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- Language Family: Kwa
- Topic #1: Focus
Focus constructions in Tuwuli
Tuwuli has five distinct strategies of focus-marking: a verbal prefix, fronting, nominal periphrasis, in–situ pitch-accent and the cleft construction. The use of each strategy depends on a variety of grammatical and pragmatic factors including the scope and intensity of the focus, the syntactic form of the focussed constituent, the tense-aspect of the verb, and the polarity of the proposition. This paper illustrates each strategy and describes the factors that motivate its use. The paper also attempts to trace the diachronic sources of the cleft construction, giving evidence that cleft constructions have evolved independently from both relative clauses and coordinate constructions. The latter origin is particularly interesting given that one of the focus markers appears to be evolving into a simple coordinating conjunction. Hence the evolutionary path between focus constructions and coordinate constructions appears to be have run in both directions simultaneously, albeit in different ways.
Tuwuli a cinq stratégies distinctes pour marquer le focus : la préfixation verbale, le positionnement en début de proposition, la périphrase nominale, le marquage par un pitch-accent in-situ et la construction clivée. L'utilisation de chaque stratégie dépend d’une série de facteurs grammaticaux et pragmatiques comprenant la portée et l'intensité du focus, la forme syntactique du constituant focalisé, le temps et l’aspect du verbe, et la polarité de la proposition. Cet article illustre chaque stratégie et décrit les facteurs qui motivent leur utilisation. J’essaye également de retrouver les sources diachroniques des constructions clivées, démontrant que celles-ci ont évolué indépendamment aussi bien des phrases relatives et que des constructions coordonnées. L‘origine de ces dernières est particulièrement intéressante, car l’un des marqueurs de focus semble se transformer en une conjonction de coordination simple. Par conséquent, l’évolution entre les constructions focales et les constructions coordonnées semble s’être dirigée dans les deux directions simultanément, bien que de différente manière.