Language Typology and Syntactic Description, Volume I: Clause Structure, Second edition
On clause-external packaging options: topicalizations, left
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Lgg Typology, Synt Description v. I - Clause structure
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On clause-external packaging options: topicalizations, left dislocations, and right dislocations In section 3.3 we motivated a distinction between pivot, and topic and partic- ularly the existence of constructions in which the topic of the sentence was not the pivot, such as Soukous, I regard as the best dance music around. The claim was that the topic in such sentences was external to the clause, not a direct constituent of it. Languages often have a number of these clause-external packaging constructions, and these will be the subject of this section. A typology of information packaging 443 Topicalizations and left-dislocation constructions are superficially similar: each presents a topic np juxtaposed immediately to the left of the clause. They are distinguished by the presence in left dislocations of a pronominal element within the clause referring to the topic np; this is absent in topicalizations. The following examples illustrate both types, (179) for topicalizations and (180) for left dislocations: (179) (a) That movie I wouldn’t see if you gave me a free ticket (b) That dish, I haven’t tried (c) For Egbert, I would do anything (180) (a) Turtles, they make the greatest pets (b) Thai cooking, I find it irresistible (c) Mary, I went to university with her Note that only left dislocations are available to [ +pivot] nps; topicalizations would leave the pivot position unoccupied, which is ungrammatical in English: (181) *Turtles, make the greatest pets. These constructions foreground a given np by making it topic, but differ struc- turally from foregrounding passives and antipassives in that there is no distinc- tive mark in the verbal expression, and the topic np is external to the clause, not internal as with the different voice constructions. This structural difference is tied to a functional one. Whereas foregrounding passives and antipassives are typically used to indicate the continuity of reference of a topic or pivot np over clauses, topicalization and left dislocations have the opposite function: Lambrecht (1994) points out that the function of these constructions is to intro- duce a new topic or re-introduce one that was introduced previously but has not been mentioned for some clauses; in other words, these constructions point up discontinuity of topic. This usage is well illustrated in the mini-fable drawn from Giv´on (1976): (182) Once there was a wizard. He was very wise, rich, and was married to a beautiful witch. They had two sons. The first was tall and brooding, he spent his days in the forest hunting snails, and his mother was afraid of him. The second was short and vivacious, a bit crazy but always game. Now the wizard, he lived in Africa. Note the final sentence contains a left-dislocated np, the wizard. This is because the wizard, while already mentioned in the text, has not been a participant or topic of several previous clauses, the topics of which were his sons and their mother. Consequently, a left-dislocation construction is proper to re-introduce him as topic of the final clause. 444 William A. Foley Topicalizations and left-dislocation constructions are quite wide-spread among the languages of the world. Tagalog has pervasive and common top- icalization constructions. Interestingly, it distinguishes between topicalizations involving pivots, which require a particle ay (183b, e), and those of [ +oblique] arguments, which do not (183c); [ −oblique] [−pivot] nps cannot normally be topicalized (183d): (183) (a) nag-bigay ng isda ang lalake sa bata pivot =[+a]-give [−oblique] fish [+pivot] man [+oblique] child ‘The man gave fish to the child’ (b) ang lalake ay nag-bigay ng isda [ +pivot] man topic pivot =[+a]-give [−oblique] fish sa bata [ +oblique] child ‘The man, (he) gave fish to the child’ (c) sa bata nag-bigay ng isda ang lalake [ +oblique] child pivot=[+a]-give [−oblique] fish [+pivot] man ‘the child, the man gave fish’ (d) *ng isda nag-bigay ang lalake sa bata [ −oblique] fish pivot=[+a]-give [+pivot] man [+oblique] child ‘Fish, the man gave to the child’ (e) ang isda ‘y i-bi-bigay ng lalake [ +pivot] fish topic pivot=[−a]-fut-give [−oblique] man sa bata [ +oblique] child ‘The fish, the men will give (it) to the child’ The restrictions against sentences like (183d) make sense in view of the fact that, prototypically, pivots are topics in Tagalog, and, as a symmetrical language, any [ −oblique] np can freely be pivot and topic. Hence, if a [−oblique] np is to be topic, the language mandates that it also be pivot as in (183e). Left-dislocation constructions are perhaps even more common cross- linguistically than topicalization. Jakaltek (Craig (1977)) illustrates them well: (184) Jakaltek (a) x- -s-mak naj Pel ix Malin asp -3sg.abs-3sg.erg-hit clsfr Peter clsfr Mary [ −a] [ +a] ‘Peter hit Mary’ A typology of information packaging 445 (b) naj Pel x- -s-mak naj ix Malin clsfr Peter asp-3sg.abs-3sg.erg-hit clsfr clsfr Mary [ −a] [+a] ‘Peter, he hit Mary’ (c) ix Malin x- -s-mak naj Pel ix clsfr Mary asp-3sg.abs-3sg.erg-hit clsfr Peter clsfr [ −a] [ +a] ‘Mary, Peter hit her’ In all these Jacaltec left-dislocation constructions, the external topic np is refer- enced within the clause by a bound verbal pronominal affix and a free pronoun, which is here represented by clsfr for ‘classifier’. It needs to be borne in mind that topic nps are not necessarily realized in clause-external position. Besides being pivots in pivot languages, topics can in many languages be marked in situ within the clause with a special topic affix or particle; this is very common in Papuan languages, for example Tauya: (185) (a) ’i fanu-ni fena’a-na yau-a-’a dem man-erg woman-topic see-3sg[ +a]-indic ‘The woman, that man saw (her)’ (b) ’i fanu-na pai yau-a-’a dem man-topic pig see-3sg[ +a]-indic ‘That man, (he) saw the pig’ MacDonald (1994) In addition to nps being juxtaposed externally to the left margin of clauses in left dislocations, there are many languages which can also juxtapose them to the right margin. These are called right-dislocation or antitopic (Lambrecht (1994)) constructions. Examples in various languages include: (186) (a) He’s a good friend, Sam. (b) Yimas mum pu-n-mampi-awkura-mpi-api-k, paympan 3pl 3pl[ −a]-3sg[+a]-again-gather-seq-put in-irr eagle ‘He again gathered them and put them inside, the eagle’ (c) Cayuga kye ·’ sak´aeyo’, kashehaw´ahksho’ then 3pl.return 3pl.poss.daughters ‘Then they returned, your daughters’ Mithun (1992) In the free word order languages, Yimas and Cayuga, this clause-external right- dislocation construction is distinguished from the typically freely variant order of clause-internal constituents by prosodic factors. In Yimas, for instance, the 446 William A. Foley right-dislocated np is set off by a distinct pause from the clause itself and has a marked low falling pitch contour. Lambrecht (1994) discusses the function of right-dislocation constructions. Unlike left dislocations, they commonly indicate already-mentioned referents that are well established in the immediate discourse, but whose role may be shifting between clauses. Or they may be used to disambiguate the referents of free or bound pronominals from a range of potential referents already estab- lished in the discourse. Unlike left dislocations, they are never used to introduce completely new topics; this is because the right-dislocated np is mentioned in the clause through bound or free pronominals before it is ever uttered, and pronominals are characteristic of already given material. Right-dislocated nps are also typically of low pitch prosodically; this prohibits them from signalling contrastive topics, which are marked by high falling pitch like focussed nps. Again the contrastive function is a speciality of left dislocations. Thus, while both left and right dislocations present nps externally to the clause, at the left and right margins respectively, they serve quite distinct functions, a fact no doubt linked to their different structural positions. Download 1.59 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
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