Object of donation in Tamil epigraphic texts (10th -11th centuries): Exploring the interaction between syntax and information structure
Résumé
This study will focus on the grammatical treatment of 'the object of donation' in the Tamil inscriptions. In our corpus, the object of donation, unmarked for accusative, is placed-on the right of the predicate-in the focal position. This right dislocation [VO], deviating from the basic [OV] position, triggers also the phenomenon of quantifier floating, where the quantifier is placed on the right side of the noun head. The dislocation of 'object of donation' is clearly the result of a discourse strategy. 'The object of donation' is semantically proned to fill the grammatical function of complement or 'direct object' of a verb meaning 'to give'-or something similar-inside the VP constituent of a sentence. However, pragmatically, the object of donation is a crucial referential entity in this type of texts and it will appear that the information structure principles allow a variety of constructions to put it in a more prominent structural position. We need a three level analysis-syntactic, semantic and pragmatic-to account for this dislocation.
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