Íslenskt mál og almenn málfræði - 01.01.2008, Page 136

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Alexander Andrason
Traugott (2003:100-106). In generalization a given construction
spreads in the linguistic system, for example through polysemy, weak-
ening of the semantic content and reduction or loss of constraints on
contexts and components. This means that a lexical or grammatical
expression expands the range of its meanings. The BÚNA-construc-
tion shows various properties of this kind when it is compared to its
source, the SI B-perfect (or B-resultative) with vera búinn að.
First, the BÚNA-construction has been generalized to all verbs,
even modal verbs like geta ‘can’, kunna ‘can, know\þurfa ‘need, have
to’, ætla ‘intend, want to, will’ and vilja ‘want to’, i.e. verbs that stan-
dardly do not form the B-perfect in SI. This is illustrated in (15):
(15)a. É búna kunna gera þetta.
I BÚNA know(inf.) do(inf.) this
‘I have known how to do this.’
b. É búna geta gera þetta.
I BÚNA can(inf. do(inf.) this
‘I was able to do this.’
c. É búna ætla kaupa bíl.
I BÚNA intend(inf.) buy(inf.) car
‘I wanted to buy a/the car.’
Second, as already mentioned, agentive human or at least animate
subjects are most typically used in the B-perfect in SI, except for spe-
cial contexts, e.g. an iterative one. Such restrictions do not hold for the
BÚNA-construction in PI as illustrated in (16):
(16)a. Bíl búna fara.
car BÚNA go(inf.)
‘The car has left.’
b. Vél búna bilast.
machine BÚNA get-broken(inf)
‘The machine has broken down.’
c. Bók búna týnast.
book BÚNA get-lost(inf)
‘The book has gotten lost.’