Cover not available

Article published In: Usage-based and Typological Approaches to Linguistic Units
Edited by Tsuyoshi Ono, Ritva Laury and Ryoko Suzuki
[Studies in Language 43:2] 2019
► pp. 469–497

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF
authorization required
News from the field

Reversed ang-inversion and narrow focus marking in Tagalog

 | Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf
Published online: 13 November 2019
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/sl.18034.nuh
Abstract
In Tagalog, an argument that is in narrow focus can be fronted to the clause initial position, deviating from the default verb-initial word order. This so-called ang-inversion has been claimed to be obligatory (. 2007. Information structure and constituent order in Tagalog. Language and Linguistics 8(1). 343–372.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar) or at least the go-to strategy (Kaufman, Daniel. 2005. Aspects of pragmatic focus in Tagalog. In I. Wayan Arka & Malcolm Ross (eds.), The many faces of Austronesian voice systems: some new empirical studies, 175–196. Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, ANU.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar) of encoding narrow focus. There is, however, an alternative that has so far received little attention in the literature: reversed ang-inversion. Structurally, this construction can be understood as the result of combining two inversion constructions: ang-inversion and ay-inversion. As a consequence, the focal constituent appears at the end of the sentence rather than at the beginning.
This article presents spoken data elicited during field work as well as written data on reversed ang-inversion. Comparing the use of regular and reversed ang-inversion indicates that discourse-structural considerations play an important role in construction choice between the two.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Information-structural notions
  • 3.Inversion constructions and narrow focus in Tagalog
    • 3.1 Ang-inversion
    • 3.2Adjunct inversion
    • 3.3 Ay-inversion
    • 3.4Reversed ang-inversion
  • 4.Use of reversed ang-inversion
    • 4.1Spoken data: QUIS Fairy Tale and Frog Stories
      • QUIS Fairy Tale
      • Frog Stories
    • 4.2Written data: The Hunger Games corpus
  • 5.Summary and outlook
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • List of glosses
  • References
References (35)
References
Collins, Suzanne. 2008. The Hunger Games. Scholastic.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2009. Catching Fire. Scholastic.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2010. Mockingjay. Scholastic.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2012a. Catching Fire (Filipino edition). Quezon City: Precious Pages Corporation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2012b. The Hunger Games (Filipino edition). Quezon City: Precious Pages Corporation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2013. Mockingjay. Quezon City: Precious Pages Corporation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Declerck, Renaat. 1984. The pragmatics of it-clefts and wh-clefts. Lingua 64(4). 251–289. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dery, Jeruen E. 2007. Pragmatic focus and word order variation in Tagalog. Language and Linguistics 8(1). 373–402.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Frascarelli, Mara & Francesca Ramaglia. 2009. (Pseudo)cleft constructions at the interfaces. Manuscript. lingbuzz/000841 (2018–01–02). [URL]
Gundel, Jeanette K. 1988. Universals of topic-comment structure. In M. Hammond, E. Moravcsik & J. Wirth (eds.), Studies in linguistic typology, 209–239. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kaufman, Daniel. 2005. Aspects of pragmatic focus in Tagalog. In I. Wayan Arka & Malcolm Ross (eds.), The many faces of Austronesian voice systems: some new empirical studies, 175–196. Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, ANU.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kroeger, Paul. 1991. Phrase structure and grammatical relations in Tagalog: Stanford University dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lambrecht, Knud. 1986. Topic, focus and the grammar of spoken French: University of California, Berkeley dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1987. Sentence focus, information structure, and the thetic-categorical distinction. In Proceedings of the 13th annual meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society, vol. 131, 366–382. Berkeley Linguistics Society.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1994. Information structure and sentence form. Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Latrouite, Anja. 2019. Specification Predication, Unexpectedness and Cleft-Constructions in Tagalog. Manuscript currently under review.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Latrouite, Anja & Arndt Riester. 2018. The role of information structure for morphosyntactic choices in Tagalog. Riesberg, Sonja & Shiohara, Asako. Information Structure in Austronesian Languages. Berlin: Language Science Press. 1–47. (in press).Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Latrouite, Anja & Robert D. Van Valin, Jr. to appear. A Role and Reference Grammar account of aspects of the information structure-syntax interface in Tagalog. In Koen van Hooste, Anja Latrouite & Robert D. Van Valin, Jr. (eds.), Proceedings of the 2015 Role and Reference Grammar conference, in preparation.
Lee, Eun Hee & Mitsuaki Shimojo. 2016. Mismatch of topic between Japanese and Korean. Journal of East Asian Linguistics 25(1). 81–112. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lovestrand, Joseph. 2018. The background marker ná in Barayin. Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 39(1). 1–39. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mayer, Mercer. 1967. A boy, a dog and a frog. New York: Dial Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1969. Frog, where are you? New York: Dial Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1971. A boy, a dog, a frog and a friend. New York: Dial Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nagaya, Naonori. 2006a. Preferred referential expressions in Tagalog. Tokyo University Linguistics Papers 251. 83–106.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2006b. Topicality and reference-tracking in Tagalog. In 9th philippine linguistics congress. Quezon City: University of the philippines diliman, Citeseer.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2007. Information structure and constituent order in Tagalog. Language and Linguistics 8(1). 343–372.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schachter, Paul & Fe T. Otanes. 1972. Tagalog reference grammar. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shimojo, Mitsuaki & Hye-Won Choi. 2000. On asymmetry in topic marking-the case of Japanese wa and Korean nun. In Akira Okrent & John P. Boyle (eds.), Chicago linguistic society, vol. 36 1, 455–467.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Simons, Gary F. & Charles D. Fennig. 2018. Ethnologue: Languages of the world, twenty-first edition, online version (last visited: 2018-03-22). [URL]
Skopeteas, Stavros, Ines Fiedler, Samantha Hellmuth, Anne Schwarz, Ruben Stoel, Gisbert Fanselow, Caroline Féry & Manfred Krifka. 2006. Questionnaire on information structure (QUIS): Reference manual, vol. 41. Universitätsverlag Potsdam.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Van Valin, Robert D., Jr. 2005. Exploring the syntax-semantics interface. Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Van Valin, Robert D., Jr. & Randy J. LaPolla. 1997. Syntax: Structure, meaning, and function. Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ward, Gregory & Betty J. Birner. 2011. Discourse effects of word order variation. In Claudia Maienborn, Klaus von Heusinger & Paul Portner (eds.), Semantics: An international handbook of natural language and meaning, vol. 33 2, 1934–1963. Berlin/Boston: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (1)

Cited by one other publication

Latrouite, Anja
2021. Specification predication: Unexpectedness and cleft constructions in Tagalog. Faits de Langues 52:1 ► pp. 227 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 2 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue