Promoting the demoted: The distribution and semantics of “main clause word order” in spoken Danish complement clauses
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Promoting the demoted : The distribution and semantics of “main clause word order” in spoken Danish complement clauses. / Jensen, Torben Juel; Christensen, Tanya Karoli.
In: Lingua, Vol. 137, 2013, p. 38-58.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Promoting the demoted
T2 - The distribution and semantics of “main clause word order” in spoken Danish complement clauses
AU - Jensen, Torben Juel
AU - Christensen, Tanya Karoli
PY - 2013
Y1 - 2013
N2 - In this article, we investigate a hypothesis regarding the distinction between the word orders ‘finite verb, adverb’ (V>Adv, in Scandinavian linguistics often considered an instance of V2, also in subject initial clauses) and ‘adverb, finite verb’ (Adv>V, sometimes referred to as V3) in Mainland Scandinavian complement clauses. The hypothesis is semantico-pragmatic and reads that V>Adv signals foregrounding of the subordinate clause, i.e. that its content is the main point of the utterance. Our results, based upon detailed coding of the LANCHART corpus of spoken Danish, are readily interpretable as supporting the semantico-pragmatic hypothesis. Our results show that V>Adv is much more frequent in subordinate clauses than commonly assumed, and that complement clauses in Danish are not in general characterized by having Adv>V word order, but only by the possibility of having this word order. Results seemingly in conflict with predictions of the semantico-pragmatic hypothesis are discussed with respect to possible norm conflicts and shifts in communicative strategy during speech production.
AB - In this article, we investigate a hypothesis regarding the distinction between the word orders ‘finite verb, adverb’ (V>Adv, in Scandinavian linguistics often considered an instance of V2, also in subject initial clauses) and ‘adverb, finite verb’ (Adv>V, sometimes referred to as V3) in Mainland Scandinavian complement clauses. The hypothesis is semantico-pragmatic and reads that V>Adv signals foregrounding of the subordinate clause, i.e. that its content is the main point of the utterance. Our results, based upon detailed coding of the LANCHART corpus of spoken Danish, are readily interpretable as supporting the semantico-pragmatic hypothesis. Our results show that V>Adv is much more frequent in subordinate clauses than commonly assumed, and that complement clauses in Danish are not in general characterized by having Adv>V word order, but only by the possibility of having this word order. Results seemingly in conflict with predictions of the semantico-pragmatic hypothesis are discussed with respect to possible norm conflicts and shifts in communicative strategy during speech production.
KW - Faculty of Humanities
KW - ledstilling
KW - Talesprog
KW - forgrundsbetydning
KW - ledsætninger
KW - sproglig variation og forandring
KW - dansk grammatik
KW - Informationsstruktur
KW - complement clause
KW - word order
KW - variation
KW - Danish
KW - foregrounding
KW - main clause phenomena
U2 - 10.1016/j.lingua.2013.08.005
DO - 10.1016/j.lingua.2013.08.005
M3 - Journal article
VL - 137
SP - 38
EP - 58
JO - Lingua
JF - Lingua
SN - 0024-3841
ER -
ID: 37917815