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Structural processes in enumeration

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Sylvie Dubois
Sylvie Dubois
Affiliation:
Louisiana State University
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Abstract

Enumeration is a figure of speech which evokes a thematic set through the concatenation of several of its elements. Its linguistic structure is variable with respect to the number of components, their syntactic nature, the use of coordinating markers and of the processes of repetition, reduction, and expansion. In studying the variation among 3,464 tokens of enumeration in Montreal French, we explain how the constitutive processes interact in terms of Slobin's (1977) charges to language: be clear, processible in real time, quick and easy, and expressive. We suggest how the six structural factors or processes contribute to the fulfillment of these charges. The data analysis evaluates the interaction of the processes and, indirectly, the pertinence of each of Slobin's four functional criteria. This analysis is a new method for attributing a pattern of process co-occurrences to a number of functions, focusing on how these processes compensate for, or cooperate with, each other.

Type
Research Article
Information
Language Variation and Change , Volume 7 , Issue 1 , March 1995 , pp. 113 - 137
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

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