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- Volume 15, Issue 2, 2010
Nederlandse Taalkunde - Volume 15, Issue 2, 2010
Volume 15, Issue 2, 2010
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Van boekenbonnen en feëverhale - De tussenklank e(n) in Nederlandse en Afrikaanse samenstellingen: vorm of betekenis?
Authors: Neijt Anneke, Schreuder Robert & Jansen CarelCompounds in Dutch and Afrikaans may contain a linking sound resembling the plural suffix [ə] or [ən]. This linking sound can be spelled in Dutch as e or en, a difference which previous research has shown to affect the interpretation of left hand members of compounds regarding their plurality. Here, we look at the existence of the reverse effect: do semantic clues about number influence preferences for a linking sound in novel compounds? Indeed, contexts in which the left hand member of a compound-to-be is present in its plural form increase the tendency to prefer a linking element (using a seven-point rating scale). In contexts which merely suggest a plural interpretation for the left hand member, this propensity is markedly less for speakers of Dutch, and absent for speakers of Afrikaans. Of interest is the asymmetry with previous research that shows how subtle form differences influence number interpretation.
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Dus vooraan of in het midden? - Over vorm-functierelaties in het gebruik van connectieven
More LessSentential adverbs often show variation in their positioning. Such variation is claimed to reflect form-function interactions. This paper presents a case study of Dutch dus ‘so’ that sheds more light on such interactions. Dus-fragments from the 13th, 16th, and 20th century were analyzed to find out whether any meaning changes and syntactic developments occurred, and whether form-function interactions could be found. Results indicate that dus started at the propositional level, serving as an anaphor meaning ‘thus/in that way’, then developed the textual function of causal connective and finally gained an interpersonal function as a discourse marker signaling information status. Several form-function relations were found: in the 16th century categorical status distinguished between anaphoric and connective use; in the 20th century the position of dus could be related to the accessibility of the information in the dus-clause. It appears that the form-function interactions can be seen as probabilistic “rules” that are often not one-to-one, but that are nevertheless frequently exploited by language users.
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We kunnen dus wel conclusies trekken over dus!
More LessRespondent Gert De Sutter plaatst mijn onderzoek in een rijtje klinkende namen (Diessel, Bresnan, Arnold). Eervol, maar tegelijkertijd plaatst hij een voorbehoud bij mijn conclusies. Graag maak ik van de gelegenheid gebruik om mij te verweren tegen de drie centrale kritiekpunten in zijn respons: 1) mijn (ontbrekende) definitie van de term discourse marker, 2) de wijze van sampling in mijn corpusonderzoek en 3) het nut en de noodzaak van diachroon onderzoek voor het blootleggen van vorm-betekenis-relaties.
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Anaforische middelen voor topicverschuiving
More LessThird person pronouns that require an antecedent beyond their immediate clause build discourse coherence. There are two kinds of such pronouns in Dutch, p(ersonal)-pronouns and d(emonstrative)-pronouns. They make different contributions to the discourse coherence and the present paper deals with that difference. The d-pronouns have an obviative effect. That is, they have an antecedent restriction. They require a non-topic from the preceding sentence as its antecedent in order to introduce it as the topic of the new sentence. The result is that d-pronouns function as a topic-shifting device. The p-pronouns, by contrast, do not impose such a restriction on their antecedent, nor do they have the ensuing topic-shifting function. The topic-stating function of d-pronouns finds its origin in early child language, where the d-pronoun indicates a referent that is salient in the speech situation: “see pointing gesture or gaze of me speaker”. In later child language the topic-stating function is extended to the linguistic discourse: “or listen to the preceding focus constituent”. A comparison of the topic-stating devices in German, French and Italian leads me to reject Ariel’s (1990) accessibility hierarchy for anaphoric pronouns.
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Ontwikkelingen in de linkerperiferie van de nominale constituent
More LessThis article argues that the Modern Dutch noun phrase (NP/DP) has acquired a new slot in its left periphery. This slot contains interpersonal modifiers, like focus particles, modal adverbs and other epistemic modifiers. On the basis of historical corpus inquiry it is shown how this slot has developed and how it has been accommodating more and more complex elements in the course of time. This diachronic evolution has consequences for the synchronic description of the noun phrase. Any synchronic structural description of the noun phrase, at whatever stage in the history of the language, has temporary status only.
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Goed of fout
Authors: Hans Bennis & Frans Hinskens
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