Munich

Causal and Conditional Constructions: 

Causal and Conditional Constructions Holger Diessel University of Jena holger.diessel@uni-jena.de http://www.holger-diessel.de/

Hypothesis: 

Hypothesis The formal differences between causal and conditional constructions are motivated by principles of language use.

Data: 

Data Cross-linguistic data from a representative sample of 50 languages. Corpus data from child and adult language (Diessel 2004, 2005).

Positioning: 

Positioning Data from Diessel 2005

Positioning: 

Positioning Data from Diessel 2005

Positioning: 

Positioning

Positioning: 

Positioning

Japanese (Kuno 1978): 

Japanese (Kuno 1978) (1) Kodama ga bete-iru uti ni, hon o yomimasyoo. Children SUB sleeping-is while book OBJ let’s read. ‘While the children are asleep, let’s read books.’ (2) Gakko ni iku to, Mary ga kite ita. School to go when Mary SUB coming was ‘When I got to school, Mary had already been there.’ (3) John ga ki-tara, boku wa kaeru. John SUB come-if I TOP leave ‘If John has come, I will leave.’ (4) Bukka ga agatta node, minna gakomatte iru. Price SUB rose because all suffering are ‘Because prices have gone up, all are suffering.’

Verb forms: 

Verb forms Many languages employ particular verb forms in conditional sentences.

Conditional conjunctions: 

Conditional conjunctions Multiple conditional conjunctions differentiate between semantic subtypes of conditional clauses: (i) counterfactual conditionals (ii) habitual conditionals (iii) negative conditionals (e.g. unless)

Barbareño (Wash 2001) : 

Barbareño (Wash 2001) (1) siyekutíywaš kayke iyalitimí:naw΄΄š. they.would.not.go.out.to.see.it because they were afraid ‘They did not go out to see it, because they were afraid (2) no?no? sixwatá:ta΄΄n mehu=salaxs۪úmwa΄΄š much he.trembling because=he.be.suffering ‘He was trembling a lot because he was suffering.’ (3) mehu=samšú:ku΄΄š tšuka sé:wil hiláyi΄΄ … because=they.were.law.abiding thus not.be anyone …. ‘Because they were law abiding there was therefore never anybody ...’

Positioning of English causal clauses: 

Positioning of English causal clauses Data from Diessel 2005

Kannada (Sridhar 1990) : 

Kannada (Sridhar 1990) (1) Bisilu hecca:giruv-udarinda oLage: a:Ta aDo:Na. Heat much.hot.be-CAUSE inside game play ‘Since it’s very hot, let’s play inside.’ (2) Ra:manige jvara bandidda karana na:vu maduvege barala galilla. Rama fever come CAUSE we wedding come not.possible ‘Because Rama had a fewer, we couldn’t come to the wedding.’ (3) Na:vu mya:cige ho:galla ya:kandre namma yajama:narige we match go CAUSE my husband mayyalli sariya:gilla. body not.well ‘We won’t go to the match because my husband isn’t feeling well.’

English and German : 

English and German

English and German : 

English and German

English and German : 

English and German

English and German : 

English and German

Weil and because : 

Weil and because (1) Ich komme nicht, weil … ich habe absolut keine Zeit. (2) a. She didn’t answer because she wasn’t there, was she? b. He moved to NY, because there lives his family. c. I’m leaving because when Jack comes there’ll be trouble.

Subordination-coordination continuum : 

Subordination-coordination continuum causal constructions SUB COOR conditional constructions SUB

Questions : 

Questions Why do causal and conditional clauses differ in their distribution? Why do so many languages employ multiple causal constructions that vary along the subordination-coordination continuum?

Conditional clauses : 

Conditional clauses (1) If you have a large garden with a lot of trees you should gather your own supply, otherwise leaves have to be acquired from somewhere else. [ICE-GB]

Conditional clauses: 

Conditional clauses otherwise If you have a garden with lots of trees you should gather your own supply leaves have to be acquired somewhere else If you don’t have a garden with trees

Conditional clauses : 

Conditional clauses (1) I will take the big one, … if you don’t mind.. (2) I guess we ought to put those in the oven, if we’re gonna eat them.

Causal clauses : 

Causal clauses (1) Because the climate is changing, there will be more floods in the future.

Causal clauses : 

Causal clauses (1) I .. played with them all week long, which was really stupid, … because they got worked up. (2) ... And me and mom always accused her of being lazy. ... You know, … because she was just, ... all she did was sleep. (3) I realize it takes two to three weeks to process, but just tell me whether it's on file. …because if not, I want her to have another one (4) A: We could spend a lot of our life trying to contradict that. B: Why? A: Well, because … it may be a very bad chemical bath.

Causal clauses : 

Causal clauses (1) ADULT: Did you run over my blocks? [Peter 2;5] CHILD: Mmhm. ADULT: Why? CHILD: Because it’s a fire engine. (2) CHILD: No you can’t get a napkin. [Peter 2;7] ADULT: Hmhm. CHILD: No! ADULT: Why? CHILD: Cause it’s Mommy’s, … Mommy’s cleaning. (3) CHILD: No, don’t touch this camera. [Peter 2;7] ADULT: Why? CHILD: Cause it’s broken.

Causal clauses : 

Causal clauses (4) CHILD: The microphone. [Peter 2;7] CHILD: Don’t touch it! ADULT: Why? CHILD: Cause it’s … I wanna put this right there. (5) CHILD: Over here right over here, … don’t put it there. [2;8] ADULT: Why not? CHILD: Cause it’s my horse. (6) ADULT: On the truck? [Peter 2;8] CHILD: Yeah ADULT: Why? CHILD: Cause … you need to?

Why? Because …: 

Why? Because … Data from Diessel 2004

Conclusion: 

Conclusion Processing motivates the tendency to express conditional clauses in initial subordinate constructions. Causal clauses vary along the subordination-coordination continuum because they serve several communicative functions. In conversations, causal clauses are commonly embedded in a particular discourse structure in which the causal clause serves as an independent utterance. In other registers (e.g. academic prose) causal clauses are commonly used like ordinary subordinate clauses.