Abstract
Numerical and quantificational expressions differ not only in their logical meaning, but also in their conditions of use. In particular, One hypothesis suggested in previous work states that vague expressions should be associated with informality and precise expressions with formality. We introduce a novel corpus measure, the SOLT, to quantify formality of an expression and show that it correlates well with established data on formality. We then apply the SOLT to numerical and quantificational expression to test the hypothesis that vagueness and informality are related. We find that there is some support for the hypothesis, but the relation is not straightforward as claimed.
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
German also has derived forms such as einzigste (‘only-est’) that are felt to be colloquial by native speakers, though neither of the component morphemes is. Derived forms in general do not occur as entries in the dictionary, so I put aside such forms.
- 3.
These numbers are rather approximate especially since frequently only a specific form or meaning of a lemma is annotated for style. E.g., Anzahl (‘number’) is unmarked, but the plural Anzahlen is marked as specialist language.
- 4.
The dictionary does not describe on what basis the stylistic annotations were assigned. The dictionary states that it also heavily relies on a corpus of the Duden Verlag, which I didn’t have access to.
- 5.
For ‘formal’, random numbers below 3906 would point to occurrences of ‘elevated’, those above after subtraction of 3905 to occurrences of ‘specialist language’.
- 6.
The bimorphemic Dreizehn (‘thirteen’) with SOLT 0.64 seems to be an outlier possibly due to its occurrence in fixed expressions such as jetzt schlägt’s dreizehn (‘I’m very surprised.’. lit. ‘Now it rings 13.’).
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Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Stephanie Solt for many inspiring and motivating remarks on this and other work of mine. I also thank Artemis Alexiadou and Roland Mühlenbernd for helpful comments, Kai Sauerland for providing a Python skript, and Renata Shamsutdinova for editorial help. Funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation)—SFB 1412, 416591334.
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Data of the Validation Study
Data of the Validation Study
Number | Lemma | Marking | Kern | Untertitel | Total | SOLT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1. | anstreben | elevated | 1925 | 108 | 2033 | 3.472466777 |
2. | Wiederkehr | elevated | 803 | 75 | 878 | 2.737149035 |
3. | behaglich | elevated | 760 | 59 | 819 | 3.003924107 |
4. | erachten | elevated | 1291 | 97 | 1388 | 3.051071991 |
5. | erschaffen | elevated | 393 | 1852 | 2245 | −2.919771333 |
6. | fernhalten | elevated | 733 | 699 | 1432 | −0.614767709 |
7. | Geschehnis | elevated | 664 | 100 | 764 | 2.04789479 |
8. | zurückkehren | elevated | 4463 | 3121 | 7584 | −0.167283002 |
9. | indessen | elevated | 2628 | 18 | 2646 | 6.506536107 |
10. | zugehören | elevated | 618 | 729 | 1347 | −0.921600428 |
11. | mithin | elevated | 923 | 2 | 925 | 8.166898386 |
12. | ausnehmend | elevated | 1676 | 402 | 2078 | 1.376466291 |
13. | obschon | elevated | 749 | 20 | 769 | 4.543605362 |
14. | zudem | elevated | 2974 | 321 | 3295 | 2.528470993 |
15. | überaus | elevated | 1983 | 339 | 2322 | 1.865039047 |
16. | überbringen | elevated | 568 | 541 | 1109 | −0.613026116 |
17. | umher | elevated | 1437 | 398 | 1835 | 1.168931274 |
18. | Bemühen | elevated | 1193 | 100 | 1293 | 2.893233686 |
19. | verkünden | elevated | 2805 | 569 | 3374 | 1.618211762 |
20. | vollbringen | elevated | 982 | 539 | 1521 | 0.1821493 |
1. | abschie\(\beta \)en | unmarked | 1578 | 557 | 2135 | 0.819059521 |
2. | Auslegung | unmarked | 1401 | 29 | 1430 | 4.910971794 |
3. | Bündnis | unmarked | 2706 | 180 | 2886 | 3.226804576 |
4. | erbrmlich | unmarked | 412 | 901 | 1313 | −1.81217122 |
5. | Fachleute | unmarked | 1001 | 43 | 1044 | 3.857673052 |
6. | formal | unmarked | 3012 | 57 | 3069 | 5.040327589 |
7. | Freak | unmarked | 31 | 930 | 961 | −5.590179047 |
8. | Gras | unmarked | 1812 | 1589 | 3401 | −0.493824621 |
9. | herum | unmarked | 7218 | 4851 | 12069 | −0.109971488 |
10. | oft | unmarked | 26097 | 9830 | 35927 | 0.725332197 |
11. | plus | unmarked | 1021 | 752 | 1773 | −0.242110152 |
12. | probieren | unmarked | 949 | 3274 | 4223 | −2.469862781 |
13. | respektieren | unmarked | 1215 | 1751 | 2966 | −1.210511222 |
14. | Salon | unmarked | 1263 | 370 | 1633 | 1.087969012 |
15. | selbständig | unmarked | 4855 | 105 | 4960 | 4.847721611 |
16. | Sippe | unmarked | 699 | 76 | 775 | 2.51793268 |
17. | teilen | unmarked | 9917 | 5140 | 15057 | 0.264846945 |
18. | unbestimmt | unmarked | 1342 | 103 | 1445 | 3.020379977 |
19. | Verhaftung | unmarked | 1416 | 609 | 2025 | 0.534018681 |
20. | wegen | unmarked | 24140 | 26823 | 50963 | −0.835333379 |
1. | aufbleiben | colloquial | 23 | 112 | 135 | −2.967081418 |
2. | aufgedreht | colloquial | 127 | 224 | 351 | −1.501958687 |
3. | eh | colloquial | 687 | 2151 | 2838 | −2.329913972 |
4. | Eisenbahner | colloquial | 293 | 37 | 330 | 2.302015037 |
5. | fremdgehen | colloquial | 16 | 88 | 104 | −3.14272007 |
6. | Halbe | colloquial | 93 | 57 | 150 | 0.022980345 |
7. | hinauswerfen | colloquial | 235 | 99 | 334 | 0.563871875 |
8. | hinwollen | colloquial | 18 | 83 | 101 | −2.888402882 |
9. | Kopfweh | colloquial | 40 | 107 | 147 | −2.102827343 |
10. | loskommen | colloquial | 169 | 81 | 250 | 0.377740982 |
11. | Oscar | colloquial | 328 | 781 | 1109 | −1.934915185 |
12. | protzen | colloquial | 87 | 26 | 113 | 1.059215326 |
13. | Pulli | colloquial | 52 | 277 | 329 | −3.0965909 |
14. | Rheuma | colloquial | 81 | 47 | 128 | 0.1019727 |
15. | Teufelskerl | colloquial | 14 | 122 | 136 | −3.806670867 |
16. | übern | colloquial | 137 | 75 | 212 | 0.185924941 |
17. | verdreschen | colloquial | 45 | 83 | 128 | −1.566474787 |
18. | verheddern | colloquial | 69 | 54 | 123 | −0.329651497 |
19. | Wirtschaftswunder | colloquial | 100 | 5 | 105 | 3.638639643 |
20. | wuchten | colloquial | 109 | 4 | 113 | 4.084895873 |
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Sauerland, U. (2022). Quantifying the Register of German Quantificational Expressions: A Corpus-Based Study. In: Gotzner, N., Sauerland, U. (eds) Measurements, Numerals and Scales. Palgrave Studies in Pragmatics, Language and Cognition. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-73323-0_14
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