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The speech functions of tag questions and their properties. A comparison of their distribution in COLT and LLC

  • Ditte Kimps , Kristin Davidse and Bert Cornillie
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Corpus Interrogation and Grammatical Patterns
This chapter is in the book Corpus Interrogation and Grammatical Patterns

Abstract

This article proposes a classification of speech functions of variable tag questions in British English conversations. Based on intonational, conversational and formal criteria the analysis shows that tag questions can not only function as questions and statements, but also as responses, commands and offers. A large group of tag questions cannot be captured by any of the traditional speech functions and are classified instead as Statement-Question blends. The article investigates the impact of the LLC and COLT corpora, and features such as gender, age and social roles, on the distribution of the different speech functions and their properties. The main finding is that all speech functions are present in the two different corpora, albeit with differing relative frequencies.

Abstract

This article proposes a classification of speech functions of variable tag questions in British English conversations. Based on intonational, conversational and formal criteria the analysis shows that tag questions can not only function as questions and statements, but also as responses, commands and offers. A large group of tag questions cannot be captured by any of the traditional speech functions and are classified instead as Statement-Question blends. The article investigates the impact of the LLC and COLT corpora, and features such as gender, age and social roles, on the distribution of the different speech functions and their properties. The main finding is that all speech functions are present in the two different corpora, albeit with differing relative frequencies.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Acknowledgements vii
  4. List of contributors ix
  5. Interrogating corpora to describe grammatical patterns 1
  6. Part 1. Patterns in the verb phrase
  7. Light verb constructions in the history of English 15
  8. What happened to the English prefix, and could it stage a comeback? 35
  9. The pattern to be a-hunting from Middle to Late Modern English 57
  10. The present perfect and the preterite in Late Modern and Contemporary English 81
  11. can and be able to in nineteenth-century Irish English 105
  12. Part 2. Patterns in the noun phrase
  13. Syntactic constraints on the use of dual form intensifiers in Modern English 131
  14. Ma daddy wis dead chuffed 151
  15. The case of focus 173
  16. Part 3. Patterns in complementation structures
  17. Null objects and sentential complements, with evidence from the Corpus of Historical American English 209
  18. A new angle on infinitival and of - ing complements of afraid , with evidence from the TIME Corpus 223
  19. Active and passive infinitive, ambiguity and non-canonical subject with ready 239
  20. Part 4. Patterns of clause combining
  21. The diffusion of English absolutes 265
  22. It-clefts in English L1 and L2 academic writing 295
  23. The speech functions of tag questions and their properties. A comparison of their distribution in COLT and LLC 321
  24. Author index 351
  25. Subject index 355
https://doi.org/10.1075/scl.63.21kim

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Acknowledgements vii
  4. List of contributors ix
  5. Interrogating corpora to describe grammatical patterns 1
  6. Part 1. Patterns in the verb phrase
  7. Light verb constructions in the history of English 15
  8. What happened to the English prefix, and could it stage a comeback? 35
  9. The pattern to be a-hunting from Middle to Late Modern English 57
  10. The present perfect and the preterite in Late Modern and Contemporary English 81
  11. can and be able to in nineteenth-century Irish English 105
  12. Part 2. Patterns in the noun phrase
  13. Syntactic constraints on the use of dual form intensifiers in Modern English 131
  14. Ma daddy wis dead chuffed 151
  15. The case of focus 173
  16. Part 3. Patterns in complementation structures
  17. Null objects and sentential complements, with evidence from the Corpus of Historical American English 209
  18. A new angle on infinitival and of - ing complements of afraid , with evidence from the TIME Corpus 223
  19. Active and passive infinitive, ambiguity and non-canonical subject with ready 239
  20. Part 4. Patterns of clause combining
  21. The diffusion of English absolutes 265
  22. It-clefts in English L1 and L2 academic writing 295
  23. The speech functions of tag questions and their properties. A comparison of their distribution in COLT and LLC 321
  24. Author index 351
  25. Subject index 355
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