The first position in a sentence is topic position (this, by the way, is a pan-linguistic phenomenon), that is, the position of primary focus (focus is actually different from topic, but the distinction isn't relevant here). So "John went swimming" is about John, because John appears in topic position. We can, in English, shift something other than the subject to topic position when we want to make it, and not the subject, the topic of the sentence. This is called dislocation: "But as for Mary, John left her at the party." We also use cleft sentences to place something other than the subject in topic position, and make it the topic of the sentence. A cleft sentence looks like: "It was Mary John left at the party." Jefferson masterfully controls the topic throughout the document, and shifts it from section to section, beginning with the abstract, moving to King George III, and ending with the colonists. It's particularly effective in the long section of grievances, all of which begin with "He," meaning, of course, George III, even when the perpetrators of those wrongs were, in fact, other parties (ultimately, yes, Georgie was responsible).
Actually, to see what I was talking about wrt grammar and rhetoric, see Joseph Williams's Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace (am I imagining it, or didn't you say you had ordered it?) He has an excellent section on using topicalization to create coherence.
I do have Joseph Williams' book (haven't read much thus far) -- it is fantastic.
My neighbor thinks so, too. I got it for her for Christmas.
"(this, by the way, is a pan-linguistic phenomenon)"
ReplyDeleteOooh, universal grammar!
(Which reminds me of the topic-prominent structure which Singlish acquired from the Chinese languages.)
Well, linguistic universal. Universal Grammar (UG) is Chomskyan, and means one and only one specific thing to a linguist, not a language universal, nor the innate ability for humans to learn language, but some sort of abstracted innate system of rules and/or constraints on rules.
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ReplyDeleteWell, Chomskyian UG isn't the only UG, isn't it? UG as far as I know is the idea that, "there is an inherent structure and logic behind all languages."
ReplyDeleteIf for example, there is an innate structure or nature to symbolic thought, then this would be a compelling underlying reason for a linguistic universal.
The universal of why postpositions are common with languages with particular types of word orders whilst prepositions are common with languages with another set of word orders reflects a certain pattern in which the mind conceives of actions.
The problem with symbolic thought, of course, is that there the neurological data not only do not support, but contradict it. But yes, Chomsky pretty much holds a monopoly on UG these days. UG is a mentalist construction, not an empirical one.
ReplyDeleteHmm, I'm pretty ignorant about neuroscience, but symbolic thought is suspected not to exist?
ReplyDeleteMaybe I'm using the wrong term. :D I'm conceiving of that mental language that exists before it gets translated into an L1. Normally (I conjecture) that they are so strongly associated with each other (thus is the nature of fluency) but they are divorceable concepts (I think?)
I don't know. My recent technique of more effective language acquisition is to try to bypass my L1s when reading literature. (Which is why I hate most 'learn Latin' programmes -- they stress so much on translation to your L1, and there are so many translation exercises, as opposed to *acquisition* exercises.)
The other thing is that I don't have fully native command of either of my L1s (one is a creole that invokes the other with a radically different grammar) due to my migration history. Thus I suspect there is a certain "language" we think in before processing it into our L1s.