Towards a usage-based characterisation of the English Superlative Object Construction

Abstract

Little attention has been paid to the English Superlative Object Construction (SOC), as in "She worked her hardest". The historical grammarians Jespersen (1909–1949) and Poutsma (1904–1929) are the only ones who do touch on the SOC, and they do so in passing relying on what seem to be the prototypical examples of the construction. This empirical evidence, though valuable for a first characterisation of the pattern, is insufficient to provide a detailed analysis of the form, function, frequency, and distribution of the SOC in Present Day English from the perspective of Construction Grammar. Based on usage-based data from COCA, this paper argues that the SOC qualifies as an intensifying comparative construction. Despite being low frequent and showing a set of highly entrenched, lexicalised units (e.g., smile [X] prettiest, work [X] hardest), the SOC is relatively productive, especially in informal registers where the construction can be easily accommodated to serve emotive, phatic, and conative functions.