Language change at the syntax-semantics interface. Perspectives and challenges

The contributions in this volume address, from various theoretical and methodological perspectives, the interplay of grammatical structure and meaning through time. The “interface” between syntax and semantics is understood here in two different senses, a technical and a methodological one. In the technical sense, change at the syntax-semantics interface is represented by events targeting both the structural configuration and the meaning of a certain item. This is, for example, the typical situation in grammaticalization phenomena, whose effects range across multiple linguistic modules. All contributions in this volume are based on diachronic data attesting this kind of interface change, and aim at uncovering temporal and causal relationships between interpretational and structural factors. Besides proposing a detailed reconstruction of their particular case studies, the authors engage in the challenge of precisely modeling – according to their respective theoretical frameworks – the interaction of meaning and form, thus suggesting general formats. In a more methodological sense, the term “interface” is also understood in this volume as the theoretical comparison and dialogue between syntactic and semantic models of diachronic processes.