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Causalclauses:Across­linguisticinvestigationoftheirstructure,meaning,anduse

HolgerDiesselandKatjaHetterle

Abstract

In this paperwe investigate the form and function of causal adverbial clauses,whichhaveneverbeensystematicallystudiedfromacross‐linguisticpointofview.Usingdatafrom60 languages, it isshownthatcausalclausestendtobemore independentof theassociatedmain clause than other semantic types of adverbial clauses. In contrast totemporal and conditional clauses, causal clauses predominantly follow the (main)clause, include the same non‐reduced verb forms as independent sentences, and areoften intonationallyseparated fromthesemantically relatedclause.Weargue that theparticularstructuralpropertiesofcausalclausesaremotivatedbytheircommunicativefunction in speaker‐hearer interactions.Drawingon conversationaldata fromEnglish,German,Mandarin Chinese and Japanese, we show that causal clauses are commonlyusedtosupportapreviousstatementthathasbeenchallengedbythehearer.Inthisuse,causal adverbial clauses function as independent assertions that are only looselycombinedwiththeassociatedmainclause.

Keywords: adverbial clause, causal clause, coordination‐subordination continuum,clauseorder,grammarandlanguageuse,grammaticalization,languageacquisition

1 Introduction

The cause‐effect relationship is one of the most fundamental concepts of the humanmindthathasbeenstudiedextensivelyinvarioussubfieldsofcognitivescience(cf.Sowa2000; Meyer 2000). Linguistically, causal relationships are commonly expressed bycomplexsentencesconsistingofamainandasubordinateclause,but theycanalsobeexpressed by two coordinate sentences. In this paper, we examine the structure,meaning, and use of causal clauses from a cross‐linguistic point of view. Our analysisconcentrates on causal adverbial clauses, but since the distinction between adverbialsubordinationandsententialcoordinationisfluid,wewillalsolookatcausalclausesatthe borderline between subordination and coordination. In fact, the subordination‐coordinationcontinuumplaysan importantrole inourstudy. It is thecentralclaimofthis paper that causal adverbial clauses are structurally more independent of theassociated main clause than other semantic types of adverbial clauses and often arereminiscentofcoordinatesentences.

In the typological literature, causal adverbial clauseshavebeen studied togetherwithothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses,suchasconditionalandtemporalclauses(cf.ThompsonandLongacre1985;Couper‐KuhlenandKortmann2000),butincontrasttotheseothertypes,causalclauseshaveneverbeensystematicallyinvestigatedfromacross‐linguisticpointofview.Thecurrentstudyseekstofillthisgap.Itisthefirstcross‐

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linguistic investigation that systematically examines the form and function of causalclausesfromatypologicalpointofview(cf.Hetterle2007).

Drawingondatafromawiderangeoflanguages,thepaperarguesthatadverbialclausesconstituteafamilyofrelatedconstructionsthatvaryastothedegreetowhichthey are integrated into a complex sentence. Some adverbial clauses are only looselyadjoined to a neighboring clause, resembling a coordinate sentence, whereas otheradverbial clauses are tightly integrated into the main clause (cf. Diessel 2001, 2004:chap 3). The degree of formal integration is determined by several features: themorphosyntactic properties of the verb and its arguments in the adverbial clause (cf.Cristofaro2003),thepositioningoftheadverbialclauserelativetothemainclause(cf.Diessel2001,2005),andthe intonational linkbetweenmainandadverbialclauses(cf.Chafe 1984; Ford 1993). The paper shows that causal clauses tend to be less tightlyintegrated into complex sentences than other semantic types of adverbial clauses. Incontrast to temporalandconditionalclauses,causalclauses typically includethesameverb forms and arguments as ordinary main clauses, are usually placed after thesemanticallyassociatedclause,andarecommonlyexpressedbyaseparatedintonationunit. Taken together these features suggest that causal clauses are only looselycombinedwiththeassociatedmainclause;theyarecommonlyrealizedbyconstructionsthat exhibit the same morphosyntactic properties as main clauses and thus may beanalyzedascoordinatesentencesratherthanadverbialclauses.

The paper argues that the particular structural properties of causal clauses aremotivatedbytheircommunicativefunctioninspeaker‐hearerinteractions.Drawingonconversationaldatafromseveralunrelatedlanguages,itisshownthatcausalclausesarecommonlyused to support aproblematic statement.Moreprecisely, thepaper arguesthatcausalclausesareoftenembeddedinaparticulardiscoursepatterninvolvingthreeverbal actions: (1)a statement that thehearerdoesnotacceptorunderstand, (2) thehearer’s response to this statement indicating disagreement or lack of understanding,and(3)acausalclauseprovidingareasonfortheproblematicstatement(cf.Ford1993).Causalclausesthatareembeddedinthisdiscoursepatternarestructurallyindependentsentencesthatlacktheusualpropertiesofsubordinateclauses,whichtheymayexhibitinothercontexts,notablyinwrittengenres.However,inconversationaldiscoursecausalclausesarecommonlyusedasindependentassertionsthatarestructurallyindependentofthesemanticallyassociatedclause.

2 Database

Cross‐linguistic investigations are often based on a variety sample including severalhundred languages, but we decided to use a probability sample, which tends to besmaller than a variety sample because it is more rigorously designed. A probabilitysampleincludesagroupoflanguagesthatareindependentofeachotherandthereforecan be submitted to statistical analysis (cf. Rijkhoff et al. 1993; Rijkhoff and Bakker1998; Jansenetal.2006).Apureprobabilitysamplewould include languages thatareselected at random from all languages across the world, but since languages aregenetically and geographically related, the selection procedure cannot be entirely atrandom;instead,theresearcherhastocontrolforgeneticandarealfactorsinordertocompileasampleinwhichthelanguagesareindependentofeachother(cf.Rijkhoffetal.1993;Bakkertoappear).

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In our study, we used a stratified probability sample controlled for genetic andarealdispersion.The sample includes60 languages selected from60differentgenera,i.e.linguisticgroupsthatroughlycorrespondtothesubfamiliesofIndo‐European(Dryer1992),distributedacross six largeareas:Eurasia,Africa, SouthEastAsiaandOceania,AustraliaandNewGuinea,NorthAmerica,andSouthAmerica(Dryer1989,1992).Thus,the languages in our sample are genetically and geographically unrelated (or onlydistantlyrelated).Acompletelistofthelanguagesweexaminedisgivenintheappendix.

Inwhatfollows,weinvestigatethecross‐linguisticpropertiesofcausalclausesincomparisontoothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses.Specifically,wecomparecausalclausestotemporalandconditionalclauses,whichareoftenexpressedbysimilartypesofconstructionsthatarehistoricallyrelated(cf.MatthiessenandThompson1985;Givón1990, 2006).However, despite this relationship there are some important differencesbetweenthem,whicharethefocusofthecurrentstudy.

3 Theformandfunctionofcausalclausesincross­linguisticperspective

3.1 Themorphosyntacticpropertiesofcausalclauses

Tobeginwith,adverbialclausescanbeexpressedbyawiderangeofconstructionsthatdiffer in terms of the verb forms and arguments they include. In a recent study,Cristofaro(2003)arguedthatsubordinateclausescanbedividedintotwobasictypes:balancedandderankedclauses(cf.Stassen1985).Balancedsubordinateclausesincludethesameverbformsandargumentsasmainclauses,butderankedsubordinateclausesare different. They include a reduced verb form and do not always require an overtsubject.Forinstance, inEnglishadverbialclausesarecommonlyrealizedbyparticipialconstructionsthatdonotcarrytenseandpersonmarkersandlackanovertsubject.1 (1) Andheencounteredtheproblemofconductingwithonehandwhileholdingthereins

withtheothereighteenmonthsago….

Both the missing subject and the uninflected verb forms are characteristic ofderankedsubordinateclauses.Sincetheinterpretationofaderankedsubordinateclausereliesonsemanticfeaturesofthemainclause,itisreasonabletoassumethataderankedsubordinateclause ismore tightly integrated intoacomplexsentence thanabalancedsubordinate clause, whose semantic interpretation is more independent of theassociated main clause. Note that in English the occurrence of deranked adverbialclauses is most typical of temporal clauses, notably temporal clauses of simultaneity,whereascausalclausesareprimarilyexpressedbybalancedconstructions.However,inotherlanguages,causaladverbialclausesarealsocommonlyderanked.Forinstance,inEvenki (Tungusic, Russia) all adverbial clauses are expressed by converbs (cf.Haspelmath 1995). A converb is a particular non‐finite verb form that indicates thesemanticrelationshiptotheassociatemainclausebyanaffix,asinexample(2),inwhichtwoconverbalclausesaremarkedby thesuffix–kA(n)im indicatinga temporal linkof1 TheEnglishexamplesinthispaperaretakenfromtheInternationalCorpusofEnglish,BritishComponent.

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anterioritybetweentheconverbsandthemainclause.Example(3)showsthatthesametypeofconstructionisusedtorealizeacausaladverbialclause. (2) Evenki(Nedjalkov1997:45) [Asi‐va ga‐kaim] [oron‐mo rege‐keim] tar beje suru‐re‐n. wife‐ACC take‐CONV reindeer‐ACC sit‐CONV that man go.away‐NONFUT‐3SG

‘Havingtakenawifeandhavingsatonareindeerthatmanleft.’

(3) Evenki(Nedjalkov1997:53) [Engesi bi‐mi] nungan homo:ty‐va davdy‐ra‐n. strong be‐CONV he bear‐acc.DEF win‐NONFUT‐3SG

‘Heovercamethebearbecausehewasstrong.’

Interestingly, Cristofaro (2003) showed that causal clauses are less often

expressed by deranked subordinate clauses than others semantic types of adverbialclauses.Examiningavarietysampleof70 languages,shefoundthatcausalclausesarecommonly expressed by balanced constructions whereas other semantic types ofadverbial clauses, notably temporal and purpose clauses, are typically deranked (seealsoCristofaro2005).

Ourdataareconsistentwiththesefindings.FollowingCristofaro,wedistinguishedbetweenderankedandbalancedadverbial clausesbasedon thecriteriasheproposed.Deranked adverbial clauses are expressed by reduced or special verb forms such asinfinitives, participles, converbs, and nominalizations,which lack at least some of theinflectional distinctions of verbs in main clauses (such as tense, aspect, mood, oragreementdistinctions) andoftendonot include anovert subject.Balancedadverbialclauses,incontrast,areexpressedbyfiniteconstructionsincludingthesameverbformsand arguments as independent sentences. Note that we disregarded cases of simpleclausejuxtaposition(i.e.asyndeticparataxis),whichCristofaroincludedinhersampleifjuxtapositionservedasageneralmeansfortheexpressionofanadverbialrelationship.Figure1showsthatinoursamplecausalclausesarelessoftenderankedthantemporaland conditional clauses, which we lumped together in one class (cf. data in theAppendix).

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Ascanbeseen, inmorethanhalfof the languages inoursample(56.7%),causalclauses are exclusively expressed by balanced constructions; only a minority of thelanguagesemploysderankedcausalclauses.Ifwelookatthelattermorecloselywefindthat their occurrence is restricted to languages inwhich temporal and/or conditionalclausesarealsoderanked;there isnotasingle languageintheentiresample inwhichderanking is an exclusive feature of causal clauses. A randomized 2×3 χ2‐analysisrevealed a significant difference between causal clauses and temporal/conditionalclauses (χ2=12.30, p<0.01, B=10.000), supporting our hypothesis that causal clausestendtobemoreindependentofthemainclausethanothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses.2

3.2 Thepositioningofadverbialclauses

Anotherfeaturethatdistinguishescausalclausesfromtemporalandconditionalclausesis their position. In many languages, the positioning of adverbial clauses is ratherflexible.Forinstance,ascanbeseeninexamples(4)and(5),inEnglishadverbialclausescanprecedeorfollowtheassociatedmainclause.

(4) HegotreallypissedoffwhenwewerewatchingBackToTheFutureTwo. (5) Whenshegetsonthatphoneshejustdoesnotgetoff.

2 Sincelanguagesamplingcannotbeentirelyatrandom,Janssenetal.(2006)recommendthattypologicaldatabesubmittedtonon‐parametrictests,whichincontrasttoparametrictestsdonotmakeassumptionsaboutthedistributionofthevariables.Inthisstudy,weusedarandomizedchi‐squaretest,whichpermitslogicalinferencesfromthetestedsample,ratherthantheusualstatisticalinferencesonthepopulation.Janssenetal.arguethatthesetestsareasvalidandinformativeasthestandardstatisticalteststhatarebetterknowninlinguistics.

Figure1:Derankingintemporal,conditional,andcausaladverbialclauses.

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If the adverbial clause follows themain clause, as in example (4), the bi‐clausalstructure can be processed sequentially; that is, speaker and hearer can process oneclauseatatime.Theadverbialclausemaybeplannedandadjoinedtothemainclauseonlyaftertheprocessingofthemainclausehasbeencompleted(cf.Diessel2005,2008).By contrast, adverbial clauses that precede the main clause are only possible if thespeaker plans from the very beginning to produce a bi‐clausal structure inwhich theadverbialclause is followedbyamainclause. Inotherwords,complexsentenceswithinitialadverbialclausesconstituteasingleprocessingunit,whereascomplexsentenceswith final adverbial clauses may be planned and processed as a sequence of twoseparate clauses. The position of the adverbial clause is thus essential to theorganization of a complex sentence. Since final adverbial clauses can be planned andprocessedafterthecompletionofthemainclause, it isreasonabletoassumethattheyarelesstightlyintegratedinacomplexsentencethaninitialadverbialclauses,whicharegenerallyplannedandprocessedtogetherwiththefollowingmainclause.

Interestingly, Diessel (2001) observed that the ordering of main and adverbialclauses varies with the meaning of the adverbial clause. Drawing on data from aconveniencesampleof40languages,hefoundthatconditionalclausestendtoprecedethemainclause, temporalclausesarecommonlyfoundbothbeforeandafterthemainclause,andcausalclausestypicallyoccurattheendofasentence,i.e.aftertheassociatedmainclause.

Ourdataareconsistentwiththese findings.Ascanbeseen inFigure2, temporalandconditionalclausesprecede themainclausemoreoften thancausalclauses. In45percent of the languages in our sample, causal clauses follow themain clause (eitherrigorouslyorasa tendency),whereas temporalandconditionalclausesarecommonlypreposed.A randomized2×3χ2‐analysis revealedahighly significantdifference in thepositioning of causal clauses and temporal/conditional clauses (χ2=31.4914, p<0.001,B=10.000),suggestingthatthepredominantuseinfinalpositionisaparticularpropertyof causal clauses that sets themapart fromother semantic typesof adverbial clauses,supporting our hypothesis that causal clauses are less tightly integrated in complexsentencesthanothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses.

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Note that the occurrence of initial causal clauses is restricted to particularlanguages types. Languages inwhich causal clauses precede themain clause are left‐branching languages, i.e. OV languages, in which all adverbial clauses are commonlypreposed(cf.Diessel2001;Hetterle2007).AscanbeseeninTable1, inVOlanguagesadverbialclausesarecommonlyfoundbothbeforeandaftertheassociatedmainclause.Thereisonelanguage,Wambaya(WestBarkly,Australia),anAustralianlanguagewithextremely flexiblewordorder, inwhichall adverbial clauses typically follow themainclause; but in all other VO languages the positioning of adverbial clauses varies withtheirmeaning:While temporal and conditional clausesoftenprecede themain clause,causalclausesarecommonlypostposed.

Bycontrast, inOV languagescausalclausesarealsocommonlyplacedbefore themain clause.As canbe seen in this table, there are15OV languages in our sample inwhich all adverbial clauses, including causal adverbial clauses, generally precede themain clause (disregarding cases of pragmaticallymotivated extraposition), suggesting

Figure2:Positioningoftemporal,conditional,andcausaladverbialclauses.

Table1:Theorderingofverbandobjectandthepositioningofadverbialclauses.

Initialadverbialclauses

Initialandfinaladverbialclauses

Finaladverbialclauses

Total

VO

OVVO/OV

­

15

1

19

15

9

1

­

­

20

3010

Total 16 43 1 60

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that the occurrence of initial causal clauses ismotivatedby general properties of thislanguage type. Adopting Hawkins’ processing theory of constituency and order(Hawkins 1994, 2004), Diessel (2005) argued that left‐branching languages tend toemployinitialadverbialclausesbecauseinlanguagesofthistypecomplexsentencesareofteneasiertoprocess,andthusmorehighlypreferred,iftheadverbialclauseprecedesthe main clause. Specifically, he claims that OV languages tend to employ initialadverbial clauses if they aremarked by a subordinatingmorpheme at the end of theadverbial clause, as in the following example fromBarasano (Tucanoan, Columbia) inwhich a causal adverbial clause is marked by a subordinating affix attached to theclause‐finalverb. (6) Barasano(JonesandJones1991:159) Yukú yeba‐u ti wãbe kuti‐hare ‘Yeba bãs‐a Tree yeba‐tree 3in name have‐because Yeba human‐p

yã‐a‐ha yua’ yi‐rã‐bã ĩdã. be‐PRES‐3 1 say‐anp‐3p 3p

‘BecausethetreehasthenameYebau,theyrefertothemselvesasYeba’speople.’

Ourdataareconsistentwiththishypothesis.Inall15languagesinwhichadverbialclausesprecedethemainclauseregardlessoftheirmeaning,thesubordinatoroccursatthe end of the adverbial clause; whereas in most other languages, both VO and OV,adverbialclausesaremarkedbyaninitialsubordinator.Inotherwords,theconsistentuse of initial adverbial clauses correlateswith the occurrence of a final subordinator,whichmay favour the order adverbial‐main clause for processing reasons (cf. Diessel2001,2005).

However,theprocessinganalysisdoesnotaccountforallofthedata.Inparticular,it does not explain why in the vast majority of the languages in our sample thepositioningofadverbialclausesvarieswiththeirmeaning.Diessel(2005)suggeststhatthe distributional differences between conditional, temporal, and causal clauses aremotivated by semantic and pragmatic factors that characterize individual types ofadverbial clauses, but his analysis ismainly concernedwith conditional and temporalclauses. In what follows we will take a closer look at the semantic and pragmaticfeatures of causal clauses. Specifically, we will review some discourse studies thatexaminedtheuseofcausalclausesinconversations.Ouranalysisconcentratesonafewselected languages inwhich the conversationaluseof causal clauseshasbeen studiedbased on quantitative corpus data: English, German,Mandarin Chinese, and Japanese.The review of the conversational literature suggests that the particular structuralpropertiesofcausalclausesaremotivatedbytheiroccurrenceinaparticulardiscoursepatterninwhichcausalclausesfunctiontosupportapreviousstatementthathasbeenquestionedbythehearer.

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4 Theformandfunctionofcausalclausesinconversationaldiscourse

4.1 CausalclausesinEnglishconversations

Themost frequent causal conjunction in English isbecause. Apart frombecause, sinceandascanfunctionascausalsubordinateconjunctions,butunlikebecause,sinceandasarealsousedintemporaladverbialclauses.Incontrasttocertainothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses,notablytemporalandpurposeclauses,causaladverbialclausesarepredominantlyexpressedbybalancedadverbialclauses.

Moreover, causal clauses show a strong tendency to follow the associatedmainclauses(cf.Altenberg1984;Schleppegrell1991;Ford1993,1994;Couper‐Kuhlen1996;Diessel1996,2005;Hetterle2007).Inparticularinspokendiscourse,causalclausesarealmostalwayspost‐posed.Usingdatafromconversationaldiscourse,Ford(1993)foundthat while conditional and temporal clauses often precede the main clause, causalclausesarealwaysplacedattheendofthesentence.AscanbeseeninTable2,therewasnot a single causal clause in Ford’s entire database that occurred in front of theassociatedmainclause.

SimilarresultsarereportedinDiessel(2005),whoinvestigatedthepositioningoffiniteadverbialclauses inbothspokenandwrittengenres.LikeFord,he foundthat inEnglish conversations causal clauses almost always follow the main clause; butinterestingly inwrittendiscourse, causal clausesarealsocommonlyplacedbefore themainclause.Ascanbeseen inTable3, initialcausalclausesareespecially frequent inacademic writing, in which they precede the main clause almost as frequently astemporalclauses.Note,however,thatinitialcausalclausesarecommonlyintroducedbysinceoras.InDiessel’sdata,50percentoftheinitialcausalclausesinacademicwritingare marked by since or as, whereas final causal clauses are mostly introduced bybecause.

Table2:PositioningofEnglishadverbialclauses(basedonFord1993:24).

Conditional Temporal Causal Total

InitialFinal

26(59.1%)

18(40.9%)

21(34.4%)

40(65.6%)

0(0%)

75(100%)

47(26.1%)133(73.9%)

Total 44 61 75 180

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Ifwelookattheuseoffinalclausalclausesinconversations,wefindthattheyareoften intonationally separated from the preceding main clause. In Ford’s data, 53percent of all causal clauses follow a main clause with closing intonation (see alsoCouper‐Kuhlen1996),whereas temporalandconditional clausesareusuallybound totheprecedingclause:Only18percentofthefinaltemporalclausesand33percentofthefinalconditionalclausesareintonationallyseparatedfromthemainclauseinherdata.

Whatismore,Fordnoticedthatfinalcausalclausesareoftenpromptedbyahearerresponse indicating disagreement or lack of understanding. Consider for instance thefollowingexamplefromFord’sdatabase,inwhichthespeakeraddsabecause‐clausetohispreviousstatementafterthehearerexpressedsurprise(cf.Ford1993:115). (7) A: Didyougetye:r/…yourfirstpaycheckfromit? A: …Atleast? B: No,Iwon’tgetthatforacoupleofweeksyet. A: Oh,…w’l/ B: Causeittakesalongtime. A: Atleastit’sinthebank. B: Yeahitwillbe.

Inexample(7),theoccurrenceofthebecause‐clauseisindirectlypromptedbyaninterjection(i.e.oh,forthline),butthehearermayalsodirectlyaskforanexplanation,asinexample(8),inwhichthebecause‐clauseprovidesananswertoacausalwhy‐question(examplefromInternationalCorpusofEnglish). (8) A: WellImeanpartofthereasonIameatingwillbethatI/wedon’thaveto haveapicnic. B: Yeah. B: Why? A:Becauseyouhategettinganythinglikethatprepared.

What these examples demonstrate is that causal clauses are commonly used “in

responsetointeractionaltrouble”(Ford1993:135).Theyserveasindependentspeechactsthatareonlylooselyadjoinedtotheassociatedmainclause,suggestingthatcausalclauses are less tightly combinedwith the (main) clause thanother semantic typesofadverbial clauses. In fact, a number of studies have argued that final because‐clauses

Table3:Proportionofinitialadverbialclausesindifferentgenres(basedonDiessel2005:454).

Conditional Temporal Causal

Conversation

Fiction

Academicwriting

72.9%

67.0%

72.2%

41.5%

34.1%

34.2%

1.1%

10.2%

27.1%

Mean 70.7% 36.6% 12.8

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functionascoordinatesentencesratherthanadverbialclauses(cf.Schleppegrell1991;Ford1993,1994).

Theparticularfunctionofcausalclausesisreflectedinthefactthatinfinalpositionbecause‐clauses are compatiblewith syntactic structures that areusually restricted toordinarymainclauses.AsLakoff(1984)pointedout,incontrasttoconditionalif‐clauses,finalbecause‐clausesmayoccurwithatagquestion(cf.9a‐b),locativeinversion(cf.10a‐b),orarhetoricalquestion(cf.11a‐b)(examplesfromLakoff1984:474;seealsoGreen1976). (9) a. Iguessweshouldcalloffthepicnicbecauseit’sraining,isn’tit? b. *Iguessweshouldcalloffthepicnicifit’sraining,isn’tit?

(10) a. I’mleavingbecauseherecomesmybus. b. *I’mleavingifherecomesthebus.

(11) a. TheKnicksaregoingtowin,becausewhoonearthcanstopBernard? b. *TheKnicksaregoingtowin,ifwhoonearthcanstopBernard?

Notethatthesephenomenaarenotpermissibleifthebecause‐clauseprecedesthemainclause (cf.12a‐b), suggesting that initialand final causal clausesare twodistinctconstructions.

(12) a. *Becauseitisraining,isn’tit,Iguessweshouldcalloffthepicnic. b. *Becauseherecomesthesun,I’mleaving. c. *BecausewhoonearthcanstopBernard,theKnicksaregoingtowin.

As Chafe (1984), Givón (1990), and others have argued, initial adverbial clauses

serveparticulardiscoursepragmaticfunctions.Theyprovideathematicframeworkthathelps the hearer to interpret the subsequent main clause. This explains why thesyntacticstructures in (9) to (11)arenotcompatiblewithcausalclauses thatprecedethe main clause. Since initial adverbial clauses are used for discourse‐organizingfunctions, they cannot occur with main clause phenomena such as tag questions orrhetorical questions that are immediately tied to the illocutionary force; this is onlypossibleinafinaladverbialclausefunctioningasanindependentassertion.

4.2 CausalclausesinGermanconversations

LikecausalclausesinEnglish,causalclausesinGermantendtobemoreindependentofthemainclausethanothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses.ThemostfrequentcausalsubordinateconjunctioninGermanisweil. Inadditiontoweil,dacanintroducecausaladverbialclauses;butunlikeweil,daislargelyrestrictedtoformalregisters.

Examiningdatafromvariousspokenandwrittengenres,Diessel(1996)foundthatinGermancausalclausestypicallyfollowthemainclause.AscanbeseeninTable4,76.6percent of all causal clauses occur after the main clause in Diessel’s data, whereas

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conditional clauses are commonly preposed and temporal clauses are about equallyfrequentininitialandfinalposition(χ2=77.1,df=2,p<0.001).

The vast majority of the initial causal clauses occur in written genres and aremarkedbyda,suggestingthattheoccurrenceofinitialcausalclausesisaparticulartraitofformalregisters.Infreeconversations,causalclausesareusuallyintroducedbyweil,whichpredominantlyoccurs in final adverbial clauses. InDiessel’sdata,79percentofthe da‐clauses precede the main clause, whereas 92 percent of theweil‐clauses arepostposed.

Like English because‐clauses, German weil‐clauses are commonly used asindependent (coordinate) sentences if they follow themain clause. One indication forthis is that weil‐clauses are often used with main clause word order. In standardGerman,weil‐clausesincludethefiniteverbinfinalpositionlikeallothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses;butincolloquialGermanweilisoftenusedwithmainclausewordorder,i.e.withthefiniteverbinsecondposition(cf.13fromGünther1996:42). (13) Der hat sicher wieder ge‐soff‐en; weil … 3SG.MASC.NOM have.AUX.3SG.PST probably again PTCP‐drink.PST‐PTCP because

sie läuf‐t total deprimiert durch die Gegend. 3SG.FEM.NOM run.PRES‐3SG totally depressed through DET.FEM.SG.ACC area

‘Heisprobablydrunkagain,becausesheisrunningaroundtotallydepressed.’

The occurrence of main clause word order in weil‐clauses has been discussed

extensivelyboth in themedia and in linguistics (cf.Keller1993;Günther1996;Pasch1997; Gohl and Günther 1999; Uhmann 1998). In the media, this phenomenon iscommonly characterized as language decay, but linguists agree that the use of mainclause word order inweil‐clauses is motivated by the communicative function. LikeEnglish because, German weil can introduce an independent assertion supporting aprevious statement that the hearer may not understand or may not find convincing.Considerforinstancethedialogueinexample(14),inwhichtheweil‐clausesupportsastatement that the hearer would not be able to understand without an explanation(example14fromUhmann1998:97).

(14) A: Und ich äh hoff‐e auch, dass ich Herr‐n Mackermann and 1SG hm hope.PRES‐1SG PART COMP 1SG Mr.‐ACC Mackermann

Table4:PositioningofGermanadverbialclauses(basedonDiessel1996:72).

Conditional Temporal Causal Total

InitialFinal

151(69.9%)

65(30.1%)

82(49.1%)

85(50.9%)

33(23.4%)

108(76.6%)

266234

Total 216 167 141 500

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davon überzeug‐en kann. of.that convince‐INF can.AUX.1SG.PRES

B: Ja da/da möcht‐Ø ich also kein‐e

Well there want.AUX.PRES‐1SG 1SG.NOM PART no‐SG.FEM.ACC

Prognose wag‐en, weil der Herr‐Ø prediction.ACC dare‐INF because DET.SG.MASC.NOM Mr.‐NOM

Mackermann ist ähm na… sagen wir mal Mackermann be.3SG.PRES hm ITJ say.1PL.PRES 1PL.NOM PART

Kein bequemer Partner. no.MASC.SG.ACC easy.MASC.SG.ACC partner.ACC

A: ‘IjusthopethatIcanconvinceMr.Mackermannofthat.’ B: ‘Well,Idon’tdaretomakeaprediction,becauseMr.Mackermanisnota/hm let’ssay,notaneasypartner.’

Note that the weil‐clause is intonationally separated from the semantically

associated clause and that it includes an interjection (i.e. na) and a metalinguisticformula(i.e.sagenwirmal‘let’ssay’),whicharecharacteristicofmainclauses.Theweil‐clause functions as an assertion and is structurally independent of the semanticallyassociated clause. Another indication that this construction hasmain clause status isthatitallowsforwordorderpermutationsthatarenotpermissibleinadverbialclauses(cf.Uhmann1998).Forinstance,ascanbeseeninexample(15),aweil‐clausewithmainclause word order can occur with a topicalized adverb at the beginning of theweil‐clause,whichisunacceptableifthefiniteverboccursattheendoftheclause(example15fromUhmann1998:111).

(15) Ich frag‐Ø dich dann nochmal; weil nachher 1SG‐NOM ask‐1SG.PRES 2SG.ACC then again because later

treff‐Ø ich mich mit dem Köhlersen. meet.pres‐1sg 1sg.nom refl.1sg.acc with det.sg.masc.dat Köhlersen

‘I’llaskyouagain,becauselaterI’llmeetKöhlersen.’

Finally,whileordinaryadverbialclausescanprecedethemainclause,weil‐clauseswithmainclausewordordercannotbefronted.Ascanbeseenin(16a‐b),aweil‐clausewithmain clauseword order is not acceptable before the (main) clause, because theassertive function of the weil‐clause is incompatible with the discourse‐organizingfunctionofapreposedadverbialclause(seeabove).

(16) a. Ichmachedasnicht,weildazuhabeicheinfachkeineLust.

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’Idon’tdothat,becauseIjustdon’tfeellikeit.’

b. *WeildazuhabeicheinfachkeineLust,macheichdasnicht.

4.3 CausalclausesinChineseconversations

SinceEnglishandGermanaregeneticallyandgeographicallyrelated,onemightassumethat they inherited the paratactic use of causal clauses from their common ancestorlanguageorthroughlanguagecontact.However,inarecentstudyWang(2006)showedthat causal clauses inMandarin Chinese exhibit the samemain clause phenomena inconversations as causal clauses in English andGerman, suggesting that the paratacticuseof causal clauses is not a particular trait ofGermanic orEuropean languages (seealsoBiq1995;Tsai1996).

Using data from both spoken and written discourse, Wang found that causalclauses introduced by yinwei ‘because’ tend to follow the main clause, whereasconditional and temporal clauses are commonly preposed. The distributional contrastbetweencausal,conditionalandtemporalclauses isespeciallystriking inspokendata,notably in conversations.As canbe seen inTable5, inWang’s conversationaldata74percentofallcausalclausesoccurinfinalposition,i.e.afterthemainclause,whereas87percentoftheconditionalclausesand91percentofthetemporalclausesarepreposed(χ2=177.43,df=2,p<0.001).

Interestingly, themajorityof thecausalclauses inWang’sdataare intonationallyunbound: 62percent of the finalyinwei‐clauses are independent intonationunits thatfollow amain clausewith closing intonation, as in example (17), inwhich the causalclauseoccursafterashortpause(filledwiththehearer’sbackchannelresponsetotheprevioussentence)(example17fromWang2006:71‐72). (17) A: …Ta yi tian shui duojiu? …3SG one day sleep how.long

B: …Qishi shui/ ..ta dagai ye keyi shui nage/ …actually sleep ..3SG probably also can sleep that

..qishi wo bushi hen queding ..ta meitian ..actually 1SG NEG very sure ..3SG everyday

wanshangjidian shui. night what.time sleep.

Table5:PositioningofMandarinadverbialclausesinconversations(basedonWang2006:54).

Conditional Temporal Causal Total

Initial

Final

94(87.0%)

14(13.0%)

110(90.9%)

11(9.1%)

53(26.1%)

150(73.9%)

257(59.5%)

175(60.5%)

Total 108 121 203 432

15

A: ..Mm. ..Mm.

B: ..Yinwei..wo doushi xian shui. ..Because 1SG alwaysearly sleep

A: ‘…Howmuchdoesshesleep?’ B: ‘…Actuallysleeping/..shecanprobablysleepfor/ ..Actually,I’mnotsurehowmuchshesleepseverynight.’ A: ‘..Mm.’ B: ‘..Because..Ialwaysgotobedfirst.’

Inthisexample,theyinwei‐clauseservesasanindependentspeechactsupporting

the speaker’s previous assertion. Wang characterizes causal clauses of this type ascoordinate sentences that are structurally independent of the semantically associatedclause. Thus, like causal clauses in English and German, causal clauses in MandarinChineseareoftenusedasindependentassertionsthatspeakersusetojustifyorsupporta previous statement. Note that in written discourse, causal yinwei‐clauses are moresimilartoothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses:56.5percentofallcausalclausesinWang’s written data precede the main clause providing a thematic ground for theinterpretationof subsequent clause(s) (Wang2006:56).Thus,while causal clauses inChineseconversationsarecommonlyusedas independentspeechacts, inwritingtheybehave more like ordinary adverbial clauses functioning to organize the informationflowintheongoingdiscourse.

4.4 CausalclausesinJapaneseconversations

LetusfinallyturntoJapanese,aleft‐branchinglanguagewithrelativelyrigidwordorderin which dependent categories generally precede the head (cf. Kuno 1978). Sinceadverbial clauses are dependent categories, they are usually placed before the mainclause in Japanese (ibid.). This raises the interesting question how causal clauses arerealizedinJapaneseconversations.DotheyfollowthesamediscoursepatternascausaladverbialclausesinEnglish,German,andMandarinChineseoristheconversationaluseofcausalclausesdifferentinJapanese?

This question has been addressed in a study by Ford and Mori (1994) thatcompared theconversationaluseof causal clauses inEnglishand Japanese.Likeothersemantictypesofadverbialclauses,causalclausesaremarkedbyaconnectiveparticleinJapanese,kara‘because’,whichoccursattheendoftheadverbialclause(cf.example18fromFordandMori1994:40).

(18) Peepaa kaite nai kara watashi wa damenan desu yo. paper write NEG because 1SG TOP not.good CO PART ‘BecauseIhaven’twrittenanypaper,Ihavelittlechance.’

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Inthe literature, it iscommonlyassumedthatthecanonicalpositionofadverbialclausesinJapaneseisbeforethemainclause,butFordandMorifoundthatthisdoesnothold true for causal clauses in conversations. In their data, kara‐clauses are alsocommonly placed after themain clause. As can be seen in Table 6, 47 percent of thecausal clauses in Ford andMori’s data are extraposed to the position after themainclause. This is in stark contrast to conditional and temporal clauses, which usuallyprecedethemainclause(χ2=59,90,df=2,p<0.001).

What ismore, thevastmajorityof the finalkara‐clausesdonotoccurunder thesame intonation contour as the preceding main clause. In Ford and Mori’s data, 93percent of the final kara‐clauses are independent intonation units that are separatedfromthepreceding(main)clause.Notethatconditionalandtemporalclausesaremoreoftenboundtothemainclause:59percentofthefinalconditionalandtemporalclausesoccur under the same intonation contour as the precedingmain clause (cf. Ford andMori1994:41).

Theparticularstructuralpropertiesofkara‐clausesreflect theirparticularuse inconversations. As Ford and Mori (1994) showed, like causal clauses in English (andGerman and Mandarin Chinese), causal clauses in Japanese are commonly used tosupport a statement that the hearer does not accept or understand. Consider forinstanceexample(19),inwhichspeakerBproducesakara‐clauseinordertoexplainhispreviousstatement,whichspeakerAisunlikelytoacceptasananswertoherquestion(cf.19fromFordandMori1994:43‐44).

(19) A: Amerika josei wa ja ikaga doo desu ka? America woman TOP then how how COP Q

B: Nakanaka hitokoto de iemasen nee. not.easily one.word by cant.say PART

B: Ano boku no un honto iroNna hito iru kara. well 1SG GEN yeah really various.kind people exist because

A: ‘WhatdoyouthinkofAmericanwomenthen?’ B: ‘Ican’tsaysoeasily.’ B: ‘Well,my/yeahbecausereallytherearevariouskindsofpeople.’

Example (20) is similar in this regard. In the discourse preceding this sentencespeakerAarguedthatsheexpectsherstudentstoexpresstheirownopinioninanessayexam;speakerBrepliedthatthisdependsonthekindofquestion.However,speakerA

Table6:CausalclausesinJapaneseconversations(basedonFordandMori1994:41).

Conditional/Temporal Causal Total

InitialFinal

178(91%)

17(9%)

61(53%)

54(47%)

239(77.1%)71(23.9%)

Total 195 115 310

17

disagrees and supports her view by the kara‐clause in (20) (example from Ford andMori1994:46). (20) Maa mondai nimoyoru daroo kedo, boku wa docchi ka well question onalsodepend may although 1SG TOP which Q

tte iu to originaritii o motomeru hoo da kara. QUOT say if originality ACC desire type COP because

‘Well,eventhoughitmaydependonthequestion,(Istilldisagree)becauseI’mthekindofpersonwhoprefersoriginality.’

Interestingly,likecausaladverbialclausesinEnglishandGerman,causaladverbialclausesinJapanesecanoccurwithmainclausephenomenathatarenotpermissibleinother semantic types of adverbial clauses.AsHara (2008:229-230) pointedout,kara‐clausesmay include thecontrastive marker wa and the evidential morpheme sooda/soona, which may not occur in temporal and conditional adverbial clauses.

In addition to kara, Japanese has another causal conjunction, datte, that iscommonly translated into English by ‘because’. However, datte is not a subordinateconjunction;itoccursatthebeginningofaclausethatgenerallyfollowsthesemanticallyassociatedsentence.Incontrasttokara‐clauses,datte‐clausescannotbepreposed(cf.21fromFordandMori1994:44). (21) Kimete nai yo. Datte kaanegiimeron nante itsutsu da decide NEG PART because CarnegieMellon five COP

tte iu shi. PART say

‘Ihaven’tdecided.BecauseCarnegieMellonforinstancerequiresfive(references).’

According toFordandMori,datte occurs in the samediscourse context askara;both are commonly used in situations in which speaker and hearer disagree about aprevious statement or action. The two conjunctions differ in thatdatte expresses thedisagreement more forcefully than kara; but this is just a minor aspect of their use.Important is that both types of causal clauses areused in the samediscoursepatternthat we observed in the use of causal clauses in other languages. Like speakers ofEnglish,German,andMandarinChinese,Japanesespeakersmakecommonuseofcausalclauses as independent assertions; both datte‐clauses and postposed kara‐clausesfunctiontosupportacontroversialstatement(oraction)thathasbeenchallengedbythehearer.

4.5 Otherlanguages

Concludingthissection,wewilllookatthecausalclausesinafewotherleft‐branchinglanguages in our sample. We suspect that in left‐branching languages with initialadverbial clauses right‐extraposition is a common strategy to use causal clauses asindependent assertions, but apart from the Japanese data reviewed in the previoussection we do not have any evidence to support this view. However, we do have

18

evidencethatcausalclausesareoftenrealizedbycoordinatesentencesthatsupplementtheuseofadverbialclauses in left‐branching languages, likedatte‐clauses in Japanese.For instance, inSantali (Munda, India)adverbial clausesare realizedbyconverbs thatgenerallyprecedethemainclause(cf.example22);butcausalclausesaredifferent.Ascan be seen in (23), causal clauses are expressed by finite sentences that generallyfollow the associated clause. Like Japanese datte‐clauses, these constructions areindependent intonationunitsthataremarkedbyaconjunctionatthebeginningofthecausalclause. (22) Santali(Neukom2001:185)

Oṛak’‐re sɛn‐kate uni haṛam‐dᴐ hᴐpᴐn‐tɛt‘ koṛa‐e house‐LOC go‐CONV that old.man‐TOP son‐3POSS boys‐3SG.SBJ

met‐a‐e‐kan‐a… say‐appl‐3sg.obj‐ipfv‐ind

‘When(he)reachedhome,theoldmansaidtohisson,…’

(23) Santali(Neukom2001:180)

Am-țhɛn‐ge baba-ɲ cala‐k‘‐kan‐a; you(s)‐DAT‐FOC father‐1SG.SBJ go‐MID‐IPFV‐IND

ɛnte‐ ɲ baḍae‐y‐et’‐a dhǝrti mᴐtᴐ‐re‐dᴐ for/because‐1SG.SBJ know‐y‐IPFV:ACT‐IND earth among‐LOC‐TOP

am kan‐ge‐a‐m mǝlik‐dᴐ. you.sg cop‐foc‐ind‐2sg.sbj master‐top

‘Iamcomingtoyou,father,becauseIknowthatyouarethemasterintheworld.’

AsimilarcausalclauseconstructionoccursinKannada(Dravidian,India),another

left‐branchinglanguageinwhichadverbialclausescommonlyprecedethemainclause.Interestingly,Kannadahasmultiple causal clause constructions that differ in termsoftheirstructureanduse.TherearetwotypesofcausalclauseswithderankedverbformsthatgenerallyprecedethemainclauselikeallothersemantictypesofadverbialclausesinKannada(cf.24‐25).Inaddition,thereisafinitetypeofcausalclausethatincludesaninitial conjunction and always follows the semantically associated clause (cf. 26).According to Sridhar (1990: 66), the two non‐finite causal clauses are subordinateconstructions,whereasthefiniteclausefunctionsasanindependentsentence.Althoughitexpressesthesamecausallinkasthetwonon‐finiteclauses,thereisnoevidencethatthisconstructionissubordinatedtothemainclause.

(24) Kannada(Sridhar1990:74) Bisilu hecca:giruv‐udarinda oLage: a:Ta aDo:Na. heat much.ADV:be‐because inside.EMPH game play.HORT

19

‘Sinceit’sveryhot,let’splayinside.’

(25) Kannada(Sridhar1990:74) Ra:manige jvara bandidda karana na:vu maduvege Rama.DAT fever come.PST.PRF because we wedding.DAT

barala:galilla. come.INF.possible.INF.NEG

‘BecauseRamahadafever,wecouldn’tcometothewedding.’

(26) Kannada(Sridhar1990:75f) Na:vu mya:cige ho:galla, ya:kandre namma yajama:narige mayyalli we match.DAT not.go because my husband.DAT body.LOC

sariya:gilla. not.well.ADV

‘Wewon’tgotothematchbecausemyhusbandisn’tfeelingwell.’

There are several other left‐branching languages in our sample in which causalrelationships are commonly expressed by coordinate sentences while temporal andconditional clauses are realized by adverbial clauses (e.g. Lavukaleve, MarphatanThakali,Lakota,Abun,Supyire).Interestingly,insomeoftheselanguages,causalclausesare marked by a reduced causal question reflecting the interactive use of theseconstructionsinconversations.Forinstance,inMarphatanThakali(Bodic,Nepal)thereare several causal clause constructions, but the most common strategy to express areasonor cause involves theexpression tálan1pi3­janse,which literallymeans ‘if youaskwhy’: (27) MarphatanThakali(George1996:220) T’e lo1‐la a3 k’am2 tálan1 pi3­janse mi2 a3 mran1. 3SG read‐INF NEG can why say‐COND eye NEG see

‘Hecannotreadbecauseheisblind.’[lit.‘Hecannotread.Ifyouaskwhy:Heisblind.’]

George (1996) describes tálan1 pi3­janse as a “petrified construction” that has

assumedthefunctionofacausalconjunctionintroducingacoordinatesentence.SimilarconstructionsoccurinSupyire(Gur,Mali)andKoyraChiini(Songhay,Mali).InSupyire,thecommonestwayofexpressingacausalclauseinvolvesareducedquestion:ŋàhánáyɛ ‘what for’ or ŋàhá kúrúgó yɛ ‘through what’ (cf. 28). Carlson points out that theconnectingquestion is intonationally separated from the combined clausesbypauses,suggestingthatthereasonclauseafterŋàhánáyɛ functionsasanindependentassertion,whose“syntacticsubordinationandintegrationintothemainclausehasnotprogressedveryfar”(Carlson1994:580‐581).

20

(28) Supyire(Carlson1994:580)

Bòm‐ɛ ɛ gé mɛ gé mpyi “Sámbà na ŋ‐kwᴐ hᴐ lì”; Baboon‐male.DEF name.DEF was Samba PROG INTR‐dance

àhá ná yɛ , kwᴐ hᴐ ra a tààn ka à. hat on Q dancing.DEF PRF be.sweet it to

‘Themalebaboon’snamewas‘Sambaisdancing’,becauseitlikesdancing.’

In Koyra Chinni, causal clauses are commonly marked bymaa se ‘because’ (cf.example 29), which also appears in causal questions (cf. example 30). According toHeath(1999:182),maase isagenuinequestionwordthathasassumedtheadditionalfunctionofacausalclausemarker.

(29) KoyraChiini(Heath1999:280) A wanealbarka di jaatir o bow [maa se] a‐a 3SG POSS force DEF self IMPV be.big what? DAT 3SG.SUBJ‐IMPV

jii‐jii. REDUPL.be‐only

‘It’s(melonseeds’)veryvalueisgreat,becauseitisoily.’

30) KoyraChiini(Heath1999:182) [Maa se] n koy? what? dat 2sg.subj go?

‘Whydidyougo?’

The same extension of a questionword to a causal connective occurs in Italian.LikeKoyraChiini,Italianusesaninterrogativepronoun,perché ‘why’,tomarkacausalclause(cf.Schwarze1995).Finally,Englishusesthecopularclausethat’swhytoindicatea reason, though in this case the reason precedes the statement after the connectingclause(cf.Theyarenottoobad.That’swhyI’mworried).

5 Conclusion

To summarize, this paper has shown that causal clauses are commonly expressed byconstructions that are less tightly integrated into complex sentences than othersemantic types of adverbial clauses. In contrast to conditional and temporal clauses,causalclausespredominantlyfollowthemainclause,areoftenrealizedasindependentintonationunits,andmayexhibitstructuralpropertiessuchas theoccurrenceofa tag

21

question or topicalization that are characteristic of main clauses. In fact, in manylanguages causal relationships are expressed by coordinate constructions that aresyntactically independent of the semantically associated clause. In particular, in left‐branching languageswith initialadverbialclausescoordinatesentencesarecommonlyused to express a causal relationship. We have argued that the particular structuralpropertiesofcausalclausesaremotivatedbytheircommunicativefunctioninspeaker‐hearer interactions. As Ford and others demonstrated, in conversational discoursecausalclausesarecommonlyusedtosupportaproblematicstatement.Moreprecisely,causal clauses are often embedded in a discourse pattern that involves three verbalactions:

1. Astatementoractivitythatthehearermaynotacceptorunderstand.

2. Thehearer’sreactiontothisstatement(optional).3. Thespeaker’sjustificationorexplanationofthecontroversialstatement.

Thisisanextremelyfrequentdiscoursepatternthatappearstobesofundamental

toeverydaycommunicationthatonemightexpectittobeuniversal(cf.FordandMori1994).

Interestingly,childrenseemtolearntheuseofcausalclausesinthecontextofthispattern.AsDiessel(2004:chap7)showedinanextensivecorpusstudyoffivechildren,the earliest causal clauses that English‐speaking children produce are prompted by acausalwhy‐question, as in the following examples froma two‐yearoldboy (examplesfromDiessel2004:161). (32) CHILD: Noyoucan’tgetanapkin. [Peter2;7] ADULT: Hmhm. CHILD: No! ADULT: Why? CHILD: Causeit’sMommy’s,…Mommy’scleaning.

(33) CHILD: No,don’ttouchthiscamera. [Peter2;7] ADULT: Why? CHILD: Causeit’sbroken. (34) CHILD: Themicrophone. [Peter2;7] CHILD: Don’ttouchit! ADULT: Why? CHILD: Causeit’s…Iwannaputthisrightthere.

(35) CHILD: Youcan’thavethis! [Peter2;8] ADULT: Why? CHILD: Cause…I’musingit.

(36) CHILD: Overhererightoverhere,…don’tputitthere. [Peter2;8] ADULT: Whynot?

22

CHILD: Cause it’s my horse.

The because‐clauses in (32) to (36) are characteristic of children’s early causalclauses(cf.Eisenberg1980).InDiessel’sdata,anaverageofmorethan80percentofthefirst fifteen because‐clauses produced by the five children he examined occur inresponse to a causal question. As the children grew older, they extended the use ofbecause to other patterns in which the adverbial clause ismore tightly bound to thepreceding (main) clause. However, there is not a single because‐clause in the entiredatabasethatprecedesthemainclause,supportingthehypothesisthattheuseofinitialcausalclausesis largelyrestrictedtowrittengenres.Inwriting,causalclausesarealsocommonlyusedtoenhancediscoursecoherence;butinconversations,causalclausesareassociatedwithaparticulardiscoursepatterninwhichthecausalclausefunctionsasaseparatespeechactthatisstructurallyindependentoftheassociated(main)clause.

23

Appendix

Languagesample

Language Affiliation3 Word Position Position Deranking Deranking order causal temp/cond causal temp/cond

Africa

Babungo Bantoid VO final mixed balanced balancedKoyraChinii Songhay VO final mixed balanced balanced

Krongo Kadugli VO final initial balanced mixedKwami W.Chadic VO final mixed balanced balanced

Noon N.Atlantic VO final mixed balanced balanced

Supyire Gur OV final mixed balanced mixedTurkana Nilotic VO mixed mixed balanced mixed

Vai W.Mande OV final mixed balanced mixedWolyatta Omotic OV initial initial balanced mixed

Khoekhoe CentralKhoisanOV mixed mixed mixed mixed

Australia/NewGuinea

Abun N.‐C.Bird’sHead VO final mixed balanced deranked

Amele Madang OV initial initial deranked derankedDuungidjawu Pama‐Nyungan OV final mixed balanced balanced

Kayardild Tangkic VO/OV mixed mixed mixed mixed

Lavukaleve EastPapuan OV initial initial deranked derankedTiwi Tiwian VO final mixed balanced balanced

Ungarinjin Wororan OV mixed initial balanced balanced

Wambaya WestBarkly VO final final deranked derankedWardaman Yangmanic VO/OV mixed mixed mixed mixed

Yimas LowerSepik VO/OV mixed mixed balanced mixed

3TheaffiliationindicatesthelevelofthegenusbasedontheclassificationintheWorldAtlasofLinguisticStructures(Haspelmathetal.2005).

24

SouthEastAsia/Oceania

Acehnese Sundic VO/OV mixed mixed balanced balancedFijian Oceanic VO mixed mixed balanced balanced

Marph.ThakaliBodic OV initial initial deranked deranked

Santali Munda OV initial initial deranked derankedSemelai Aslian VO final initial balanced balanced

Tetun Cent.Malay.‐P. VO final initial deranked deranked

Eurasia

Arabic Semitic VO final mixed mixed mixedBasque Isolate OV final initial balanced mixed

English Germanic VO final mixed balanced mixed

Hungarian Ugric VO/OV mixed mixed balanced mixedGeorgian Kartvelian OV mixed mixed balanced mixed

Japanese Isolate OV mixed initial balanced mixed

Kannada S.‐Dravidian OV mixed initial mixed derankedKorean Isolate OV initial initial deranked deranked

Lezgian Lezgic OV initial initial mixed mixedMand.ChineseChinese VO final mixed balanced balanced

Persian Iranian OV mixed mixed balanced balanced

Udihe Tungusic OV initial initial deranked derankedYukaghir Isolate OV initial initial deranked deranked

NorthAmerica

Lakhota Siouan OV final initial balanced balanced

Lea.ChinantecChinantecan VO final mixed balanced balanced

Maricopa Yuman OV mixed initial deranked derankedPurépecha Tarascan VO final mixed balanced deranked

25

Slave Athapsakan OV initial initial balanced balanced

T.Shoshone Numic VO/VO mixed mixed deranked derankedTzutujil Mayan VO final mixed balanced balanced

W.GreenlandicEskimo‐Aleut OV initial initial deranked deranked

Yurok Yurok VO/OV final mixed balanced mixed

SouthAmerica

Barasano Tucanoan OV mixed initial deranked derankedHixkaryana Cariban OV final mixed deranked deranked

H.Quechuan Quechuan OV initial initial deranked deranked

Ika Aruak OV mixed mixed deranked derankedKwazá Isolate VO/OV initial initial deranked deranked

Paumari Arauan VO/OV mixed mixed deranked derankedPirahã Mura OV final initial balanced balanced

Sanuma Yanomam OV initial initial balanced mixed

Trumai Isolate VO/OV final mixed balanced mixedWarao Isolate OV initial initial balanced deranked

Wari’ Chap.‐Wanhan VO final mixed mixed mixed

Mapudungun Araucanian VO final initial deranked deranked

26

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