Die Afrikaanse partikel ewe/effe(ns) in vergelyking met Nederlands even/effe(n), Duits eben en Engels even

Abstract

The Afrikaans particle ewe/effe(ns), Dutch even/effen, High German eben and English even all developed from a common Germanic root. Dual root meanings can be distinguished, namely (i) 'equal' and (ii) 'level'. From these root meanings, various adverbial functions developed in the four languages, such as specifiers of time, place and degree, and illocutionary, focus and modal functions. German developed, in particular, the semantic value of 'categorical affirmation' from (i), but also certain values from (ii). Modern English mainly retains a scalar focus function from (i). Dutch developed a quantifying specification of degree with temporal and illocutionary applications; effe(n) is at present an informal variant of even. Afrikaans, derived from older Dutch, developed from (ii) the specifier of degree effe(ns) and an ironic-contrastive function ewe, of which the latter can be considered a new development.