This paper attempts to explore the grammaticalization of the [The fact is that] construction in order to substantiate the synchronic extensions of [The fact is that] > [The fact is,] > [Fact is,] (Kim 2001, 2003a) found in the present-day corpus (COBUILD 2000). In other words, this study is to examine whether such present-day extensions can be observed historically or not. For the historical data ARCHER (A Representative Corpus of Historical English Registers) Corpus (1999) and OED (Oxford English Dictionary 1989) will be used. These data will reveal that [the fact is that] construction has evolved along the grammaticalization path: [The fact is this.] + independent sentence [The fact is that] + complement clause > [The fact is,] + main clause > [Fact is.] + main clause. To conclude, this paper verities our claim that seemingly superficial THAT deletion and THE deletion do not represent optional ommission or performance errors but fit into the systematic language changes: the present- day variations reflect different stages in historical grammaticalization.

• 김희진 | Kim Hui Jin