Über Argumentstruktur, Fokussierung und modale Satzadverbien im Tschechischen und Russischen

Abstract

Prototypical features of modal sentence adverbial constructions are analyzed and compared with the prototypical features of the so-called rhematizers such as only (focalizers or focus sensitive particles, cf. Hajicova 1995 ; Koktova 1986, 1987 ; McCawley 1996 ; Boguslavskij 1985) in Czech and Russian sentences. The analysis is based on the assumption that the syntactic position of the surface word order of arguments and adjuncts reflects (also in its relation to sentence prosody) the categorical representation of the cognitive meaning of the sentence. In secondary cases, an adverbial of mood can also occur in the topic position of the sentence (i.e. in the leftmost position) without necessarily ascribing the sentence an existential meaning as proposed for locative sentences by Babby (1980, 101). Following Hajicova (1995), it seems to be necessary to distinguish between the focus of a rhematizer, the focus position of the adjuncts (adverbials) and the focus of the arguments. In addition, several Czech and Russian modal sentence adverbials and focalizers are discussed which exhibit interesting syntactic relations. The analysis is based on the dichotomy of topic and focus articulation as developed in the tradition of Prague School (Firbas 1992 ; Hajicova, Partee, Sgall, in prep.), but it entails also some considerations on informational structure of adjuncts and arguments (Grimshaw 1991) as described in the Minimalist program (Chomsky 1995 ; Kayne 1995 ; Kosta 1997). Also the notions of pragmatic ordering principle, of contextual boundness (Krifka 1995), of salience and the hierarchy of communicative dynamism offer convenient tools for a sufficiently detailed description of the sentence structure of Czech and Russian modal sentence adverbials