A conversational Analysis of Right-Dislocation in Korean

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

The present study examines the discourse functions of right-dislocation in Korean basically from interactional and functional perspectives, using naturally occurring conversations as data, and suggests some theoretical implications. On the basis of two assumptions that the primary motivation not only of language in use but also of syntactic organization is of interactional nature (Schegloff 1979), and that functions of language have several dimensions, such as propositional, textual, and interpersonal (Halliday & Hasan 1976; Traugott 1989), the present study basically argues that right-dislocation is a word order variation adapted for conversational need to satisfy such functional and interactional requirements as "increasing propositional cohesiveness," "information management," "discourse organization," and "affective stance marking." After discussing some implications related to "newsworthiness/urgent principle," "achieving coherence," "iconicity principle" and "competing motivations," the present study concludes that right-dislocation is not a syntactic phenomenon whose functions we can investigate at the sentence level, focusing primarily on its right-dislocated constituent, with only the help of such traditional notions as "repair," "topicality" and "topic continuity."

목차 (Table of Contents)

• 1. Introduction
• 2. Data
• 3. Definition and scope of Right-dislocation
• 4. Previous analyses: Their main points and limitations
• 5. Discourse functions of Right-dislocation in sequential environments
• 6. Conclusions: Summary and implications
• References