Cover not available
Article published In:
Evidentiality and the Semantics-Pragmatics Interface
Edited by Bert Cornillie and Juana I. Marín-Arrese
[Belgian Journal of Linguistics 29] 2015
► pp. 101–122

Between evidentiality and epistemic modality

The case of the future and the conditional in European Portuguese

This paper aims to present an in-depth description of the synthetic and compound forms of the future and the conditional, as both inferential and reportative markers, drawing a framework for the respective distribution in Portuguese journalistic texts. A corpus analysis shows that different categories (evidentiality, modality, tense, and aspect) contribute to the construction of the values in question, defining different sets of properties for each of the verbal forms, in both inferential and reportative uses. Furthermore, it proves that these same values are particularly sensitive to textual genre: the reportative uses emerge in news reports, while the inferential uses appear more frequently in opinion texts. Ultimately, it illustrates how the use of these forms sheds light on the boundary between epistemic modality and evidentiality, demonstrating that the assertion of the information source is distinct from the assessment of the speaker’s attitude toward his/her statement.

Keywords: reportative evidentiality, inference, epistemic modality, conditional, future
Published online: 24 March 2016
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/bjl.29.05oli
References (28)
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y
2003 “Evidentiality in Typological Perspective.” In Studies in Evidentiality, ed. by Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald, and Robert M.W. Dixon, 1–32. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2004 Evidentiality. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y., and Robert M.W. Dixon
1998 “Evidentials and Areal Typology: A Case-study from Amazonia.” Language Sciences 20 (3): 241–257. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Azzopardi, Sophie
2011 Le futur et le conditionnel: valeur en langue et effets de sens en discours. Analyse contrastive espagnol / français. Ph.D. dissertation. Université Paul Valéry-Montpellier III.Google Scholar
Cornillie, Bert
2009 “Evidentiality and Epistemic Modality. On the Close Relationship between Two Different Categories.” Functions of Language 16 (1): 44–62. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Culioli, Antoine
1990 Pour une linguistique de l’énonciation. Tome 1: Opérations et représentations. Paris: Ophrys.Google Scholar
1999a Pour une linguistique de l’énonciation. Tome 2: Formalisation et opérations de repérage. Paris: Ophrys.Google Scholar
1999b Pour une linguistique de l’énonciation. Tome 3: Domaine notionnel. Paris: Ophrys.Google Scholar
de Haan, Ferdinand
1999 “Evidentiality and Epistemic Modality: Setting Boundaries.” Southwest Journal of Linguistics 181: 83–101.Google Scholar
Dendale, Patrick, and Liliane Tasmowski
2001 “Introduction: Evidentiality and Related Notions.” Journal of Pragmatics 33 (3): 339–348. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Duarte, Isabel Margarida
2009a “Emoção e argumentação: futuro perfeito nos títulos de notícias.” In Anais do III Simpósio Internacional sobre Análise do Discurso: emoções, ethos e argumentação (Belo Horizonte, abril 2008), ed. by Wander Emediato, Ida Lucia Machado, and Renato de Mello. Belo Horizonte: Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (CD-Rom).Google Scholar
2009b “Futuro perfeito e condicional composto: mediativo no discurso jornalístico em português europeu e em português brasileiro.” In Anais do VI Congresso Internacional da Abralin (João Pessoa, 2009), ed. by Dermeval da Hora.Google Scholar
Guentchéva, Zlatka
1994 “Manifestations de la catégorie du médiatif dans les temps du français.” Langue Française 1021: 8–23. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1996 “Introduction”. In L’Enonciation Médiatisée, ed. by Zlatka Guentchéva, 11–18. Louvain/Paris: Éditions Peeters.Google Scholar
Guentchéva, Zlatka, and Jon Landaburu
2007 “Introduction.” In L’Enonciation Médiatisée II. Le traitement épistémologique de l’information: illustrations amérindiennes et caucasiennes, ed. by Zlatka Guentchéva, and Jon Landaburu, 1–19. Louvain: Peeters.Google Scholar
Haillet, Pierre Patrick
2002 Le Conditionnel en Français: une approche polyphonique. Paris: Ophrys.Google Scholar
Lazard, Gilbert
2001 “On the grammaticalization of evidentiality.” Journal of Pragmatics 33 (3): 359–367. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Martins, Ana
2010 “Evidencialidade no discurso dos media .” Estudos Linguísticos/Linguistic Studies 51: 235–245.Google Scholar
Moirand, Sophie
2007 Les discours de la presse quotidienne, Observer, analyser, comprendre. Paris: PUF.Google Scholar
Oliveira, Fátima
2003 “Tempo e aspecto.” In Gramática da Língua Portuguesa. 5th ed. by Maria Helena Mira Mateus, Ana Maria Brito, Inês Duarte, Isabel Hub Faria, Sónia Frota, Gabriela Matos, Fátima Oliveira, Marina Vigário, and Alina Villalva, 127–178. Lisboa: Caminho.Google Scholar
Oliveira, Teresa
2013 Valores de (inter)subjetividade na análise semântica: a marcação da distância. Ph.D. dissertation. Universidade Nova de Lisboa.Google Scholar
2014 “Enunciação mediatizada na imprensa portuguesa e brasileira: um estudo de caso.” Estudos Linguísticos/Linguistic Studies 101: 209–218.Google Scholar
Palmer, Frank R
2001 Mood and Modality. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Saussure, Louis de
2012 “Modalité épistémique, évidentialité et dépendance contextuelle.” Langue Française 1731: 131–143. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Squartini, Mario
2001 “The Internal Structure of Evidentiality in Romance.” Studies in Language 25 (2): 297–334. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2004 “La relazione semantica tra Futuro e Condizionale nelle lingue romanze.” Revue Romane 39 (1): 68–96. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Vion, Robert
2001 “«Effacement énonciatif» et stratégies discursives.” In De la syntaxe à la narratologie énonciative : Hommage à René Rivara, ed. by Monique de Mattia, and André Joly, 331–354. Gap/Paris: Ophrys.Google Scholar
Willett, Thomas
1988 “A Cross Linguistic Survey of the Grammaticalization of Evidentiality.” Studies in Language 12 (1): 51–97. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by (1)

Cited by 1 other publications

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 30 june 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.