Abstract:ResumenLa definición de variables morfosintácticas suele basarse en la identidad de sus variantes en el nivel semántico descriptivo; no obstante, a menudo existen diferencias en los planos del discurso y la cognición. Así, las formas reflexivas del paradigma de los clíticos son elementos que se añaden al lexema verbal para reforzar la concordancia del sujeto con el verbo y generar con ello ciertos significados. Entre ellas destaca la de tercera persona, se, por su versatilidad contextual y la variedad de usos … Show more
Spanish third-person reflexive clitic se allows for passive and impersonal uses that can sometimes be pragmatically interpreted as directive in spite of their declarative form, e.g. Eso no se hace ‘That is not done’. This paper explores the grammatical, semantic and referential factors that promote such an interpretation, using a corpus of oral and written Peninsular media discourse and adopting a qualitative approach. Deontic readings are shown to be connected with more general uses of reflexive constructions as evidential and/or modal markers. Agent defocusing and imperfective verbal aspect construct an objective viewpoint of discourse whereby the event is detached from particular communicative circumstances. At the same time, contextual elements acting as space builders counter such objectivity by guiding the interpretation of the utterance as primarily concerning the direct participants. The analysis suggests that the inherent meanings of grammatical constructions are at the basis of their pragmatic potential in specific contexts.
The purpose of this study is to analyze the variation of the second-person object clitic te [‘you’] and the clitic se [lit. ‘it’] in advertising discourse from a cognitive viewpoint. The main explanatory notion will be cognitive salience; both clitics, te and se, exhibit this to varying degrees. The second-person te is more salient than the clitic se; therefore, the meanings conveyed by each in media discourse will be notably different. Results indicate that the distribution and usage of the clitics te vs. se constitutes a different strategy of persuasion in advertising discourse. In general terms, te is used when a special deictic stance is needed, such as indexing a second-person as a potential consumer of the product or idea, whereas se tends to appear in utterances that describe the general and objective benefits of the product or idea advertised, denoting a desubjectivizing stance. The sociosituational distribution of this variation according to the target consumers will be analyzed.
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