- Oxford Handbooks in Linguistics
- The Oxford Handbook of Information Structure
- Abbreviations
- The Contributors
- Introduction
- Alternative Semantics
- Givenness
- (Contrastive) Topic
- Question-based Models of Information Structure
- Information Structure and the Landscape of (Non-)at-issue Meaning
- Information Structure and Presupposition
- Information Structure: A Cartographic Perspective
- Nuclear Stress and Information Structure
- Focus Projection Theories
- Constraint Conflict and Information Structure
- Focus Sensitive Operators
- Quantification and Information Structure
- Contrast: Dissecting an Elusive Information-structural Notion and its Role in Grammar
- Verum Focus
- Predicate Focus
- Information Structure and Discourse Particles
- Ellipsis and Information Structure
- Word Order and Information Structure
- Dislocations and Information Structure
- Discourse-configurationality
- On the Expression of Focus in the Metrical Grid and in the Prosodic Hierarchy
- Focus, Intonation, and Tonal Height
- Second Occurrence Focus
- Information Structure and Language Change
- Information Structure and Language Comprehension: Insights from Psycholinguistics
- Information Structure and Production Planning
- Information Structure in First Language Acquisition
- Towards a Neurobiology of Information Structure
- Corpus Linguistics and Information Structure Research
- Syntactic and Prosodic Reflexes of Information Structure in Germanic
- Syntactic and Prosodic Effects of Information Structure in Romance
- Discourse Functions: The Case of Hungarian
- Information Structure in Modern Greek
- Information Structure in Slavic
- Topic and Focus Marking in Chinese
- Information Structure in Japanese
- Information Structure in Asia: Yongning Na (Sino-Tibetan) and Vietnamese (Austroasiatic)
- Information Structure in Bantu
- Information Structure in Sign Languages
- References
- Subject Index
- Language Index
- Oxford Handbooks in Linguistics
Abstract and Keywords
Distinguishing between two forms of givenness status, known and salient, this chapter investigates the latter, using deaccenting as a probe into the nature of salience-based givenness. A presuppositional account of salience-based givenness is presented, based on entailment and coreference. Other putative semantic relations claimed to underlie givenness-based deaccenting are shown to be inadequate. The question whether givenness can be reduced to focus is considered, with motivation provided for distinguishing among given, focused, and discourse new. It is seen that the distribution of accenting and deaccenting in English is only partly a function of context, with speaker’s communicative intent playing a critical and unpredictable role.
Keywords: givenness, deaccenting, focus, presupposition, discourse new, communicative intent
Michael Rochemont is Professor of Linguistics at the University of British Columbia. His current areas of interest are prosodic phonology, specifically the syntax phonology connection and relations between information structure categories and prosody; the syntactic expression of categories of information structure, both within and across languages; and givenness, particularly as expressed through deaccenting.
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- Oxford Handbooks in Linguistics
- The Oxford Handbook of Information Structure
- Abbreviations
- The Contributors
- Introduction
- Alternative Semantics
- Givenness
- (Contrastive) Topic
- Question-based Models of Information Structure
- Information Structure and the Landscape of (Non-)at-issue Meaning
- Information Structure and Presupposition
- Information Structure: A Cartographic Perspective
- Nuclear Stress and Information Structure
- Focus Projection Theories
- Constraint Conflict and Information Structure
- Focus Sensitive Operators
- Quantification and Information Structure
- Contrast: Dissecting an Elusive Information-structural Notion and its Role in Grammar
- Verum Focus
- Predicate Focus
- Information Structure and Discourse Particles
- Ellipsis and Information Structure
- Word Order and Information Structure
- Dislocations and Information Structure
- Discourse-configurationality
- On the Expression of Focus in the Metrical Grid and in the Prosodic Hierarchy
- Focus, Intonation, and Tonal Height
- Second Occurrence Focus
- Information Structure and Language Change
- Information Structure and Language Comprehension: Insights from Psycholinguistics
- Information Structure and Production Planning
- Information Structure in First Language Acquisition
- Towards a Neurobiology of Information Structure
- Corpus Linguistics and Information Structure Research
- Syntactic and Prosodic Reflexes of Information Structure in Germanic
- Syntactic and Prosodic Effects of Information Structure in Romance
- Discourse Functions: The Case of Hungarian
- Information Structure in Modern Greek
- Information Structure in Slavic
- Topic and Focus Marking in Chinese
- Information Structure in Japanese
- Information Structure in Asia: Yongning Na (Sino-Tibetan) and Vietnamese (Austroasiatic)
- Information Structure in Bantu
- Information Structure in Sign Languages
- References
- Subject Index
- Language Index
- Oxford Handbooks in Linguistics
