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Title Bantu word order between discourse and syntactic relations
Full text https://journals.openedition.org/lla/9496
Date 2023
Author(s) Kerr, E.J.; Asiimwe, A.; Kanampiu, P.; Li, Z.; Nshemezimana, E.; Wal, J. van der
Abstract Discourse function has often been noticed to be a strong factor in conditioning Bantu word order. The importance of discourse function for determining the word order of Bantu languages is visible for example in locative inversion and dedicated focus positions. As a result of such phenomena, it has been proposed that Bantu word order is best captured by reference to discourse roles, e.g. Topic-Verb-Nontopic. Nevertheless, we typically see statements describing Bantu word order in relation to grammatical roles (e.g. 'SVO'), and the notions 'subject' and 'object' remain core in analyses of Bantu. In this paper we present the result of a study reconsidering Bantu word order from a discourse-configurational perspective, asking how far we can get without reference to grammatical roles. We use a parametric approach to investigate this syntactic variation, presenting new discourse-oriented field data collected on 9 Bantu languages. We show how these parameters highlight variation within the family, with each language sitting at a different point on a continuum between grammatical role-oriented and discourse role-oriented. We therefore argue against a one-size-fits-all account of Bantu word order and advocate for approaches that include both grammatical and discourse roles. - NWO - 276-78-001 - Descriptive and Comparative Linguistics
Subject(s) Bantu; Discourse Configurationality; Parameters; Syntax; Word Order
Language en
Type of publication Article / Letter to editor; info:eu-repo/semantics/article; Text
Format application/pdf
Source Linguistique et Langues Africaines
Identifier doi:10.4000/lla.9496; lucris-id:1266107370
Repository Leiden - University of Leiden
Added to C-A: 2023-09-04;09:20:08