I don’t remember the name of the book in which Halliday (and a co-author?) make English out to be a topic-comment language, but the title of this article of his perhaps gives you an idea of his argument: ’ It’s a fixed word order language is English.’
That’s not grammatical. More correct would be: ’ It’s a fixed word order language, English is.
drbean, why would that be more correct?
The article title isn’t what usually passes as a run-on sentence, I don’t think.
Perhaps I was overstating Halliday’s position. He may have just been showing the resources English has for structuring topics.
In Japanese they have a special particle for topics and another one for subjects So, I’m visiting a Japanese university and I go in and meet some profs with Dr Lee from Hong Kong University. Lee doesn’t speak any Japanese. I do all the talking.
I introduce Lee. I say in Japanese, ‘This is Dr Lee from Hong Kong University’.
OK. In a different scenario, Lee is not there when I meet the profs. But I’m talking about Lee with the profs. Lee walks in. I say in Japanese. ‘This is Dr Lee.’
The form of the ‘this’ in the 2 sentences is different.
In the first case, ‘this’ has the topic particle after it. Lee is in the topic. In the second case, ‘this’ has the subject particle after it. Lee is not the topic.
Inscrutable, no?
Actually, Lee is not the topic. ‘this’ is the topic in the first case, because Lee is in the room, and everyone is aware of them being there, so ‘this person’ is a given.
In the second case, Lee walks in. It’s a novel situation. ‘this person’ is new, not part of the topic.
That’s the theory of the Japanese, anyway, apparently.
Don’t you see some parallels between this situation and the use in English of the in/definite articles.
‘the’ for things which are given, like ‘wa’ for topics in Japanese, with Lee’s presence a given. And ‘a’ for new things, like ‘ga’ for new things, when Lee walks in.
Telling people use ‘the’ for when there’s only one thing doesn’t really help them if they don’t have articles in their first language.
I read in an American ESL textbook:
“The store”? There’s only one store?
There are many stores. A doesn’t know which store B is talking about. B is not talking about any particular store. B means they’ve seen them in stores. For me, at least.
‘the beach’ was mentioned. But it doesn’t mean any particular beach. It means ‘a’ beach. For me, anyway.
What about ‘the hospital’ in AmE and ‘hospital’ in BrE. Do they mean different things in the US and UK?
AmE, BrE article use differences: BrE has ‘the theatre’ as the institution of the theater. At least I read that in Quirk et al.
‘I go to college/I’m studying at the university’ in AmE, but ‘I go to university’ in the UK. ‘school’, not ‘the school’ in both.
A: Let’s go down to the beach B: Which one? (B doesn’t understand/is challenging A?)
‘Let’s go to the mountains for our next vacation’
I don’t think reference adequately explains use of the definite article. ‘the’.
Taking up the discussion about default reference with ‘the beach’ and ‘the mountains’, what about 2 people from a US mid-Western state who have never seen the sea (not A sea).
A: I’ve never seen the sea. B: I saw the Atlantic Ocean when I flew to Europe.
Which sea is the default sea referenced by A: the Atlantic, Pacific, Gulf of Mexico, or Great Lakes?
Maybe any, or maybe the Pacific
I was editing a manuscript about the entrepreneurial university. Not a/the university up the road, which is pushing industrial-academic cooperation but all such universities.
Perhaps it just means all entrepreneurial universities in your country. Or more internationally, all such universities that are part of one’s mindset. Or perhaps it just means the idea of A (not ‘an’ because I am emphasizing ‘a’) entrepreneurial university.
A commenter mentioned ‘going to the ocean’, instead of ‘seeing the sea’.
‘the ocean’ has a default reference for me too, I think, which ‘the sea’ does not necessarily have. j Is ‘the sea’ or ‘the beach’ in ‘Let’s go to the beach’ the same kind of use of ‘the’?
Is this what someone from a mid-Western US state would really say:
“A: I’ve never seen the sea.” How would they say it?
I don’t use ‘the store’ to mean stores in general, but I’ve seen it used that way.
It seems like they might be referring to the ocean closest to them if they say ‘ocean’ rather than ‘sea’.
The large expanse of water, not the Great Lakes, they would be going to if they were going to the ocean/sea.
I think I see in my own use, default reference, subjective autoreference, in ‘the ocean’, but not ‘the sea’.
I think subjective autoreference, default reference is the main use of ‘the’, and when you use it, you are conveying the impression that you expect the listener to get the reference, but is it possible this can be used with deceit on your part? You may know the listener will have no idea of your reference, but you still use ‘the’?
Like above in ‘the university up the road’.
I’m trying to think of an example. What about showing a newcomer around town: ‘I like the bread from that corner store.’ They’ve never been in the store. They don’t know if it sells bread.
Like Dr Lee with me, meeting the Japanese profs, is part of the topic, without Lee saying a word, bread is part of the topic (things the newcomer needs to become familiar with, specifically, where to buy food), without bread having been mentioned.
So ‘the bread’ is part of the topic.
Remember, in the other scenario, I’m talking with the profs about Lee, but Lee is not in the room. Lee comes in and I say, ‘This is Dr Lee,’ but Lee is not part of the topic (actually, ‘this person’ is not marked as part of the topic) even though we are talking about them.
Going back to telling the newcomer, ‘I like the bread from that corner store,’ they have to associate bread and buying bread with things they need to know about as newcomers before I say ‘the bread’, not after.
But, ‘You can buy bread (not the bread) from that corner store.’
I give up.
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