Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Karssenberg, Lena
• Lahousse, Karen

Titel

On the different interpretations of sentence-initial ainsi ‘so’ and the competition between three types of Verb–Subject order

Ist Teil von

• Folia linguistica, 2018-03, Vol.52 (1), p.1-38

Ort / Verlag

Berlin: De Gruyter

Erscheinungsjahr

2018

Quelle

Alma/SFX Local Collection

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• This article is about different types of Subject–Verb inversion (nominal, pronominal, and complex inversion) in sentences introduced by ‘so, in this way’. We first make a distinction between four main interpretations: manner adverb , quotative , consecutive (expressing either an intentional or an unintentional consequence), and illustrative . On the basis of a corpus study, we show that nominal inversion often (but not always) combines with the manner interpretation, whereas the predominant function of + pronominal/complex inversion is to introduce an example or a consequence of the preceding discourse context. The data also contribute to the debate about the grammaticalization path of . Firstly, the unintentional consequence interpretation is argued to be a “bridging context” between manner and unintentional consequence. Secondly, given the preponderance of the illustrative interpretation, we argue that this under-researched interpretation be taken up in future diachronic and synchronic analyses of and its cross-linguistic counterparts.