Thank you so much, Herb. -José
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Stahlke, Herbert F.W.
Sent: Monday, October 31, 2005 10:35 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Syntax question
José,
Probably the best-known text that deals with these issues is Martha Kolln's
Rhetorical Grammar. Also, the Center for Applied Linguistics did a short
bibliography on linguistics and the teaching of composition, back in 1994,
that contains a number of articles on functional concepts that are useful in
the teaching of composition. You can find it at
http://www.cal.org/ericcll/minibibs/Role.html
I'm sure there is more than that available, but I don't know the composition
literature as well as others on this list. I suspect that Craig's
forthcoming text will deal interestingly with functional issues.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of José Antonio Santos
Sent: Monday, October 31, 2005 8:32 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Syntax question
Herb, could you suggest some books or articles that deal with
"topic/comment" and that could be used in a unit for undergraduate
linguistics students.
Thank you.
-José
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Stahlke, Herbert F.W.
Sent: Monday, October 31, 2005 12:17 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Syntax question
Topic-comment terminology and concepts come out of several strands of
functional linguistic analysis, starting at least with early Halliday work
and probably going back farther than that. Topic has been discussed
extensively in connection with definitions of subjecthood. The Chinese
example that Johanna gave is an example why linguists argue that Chinese is
a topic-comment language rather than a subject-predicate language. Topic
comes initially in a sentence, but there is no other grammatical or
morphological marking of subjecthood in Chinese. In English, subjects are
usually topics, but we have structures, like some of those under discussion
in this thread, which allow us to make something else topic. We also have
sentences that start with subjects that aren't topics, like
It's raining.
It looks like UCLA will win the PAC-10.
There's an elephant behind that tree.
Typically such sentences are used to introduce new content (focus) at the
end of the sentence that then becomes the topic of the discourse.
"Topical" refers usually to nominal structures in a sentence that are
neither topic nor focus, have been previously mentioned or are in some other
way salient, and are not in topic or focus position. In the sequence
I just talked to Mary. John gave her a ring. It had a fake stone.
"Mary" is in focus. "John" is topic. "her" is topical, and "a ring" is in
focus. "It" is topic, and "a fake stone" is in focus, so it might well
become the subject of the next sentence.
Topic continuity and the given-new contract are concepts that can be very
useful in the teaching of writing because they name crucial elements of
discourse structure.
Herb
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar on behalf of Paul E.
Doniger
Sent: Sun 10/30/2005 9:09 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Syntax question
Johanna is right. I didn't know that the reduntant pronoun was called
"topic-comment" (it sounds like an odd term to me), but it seems to me that
it can be very effective rhythmically. Labelling it as ungrammatical in all
cases does seem extreme.
It occurs in French, too. I think it's a song by Edith Piaf that has the
line, "Quand j'ai fame, moi j'ai le pain." It's a downright beautiful line!
Paul D.
Johanna Rubba <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
..........
As to topic-comment, this terminology appears in some writing manuals
with reference to structures such as "My father, he seldom votes". They
are labeled outright ungrammatical, which I find a little extreme. I
view the Beowulf example as similar. Topic-comment syntax is standard
in some languages. A rough example I recall from my
structure-of-Chinese course is "Elephant, nose is long", which would be
translated as "Elephants have long noses". I can imagine a novice
writer writing something like "As far as elephants, they have long
noses".
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