Lo dijo en mi delante. On the «preposition + possessive + adverb» construction in Modern Spanish

Abstract

This theoretic paper deals with the description of the prepositional construction with possessive determiner (mi, tu, su) and ‘adverb’ of place (por su delante, en mi delante), a feature documented in the Andean Spanish varieties (Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador and south of Colombia), but whose use in Modern Spanish extends to other dialectal areas. The study responds to four objectives: (1) to establish where the phenomenon is registered in Modern Spanish, in which person and number the possessive determiner usually appears, what prepositions head it and what values ​​are attributed to this construction; (2) to argue in favor of the nominal character of the adverb delante, consider this phenomenon like a 'redundancy' case in Modern Spanish, and review its process of analogy and progression to other adverbial pieces; and (3) reconsidering the explanation of functional loan and its normativity, given the evidence that this phenomenon does not contradict the Spanish-language models.