THE INTERACTION BETWEEN MORPHOLOGY AND PRAGMATICS IN POLISH
THE INTERACTION BETWEEN MORPHOLOGY AND PRAGMATICS IN POLISH

Summary/Abstract: This work reports the findings of a fieldwork conducted in order to investigate the patterns of agreement of hybrid and epicenes nouns in contemporary Polish. In a pragmatic perspective, the informative function reveals its influence on the use of feminine gender. Set phrases denoting titles activate higher percentages of use of feminine gender if they occur in the rhematic, pragmatically marked part of the sentence. The derivation of a feminine noun, marked by the feature [+ woman] with respect to the masculine, can thus be considered a morphological means used to emphasize the relevance of a sentence element. When the focus is the whole sentence the choice of the masculine contributes to highlighting its global meaning. Focusing strategies take part also in the agreement of epicenes, with formal agreement marked with respect to semantic agreement.

• Details
• Contents