Scott, It has been called "meta-discourse", discourse about the text as a text. It orients the reader to the text itself (rather than the subject.) My problem with "first of all" is that it tends to be used mechanically. I had a handful of students coming out of the same English as a Second language program in a New York city high school who used the term "firstable". I thought that was conceptually interesting. Not everything is able to be first. Does being first mean most important? Is it background necessary before understanding the rest? A preliminary orientation? An arbitrary starting point? I usually find it productive to ask those questions. Craig > List, > > What would you call and how would you explain "First of all" (and similar > constructions) as a sentence opener marking the relationship of the > following sentence with a previous statement? > > Thanks, > > Scott Woods > > > > > To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface > at: > http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html > and select "Join or leave the list" > > Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/ To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/