Claims about Syntactic Change and Finnish Historical Syntax

Abstract

This paper examines a number of important claims that have recently been made concerning syntactic change. These include the role of surface structure reanalysis and the thesis of the autonomy of syntax (e.g., Lightfoot 1979, Muysken 1977); the claims that syntactic change precedes morphological change (e.g., Givon 1971, Lightfoot 1979), and that syntactic change affects main clauses prior to subordinate clauses (e.g., Givon 1984); the role of grammaticalization of lexical elements in syntactic change (e.g., Givon 1984, Langacker 1977); and the principle of synonymy, or the extent to which synonymous lexical items are subject to the same rules of diachronic syntax (e.g., Ard 1975). These claims are tested by application to several well-known developments in Finnish historical syntax.