The Expression of Information Structure
A documentation of its diversity across Africa
Editors
| Humboldt University, Berlin
| Humboldt University, Berlin & James Cook University, Cairns
This book analyzes the different patterns found across subsaharan Africa to express information structure. Based on languages from all four African language phyla, it documents the great diversity of linguistic means used to encode information-structural phenomena and is therefore highly relevant for some of the most pertinent questions in modern linguistic theory. The special contribution of this volume is the perspective on a variety of information-structurally related phenomena which go far beyond classical notions such as focus and topic. Detailed investigations are dedicated to so far less discussed focal subcategories, like focus on verbal operators or the thetic-categorical distinction. Finally, the information-structural configuration of unmarked, canonical sentence structures is recognized. The papers provide evidence that the formal means to encode information-structural categories range from means such as morphological markers or syntactic operations, famous in linguistics, to less well-known strategies, such as defocalization rather than focalization.
[Typological Studies in Language, 91] 2010. xii, 383 pp.
Publishing status: Available
© John Benjamins Publishing Company
Table of Contents
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vii–xii
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1–34
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35–68
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69–94
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95–116
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117–144
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145–164
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165–192
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193–232
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233–260
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261–286
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287–314
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315–348
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349–376
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Language index
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377
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Subject index
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379–383
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“Through its presentation of studies of information structure in languages from all of the major indigenous language phyla of Africa this volume makes a significant contribution to this increasingly important area of linguistic theory and analysis. Of particular interest are the investigations of special verb-focus marking in several languages, a phenomenon to which insufficient attention has been paid in the past. This volume is a welcome addition to the growing literature on the typological variation in information structure across languages.”
Robert D. Van Valin Jr., Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf
Cited by
Cited by other publications
Güldemann, Tom
2016. Maximal backgrounding = focus without (necessary) focus encoding.
Studies in Language 40:3 ► pp. 551 ff. 
Güldemann, Tom, Sabine Zerbian & Malte Zimmermann
2015. Variation in Information Structure with Special Reference to Africa.
Annual Review of Linguistics 1:1 ► pp. 155 ff.
Mihas, Elena
2016. Contrastive focus-marking and nominalization in Northern Kampa (Arawak) of Peru.
Studies in Language 40:2 ► pp. 414 ff.
H. Ekkehard Wolff
2019.
In A History of African Linguistics,
H. Ekkehard Wolff
2019.
In The Cambridge Handbook of African Linguistics,
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 06 november 2020. 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.
Subjects
BIC Subject: CFK – Grammar, syntax
BISAC Subject: LAN009000 – LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES / Linguistics / General