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Project

A diachronic and synchronic study of the imperative in Dutch, English and German.

The subject of this project is the imperative. Our view on the imperative is a broad one: we include first and third person constructions, sometimes referred to as hortatives, and prohibitives. The project consists of two parts: 1. a synchronic study in parallel corpora of Dutch, English and German, 2. a diachronic study in corpora of the same three languages. The main questions are: 1. which functions does the imperative fulfill in Dutch, English and German and what are the differences between these languages?; 2. what other grammatical and/or lexical means do Dutch, English and German use to express the different functions of the imperative in the other languages?; 3. how have the Dutch, English and German imperatives evolved semantically and formally and what are the similarities?
Date:1 Oct 2008 →  30 Sep 2010
Keywords:DUTCH, GERMAN, ENGLISH, DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS
Disciplines:Language studies, Linguistics