A Corpus-based Investigation of Diachronic Evolution of Like and Its Variants through Grammaticalization

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to investigate the diachronic evolution of the word “like” and its variants “likely”, “like to”, “feel like”, and “would like to”, etc. in the process of grammaticalization. Statistics from the search of corpora BNC and COHA show the variants of “like” and their historical trend of grammatication. The results demonstrate the highly active role of “like” in both lexical and grammatical functions in history. Furthermore, the variants and collocations of “like” have been the result of frequent interaction between human beings and languages. The findings have significant implications for second language pedagogy.