Discourse analysis, lecture 5 May 2012 Carina Jahani

Reported speech Reported conversations tend not to be presented like ordinary theme-line events in a narrative. The speech orienter (“He said”, “Peter asked”) may use unexpected verb forms or there may be other devices for introducing direct speech. The default encoding of participants may not be followed when it refers to a speaker.

Forms of reported speech Direct speech: John told Peter : “I can see you”. Indirect speech: John told Peter that he could see him. Semi-direct speech (hybrid form) – (no change in the pronoun referring to the direct speaker): John told Peter that I can see him. (Other possibilities) Logophoric pronoun (a special pronoun that refers to the speaker

The case of Iranian languages Indirect report only affects the pronoun system, never the TAM-form of the finite verb. He said: I am coming tomorrow. Pe: He said that he is coming tomorrow. (He said that he was coming tomorrow.) (Also perception verbs and mental verbs) This morning when I woke up, I saw that is was snowing. Pe: This morning when I woke up, I saw that it is snowing. I thought that he would come, but he didn’t. Pe: I thought that he will come but he didn’t.

Semi-direct speech in Balochi Well the next day (lit. tomorrow) he went, because the king called him to shave MY (i.e. the king’s) beard. The first one said: Brother! This dog says: the king is here, the king is with us (i.e. with the theives, not with the dog, so the dog said “The king is with you”)

Factors that may determine the form of reporting Verbatim reporting (the reported speech is to be understood as a direct quote, the indirect not) Language specific constraints (syntactic) (some languages allow only direct speech in certain sentence types, indirect speech in others) Discourse related factors (find the default) Prominence: for highlighting, backgrounding etc. Status of participants Non-real versus real events Climax

Speech orienter Find the default – presence/absence – position Comment on deviations Repetition often a “slowing down” device

+/- clause linkage marker The presence or absence of a conjunction may have a discourse pragmatic function. There could also be syntactic constraints. Bal. “ke” He said that he wanted that Ali should come

Closed conversations A reported conversation with only two speakers. Each speaker is the addressee of the previous speech. Special rules often apply in closed conversations (participant reference and speech orienters).

Status of reported speech Often background material (the speech orienter is foreground) Often non-developmental (doesn’t move the story forward) But it can possibly be foregrounded as well. (see Levinsohn 7.5.4)

Tight-knit conversation versus new direction Tight knit conversation: a closed conversation where the speakers continue on the same topic as that of the previous speech. New direction is often marked somehow

Reference to the speaker and addressee in speech orienters noun, pronoun, enclitic pronoun, Ø find the default (often minimal, particularly in closed conversations) Deviations e.g. for highlighting or in change of direction

Status of speakers Can be marked in different ways (See Levinsohn 7.9)

Interpretive use marker Marks that the speech is NOT describing what was said on a particular occasion, but rather represents an utterance or thought.