Semantics and Typology of Hedges: A Corpus-Based Study of German-Language Linguistics Research Articles

This article offers a comprehensive analysis of hedging devices within the framework of academic discourse. The study draws on a corpus of German-language research articles in linguistics published in “Zeitschrift für Sprachwissenschaft” between 2011 and 2019. A total of 1,445 hedging units were extracted via continuous sampling. Drawing on contextual and semantico-pragmatic analysis, the author proposes an original typology of hedges comprising three distinct categories: (1) hedges with modal semantics, (2) hedges with approximative semantics, and (3) hedges with semantics of vagueness. The findings indicate that hedges with modal semantics function as markers of possibility, conjecture, and the expression of the author's personal stance. It is further observed that approximative hedges serve to signal proximity to a reference point, similarity to a baseline unit, or a marginal quantity. The analysis demonstrates that the category of vagueness hedges encompasses linguistic units whose semantics profile non-strict generalization, quantitative vagueness, and imprecision resulting from the negation of a high degree of quality or quantity. The study highlights that hedges with modal semantics exhibit the highest frequency in the dataset, followed by approximative hedges in second place, and hedges with semantics of vagueness in third.