Grave : de l’adjectif à l’unité résomptive

Abstract

The aim of this article is to provide an overview of the uses of the word grave in present-day spoken French and to offer an analysis of cases where grave deviates from its prototypical function as a qualifying adjective. We will show which syntactic, morphological, semantic and pragmatic properties enable grave to become the trace of a resumptive phenomenon. This happens both in standard use, where grave is a prototypical qualifying adjective, but mainly corresponds to cases where it is the result of a process of pragmaticalization. In these uses, the meaning of grave changes depending on the illocutionary value of the statement to which it connects and becomes an expression of acceptance or assent. Our analysis will show how grave operates resumptive references to discourse, or how, in certain cases, it becomes able to take up the segment in its scope anaphorically.

Keywords

• discourse markers
• resumptive
• spoken french
• adjective