Open AccessSemantics and Pragmatics of Non-Canonical Word Order in South Asian Languages: <Verb-Left> of lag- ‘Begin’ as an Attitude-Marker in Hindi-Urdu
Author(s) -
Peter Edwin Hook
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
lingua posnaniesis/lingua posnaniensis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.124
H-Index - 4
eISSN - 2083-6090
pISSN - 0079-4740
DOI - 10.2478/v10122-011-0010-9
Subject(s) - linguistics , hindi , word order , pragmatics , verb , urdu , semantics (computer science) , indo european languages , computer science , philosophy , programming language
Semantics and Pragmatics of Non-Canonical Word Order in South Asian Languages: of lag - ‘Begin’ as an Attitude-Marker in Hindi-Urdu This paper examines possible motivations for departures from canonical clause-final word order observed for the finite verb in Hindi-Urdu and other modern Indo-Aryan languages. Depiction of speaker attitude in Premchand's novel godān and the imperatives of journalistic style in TV newscasts are shown to be prime factors. The emergence of V-2 word-order in Kashmiri and other Himalayan languages may have had a parallel history.