Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-g96k6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-11T01:23:00.162Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Regularity and Idiomaticity in Grammatical Constructions: The Case of Let Alone

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 March 2026

Charles J. Fillmore ,
Paul Kay  and
Mary Catherine O'Connor
Charles J. Fillmore*
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
Paul Kay*
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
Mary Catherine O'Connor*
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
*
Department of Linguistics, 2337 Dwinelle Hall, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720
Department of Linguistics, 2337 Dwinelle Hall, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720
Department of Linguistics, 2337 Dwinelle Hall, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Through the detailed investigation of the syntax, semantics, and pragmatics of one grammatical construction, that containing the conjunction let alone, we explore the view that the realm of idiomaticity in a language includes a great deal that is productive, highly structured, and worthy of serious grammatical investigation. It is suggested that an explanatory model of grammar will include principles whereby a language can associate semantic and pragmatic interpretation principles with syntactic configurations larger and more complex than those definable by means of single phrase structure rules.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 64 , Issue 3 , September 1988 , pp. 501 - 538
Copyright
Copyright © 1988 by Linguistic Society of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Footnotes

* We would like to acknowledge the good, if not always heeded, advice of Farrell Ackerman, Daniel Andler, George Bergman, Joan Bresnan, Claudia Brugman, Regina Bustamante, Linda Coleman, Amy Dahlstrom, Michelle Emanatian, Pierre Encrever, Gilles Fauconnier, Michel de Fornel, Mark Gawron, James Greeno, Jacqueline Guéron, Ron Kaplan, Ed Keenan, Paul Kube, George Lakoff, Tom Larsen, Monica Macaulay, Jim McCawley, Kiki Nikiforidou, Peter Norvig, Eric Pederson, François Recanati, Ivan Sag, Paul Schachter, Manny Schegloff, Barry Schein, Dan Sperber, Donca Steriade, Eve Sweetser, Len Talmy, James Watters, Bob Wilensky, Karl Zimmer, and three anonymous referees for Language. The work reported here was supported in part by a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to the University of California at Berkeley.

References

Akmajian, Adrian. 1984. Sentence types and the form-function fit. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 2. 1–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Allwood, Jens. 1972. Negation and the strength of presuppositions. (Logical grammar report 2.) Gothenburg: University of Goteborg.Google Scholar
Anscombre, Jean-Claude, and Ducrot, Oswald. 1983. L'argumentation dans la langue. Brussels: Mardaga.Google Scholar
Baker, C. Leroy. 1970. Double negatives. LI 1. 169–86.Google Scholar
Bresnan, Joan. 1975. Comparative deletion and constraints on transformations. Linguistic Analysis 1. 25–74.Google Scholar
Clark, Herbert. 1974. Semantics and comprehension. Current trends in linguistics 12, ed. by Sebeok, Thomas A., 1291–428. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Cresswell, Max J. 1976. The semantics of degree. Montague grammar, ed. by Partee, Barbara H., 280–91. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Ducrot, Oswald. 1973. La preuve et le dire. Paris: Mame.Google Scholar
Fauconnier, Gilles. 1975a. Pragmatic scales and logical structure. LI 6. 353–75.Google Scholar
Fauconnier, Gilles. 1975b. Polarity and the scale principle. CLS II.188–99.Google Scholar
Fauconnier, Gilles. 1976. Etude de certains aspects logiques et grammaticaux de la quantification et de l'anaphore en français et en anglais. Doctorat d'Etat, Université de Paris VII.Google Scholar
Fraser, Bruce. 1970. Vice versa. LI 1.277.Google Scholar
Gazdar, Gerald. 1979. Pragmatics: Implicature, presupposition, and logical form. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Green, Georgia. 1985. The description of inversions in Generalized Phrase Structure Grammar. BLS 11. 117–45.Google Scholar
Hankamer, Jorge. 1971. Constraints on deletion in syntax. Yale University dissertation.Google Scholar
Horn, Laurence. 1972. On the semantic properties of logical operators in English. UCLA dissertation.Google Scholar
Karttunen, Lauri, and Peters, Stanley. 1979. Conventional implicature. Syntax and semantics 11: Presupposition, ed. by Oh, Choon-Kyu and Dinneen, David A., 1–56. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Kay, Paul. 1987. EVEN. Berkeley Cognitive Sciences Report No. 50. Berkeley: University of California. [To appear in Linguistics and Philosophy.].Google Scholar
Klima, Edward. 1964. Negation in English. The structure of language, ed. by Fodor, Jerry A. and Katz, Jerrold J., 246–323. New York: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Lakoff, George. 1986. Frame semantic control of the coordinate structure constraint. Papers from the Parasession on Pragmatics and Grammatical Theory (CLS 22:2), 152–67. Chicago.Google Scholar
Levin, Lori S. 1982. Sluicing: A lexical interpretation procedure. The mental representation of grammatical relations, ed. by Bresnan, Joan, 590–654. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Lewis, David. 1979. Scorekeeping in a language game. Semantics from different points of view, ed. by Bauerle, R., Egli, Urs, and Stechow, Arnim von, 172–87. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.Google Scholar
Linebarger, Marcia. 1981. The grammar of negative polarity. Bloomington: Indiana University Linguistics Club.Google Scholar
Makkai, Adam. 1972. Idiom structure in English. The Hague: Mouton.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mandel, Mark. 1974. When things don't happen. Berkeley Studies in Syntax and Semantics 1.XIX:1–3.Google Scholar
McCawley, James D. 1976. The annotated respective. Grammar and meaning, ed. by McCawley, James D., 121–32. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Partee, Barbara H. 1977. Comments on the paper by Bresnan. Formal syntax, ed. by Culicover, Peter, Wasow, Thomas, and Akmajian, Adrian, 197–206. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Pawley, Andrew, and Syder, Frances. 1983. Two puzzles for linguistic theory: Nativelike selection and nativelike fluency. Language and communication, ed. by Richards, Jack C. and Schmidt, Richard W., 191–225. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Prince, Ellen F. 1981. Topicalization, focus movement and Yiddish movement: A pragmatic differentiation. BLS 7. 249–64.Google Scholar
Selkirk, Elizabeth O. 1984. Phonology and syntax: The relation between sound and structure. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Wierzbicka, Anna. 1987. Boys will be boys: ‘Radical semantics’ vs. ‘radical pragmatics’. Lg. 63. 95–114.Google Scholar