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Pragmatic Markers, Discourse Markers and Modal Particles: New perspectives
Edited by Chiara Fedriani and Andrea Sansó
[Studies in Language Companion Series 186] 2017
► pp. 229–254

Chapter 8
A format for the description of German modal particles and their functional equivalents in Croatian and English

| University of Zadar
| University of Zadar
| Leibniz University Hannover

This paper presents a format for a cross-linguistic, corpus-based description of the formal features and the function of modal particles (hereafter: abbreviated as MPs) and their equivalents in German, Croatian and English. We define the word category of MPs for the Croatian language and propose a shared, pragmatic function of these particles in a cross-linguistic perspective. The starting point for the comparative analysis is the pragmatic function of German MPs, i.e. a specific discourse grammatical function which consists in anchoring the utterance in an assumed dialogic setting as the second turn, thus being set off from discourse marking elements as well as from text-connective elements in the narrow sense (cf. Diewald 2007, 2013; Diewald et al. 2009, see also Sections 1 and 2.1.2). Particle meanings are described in terms of the speaker’s assumptions about a state of affairs in the context of the communication (cf. Kresić & Batinić 2014). The proposed method for the lexicographic description of particle meanings in a cross-linguistic perspective encompasses their central features on the levels of morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics.

Keywords: modal particles, contrastive analysis, corpus analysis, basic meaning, sentence types
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Modal particles in a cross-linguistic perspective
    • 2.1German and Croatian modal particles
      • 2.1.1Formal properties
      • 2.1.2Functional properties
    • 2.2Functional equivalents of MPs in Croatian and English
  • 3.A format for the description of modal particles and their functional equivalents in a cross-linguistic perspective
    • 3.1Precursors
    • 3.2The descriptive format: The example of German bloβ and its equivalents
  • 4.Outlook: Where do we go from here?
  • Notes
  • References
  • Cited corpora
Published online: 13 November 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.186.09kre
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Cited by

Cited by 1 other publications

Hamiti, Vjosa & Blertë Ismajli
2022. Zur Übersetzbarkeit der Abtönungspartikel doch ins Albanische. Lebende Sprachen 67:2 ► pp. 342 ff. DOI logo

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