TY  - JOUR
A1  - Skopeteas, Stavros
A1  - Verhoeven, Elisabeth
T1  - The interaction between topicalization and structural constraints : evidence from Yucatec Maya
N2  - This article deals with the syntactic and pragmatic properties of left dislocated constituents in Yucatec Maya. It has been argued that these constituents are topics, which implies that a particular structural configuration, namely left dislocation displays a 1:1 correspondence to a particular discourse function. We present evidence that the discourse properties of left dislocation are not uniform: only a subset of the left dislocated constituents qualify as topics in the strict sense, while other instances of left dislocation are better explained if we assume a structural constraint that bans the postverbal occurrence of subject constituents in a particular syntactic configuration. Our empirical findings show that though the occurrence of word order possibilities in discourse is not random, it is not necessarily determined by a unique licensing condition.
Y1  - 2009
UR  - https://publishup.uni-potsdam.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/31932
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/tlir
SN  - 0167-6318
ER  -