It is interesting to view the present findings in a theoretical light. As mentioned initially, the findings seem to be incompatible with Bybee et al.’s (1994) predictions about developing
source meanings. The findings presented in the present paper do indeed challenge Bybee et
al.’s (1994:12) strong claim that “the source meaning uniquely determines the grammaticization path that the gram will travel in its semantic development”. In this case, the source meaning has not travelled the expected path in its semantic development. In fact, we are presented with what seems to be an exception from the Perfective Path. The spread of the preterit is not accounted for in the theory of paths. The sudden halt in the cline is very recent. Until the end of the 19th century, everything was happening exactly as expected. The Latin resultative construction had developed into a perfect, gradually broadening its functional applicability. It coexisted with the preterit in Romance, until the expected happened: the perfect generalized to perfective. This has happened in French, Romanian, north Italian and is happening in several varieties of Spanish. In Rioplatense, it seemed to be happening as well. Literary sources from ca. 1900 suggest that the perfect was indeed frequent. Nevertheless, at some point, it stopped. Everything was happening by the book when a sudden halt occurred. Therefore, it is possible to conclude that the source meaning does not “uniquely” determine the future development of a grammaticalizing construction, or at least moderate it to a statistical deviation.
The development in Rioplatense went as follows:
source meaning: possession resultative perfect perfective
As we see, the path stopped on the ‘perfect’ stage, it never reached the ‘perfective’ stage. It is in fact preterit that has generalized to perfective:
preterit perfective
In addition to challenge the hypothesis of the predictions of semantic development based on source meanings, the case in question exemplifies several more expected characteristics of
language and language change. The inability to predict has been touched upon; even though there are statistics that show the tendency of source meanings to develop in certain ways, this does not always hold. As noted by Buescher (2004), it does not for American English.
Also, two additional findings exemplify the two levels of prediction presented in chapter 5. In the cases of viste and ya, the fact that the two grammaticalize was not possible to predict, because the same constructions can exist in other languages without ever grammaticalizing. They did not have to change. Still, as the grammaticalization happens, it is possible to predict which source meanings will be grammaticalized; ‘see’ can, but ‘stare’ never would. ‘Already’ often does, but ‘immediately’ is unlikely to, etc.
Above all, the findings support a view that emphasizes the impact frequency has on language
structure. If we accept the hypothesis that viste was the centre of analogy of the preterit category, we are actually faced with a case of the frequency of a single construction erasing the distinction between two categories. This would indeed support the claim that frequency has an impact on structure. Intuitively, this seems plausible; it is difficult to imagine how a sudden abstract category change would take place without any external anchoring point. The single construction is therefore seen as the point of departure for the extension of the whole category. As illustrated, there is substantial psycholinguistic evidence to support this claim.
It is difficult not to conceive at last parts of language knowledge as procedural seen in the
light of these findings. For instance, in the possible grammaticalization process of the adverb ya, what we see is a type of knowledge highly affected by frequency; a unit becomes larger with repetition (the unit in question being ya + PRET), as recurring sequences of actions come
to be represented as a single action (Boyland 1998). If ya becomes grammaticalized, the construction ya + PRET would not be conceived as different parts but as a unified whole. If
linguistic knowledge were declarative knowledge, frequency would not have such an impact.
All in all, the dynamic nature of grammar is illustrated with the present cases. In the span of only four generations, the past system in Rioplatense has changed radically, possibly as a direct result of the frequency of a single construction. The creative role of repetition has once again culminated in a structural result. As quoted initially, Langacker (1987) argues that understanding the nature of change is pivotal for understanding the organization of language. The present findings emphasize how frequency, leading to change, is the main and continuous creator of category structure.
6. Summary
The present work has described the loss of a distinction in a variety of Spanish, that is, the generalizing of Preterit into perfective in Rioplatense. I have shown that the frequency of the Perfect has gradually diminished in four generations, as demonstrated in the speech of informants with ages ranging from 14 to 87. On this basis, we can assume the following; first, that a major morphosyntactic change has taken place in Rioplatense; the Perfect has disappeared from the speech of the young speakers; a distinction is lost. Second, using age as a variable has revealed that the change is very likely to have taken place during the last hundred years. This is assumed both on the basis of oral sources of old informants, and after investigating the distribution between the perfect and the preterit in plays from the end of the 19th century, which all show a frequency of the perfect as expected in a standard variety. The synchronic description has revealed a diachronic element.
All in all, an exception to the paths of Bybee et al. has been identified: a seeming predictable path may stop. Instead of the predicted development perfect perfective, the perfect has
disappeared in favour or the preterit, which has generalized; preterit perfective. This is a
reminder that reconstruction on the basis of grammaticalization clines is impossible. It also illustrates that only looking at a synchronic layer may indeed be misleading.
Apart from these findings, two elements in the data have been too salient to overlook. First, that the adverb ya (‘already’) can be assumed to be in the early stages of grammaticalization, based on its use in contexts where no element of ‘prior to, before expected’ etc. (the typical original meanings of ya) is intended.
Second, the existence of a grammaticalized construction with the form of a past, viste is too outstanding to be overlooked. I have investigated whether such a single construction may have served as a centre and kick off point for the extension of the entire category. Of all the occurrences of the perfect, not once does it occur in the second person singular (2SG). The change has manifested itself first in the 2SG, which may be the direct result of the frequency of viste. I have argued that this is the result of a generalization of the construction viste mentioned above; analogous with this, the preterit has spread to the entire paradigm. I have shown that such a development may well be consistent with construction-based approaches to learning and generalization, and also show that such changes do occur in other language processes, such as productivity and categorization.