Politeness in 13–16th Century Catalan Requests in the Computerized Corpus of Old Catalan

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Publicades: Oct 29, 2021
DOI: https://doi.org/10.14232/actahisp.2021.0.49-73
Paraules clau:
Corpus Pragmatics, Historical Pragmatics, Old Catalan, Politeness, Requests

Main Article Content

Katalin Nagy
MTA-DE-SZTE Research Group for Theoretical Linguistics, Eötvös Loránd Research Network (ELKH)
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1106-7644

Resum

The present study aims to discuss some politeness strategies in 13–16th century Catalan, based on a corpus pragmatic analysis of requests from the Computerized Corpus of Old Catalan (Corpus Informatitzat del Català Antic [CICA]), found by searching for occurrences of the speech act verbs pregar ‘ask, pray’ and suplicar ‘supplicate, beg, beseech’. Results of the present study provide evidence that politeness in 13–16th century Catalan was realized by different linguistic means than in contemporary Catalan. It focuses on some conventionally indirect strategies that consisted in using the verb voler ‘want’ to transfer the imperative force from the performance of the requested act to the hearer’s willingness. At the intersection of speech act research, politeness studies, historical pragmatics and corpus pragmatics, this study also discusses some methodological challenges of these areas.

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Article Details

Com citar
Nagy, K. (2021). Politeness in 13–16th Century Catalan: Requests in the Computerized Corpus of Old Catalan. Acta Hispanica, (III), 49–73. https://doi.org/10.14232/actahisp.2021.0.49-73
Número
No III (2021): ACTA HISPANICA SUPPLEMENTUM. Catalanística a Szeged: 25
Secció
Artículos
Biografia de l'autor/a

Katalin Nagy, MTA-DE-SZTE Research Group for Theoretical Linguistics, Eötvös Loránd Research Network (ELKH)

Katalin Nagy C. currently works for the Research Group for Theoretical Linguistics at the Universities of Debrecen and Szeged. She has been working in the field of historical pragmatics since her PhD in 2013, her research focuses on semantic change in grammaticalization, diachronic speech act analysis, and the methodology of historical pragmatics. Her topics of interest include the grammaticalization of the Catalan GO-past, politeness in medieval Catalan, and the role and notions of context in historical pragmatics.

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Europe PMC
Received 2021-08-12
Accepted 2021-08-29
Published 2021-10-29

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