{"title":"Discourse functions of demonstratives in Eastern Bantu narrative texts","authors":"S. Nicolle","doi":"10.32473/sal.v43i2.107265","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Demonstratives are an important feature of many eastern Bantu narrative texts. In addition to a basic tracking use, in which demonstratives are used to refer to different participants in a narrative, at least four additional functions can be identified: specifying the activation status (activated vs. reactivated) of major participants; distinguishing participants with agent semantic roles from those with non-agent semantic roles; distinguishing different kinds of participants and different episodes; and marking key thematic developments. These functions are described for 10 eastern Bantu languages based on analyses of original (i.e. non-translated) narrative texts.","PeriodicalId":35170,"journal":{"name":"Studies in African Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2014-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"6","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Studies in African Linguistics","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.32473/sal.v43i2.107265","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"Arts and Humanities","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 6
Abstract
Demonstratives are an important feature of many eastern Bantu narrative texts. In addition to a basic tracking use, in which demonstratives are used to refer to different participants in a narrative, at least four additional functions can be identified: specifying the activation status (activated vs. reactivated) of major participants; distinguishing participants with agent semantic roles from those with non-agent semantic roles; distinguishing different kinds of participants and different episodes; and marking key thematic developments. These functions are described for 10 eastern Bantu languages based on analyses of original (i.e. non-translated) narrative texts.