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Topic Continuity in Discourse
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<p><i>Topic Continuity in Discourse</i>—subtitled <i>A Quantitative Cross Language Study</i>—is a book edited by <a href="/facts/Talmy_Giv%25C3%25B3n/1Yt9CE3x">Talmy Givón</a>, with contributions by himself and other experts in various languages. It is part of the series <a href="/facts/Typological_Studies_in_Language/AXLc0LWh">Typological Studies in Language</a> (a supplement series to the <a href="/facts/Academic_journal/SBI7Ue0q">academic journal</a> <i><a href="/facts/Studies_in_Language/VdCLevLJ">Studies in Language</a></i>) and was published by <a href="/facts/John_Benjamins/E9QUN5tn">John Benjamins</a> in 1983. </p><p>The book presents a cross-linguistic hierarchy of <a href="/facts/Natural_language/B4gLS7Kd">natural language</a> "<a href="/facts/Syntax/6PxSV98p">syntactic</a> coding of <a href="/facts/Topic%25E2%2580%2593comment/vow08bl6">topic</a> accessibility" (including, for example, discourse participant prominence). Givón describes the aim of the research, documented in the book, as "the rather ambitious goal ... to define, in a preliminary but cross-linguistically stable fashion, the basic principles of <i>iconicity</i> underlying the syntactic coding of the topic identification domain." </p><p>Givón's starting point was his previously published (1978, 1979, 1981 and 1982) one-dimensional scale. As listed by him, from "most continuous/accessible topic" to "most discontinuous/inaccessible topic" this was as follows: </p> <ul><li>zero <a href="/facts/Anaphora_(linguistics)/gm1WHVBF">anaphora</a></li> <li>unstressed-<a href="/facts/Bound_variable_pronoun/nzQkfGtb">bound pronouns</a> and grammatical agreement</li> <li>stressed-independent pronouns</li> <li>right-dislocated <a href="/facts/Definiteness/0CAjpK8m">definite</a> <a href="/facts/Noun_phrase/mmz3tJt9">noun phrases</a> (NP)</li> <li>neutral-ordered NPs</li> <li>left-dislocated NPs</li> <li>Y-moved NPs (or "contrastive topicalization")</li> <li><a href="/facts/Cleft_sentence/QVvzUPqn">cleft</a> and focus constructions</li> <li><a href="/facts/Reference/pLmVxBjJ">referential</a> indefinite NPs</li></ul> <p>The language specific studies provided in the book are on <a href="/facts/Japanese_language/EEv485a5">Japanese</a>, <a href="/facts/Amharic/zVHLsajh">Amharic</a>, <a href="/facts/Ute_language/BrBY5oIr">Ute</a>, <a href="/facts/Biblical_Hebrew/yCJ3bh30">Biblical Hebrew</a>, <a href="/facts/Spanish_language_in_the_Americas/zg4wWN9K">Latin-American Spanish</a>, written English, spoken English, <a href="/facts/Hausa_language/hQF3HW8r">Hausa</a> and <a href="/facts/Chamorro_language/VMD9JwSQ">Chamorro</a>. The data from these languages were analysed according to a common <a href="/facts/Methodology/dk5X9Hxx">methodology</a>, explained by Givón in the introduction to the book, and agreed upon by all the other contributors. The methodology involved quantitative measurements, which although <a href="/facts/Statistics/DNPsKGYU">statistical</a>, were designed to be <a href="/facts/Experiment/esltM54f">repeatable</a> and applicable to any language. </p>