This close to V-ing construction

Part of language	Spoken American English
has gesture	eng_ThisclosetoVingconstruction_Gest
Meaning of the construction	An agent is/was metaphorically very close to a goal or an outcome.

Construction elements

Small Quantity Gesture Construction

Colloprofile for Element 6

Colloprofile for Element 3

Examples

Example 1

Text	It was this close to happening, right? This close to happening!
comment	http://go.redhenlab.org/yas/0117

Research

Research Question	Finding
How can multimodal phenomena be modelled in Construction Grammar?	The verbal form “this close to V-ing” and the close index finger - thumb gesture co-occur 93% of the time. The two forms are likely entrenched together as a single unit, thus making it one formal multimodal unit. The construction is multimodal.
How can multimodal phenomena be modelled in Construction Grammar?	This close to is an example of a multimodal construction in which the verbal form and the gesture are fixed and frequently co-occur. As such, it presents no significant challenges for modeling within Construction Grammar.

Metadata

Date Created	2026-02-02
Annotator	Yassine Iabdounane

Back to Constructions List