Topicalization in Asian Englishes: Forms, Functions, and Frequencies of a Fronting Construction (Routledge Studies in World Englishes) - Hardcover

Leuckert, Sven

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1138549452 ISBN 13: 9781138549456

Publisher: Routledge, 2019

Synopsis

Shortlisted for the 2020 ESSE Book Award in English Language and Linguistics

This monograph is the first comprehensive study of topicalization in Asian second-language varieties of English and provides an in-depth analysis of the forms, functions, and frequencies of topicalization in four Asian Englishes. Topicalization, that is, the sentence-initial placement of constituents other than the subject, has been found to occur frequently in the English spoken by many Asians, but so far the possible reasons for this have never been scrutinized. This book closes this research gap by taking into account the structures of the major contact languages, the roles of second-language acquisition and politeness as well as other factors in order to explain why topicalization is highly frequent in some varieties such as Indian English and much less frequent in other varieties such as Hong Kong English. In addition to exploring major and minor forces involved in explaining the frequency of topicalization, the forms and functions of the feature are assessed. Central questions addressed in this regard are the following: Which syntactic constituents tend to be topicalized the most and the least frequently? Which discourse effects does topicalization achieve? How can we approach topicalization methodologically? And, lastly, which influence do language processing and production have on topicalization?

About this title

About the Author

Sven Leuckert is a lecturer in the Institute of English and American Studies at the Technical University of Dresden, Germany.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2019
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1138549452
• ISBN 13: 9781138549456
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 238