Facets of subjectification

Subjectification, as the diachronic facet of subjectivity, has raised in the last two decades a number of interesting questions in grammaticalization and semantic change theory. In this paper I shall reflect on the nature and construal of subjectification, focusing on the question, formulated by Traugott (2010a, p. 58), ‘‘whether it is possible to identify factors of subjectification that are replicable across languages and construction-types, independently of those that might be particular to a construction’’. Taking as my point of departure a Traugottian definition of subjectification as a pragmatic–semantic process whereby ‘‘meanings become increasingly based in the speaker’s subjective belief state/attitude toward the proposition’’ (Traugott, 1989, p. 31). I shall consider in more detail the two components of such a definition: ‘‘speaker’s subjective belief state/attitude’’ vs ‘‘proposition’’. I propose to define instances of subjectification on the basis of a systematic link between the shift to subjective to the shift to the attitudinal, non-propositional component of the semantic structure of an utterance. This results in a narrowing of the definition to ‘‘attitudinal’’ subjectification, vs ‘‘lexical’’ subjectification, as in pejoration or amelioration, and ‘‘textual’’ subjectification, concerning the development of devices coding cohesion, which are both conferred a distinct status, as in Traugott’s (1989) original insights. This narrowing is aimed at limiting the heterogeneity of the phenomena currently brought under the umbrella of subjectification, which makes it hard to identify precise criteria for distinguishing subjective (subjectified) vs non or less subjective (subjectified) expressions.