Chapter 9. Three German discourse particles as speech act modifiers
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Johannes Schneider
Abstract
This work attempts to reduce the properties of three German discourse particles (DPs), ja, nicht and etwa, to the basic building blocks of a formal discourse model (Farkas & Bruce 2010). We propose a definition of DPs as speech act modifiers that restricts the space of allowed variation of their meanings, arguing against previous approaches in terms of speaker attitudes. Speech acts modified by ja update the Common Ground (CG) directly; previous characterizations of the epistemic status of the proposition arise as descriptions of common justifications for such an imposed CG update. Etwa and nicht turn open polar questions with two default resolutions into questions with only one unmarked resolution; epistemic or bouletic attitudes arise as frequent connotations.
Abstract
This work attempts to reduce the properties of three German discourse particles (DPs), ja, nicht and etwa, to the basic building blocks of a formal discourse model (Farkas & Bruce 2010). We propose a definition of DPs as speech act modifiers that restricts the space of allowed variation of their meanings, arguing against previous approaches in terms of speaker attitudes. Speech acts modified by ja update the Common Ground (CG) directly; previous characterizations of the epistemic status of the proposition arise as descriptions of common justifications for such an imposed CG update. Etwa and nicht turn open polar questions with two default resolutions into questions with only one unmarked resolution; epistemic or bouletic attitudes arise as frequent connotations.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction 1
-
Part I. Diachronic issues and the development of discourse particles
- Chapter 1. On the adverbial origin of German modal particles 13
- Chapter 2. A particle-like use of hwæþer Wisdom’s questions in Boethius 41
- Chapter 3. The discourse particle es que in Spanish and in other Iberian languages 65
-
Part II. Syntactic analyses of discourse particles
- Chapter 4. Agreeing complementizers may just be moody 101
- Chapter 5. Outer particles vs tag particles 131
- Chapter 6. Anchoring primary and secondary interjections to the context 157
- Chapter 7. Sentence-final particles in Mandarin Chinese 179
-
Part III. The semantic-pragmatics of discourse particles
- Chapter 8. Meaning and use of the Basque particle bide 209
- Chapter 9. Three German discourse particles as speech act modifiers 229
- Language index 255
- Subject index 257
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction 1
-
Part I. Diachronic issues and the development of discourse particles
- Chapter 1. On the adverbial origin of German modal particles 13
- Chapter 2. A particle-like use of hwæþer Wisdom’s questions in Boethius 41
- Chapter 3. The discourse particle es que in Spanish and in other Iberian languages 65
-
Part II. Syntactic analyses of discourse particles
- Chapter 4. Agreeing complementizers may just be moody 101
- Chapter 5. Outer particles vs tag particles 131
- Chapter 6. Anchoring primary and secondary interjections to the context 157
- Chapter 7. Sentence-final particles in Mandarin Chinese 179
-
Part III. The semantic-pragmatics of discourse particles
- Chapter 8. Meaning and use of the Basque particle bide 209
- Chapter 9. Three German discourse particles as speech act modifiers 229
- Language index 255
- Subject index 257
