Presentational articulation sentence focus

The field is salient for the man it is something he has been thinking about, and it may even be in sight and functions as a new topic. It therefore occurs before the predicate even though grammatically it is an object note the object pronoun u- on the verb. 5.5c con. predicate focus elaboration na sikaphaha hata tsere mwenga, kpwani nini?” and I have not got even a single maize cob, but why?” 5.6a con. predicate focus continued topic Lakini achinyamala mutu yuyu, But he stayed silent that person, Here, mutu yuyu is a continued topic for the narrator, whose last topic was in line 5a. It occurs after the verb even though it is the subject of the clause that is, it is ‘right-dislocated’. This indicates that there is no new paragraph, in contrast to line 4, where the topic occurs before the verb. 5.6b con. predicate focus wala kayagomba na mutu. neither did he speak with anyone. Continued topic indicated by an incorporated subject pronoun only. 5.7a point of departure switch topic predicate focus Halafu hura munda achiuenjereza zaidi Then that field he increased it even more Switch topic indicated by an object noun phrase before the predicate. 5.7b con. predicate focus ela achikosa vivyo. but he failed none the less. Continued topic indicated by an incorporated subject pronoun only.

6.3 Sentence articulations in text 5

Mutu na Mamba

6.3.1 Presentational articulation sentence focus

New participants or other entities can be introduced into a narrative without reference to an existing topic through presentational articulation. In Digo, the entity being introduced occurs as the complement of a predicate which has a locative noun class as its grammatical subject. When the predicate is a verb, as in the introduction of the man and his wife in 5.1a, this is known as ‘locative inversion’. The newly introduced entities are now immediately available as topics and can be expressed as continued topics through an incorporated subject pronoun alone. When the predicate is a copula here using the comitative particle na as in the introduction of the crocodile in 5.11 and the introduction of the shaking rock where the god lived in 5.23, this does not make them immediately available as topics. Entities introduced using a copula construction may become topics, as in 5.12a, in which case they are expressed as switch topics using a noun phrase before the verb. 5.11 Kumbavi paharatu pha=na mamba. 5.12a Mamba a-na-mu-amb-a, EXCLAM 16. DEM _ DIST 16. REF = COM crocodile crocodile 3 SG - PRES -3 SG -say- FV ‘However right there there was a crocodile. The crocodile said to him...’ However, entities introduced using a copula construction do not necessarily become new topics, and the previous topic may continue as in 5.24a where the crocodile is a continued topic, despite the mention of the rock in the previous sentence. 5.23 Pha=na dziwe ri-na-mekamek-a phapho ndani ya madzi. 16. REF = COM 5.stone 5- PRES -shake- FV 16. DEM _ NP inside of water 5.24a A-na-amb-a, ... 3 SG - PRES -say- FV ‘There was a rock which was shaking in the water. He the crocodile said...’ Sentence focus can also be used to introduce new events as opposed to new participants into a discourse without reference to a pre-existing topic; this kind of sentence focus is known as event- reporting sentence focus. There are no examples of event-reporting sentence focus in Text 5, and it is rare in the text corpus as a whole. An example is found in Text 1, line 1.4a, however. This clause describes an event in which a previously unmentioned woman has died; she only functions as a prop, and so the purpose if this clause is not to introduce the woman but simply to record the fact that she had died: 1.4a Kumbavi kuku kaya kala ku-ka-fw-a m-chetu, EXCLAM 17. DEM _ PROX 9.home PST . COP 17- SEQ -die- FV 1-woman ‘However, there at home a woman had died...’ Another example is found in Text 6, line 6.12b. In this clause, the topic is Mino I but this is not one of the arguments of the clause; the subject is mpwazangu my wife and the object is sima ugali. Neither is it an oblique element; it is not possible to place mino at the end of the sentence and for it to make any sense. At this point in the conversation between a man and a lion the man’s wife has not been mentioned and so she cannot be referred to ‘out of the blue’ using a pre-verbal lexical subject as this would imply that the wife is a topic, and therefore has already been mentioned. In this sentence, mino functions as an ‘external topic’ Eaton 2010: 18 or Theme 7 with which the wife can be linked. The clause mkpwazangu karya sima my wife does not eat ugali exhibits event-reporting sentence focus. 6.12b Mino mkpwazangu ka-ry-a sima 1 SG 1.wife.1.1 SG . POS 3 SG . NEG -eat- FV ugali ‘As for me, my wife does not eat ugali.’

6.3.2 Topic-comment articulation predicate focus with a switch topic