The Function of Inversion

• Published in: The Discourse Function of Inversion in English pp. 77 - 104
• Main Author: Birner, Betty J.
• Format: Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: United Kingdom Routledge 1996; Taylor & Francis Group
• Edition: 1
• Subjects: LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS; Vincent Van Gogh; Unused Element; BRU; Postposed Subject; Familiar Information; Popped Corn; Nice Woman; Popcorn; Postposed Position; Chuck Wagon; SVO; Communicative Dynamism; Initial Constituent; Kennel Club; Preposed Constituent; Inversion's Function; SVO Sentence; Current Pragmatic Theory; Final Constituent; Bed's Foot; Chicago Tribune; Preposed Element; David's Bed; Gregory Ward
• ISBN: 9781138967755; 1138967750; 0815325568; 9780815325567
• DOI: 10.4324/9780203820964-4

In this chapter, I present a unified account of the discourse function of inversion, based on my study of 1778 naturally-occurring tokens. After a review of the theoretical background from which the current approach derives, I argue that inversion serves an information-packaging function (Chafe 1976), linking relatively unfamiliar information to the prior context via the clause-initial placement of information which is relatively familiar (typically evoked or inferrable) in the current discourse. Drawing on work by Prince (1992), who distinguishes between the (assumed) familiarity of an element to the hearer and the familiarity of the element within the discourse, I show that it is discourse-familiarity that is relevant for inversion. I then use this result to argue for the status of inferrable information as discourse-old. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the implications of this study for current pragmatic theory.