Chapter 1

Discourse particle position and information structure

Discourse markers differ cross-linguistically not only in their functions but also in their positions within the sentence. Some are sentence-initial, some are sentence-final, and some occur in what has been termed the ‘middle-field’. But many appear simply in second position in the sentence. In many cases the positions of the markers can be explained in terms of the source constructions from which they emerged. Here one likely pathway of development is traced in Mohawk, indigenous to North America, illustrated with a pervasive marker of discourse coherence. Patterns in the modern language suggest that it and others emerged from marked information structures, which, over time, evolved into basic clause structures via familiar mechanisms of grammaticalization.