«Luego entonces». An argumentative intersubjective marker

Abstract

This paper shows that luego entonces is the product of a conceptual fusion, a Blend (Turner and Fauconnier 2002), of a bleached consecutive marker luego and a relatively less bleached consecutive marker entonces that led to the formation of an argumentative marker by which the speaker offers a statement to be taken by the hearer as a logical consequence that is therefore irrefutable. The marker serves to validate the speaker’s assessment. In contrast with traditional analyses that see luego as a logical consecutive marker, this paper shows, based on data from the thirteenth to the seventeen century, that luego never had a logical cause-effect meaning; instead it encoded intersubjective consequences that were seen as highly probable. From a Cognitive Grammar perspective it is also shown that, as the consecutive meaning of luego started to bleach around the twentieth century, entonces joined the construction to reinstall the consecutive intersubjective reading that luego was losing. This led to the formation of the new argumentative marker luego entonces that is commonly used in argumentative texts to make the hearer interpret a statement as irrefutable.