Geertje Van Bergen

Scrambling in spoken Dutch: Definiteness versus weight as determinants of word order variation

Direct objects in the Dutch middlefield can either precede adverbs or follow them. This word order variation is traditionally labeled scrambling. Based on a corpus study of scrambling in spoken Dutch, we show that pronouns scramble almost categorically, whereas indefinite and definite objects scramble hardly at all. The observed effect of definiteness cannot be reduced to the influence of grammatical weight, in this way establishing both factors as independent determinants of word order variation. A closer investigation of proper noun objects shows that their position relative to the adverb is influenced by their animacy, length and stress. We argue that the ordering of elements in the Dutch middlefield is to be understood in terms of planning considerations on behalf of the speaker such that use of the unscrambled order buys him as much time for articulation of the direct object as possible.

Discourse Markers as Turn-Transition Devices: Evidence From Speech and Instant Messaging

In this article we investigate the relation between discourse markers and turn-transition strategies in face-to-face conversations and Instant Messaging (IM), that is, unplanned, real-time, text-based, computer-mediated communication. By means of a quantitative corpus study of utterances containing a discourse marker, we show that utterance-final discourse markers are used more often in IM than in face-to-face conversations. Moreover, utterance-final discourse markers are shown to occur more often at points of turn-transition compared with points of turn-maintenance in both types of conversation. From our results we conclude that the discourse markers in utterance-final position can function as a turn-transition mechanism, signaling that the turn is over and the floor is open to the hearer. We argue that this linguistic turn-taking strategy is essentially similar in face-to-face and IM communication. Our results add to the evidence that communication in IM is more like speech than like writing.

Where to place inaccessible subjects in Dutch: The role of definiteness and animacy

Abstract Cross-linguistically, both subjects and topical information tend to be placed at the beginning of a sentence. Subjects are generally highly topical, causing both tendencies to converge on the same word order. However, subjects that lack prototypical topic properties may give rise to an incongruence between the preference to start a sentence with the subject and the preference to start a sentence with the most accessible information. We present a corpus study in which we investigate in what syntactic position (preverbal or postverbal) such low-accessible subjects are typically found in Dutch natural language. We examine the effects of both discourse accessibility (definiteness) and inherent accessibility (animacy). Our results show that definiteness and animacy interact in determining subject position in Dutch. Non-referential (bare) subjects are less likely to occur in preverbal position than definite subjects, and this tendency is reinforced when the subject is inanimate. This suggests that these two properties that make the subject less accessible together can ‘gang up’ against the subject first preference. The results support a probabilistic multifactorial account of syntactic variation.