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Information Structure in Lesser-described Languages: Studies in prosody and syntax
Edited by Evangelia Adamou, Katharina Haude and Martine Vanhove
[Studies in Language Companion Series 199] 2018
► pp. 119–156

Chapter 5
Factors behind variation in marking information structure

Contributions from Central Pomo

| University of California, Santa Barbara

Prosody and morphosyntax are exploited in most languages for expressing information structure, but the contributions of each vary. Some of the factors underlying the both cross-linguistic similarities and the variation are differences between the two, in particular (i) their patterns of development through time and (ii) their categoriality. While prosody does not normally lose its pragmatic force with frequency of use, syntactic and morphological constructions do. While pitch, intensity, and rhythm, are matters of degree, syntactic and morphological constructions, such as particular orders or the presence of markers, are categorical. Prosodic patterns appear to be tied to cognition more directly, such as the packaging of information into intonation units and correlations between prosodic prominence and pragmatic strength. These are generally more widespread. Syntactic and morphological patterns, the result of development over time, show more cross-linguistic variation. Interactions between the two are illustrated with examples from spontaneous speech in Central Pomo, a language indigenous to California. The patterns include the packaging of information into intonation units, the expression of different kinds of topics (given and continuing, continuing but reconfirmed, shifted, contrastive), and different kinds of focus (broad, narrow of various types, contrastive, corrective, exhaustive, and additive).

Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Central Pomo
  • 3.Givenness and basic prosodic packaging
  • 4.Topic constructions
    • 4.1No mention: Continuing given topics
    • 4.2Unstressed pronouns: Given referents
    • 4.3Antitopics: Continuing topics
    • 4.4Topicalization: Shift to accessible topic
    • 4.5Separate clause or sentence: Brand new topic
    • 4.6Topic spotlight clitic =ya
    • 4.7Prosodically prominent, initial constituents: Contrastive topics
    • 4.8Contrastive enclitic =na
    • 4.9Passive: Elimination of non-topical agents
  • 5.Focus constructions
    • 5.1Broad (all new) focus
    • 5.2In-situ narrow focus
    • 5.3Initial-position focus
    • 5.4Initial position contrastive focus
    • 5.5Clefts
    • 5.6Exhaustive focus
    • 5.7Additive focus
  • 6.Strategies for marking information structure
    • 6.1Activation state
    • 6.2Topic
    • 6.3Focus
    • 6.4Prosody, syntax, and morphology
  • References
Published online: 2 August 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.199.05mit
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