Les pronoms : quelques problèmes de délimitation de la catégorie

This article deals with the pronoun word-class, its definition and the distinction between pronouns and determiners. It first examines the traditional and etymological definition of the pronoun as a word put ‘instead of a noun’, a definition which is hardly appropriate for various reasons, beginning...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Jérôme Puckica
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Cercle linguistique du Centre et de l'Ouest - CerLICO 2022-01-01
Series:Corela
Subjects:
Online Access:https://journals.openedition.org/corela/14362
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:This article deals with the pronoun word-class, its definition and the distinction between pronouns and determiners. It first examines the traditional and etymological definition of the pronoun as a word put ‘instead of a noun’, a definition which is hardly appropriate for various reasons, beginning with the fact that only some pronouns can be used anaphorically. A redefinition of the pronoun class is then proposed as a closed class of grammatical nouns that do not take determiners and whose central members are typically used anaphorically or deictically. The third part of the article focuses on the distinction between pronouns and determiners and related issues such as nominal ellipsis. It is argued that determiners are also grammatical nouns, yet that the distinction between determiners and pronouns is motivated and descriptively useful in at least some cases, most particularly with regard to the articles and the personal pronouns.
ISSN:1638-573X