Subject, Theme, and the Speaker's Empathy--a Reexamination of Relativization Phenomena

In Kuno (1973 , Chapters 20, 21), I enumerated various characteristics that Japanese thematic sentences and relative clause constructions share, and hypothesized that Japanese relative clauses are derived not by deleting an ordinary NP, but by deleting the theme of the embedded clauses. Namely, I proposed that 1-la and 1–2a, for example, are derived not from the intermediate structures 1-lb and 1–2b, but from 1-lc and 1–2c: 1–1a [Hanako ga yonda] hon read book “the book that Hanako read” 1–1b [Hanako ga sono hon o yonda] hon the book read book 1–1c [[sono hon wa] Theme , Hanako ga yonda] hon the book read book 1–2a [sinda noni, dare-mo kanasimanakatta] hito died although anyone saddened-was-not person “the person who (lit.) although (he) died, no one was saddened” 1–2b [ sono hito ga sinda noni, dare-mo kanasimanakatta] hito the person died although anyone saddened-was-not person 1–2c [[sono hito wa] Theme sinda noni, dare-mo kanasimanakatta] hito

Context (archaeology) · Thematic analysis · Thematic structure · Theme (computing) · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation