Syntactically independent but pragmatically dependent: precautioning temporal markers

To date, little research exists on the diachronic sources of markers in the apprehensional domain. Attested sources include complementisers with main verbs of fear, the lexical verb ‘look, watch’ (Lichtenberk 1995), as well as general modal markers of possibility (Bybee et al. 1994: 211; Pakendorf & Schalley 2007). In this paper, we aim to draw attention to the potential for temporal connectives to develop into markers of precautioning clauses. For example, three English-lexified creole languages of the Pacific, Hawai’i Creole, Norf’k, and Northern Australian Kriol, employ a grammaticalised reflex of English by and by in precautionary function (Mühlhäusler 2010: 356–357; Sakoda and Siegel 2008: 536; Siegel 2011: 545; Angelo & Schultze-Berndt 2016). Additional attested cases come from Australian languages, Pidgin Hawaiian, Dutch (Boogaart 2009), and German, where the deictic and anaphoric temporal adverb nachher ‘afterwards’ is used in precautionary contexts, even where no temporal sequence is involved. The propensity for such temporal markers to develop into precautionary markers can be explained in terms of the commonly attested invited inference from temporal to causal consequence (post hoc ergo propter hoc) (e.g. Traugott & König 1991). Moreover, clauses involving deictic or anaphoric temporal connectives such as German nachher share with typical precautionary clauses their pragmatic dependency on the linguistic context, independently of their syntactic status as main or subordinate clause. In this paper, on the basis of data from naturalistic discourse, we will provide evidence for the semantic development of Kriol and German temporal connectives to precautionary markers, the syntactic status the corresponding clauses as main clauses, and their simultaneous pragmatic dependency in discourse.