HALF AS AN ADVERB, HALF AS A PREFIX: THE EVOLUTION OF MEDIO AS A VERB MODIFIER IN SPANISH

Abstract

The work focuses on the study of medio (half) as a modifier of finite verbs, in respect to both the position of medio in relation to proclitic unstressed pronouns (<unstressed pronoun + medio> and <medio + unstressed pronoun>) and the aspectual types of verbal predicates with which it is combined. Of all the possible patterns for positioning pronouns, the first example is far better documented (16^th and 17^th centuries). From the 19^th century onwards, medio in combination with an unstressed pronoun starts to frequently act as an adverbial, rather than a prefixal, since there are more cases that show <medio + unstressed pronoun> than in the reverse order. On the other hand, throughout the history of Spanish medio has spread its area of action, in such a way in the 16^th-18^th centuries it was basically used to modify telic verbs, yet in the 19^th century it increased its use as a modifier of atelic verbs, although there is a predominance of the former. Furthermore, the two readings (aspectual and evaluative) that have been identified in present-day Spanish show that from the first documentations, medio is used as a modifier of finite verbs (16^th century), although to a different degree. Lastly, it can be seen how the distributional change of medio in relation with an unstressed pronoun (se medio cerró > medio se cerró) (it half closed > half it closed) occurs at the same time the use of medio was extended from being an aspectual modifier to an evaluative modifier.