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Indefinita und ihre verschiedenen Interpretationsmöglichkeiten sind seit längerem Gegenstand intensiver linguistischer Diskussion. Die folgenden Bemerkungen diskutieren einige in der Literatur häufig vertretene Thesen zum Zusammenhang der Positionierung einer indefiniten NP im deutschen Mittelfeld und ihrer Interpretation. Es wird argumentiert, daß diese Thesen den empirischen Gegebenheiten nicht gerecht werden. Dies gilt damit auch für einige Thesen zur Umstellung im Mittelfeld (Scrambling).
Das Papier argumentiert anhand einer Reihe von Phänomenen für die Existenz einer ausgezeichneten Topikdomäne im Mittelfeld des deutschen Satzes. Deutsch ist somit Diskurs-konfigurational hinsichtlich Topiks. Die Beobachtung erlaubt die Beantwortung einiger grundlegender Fragen wie die nach der möglichen Anzahl van Satztopiks, nach der Möglichkeit von Satztopiks in eingebetteten Sätzen oder nach dem Zusammenhang von Scrambling und Topikstatus. Die These, die 'starke' Interpretation einer indefiniten Phrase impliziere deren Topikstatus, wird zurückgewiesen. Syntaktische Eigenschaften der Topik-Voranstellung im Mittelfeld werden herausgearbeitet und ihre Implikationen für die Theoriebildung werden erörtert.
"Werden" plays an important role in German, especially as a copula and as an auxiliary verb. It constitutes the analytic (periphrastic) part of the verbal paradigm being used as an auxiliary by encoding the categories of Tense (Future), Mood (Conditional), and Diathesis (Passive).
The original meaning of PIE *uuerth- includes two basic readings – a terminative and an aterminative. Both of them have been used in the process of grammaticalisation of werden in constructions with participles and the infinitive. The terminative reading based on the feature "Change of a State" was originally the categorical marker of "werden" within the opposition "sein" vs. "werden", where "sein" indicated the meaning of "State". As a result of the further development which started in the later OHG period, the aterminative reading of "werden" in constructions with the Participle II mixed with the terminative one by establishing the Passive-Paradigm. This evolution forced "sein"+ Part. II into the periphery of the Diathesis where in NHG it is marked as a resultative (terminative) construction. On the other hand, werden + Participle I (later with Infinitive) did not establish aterminative readings due to the peculiarities of the semantics of the Participle I – form. In connection with the Infinitive the terminativity of werden developed in the process of its auxiliarisation to the prospective I prognostic reading in the future-tense perspective and to the epistemic reading in the perspective of the present tense. In the perspective of the past tense (cf. MHG "ward varen" {became ride}, "was ridden") it disappeared because in this perspective prospective or prognostic readings are impossible.
The German causal preposition durch ('by', 'through') poses a challenge to formal-semantic analyses applying strict compositionality. To deal with this challenge, a formalism which builds on recent important developments in Discourse Representation Theory is developed, including a more elaborate analysis of presuppositional phenomena as well as the integration into the theory of unification as a mode of composition. It is argued that that the observed unificational phenomena belong in the realm of pragmatics, providing an argument for presuppositional phenomena at a sentence- and word-internal level.
Eine wesentliche morpho-syntaktische Eigenschaft pronominaler Formen ist ihre Kongruenz mit dem Nomen. In den Grammatiken werden die pronominalen Paradigmen deshalb anhand der Kategorien des Nomens konstruiert. So wird traditionellerweise im Deutschen für all die verschiedenen pronominalen Elemente wie bestimmter/unbestimmter Artikel, Negationsartikel, Possessiv- und Demonstrativpronomen, starke/schwache Adjektive ein und dieselbe Struktur des Paradigmensystems zugrundegelegt. Die 3 Genusklassen konstituieren je ein Paradigma im Singular sowie ein gemeinsames Pluralparadigma. Jedes dieser 4 Paradigmen hat 4 Kasuspositionen, Nom., Gen., Dat., Akk. Dies ergibt ein Paradigmensystem mit 16 Paradigmenpositionen. Jede Position beschreibt eine der möglichen syntaktischen Umgebungen von nominalen Einheiten auf der Äußerungsoberfläche. Nicht nur im Deutschen existiert nun aber keineswegs für jede dieser Positionen auch eine eigenständige pronominale Form. Die Diskrepanz ist bekanntlich beachtlich. Das Paradigmensystem des bestimmten Artikels - das hier exemplarisch diskutiert werden sol1 - weist mit 6 Formen noch den größten Formenreichtum auf. Das Demonstrativpronomen dies und der Negationsartikel kein z.B. haben 5 distinkte Formen, die schwachen Adjektive schließlich nur 2.
Die Frage, die sich unmittelbar aufdrängt, ist, welche (grammatische) Ratio steckt hinter diesem hohen Maß an Formidentitäten. Inwieweit haben wir es hier mit motivierten Synkretismen, d.h. auf inhaltlich begründeten Neutralisationen beruhenden Formidentitäten, und/oder zufälligen Homonymien zu tun?
This paper draws a link between the typological phenomenon of the paradigmatically supported evidentiality evoked by perfect and/or perfectivity and the equally epistemic system of modal verbs in German. The assumption is that, if perfect(ivity) is at the bottom of evidentiality in a wide number of unrelated languages, then it will not be an arbitrary fact that systematic epistemic readings occur also for the modal verbs in German, which were preterite presents originally. It will be demonstrated, for one, how exactly modal verbs in Modem German still betray sensitivity to perfect and perfective contexts, and, second, how perfect(ivity) is prone to evincing epistemic meaning. Although the expectation cannot be satisfied due to a lack of respective data from the older stages of German, a research path is sketched narrowing down the linguistic questions to be asked and dating results to be reached.
The present investigation steps back to the claims of the 1990s by assuming that there is a functional opposition in the use of P- and D-PRO which affects the status of the pronoun's referent in the mental model of the discourse. We interpret the earlier findings as an indication of an information structural difference which is specifically relevant on the discourse level. The question we address here is twofold. Firstly, we ask whether the assumed opposition in the information status of P- and D-PRO referents has consequences on referent continuation in the ongoing discourse. So far, the effects of P- vs. D-PRO use were determined concerning the status of the pronoun referent in the actual sequence of discourse, i.e. they were determined by a judgement on the salience or the topic/focus status of the pronominal DP. As far as we can see, this determination has not been operationalized further. Since there are contexts in which both P- and D-PRO would fit in with only a feeling of a difference but without clear-cut exclusiveness, the opposition is empirically not well validated. If we could show that there are effects of type of pronoun on the ongoing discourse this would, in our view, provide the lacking empirical validation. Secondly, we ask whether there are effects of the narrator's point of view on P- and D-PRO use. The idea behind this question is that the way of information unfolding in discourse depends on the speaker. S/he decides which pieces of information come next, what is foreground and what is background information. If type of pronoun choice is related to the processes of discourse organization by the speaker – via fore- and backgrounding of information – and if internal or external location of the narrator's point of view influences the organization strategies of the speaker/narrator this might have an ffect on the use of P- and D-PRO.