Complementation ofashamed – diachrony and determinants of variation
Mikko Höglund · Studies in language companion series · 2018
The present chapter will contribute to the area of English complementation studies by investigating the adjectiveashamed. The study focuses on the diachronic development of the use ofashamedduring the past two centuries in different environments, and the variation between two rivalling non-finite complements,toinfinitive andof -ing. The data was collected from COHA and COCA. The results show that since the 1870sashamedhas been used less and less, and that it occurs nowadays regularly without a complement whereas in the 19th century thetoinfinitive complement was common. Theof -ingcomplement is not used much, but some contexts such as negation or copula in the complement clause were observed to attract this complement type.