Filler words and expressions in Portuguese (Abstract) The aim of this study is to describe the morphological, syntactic, semantic and pragmatic aspects of the filler words and expressions (discourse markers) in Portuguese. For that purpose, a corpus of more than 3000 occurences of these expressions was assembled. It is composed of Portuguese and Brazilian mostly spoken texts belonging to different genres. The approach taken in this work is based on textual-interactive grammar, whose vision of the text is based on the social-communicative perspective, i.e. it takes not only the cognitive- informational part of the utterances, but also their interactional part in consideration. This study describes Portuguese as one language. The differences between the Brazilian and the European variety are taken in consideration only when it is necessary to treat them separately. This work can be divided into two parts. History of the filler expressions, different approaches to this issue, processes of grammaticalization and pragmaticalization and prototypical conception of the class of discourse markers (whose brief characterization as well) are discussed in the first part. A more detailed analysis of the morphological, syntactic, semantic and pragmatic aspects of the discourse markers are discussed in the second part. The...

The present study explores the use of discourse markers (DMs) in talk-in-interaction of Korean-English bilingual children and their monolingual peers in two languages. The corpus-driven analysis proposes a core meaning of the two DMs as signaling contextual divergence in two monolingual groups. Both similarities and differences coexist in the bilingual data. While the core meaning of well was contextual divergence, that of isscanha was of the cognitive thinking process. The bilingual children utilized the first language DM as an additional resource for their own interactional purposes, such as for searching words and reasoning. The statistical analyses revealed that bilingual children used both DMs in a similar frequency to both monolingual groups. In both monolingual and bilingual data, age affected the use of well but gender did not, and neither age nor gender affected the use of isscanha. Bilingual children's use of the English DM had a correlation with the length of exposure to school context. In addition, awareness of socio-cultural factors in the use of Korean DM appeared differently from that of their monolingual peers. The study uncovered that bilingual children developed interactional competence through the use of DMs in various natural interactions. / CITE/Language Arts

The paper analyzes the translation of discourse markers from English into Lithuanian. Discourse markers are words or word combinations, who contribute little to the propositional meaning of an utterance but serve a variety of important conversational functions guiding interlocutors towards the intended interpretation of an utterance. The aim of the research is to prove the polyfunctional nature of discourse markers and the significance of rendering their meanings in translation from English into Lithuanian. The paper reviews the basic theoretical orientations within which discourse markers are analyzed and presents the list of defining and non-defining properties of discourse markers. Correct interpretation of discourse markers depend on the conversational function they serve in a particular situation rather than on lexical meaning of an item, therefore the functions of the discourse markers selected for the analysis (you know, I mean, well, okay, so, like, now) are reviewed as well. The empirical part is based on the analysis of the translation of discourse markers in two novels: John Irving’s 'A Widow for One Year' and Melvin Burgess’ 'Doing it'. / Darbe nagrinėjamas diskurso žymeklių vertimas iš anglų į lietuvių kalbą. Diskurso žymekliai - tai žodžiai ar žodžių junginiai, kurių leksinė reikšmė turi mažai įtakos sakinio prasmei, bet kurie atlieka daug svarbių funkcijų, padedančių pašnekovui teisingai interpretuoti pasakymą. Darbo tikslas – įrodyti diskurso žymeklių daugiafunkcinę prigimtį ir tų funkcijų perteikimo svarbą verčiant iš anglų į lietuvių kalbą. Darbe apžvelgiamos svarbiausios teorinės kryptys, kuriomis remiantis analizuojami diskurso žymekliai, ir pristatomi jų skiriamieji bei jiems būdingi bruožai. Kadangi teisinga diskurso žymeklių interpretacija priklauso ne nuo leksinės lingvistinio vieneto reikšmės, bet nuo jo atliekamos funkcijos, darbe taip pat aprašomos analizei pasirinktų žymeklių (you know, I mean, well, okay, so, like, now) funkcijos. Empirinė dalis pagrįsta diskurso žymeklių vertimu dvejuose romanuose: John Irving "A Widow for One Year" ir Melvin Burgess "Doing it".

The present paper studies the English imperatives look and listen used as discourse markers. The study focuses on two aspects: firstly, to identify the factors indicating the primary function as opposed to the discourse function of look and listen in English, and secondly, to analyse the Czech counterparts of these verbs used as discourse markers. The paper is comprised of two main parts. The first, theoretical background, describes the grammatical form of the English imperative with focus on look and listen, the concept of discourse markers, the cross-linguistic studies focusing specifically on look and listen, the correspondence between English and Czech imperative, and the potential Czech counterparts. The second, empirical part analyses two hundred and three examples of the imperatives look and listen and their Czech counterparts from the parallel translation corpus InterCorp. Key words: imperative, look, listen, discourse markers, primary function, Czech counterpart

La tesis doctoral que aquí se presenta se podría enmarcar dentro de tres campos lingüísticos: el análisis de género, la retórica contrastiva y el análisis de corpus.El análisis de género (Swales 1981, 1990; Dudley-Evans & Henderson 1990a, 1990b; Henderson & Hewings 1990; Bathia 1993, 2002; Skulstad 1996, 2002; Flowerdew 1994, 2002) es un parte dentro del amplio campo de análisis del discurso (Barber 1962; Halliday, Strevens & McIntosh 1964). En este estudio nos centramos en el estudio de la clase magistral dentro de los denominados géneros académicos en el aula (Fortanet 2004b). La clase magistral es un género hablado y como tal posee ciertas peculiaridades de los géneros hablados en contraposición a los géneros académicos escritos.Nuestro estudio se centra en la comparación y contraste de dos lenguas, el español peninsular y el inglés americano, ya que como corpus se utilizan clases magistrales españolas y norte-americanas y en consecuencia se toman como referencia estudios de retórica contrastiva. En este estudio nos centramos en un aspecto concreto del lenguaje, los marcadores discursivos. Con el análisis de los marcadores discursivos en el lenguaje académico hablado en español e inglés norte-americano pretendemos ver como se usan los marcadores discursivos para favorecer a hablantes nativos y no nativos de español e inglés en el espacio de educación superior.

This thesis addresses the borrowing and adaptation of the English discourse marker (DM) anyway into the speech of the Czech-speaking diaspora in Texas, known widely as Texas Czechs (TC). The primary goal of the thesis is to assess which subtypes of 'anyway', according to the schema of Ferrara (1997), are borrowed into TC, and to what extent. Chapter one addresses the sociolinguistic history of the TC community. The historical origins of the people and cultural background are provided. Late in the chapter, I provide a discussion of previous scholarship in the field of TC linguistics over the last half-century. Chapter two addresses the theories of borrowing and code-switching in language. The two are disambiguated, and a basic set of conditions which define the two are proposed. From this, I address Serra's (1998) theory of a mixed-code system, which relies on the knowledge of two separate codes for understanding, but also utilizes borrowings. The works of Fuller (2001) and Weilbacher (2007) in Pennsylvania and Texas German communities are addressed, as is Johnson's (1995) work on Tejano. The chapter concludes with a brief description of DMs. Chapter three describes the subtypes and features of 'anyway' in English according to Ferrara's (1997) schema, as well as surveys a number of possible counterparts for 'anyway' in standard European Czech. Chapter four analyzes borrowed 'anyway' in TC speech as a Ferraran subtype. I disambiguate the uses of various types of anyway, proposing that only anyway, Ferrara's only true DM, is borrowed in TC. I demonstrate that possible functions of native TC DMs similar to 'anyway' function inherently differently than those of Ferrara. I show that 'anyway' is borrowed into TC to fulfill a pragmatic gap in the form of 'anyway', whereas the two adverbial subtypes are not borrowed. In older data, these two were borrowed, but no examples exist in modern speech. I propose that this is indicative of the TC's existence as a mixed-code system, in that knowledge of both English and TC are required to properly choose the appropriate DM and to understand borrowed DMs from the other code. / text

The present paper reports the results of the study aimed to investigate the problem of discourse markers, their functions and differences and similarities in the English and Lithuanian languages in a book of prose. The methods chosen for the study were content analysis, quantitative method and contrastive method. The study is based on theories of various linguists proposing different terms and definitions for the discourse marker, on the corpus of occurrences of these linguistic items in the examined sources. The investigation also attempts to examine the functional complexity of discourse markers in cohesive texts. The research demonstrated that the most frequently used discourse markers in textual function in the English language are and, but, so. At the same time, the most frequently used discourse markers in interactional function in English are oh, well, eh, however, ah, and now. The research demonstrated that the functions of discourse markers fall into two domains - interactional and textual and they can appear simultaneously. / Šio tyrimo problema yra susijusi su diskurso žymikliais/žymekliais, kurie yra teksto formavimo įrankiai diskurse. Ši tema buvo pasirinkta, nes, visų pirma, diskurso žymekliai tik neseniai patraukė lingvistų dėmesį kaip teksto formavimo įrankiai, kurie taip pat nekompromituoja jau esančios nusistovėjusios sistemos. Pradedant prielaida, jog diskurso žymekliai užtikrina efektyvų bendravimą (taip pat teksto rišlumą ir suderinamumą), yra multifunkciniai bei jų taksonomijos ir funkcijos gali kisti skirtingose kalbose, buvo iškelti šie tyrimo klausimai: 1) kokie yra dažniausiai naudojami diskurso žymekliai analizuotuose tekstuose dviejose kalbose? 2) kokie yra atitikimai/neatitikimai diskurso žymeklių naudojime bei funkcijose lietuvių ir anglų kalbose? Anksčiau minėti faktoriai bei tyrimo klausimai padėjo nustatyti šio darbo tikslą, kuris yra: palyginti ir išanalizuoti diskurso žymeklių taksonomijas ir funkcijas dviejose kalbose. Kad šis tikslas būtų pasiektas, žemiau išvardyti uždaviniai buvo iškelti:  peržiūrėti ir sistemingai pristatyti mokslinę litratūrą susijusią su diskurso žymekliais lietuvių ir anglų kalbose;  jau esamų ir prieinamų tyrimų pagalba apie diskurso žymeklius, buvo nustatytos ir apibrėžtos diskurso žymeklių atliekamos funkcijos rišliame tekste;  remiantis kiekybiniu bei kokybiniu metodais, buvo atskleista diskurso žymeklių skirstymas, dažnumas/pasikartojimas ir dominuojančios jų funkcijos analizuotuose tekstuose. Atliekant šį tyrimą tam tikri metodai buvo... [toliau žr. visą tekstą]

Thesis (M.S.)--Georgia Southern University, 2005. / "A thesis submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Georgia Southern University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Master of Science" ETD. Includes bibliographical references (p. 54-57)

Thesis (MA (General Linguistics))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis considers the linguistic item mos as it occurs in the speech of non-standard Cape Afrikaans speakers from the rural areas of the Western Cape, namely Montague, Worcester, Robertson, Touwsrivier, De Doorns, and Beaufort West. The syntactic and pragmatic properties of mos are described, as well as its prevalence in discourse in relation to particular social factors. Properties and functions of adverbs and discourse markers, as discussed by Ponelis (1985), Schiffrin (1987, 2001), and Fraser (1993, 1999, 2001), are applied to mos in terms of its syntactic characterisation as an adverb and as a discourse marker. The pragmatic analysis of mos is based on the analysis of discourse markers, such as you know in English, by Schiffrin (1987, 2001). With regard to the grammatical properties of mos, it was found that mos behaves much like an adverb in terms of syntactic distribution, yet it does not fulfil all the grammatical functions of an adverb, which is why it is being analysed as a discourse marker. The functions of mos as an adverb are restricted; mos does not perform the adverbial function of modifying verbs, adjectives, other adverbs, and prepositional phrases; rather, the entire proposition expressed by the utterance is modified or qualified by the use of mos. Its discourse marker functions follow from this property; discourse markers tend to retain the distributional properties of the syntactic category from which they are derived – in this case, the discourse marker mos is derived from the syntactic category of adverb. The position of mos within the sentence, both medial and final, is grammatically determined and has a grammatical relationship with other constituents in the sentence. This is similar for its function as adverb and as discourse marker. Mos is bound to the sentence structure, yet it may still be removed from the sentence without affecting grammaticality; however, in such an event the intended interpretation may not be as explicit. In analysing the discourse functions of mos, a number of pragmatic functions were identified: (i) mos indicates information as general knowledge and knowledge that should be known; (ii) it presents information as necessary in order for a narrative to be understood; (iii) it functions in the development of meta-knowledge in order to discover knowledge which the hearer has about a particular topic; (iv) it presents information which is to be interpreted as a causal or reason for a particular event or situation; (v) it presents a position or opinion in an argument which is to be regarded as fact; and (vi) it reveals logical relationships between two utterances. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie tesis handel oor die linguistiese item mos soos dit in die spraak van nie-standaard Kaapse Afrikaanse sprekers in die landelike gebiede van die Wes-Kaap, naamlik Montague, Worcester, Robertson, Touwsrivier, De Doorns, en Beaufort-Wes voorkom. Die tesis beskryf die sintaktiese en pragmatiese eienskappe van mos, sowel as die effek van spesifieke sosiale faktore op die voorkoms daarvan in diskoers. Die eienskappe en funksies van bywoorde en diskoersmerkers, soos deur Ponelis (1985), Schiffrin (1987, 2001), en Fraser (1993, 1999, 2001) bespreek, word op mos toegepas in terme van sy sintaktiese karakterisering as bywoord. Die pragmatiese analise van mos is gebasseer op Schiffrin (1987, 2001) se analise van diskoersmerkers, byvoorbeeld you know ("jy weet") in Engels. Wat betref die grammatikale eienskappe van mos is daar gevind dat mos soos ‘n bywoord optree in terme van sintakties verspreiding. Dit vervul egter nie al die grammatikale funksies van ‘n bywoord nie; om daardie rede word dit as ‘n diskoersmerker ontleed. Die funksies van mos as ‘n bywoord is beperk; mos modifiseer nie werkwoorde, byvoeglikenaamwoorde, ander bywoorde, of preposisionele frases nie, maar dit modifiseer wel die algehele proposisie wat uitgedruk word deur die uiting. Die diskoersmerker-funksies volg vanuit hierdie eienskap. Diskoersmerkers is geneig om die sintaktiese gedrag van die sintaktiesie kategorie waarvan hulle afgelei is, te behou; in hierdie geval is die diskoersmerker mos afgelei vanaf die sintaktiese kategorie bywoord. Mos kan in die middel of aan die einde van die sin voorkom en sy posisie word grammatikaal bepaal. Dit is die geval vir beide sy funksie as bywoord en as diskoersmerker. Mos is verbind met die sinstruktuur (anders as ander diskoersmerkers), maar dit kan steeds uit die sin verwyder word sonder om grammatikaliteit te beïnvloed; die bedoelde interpretasie mag in so 'n geval egter minder eksplisiet wees. Met die analise van die diskoersfunksies van mos is ‘n aantal pragmatiese funksies geïdentifiseer: (i) mos dui inligting as algemene kennis aan of as inligting wat reeds bekend behoort te wees aan die gespreks genote; (ii) dit stel inligting as noodsaaklik tot die begrip van narratiewe voor; (iii) dit funksioneer in die ontwikkeling van meta-kennis; (iv) dit merk inligting weer wat as rede vir ‘n spesifieke gebeurtenis of situasie geïnterpreteer kan word; (v) dit dui ‘n posisie of ‘n opinie aan wat as feit aanvaar word in ‘n argument; en (vi) dit lê logiese verhoudings tussen uitings bloot.

The objective of this thesis is to examine which types of pragmatic markers are represented in coloquial Spanish and establish the frequency they occur wiht in native and nonnative speakers. Further, a systematical description of ten most frequent markers in native and nonnative speakers is included and examples of their use based on the transcription are shown. The author bases her work mainly on linguistic studies focused on pragmatic markers and coloquial Spanish ? on the studies of José Portolés Lázaro and María Antonia Martín Zorraquino and Antonio Briz in particular. The author emanates from Lázaro and Zorraquino?s classification, characterists and use of pragmatic markers. The practical part focuses on the differences in use of pragmatic markers between native and nonnative speakers and examines the frequency and representation of particular types of markers in coloquial Spanish.