Íslenskt mál og almenn málfræði - 01.01.1982, Page 63

,,Þágufallssýki“
61
Pétur Gunnarsson. 1976. Punklurpunklur komma strik. Iðunn, Reykjavík.
Sigurjón Björnsson. 1980. Börn í Reykjavík. Iðunn, Reykjavík.
Pórunn Friðriksdóttir. 1974. Um cannabis og LSD. Könnun á fíkniefnaneyzlu ungs fólks
í Reykjavík. Óprentuð BA-ritgerð. Háskóli íslands, Reykjavík.
SUMMARY
Thcrc arc several vcrbs in Icclandic that do not take rcgular nominative subjects
but rather prcverbal noun phrascs in accusative. These noun phrascs will be rcferrcd
to hcre as quasi-subjects (Icel. frumlagsígildi) and thc vcrbs in qucstion called imper-
sonal since thcy do not agree witli thcir quasi-subjects in pcrson (nor number).
It has been known for scvcral dccadcs at lcast that thcrc is some tcndcncy to sub-
stitute dat. for acc. as quasi-subject, esp. in the casc of some common impersonal vcrbs
(scc also thc paper by Halldór Halldórsson in this volume). This dcvelopmcnt has
sometimes becn callcd dative-sickness (lccl. þágufallssýki) and is frowned upon in schools.
It will be rcferred to as dative substitution in this summary. It has sometimes been
clainred that it is geographically restricted (a regional dialcct, perhaps rcstrictcd to thc
south-wcst corner of Iceland) and/or that it is restricted to ccrtain social classcs (a
sociolcct typical for thc lowcr classes). This has not been investigatcd systcmatically.
however. Thc present paper rcports on thc results of a special tcst which was designed
to investigate the extcnt of this dative substitution and othcr ,,irregularitics“ in the
case marking of subjects and quasi-subjects. Thc test is in the form of a narrative (cf.
Appendix 1) where a proper name (Sif) which has the samc form for nom./acc./dat.
is used as thc subjcct of personal verbs and quasi-subject of impersonal vcrbs. The
task of thc person bcing tested was then to substitute pronominal forms (first 3rd pcrs.
forms and thcn lst pcrs. forms) for thc name. The test was thus „disguised" as a
simple substitution of pronominal forms for a propcr namc, but the idea was, of course,
that the person being tested would have to make up his/her mind as to which case
form to usc and thus would rcveal, e. g., the preference for dat. or acc. with thc im-
personal verbs in qucstion. The test was administcrcd to about 200 11 ycar old childrcn
in 11 schools in diffcrent parts of thc country. The basic results arc summarized in
several tablcs and figures in the text but the following should be mentioned:
Two vcrbs that are normally called pcrsonal, i. e. hlakka (líl) ‘look forward (to)’
and kvíða (fyrir) ‘be anxious or apprehensive (about)’ show a clear tendency to ac-
cusative or dative substitution (for the ,,normal“ nominative).
Among impersonal vcrbs that ,,normally“ take acc. but show a clear tendency tow-
ards dat. substitution one could mention langa ‘want', vanta ‘need' lack’ (see also Hall-
dór Halldórsson’s result in this volume) and also svíða ‘smart’. Interestingly, this
tendency secms stronger with 3rd pers. quasi-subjects than with lst pcrs. The reason
may be that students are most likely to be corrected whcn they say mér (dat.) langar
... ‘I want . . .’ and mér (dat.) vanlar ... ‘I need . . .’ and thus they „correct" or
monitor themselves more closely in the case of lst pers. This correlates with thc fact
that there is more tendency towards acc. substitution in the case of lst pers. than 3rd
pers. with impersonal verbs that „normally" take quasi-subjects in dat. This is probably