWasserman, Gertruida Petronella
dc.date.accessioned2015-01-28T06:29:56Z
dc.date.available2015-01-28T06:29:56Z
dc.date.issued2014
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10394/13042
dc.descriptionPhD (English), North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2014en_US
dc.description.abstractThis study describes the diachronic development of modality in South African English (henceforth SAfE) from the early 19th century up to its contemporary state (1820s to 1990s) in the registers of letters, news, fiction/narrative and non-fiction, on the basis of the theoretical framework of socio historical linguistics and the empirical approach of corpus linguistics. Both quantitative and qualitative analyses are conducted for modal and quasi-modal verbs, by means of the newly compiled historical corpus of SAfE and ICE-SA (with the addition of Afrikaans corpora for comparison). The study explores general frequency changes, register-internal changes and macro- and micro semantic changes, with the focus of the main semantic analysis more strongly on the obligation and necessity cluster1. A set of parameters is compiled for analysing the strength of obligation in the modals must and should, and the quasi-modal HAVE to, and is applied in the micro semantic analyses. The findings are compared with the trends for modality in other native English’s, such as American, British and Australian English (cf. e.g. Mair & Leech, 2006; Collins, 2009a; Leech, 2011), in an attempt to present a complete and comprehensive description of SAfE modality, as opposed to the traditional approach of focusing on peculiar features. It is reported that the trends of modality in SAfE correspond to those of other native varieties in some cases, but do not correspond in others. The modals of SAfE for example have declined more and the quasi-modals have increased less over the 20th century than in other native varieties of English. One particular case, in which SAfE is reported to be unique among other varieties, is the quantitative and qualitative trends for must, which has some implications for the manifestation of the democratisation process. Must in SAfE has not declined significantly over the 20th century (as it has in other native varieties) and has become less face threatening, since uses with a median (weaker) degree of force are just as frequent as those with a higher degree of force by the 1990s (unlike in other native varieties, where must has become restricted to high-degree obligative contexts). Based on socio historical, as well as linguistic evidence (on both quantitative and qualitative levels), language contact with Afrikaans is posited as the main influence for the increased use of must in contexts that are not face threatening. Extrapolating from the semantic findings, some new insights are offered regarding the phase in which SAfE finds itself within Schneider’s (2003) model of the evolution of New English’s, and some support is offered for Bekker’s (2012:143) argument that “SAfE is ...the youngest of the colonial varieties of English”, especially in the Southern Hemisphere. Ultimately, this thesis offers a piece in the larger puzzle that is SAfE, both in terms of linguistic (textual) and socio historical (contextual) aspects.en_US
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherNorth West Universityen_US
dc.subjectSouth African Englishen_US
dc.subjectSAfEen_US
dc.subjectWSAfEen_US
dc.subjectModalityen_US
dc.subjectModalsen_US
dc.subjectQuasi-modalsen_US
dc.subjectEnglish grammaren_US
dc.subjectEnglish morphosyntaxen_US
dc.subjectEnglish verb phraseen_US
dc.subjectCorpus linguisticsen_US
dc.subjectHistorical linguisticsen_US
dc.subjectDiachronic linguisticsen_US
dc.subjectSociolinguisticsen_US
dc.subjectRegister studiesen_US
dc.subjectGrammaticalisationen_US
dc.subjectNew dialect formationen_US
dc.subjectWorld Englishesen_US
dc.subjectSouthern Hemisphere Englishesen_US
dc.subjectPost Colonial Englishesen_US
dc.subjectLanguage contacten_US
dc.subjectEnglish semanticsen_US
dc.subjectAfrikaans modalsen_US
dc.titleModality on trek : diachronic changes in written South African English across text and contexten
dc.typeThesisen_US
dc.description.thesistypeDoctoralen_US
dc.contributor.researchID10095519 - Van Rooy, Albertus Jacobus (Supervisor)


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