Grammatical processing and syntactic change

Project within the SFB 1287 - Limits of Variability in Language; Cluster A: Limits of variability in language interaction and change (2017-2021)

This project seeks to explore the dimensions of syntactic variability from a diachronic perspective. We will combine corpus study and psycholinguistic experimentation to investigate how language processing strategies might affect speakers' choices of particular syntactic variants. The extraordinary abundance of syntactic variants in Early New High German, which gradually became more constrained during the emergence of present-day Standard German, will provide a suitable empirical basis for this. The project will focus on the emergence of coherent infinitival structures. 

>>Video introduction to the project

>> SFB website

Project Staff

Prof. Dr. Ulrike Demske (principal investigator)

PD Dr. Claudia Felser (principal investigator)

Dr. Sina Bosch (postdoctoral researcher)

Ilaria De Cesare (doctoral researcher)