Dataset abstract: The dataset includes an annotated corpus sample of N = 208 French sentences with que dalle. In 2023, the sample was drawn from the literary database Frantext from which we have selected the subcorpus corpus moderne (1800-1979) and the subcorpus corpus contemporain (1980-present).We haven’t found any attestations of que dalle or graphic variants beyond the selected period. In total, we collected and analysed all 208 observations across the two corpora (see Table 2 in the article). The Frantext data serves in the first place to map out the diachronic evolution of que dalle and to compare with rien in synchrony.

Article abstract: The present study constitutes a first contribution to the understanding of the French pronoun que dalle (‘nothing’). First, we looked at its syntactic flexibility, its semantic strength in conveying zero quantification, and its pragmatic role in informal language. Then we compared que dalle with its near synonym rien and analyzed its development. The results can be summarized as follows. On a descriptive level, we can conclude that, in spite of their different diaphasic distribution, que dalle functions in much the same way as rien, but the former differs from the latter in terms of syntax (subject position, attributive adjective), stylistics and especially pragmatics. On a methodological level, we hypothesized that que dalle originates in the exceptive structure ne…que (‘only’) but the corpus data were insufficient to demonstrate this assumption. On a theoretical level, different processes, i.e. lexicalization and grammaticalization, could be distinguished. We acknowledge that individual quantifiers can be very different in nature and have different diachronic paths: the development of que dalle goes beyond this of rien in that it tends towards inherent negativity in fragment answers.

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Frantext: https://www.frantext.fr/