A corpus-based analysis of the Dat-Nom/Nom-Dat alternation in German

Abstract

A subgroup of German Nom-Dat verbs have received considerable attention in the literature due to the propensity of the dative to occur preverbally, which is unexpected on an object analysis of the dative. Here we argue for a different analysis, namely that the relevant verbs alternate between two different argument structures, Dat-Nom and Nom-Dat, and hence that either argument, dative or nominative, may be the syntactic subject. Earlier studies have shown that topicalization of direct arguments is found in 4–12% of cases in German texts. For comparison, we have extracted 13,000 tokens of 76 verbs from the deTenTen13 corpus and coded these for ten different variables. Our findings support an alternating Dat-Nom/Nom-Dat analysis for these verbs, as 42% of the tokens instantiate the Dat-Nom order and the remnant 58% instantiate the Nom-Dat order. In contexts with full NPs only, the share of Dat-Nom tokens is even higher, 46% compared to 54% Nom-Dat, altogether ruling out a topicalization analysis of the Dat-Nom order. Further light is thrown upon this alternation through a bivariate and multivariate analysis. This confirms the effect of topicality, definiteness and length, while also revealing an inherent correlation between datives and animate referents and nominatives and inanimate referents.