[B-Greek] Predicate as topic, word order in Aesop
Elizabeth Kline
kline-dekoning at earthlink.net
Wed Jun 29 10:31:29 EDT 2005
On 6/27/05 3:47 PM, "R Yochanan Bitan Buth" <ybitan at mscc.huji.ac.il> wrote:
> Simon Dik (no relation to Helma Dik, except
> assumedly being Dutch) developed Functional Grammar in the late 70's.
> His first books 1978, 1980, 1981, had a core predication which allowed
> Topic and Focus to be NON-OBLIGATORY pragmatic functions that could be
> applied to the generation of a clause/sentence. In other words, a
> Topic was not just 'what a sentence was about', it was also a special
> function that was applied to the output of the clause while it was on
> its way from within the brain to 'output'.
>
> However, in Simon Dik's expanded FG theory in 1989 he added many
> different kinds of notional topics without stipulating how these were
> grammaticized or produced rules for the output of a clause. I think
> that Helma Dik is following in this expanded but undefined model with
> multiple notional topics. Thus, she can demand that a clause would
> have a topic because it must be about something or else it wouldn't
> exist.
Randall,
Helma Dik makes it quite clear that she has departed from Simon Dik (no
relation) in her treatment of Topic and Focus. She defines topic in a very
inclusive manner. A topic is required in every clause since it serves to
anchor the clause to the rest of the discourse. A clause without an anchor
is just a random chunk of text floating in a void without any ties to other
chunks of text. Topics tie the chunks of text together to make a discourse.
This is a less than perfect exposition of her views but short of scanning
and posting a whole chapter -- I am not going to do that.
>
> I don't make such a demand. A sentence can exist that does not make
> use of special Topic marking. If someone wants to apply Occam's razor
> between us, I would claim the highground/simplicity :-) <grin>. (That
> was 'tongue-in-cheek', simplicity does not equal correctness--RB) I
> would not see a necessity of imposing a pragmatic function on a clause
> analysis that is not signalled somehow in the structural system.
OK then, a VO clause pattern in NT Greek has no topic but a SVO does because
the S is in the topic slot. VSO presents a problem. Is S topical? I know
this isn't the point you are making but the "framework" you are using is
entirely too subtle to decipher in bits and pieces.
I am not convinced that Helm Dik has found the magic key to information
structure in Ancient Greek. I agree with you that Topic-Focus analysis
applied to ever clause is unworkable if you define Topic the way Levinshon
does. But Helma Dik and Levinshon are miles apart. You can't prove that she
is wrong by demonstrating her incompatibility with Levinshon's or even Simon
Dik's framework. Anyway, she was worth reading and her framework is lucid in
the main outlines. The details are sometimes difficult to understand.
Thanks for taking the time.
good day,
Elizabeth Kline
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