<div style="text-align: center; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">=========================================================================<br>L O W L A N D S - L - 04 April 2008 - Volume 03<br style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">
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=========================================================================<br></div><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">From: R. F. Hahn <<a href="mailto:sassisch@yahoo.com">sassisch@yahoo.com</a>></span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Subject: Morphology</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Dear Lowlanders,</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">I'd like to invite you to revisit with me adverbial marking and its historical aspects. I would be interested in your ideas and additional information.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Among the living Germanic languages, it seems to be only the Anglo-Saxon branch of West Germanic that regularly marks adjective-derived adverbially used words. English uses </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-ly</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> (< *</span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-lig</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">) and Scots in many cases the older form </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-lik</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> (< *</span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-lig</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">), being cognates of Old Norse and Icelandic </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-lega</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">, Scandinavian </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-lig</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">, and Continental West Germanic </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-lig</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">, </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-lich</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> and </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-li</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">. This suffix does not strictly distinguish adjectives and adverbs in the non-Anglo-Saxon varieties, though there are lexicalized adjective-derived adverbs of this kind (e.g. Icelandic </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">ný</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> > </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">nýlega</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">, German </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">neu</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> > </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">neulich</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">, both ("newly" >) "lately", "recently"). In the Anglo-Saxon branch there is far more regularity. While there is a small handful of adjective-derived adjectives with this suffix (e.g. "She is poor" versus "She is poorly (i.e. of bad health)"), adjectives thusly marked are usually noun-derived (e.g. "love" > "lovely", "saint" > "saintly", "ghost" > "ghostly", "god" > "godly", n. "kind" > adj. "kindly" (versus adj. "kind" > adv. "kindly" - "She's a kindly soul" versus "She treated us kindly")).</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">In mainstream English at least (and I'm not sure about the extent in Scots), adjective-derived adverbs are marked by </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">-ly</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">, as mentioned above (e.g. quick > quickly, dainty > daintily, hard > hardly, angry > angrily, slow > slowly, gross > grossly, fine > finely, shy > shyly, free > freely, wild > wildly). Adverbial derivations are lexicalized (i.e. cannot be freely derived, thus must be learned, except perhaps in cutting-edge literature, e.g. "memories glowing dimly, redly" or "and followed succumbingly, hangdoggedly" -- all made up by me). This is shown by the semantic shifts involved in some cases (e.g. hard > hardly) as also in the limitations of participially based adverbs (e.g. seeming > seemingly, supposed > supposedly, but not seeing > *seeingly, standing > *standingly, despised > *despisedly, famished > *famishedly, but hungrily, ravenously). Furthermore, there are clearly lexicalized cases such as adjectival "good" versus its adverbial equivalent "well".</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">In the Continental West Germanic languages, related adjectives and adverbs tend to be homophones, as in Low Saxon (adj.) </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Dey olde was <u>trurig</u></i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> (</span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">De Ole was <u>trurig</u></i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">) 'The old man was </span><u style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">sad'</u><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">, (adv.) </span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><u>Trurig</u> moyk hey dat licht uut</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> (</span><i style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><u>Trurig</u> möök he dat Licht ut</i><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">) '</span><u style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Sadly</u><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> he turned off the light'. This is essentially the same as the exceptional English case of "fast" (e.g. "The car is </span><u style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">fast</u><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">" versus "It runs </span><u style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">fast</u><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> (not *fastly)").</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">However, I have noticed that in US American English varieties of a certain colloquial range there is a tendency toward not marking adverbs.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">" How have you been doing?</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Standard: Well.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">versus: Good.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Standard: He doesn't hear very well. (or "He's hard of hearing")</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">versus: He don't hear so good.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">While this is prominent in the case of "good" and "well", I have heard similar expressions using other words, e.g.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Standard: "We got there quickly."</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">versus: "We got there quick."</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">And then there are generalized expressions such as "You've got to think smart" and "She writes great".</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Might this US American tendency go back to historical developments, especially to early distancing from British norms and early non-English-speaking mass immigration?</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Regards,</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Reinhard/Ron</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">