Formulaic tendencies of demonstrative clefts in spoken English
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Andreea S. Calude
Abstract
Despite having been noted as a frequent construction in spoken language, little has been said about the demonstrative cleft. Clefts such as that's what I am talking about, or that's what I mean, are not entirely fixed in their structure; however, they do exhibit recurring patterns and “preferred formulations” (Wray 2006: 591). An investigation of demonstrative clefts in excerpts of spontaneous conversations from the Wellington Corpus of Spoken New Zealand English shows that, aside from being the most frequent cleft type in conversational English, the cleft is characterized by structural fixedness, fluency, and non-salient reference. As claimed by Ford, Fox and Thompson, grammar is (in general) “a collection of crystalizations of routines” (2002: 120); and nowhere is the emergent (Hopper 1987, 2001) nature of grammar more clear than in spoken language. The demonstrative cleft is an example of such a routine, and thus worth investigating further.
Abstract
Despite having been noted as a frequent construction in spoken language, little has been said about the demonstrative cleft. Clefts such as that's what I am talking about, or that's what I mean, are not entirely fixed in their structure; however, they do exhibit recurring patterns and “preferred formulations” (Wray 2006: 591). An investigation of demonstrative clefts in excerpts of spontaneous conversations from the Wellington Corpus of Spoken New Zealand English shows that, aside from being the most frequent cleft type in conversational English, the cleft is characterized by structural fixedness, fluency, and non-salient reference. As claimed by Ford, Fox and Thompson, grammar is (in general) “a collection of crystalizations of routines” (2002: 120); and nowhere is the emergent (Hopper 1987, 2001) nature of grammar more clear than in spoken language. The demonstrative cleft is an example of such a routine, and thus worth investigating further.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents vii
- Preface ix
- Introduction. Approaches to the study of formulae xi
-
Part I. What is Formulaic Language
- Grammarians' languages versus humanists' languages and the place of speech act formulas in models of linguistic competence 3
- Identifying formulaic language 27
-
Part II. Structure and distribution
- Formulaic tendencies of demonstrative clefts in spoken English 55
- Formulaic language and the relater category – the case of about 77
- The aim is to analyze NP 97
- Fixedness in Japanese adjectives in conversation 117
- Genre-controlled constructions in written language quotatives 147
- Some remarks on the evaluative connotations of toponymic idioms in a contrastive perspective 171
-
Part III. Historical change
- The role of prefabs in grammaticization 187
- Formulaic models and formulaicity in Classical and Modern Standard Arabic 219
- A corpus study of lexicalized formulaic sequences with preposition + hand 239
- The embodiment/culture continuum 257
- From ‘remaining’ to ‘becoming’ in Spanish 273
- Author index 297
- Subject index 307
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents vii
- Preface ix
- Introduction. Approaches to the study of formulae xi
-
Part I. What is Formulaic Language
- Grammarians' languages versus humanists' languages and the place of speech act formulas in models of linguistic competence 3
- Identifying formulaic language 27
-
Part II. Structure and distribution
- Formulaic tendencies of demonstrative clefts in spoken English 55
- Formulaic language and the relater category – the case of about 77
- The aim is to analyze NP 97
- Fixedness in Japanese adjectives in conversation 117
- Genre-controlled constructions in written language quotatives 147
- Some remarks on the evaluative connotations of toponymic idioms in a contrastive perspective 171
-
Part III. Historical change
- The role of prefabs in grammaticization 187
- Formulaic models and formulaicity in Classical and Modern Standard Arabic 219
- A corpus study of lexicalized formulaic sequences with preposition + hand 239
- The embodiment/culture continuum 257
- From ‘remaining’ to ‘becoming’ in Spanish 273
- Author index 297
- Subject index 307
