LINGUIST List 12.1521

Fri Jun 8 2001

Books: Parasyntactic Presentation Structures, English

Editor for this issue: Heather Taylor-Loring <heatherlinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. E. van Broekhuizen, New Book; Language and Computers Vol. 35

Joybrato Mukherjee

Form and Function of Parasyntactic Presentation Structures.
A Corpus-Based Study of Talk Units in Spoken English.

Amsterdam/Atlanta, GA 2001. VII,163 pp.
(Language and Computers 35)
ISBN: 90-420-1295-1		HB Hfl. 90,-/US-$ 38.-

This study investigates prosody-syntax interactions from a functional
perspective and based on authentic corpus data. Drawing on Halliday's
well-known interpretation of the tone unit as an information unit,
Halford's idea of a prosodically and syntactically defined talk unit
and Esser's concept of abstract presentation structures, a modified
talk unit model is developed. The talk unit is built up of one to many
tone unit(s). The focus of both the quantitative and the functional
analysis is on the interplay between prosodic status and syntactic
status at tone unit boundaries by means of which talk units as
parasyntactic units are established. The database is provided by a
sample of about 50,000 words mainly taken from the London-Lund Corpus
of Spoken English. The findings reveal that speakers have at their
disposal and make use of prosody-syntax interactions in order to
structure information effectively and to allow for or facilitate turn
taking. This volume is not only of interest for corpus linguists, but
for functionalists in general and intonationists in particular. In
analysing the stylistic and pragmatic potential of talk units and
applying corpus linguistic methodology, this study breaks new ground
with regard to functional and empirical approaches to spoken English.

List of contents:
Acknowledgements
Ch. 1: Introduction: setting the aim of the present study in context
Ch. 2: Para syntactic elements and configurations in corpus linguistics
Ch. 3: Corpus data
Ch. 4: Quantitative analysis
Ch. 5: Functional analysis I: information structure
Ch. 6: Functional analysis II: speaker interaction
Ch. 7: Summary and prospects for future research
References cited
Index
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