Information Structure in a Cross-Linguistic Perspective |
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Volume Editor:
| Hasselgård, Hilde Johansson, Stig Behrens, Bergljot Fabricius-Hansen, Cathrine Hasselgård, Hilde |
Series title: | Language and Computers Ser. |
ISBN: | 978-90-420-1469-5 |
Publication Date: | Jan 2002 |
Publisher: | BRILL
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Book Format: | Hardback |
List Price: | USD $98.00 |
Book Description:
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The present volume draws together contributions from a number of scholars with an interest in empirical, cross-linguistic description. Most of the papers were first presented at the symposium
Information Structure in a Cross-linguistic Perspectiveheld in Oslo in November/December 2000. The descriptions are functionally oriented, and their common focus is how information structure - in a broad sense - can be compared across languages. 'Information structure' has been approached...
More DescriptionThe present volume draws together contributions from a number of scholars with an interest in empirical, cross-linguistic description. Most of the papers were first presented at the symposium Information Structure in a Cross-linguistic Perspectiveheld in Oslo in November/December 2000. The descriptions are functionally oriented, and their common focus is how information structure - in a broad sense - can be compared across languages. 'Information structure' has been approached in a variety of ways by the authors, so as to give a broad picture of this fundamental principle of text production, involving the way in which a speaker/writer chooses to present a message in terms of given/new information, focus, cohesion, and point of view. Central to much of the research is the problem of establishing criteria for isolating linguistic constraints on language use from cultural-linguistic conventions in text production. The linguistic comparison includes English, German and/or one of the Scandinavian languages, with sidelights to other languages. Most of the papers are text- or corpus-based, and the ongoing work on parallel corpora in Scandinavia is reflected in several contributions.