Selected Papers from the Fourteenth International ... - STIBA Malang

146 Cristina Suárez-Gómez
English from dialect to dialect. With respect to the declined relativizers of Old
English (se/seo/þæt), Kivimaa observes that they can still be found in the South
and East Midlands in the twelfth century. They are however very sparingly used
in the West-Midlands. This finding is very surprising, for it is generally agreed that
the East-Midlands is among the linguistically advanced areas (in comparison
with the South), and therefore, declined relativizers are expected to recede earlier
in the less conservative areas than in the more advanced ones. Compound relativizers
(seþe/seoþe/þætþe) are very quickly levelled out and can only be found in the
South-West Midlands texts and sparingly in Kent, that is, in the most conservative
linguistic areas. As for wh-relativizers, these occur very occasionally all throughout
this period according to Kivimaa, but she does not provide any information
concerning the dialectal distribution of these relativizers, which in the early Middle
English period were just beginning to make their first timid appearance.
Concerning invariable relativizers, Kivimaa notices that invariable þe disappears
first in the North and the East-Midlands. Around 1200, this relativizer was
almost extinct also in Kent and, at this time, only survives in the Southwest. The
distribution of this relativizer supports the characterization of the South as a conservative
dialect, and of the North and Midlands, as advanced areas. Relativizer þat,
as an invariable word, is more frequently found where þe is receding. Therefore,
from the previous conclusion, it can be gathered that it is favoured in the North and
the East-Midlands, the areas where þe disappeared first.
My intention in the corpus analysis is to compare my results with the observations
gathered by Kivimaa and, ultimately, to find out whether the North-South
divide observed at the level of spelling and phonology, lexicon, and morphology is
also operative in processes of relativization, both in the selection and distribution
of relativizers and in the position adopted by the relative clause with respect to the
main clause, whether they are extraposed, intraposed or left-dislocated.
4. Relativization strategies
4.1 Description
Three main relativization strategies have been available throughout the history of
the English language, 7 which allows us to establish a formal distinction into the
following types of relative clauses in Present-day English:
7. See Keenan (1985: 146 –155) and Givón (1993: 124 –127) for a complete classification of
relativization strategies.