- 319 - Although not regarded as being as complex as comparatives, superlatives do also cause
problems. On page 317 we quoted Shvinder’s overgeneralized superlative form “worsest” for “worst” which is repeated several times in the same narrative. Interestingly, she does
produce the target form once in: B17
but he couldn’t FIND not EVen O-ONE team – the WORST
In her Story E, she uses the antonym “best” in: 1819
“ONE day I’ll be the BEST, Ben,”
Billy said. It is significant that it is only the two most able L2 speakers who actually produce
superlative constructions; whereas, with the comparative we have two examples from Shvinder, three from Humira, three from Sheiba, one from Shazia, and one from Fehdah,
but in the main these are simple comparative adjectives and adverbs.
7.2.7 The Conversational Historic Present CHP
As we have already said elsewhere, the Conversational Historic Present is NOT one of Labov’s original evaluative devices but one of Wolfson’s 1982 performance features;
Schiffrin describes it as follows: HP is an INTERNAL EVALUATION DEVICE: it allows the narrator to
present events as if they were occurring at that moment, so that the audience can hear for itself what happened, and can interpret for itself the significance of those events for the
experience. Schiffrin 1981:58 It is in many ways an arbitrary decision to add the CHP to the Comparator category rather
than to the Intensifiers. If, as the traditional grammarians claim, a claim that Schiffrin seems to endorse, HP merely: “makes the past more vivid by bringing past events into the
moment of speaking…
”
1981:58, then it is functioning more as a type of intensification: but if, as Wolfson argues, the historic present in conversational narratives is there to play a
distinct functional role, relating to the patterns of switching between historic past and present tense, then it is more akin to Labov’s comparators which, as we have seen above,
“provide a way of evaluating events by placing them against the background of other events”. According to Wolfson, the switches or alternations create three main effects: 1
an intervention by the teller cf. External Evaluation; 2 a focusing of attention on certain portions of the narrative cf. Intensification; and 3 a dividing-up of the flow of action
- 320 - into distinct events a cohesive ‘chunking’ device which is clearly syntactic. We mentioned
points 2 and 3 briefly on page 122 of chapter 4, quoting a short extract from Sakander’s Story B as exemplification. See also the discussion on errors in tense-aspect relations,
chapter 5, pp. 191–195. Toolan 1988 raises the following query to point 3:
Do the tense-switches really create the chunks, or do they merely accompany a prior separation of the flow of action into distinct events, a separation made on other grounds?
Or is the argument merely circular, i.e., are we identifying chunks of discourse as events only because they are bounded by tense-switches? p. 167
Schiffrin deals with some of these issues directly. As noted on page 122, Schiffrin finds that CHP is nearly always confined to the complicating action of the adult conversational
narratives that she analyses; she argues that this is significant because it is in the complication section of a narrative that tense is not being used for its special function of
temporal orientation since temporal and presentational order can be assumed to be congruent.
The most typical pattern is one in which the complicating action begins with past-tense verbs, switches after a few clauses to the HP, possibly switches between the HP and the
P[ast] a few more times, and then concludes with past-tense verbs…There is a tendency for verbs in the same tense to cluster together…sequences with rapid alternation between
the HP and P are not typical. Schiffin 1981:51 Schiffrin, therefore, seems to be relating tense-switching to the Labovian criterion of
interclausal temporal juncture and sees them as two possible ways of separating out events; with tense-switching temporal conjunctions are not essential, and with temporal
conjunctions “tense is maintained rather than switched due to other constraints” p. 168. However, Schiffrin does find a relatively high correlation of clauses with BOTH temporal
conjunctions AND tense-switching. We looked at Sakander’s Story B, first dividing up the narrative according to the placement of narrative events and orientational comments see
the appendix for a full display of this story; we then looked at the placement of temporal conjunctions and tense-switches, and the status of the various clauses, main or subordinate,
and also at their function in the narrative. The findings are set out in table 7.4; N =
- 321 - narrative section, O = orientation, C = coda, P = past, Pr = present, F = Future, M =
main clause, and S = subordinate clause. Table 7.5. Sakander’s Story B:
Continued overleaf THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TENSE-SWITCHING AND THE PRESENCE
OF TEMPORAL CONJUNCTIONS NOC
Conj Tense
MS Verb
Function 1 N
P M look
preliminary event
2 O and
P M be
comment 3 N
so P
M tidy up resulting
event 4
N and then suddenly
P M
see new development
5 N and
P M open
resulting event
6 O and
P M be
comment 7 N
and P
M wonder speech introducer
8 N Pr[Mod] S do
question 9 N
F [Mod] S go
answer 10 N
and Pr
S ask
answer 11 N
if Pr[Mod]
S like
answer 12 O
and P
M be
comment 13 N
and P
M say
speech introducer
14 N Pr[Mod]
S like
question 15 N
and P
M say
answer 16 N
so P
M play
resulting event
17 O but
suddenly when
P S kick
turning point
18 N Pr[Q.Mod] M
lose significant
event 19 O
and if
Pr S
tackle condition
- 322 - NOC
Conj Tense
MS Verb
Function 20 N
Pr[Q.Mod] M lose
consequence 21 O
if Pr
S score
condition 22 N
Pr M
lose consequence
23 N then
P M
go new
development 24 N
and P
M say
speech introducer
25 N Pr[Mod]
S like
question 26 N
and P
M say
answer 27 N
and P
M tackle
significant event
28 N but
P[Neg] M
disappear non-event 29 N
P ?
M score
significant event
30 N but
P[Neg] M
disappear non-event 31 N
and P
M say
speech introducer
32 N Pr
S be
embedded comment
33 C and then at the
end of the day P M
go temporal
orientation 34 C
and P
M say
speech 35 C
and P
M go
off denouement
36 C [-ing]
S additional
information 37 C
and then P
M tidy up
concluding event
Apart from the quoted conversations, the only occurrences of present tense forms are found in the fifth section of the narrative, i.e. lines 17–22, at the high-point or peak which
forms the turning point for the whole narrative. As we noted in chapter 5, page 191, line 17 is reported in the past tense and introduced by two temporal conjunctions; the switching
would have been even more effective if line 17 had been reported in the present tense as well as lines 18–22, the temporal conjunctions reinforcing the break between lines 16 and
17. However, from Sakander’s data it would seem that it is not the tense-switches alone
- 323 - which are creating the divisions or chunks, but a combination of temporal conjunctions
and orientational evaluative comments, with a change of tense, plus condition - consequence subordinate - main clause relations, marking off the most important section
of the narrative. Just by looking at the conjunctions, we can see that there are logical grounds for the break between lines 3 and 4, rather than between lines 2 and 3, even
though two of the other sections are terminated by a similar orientational evaluative comment.
Altogether in the data there are thirteen clauses where the verb is in the historic present, but only Humira’s Story B has a section similar to Sakander’s which is marked out by the
use of present tense forms in contrast to past tense forms everywhere else. Humira’s climactic section consists of a long speech by a lady, explaining to Father Christmas the
presence of a mystery ball, in a box in his cupboard, which had been puzzling him; putting this speech into the historic present presents the whole series of unlikely circumstances as
if they were happening at the very moment of the telling. However, Humira’s story is not as well constructed as Sakander’s.
7.3 Correlatives
