( SWL 1 ) Leipzig , 5-8 August 2004 Non-canonical applicatives and focalization in Tswana
This paper examines non-canonical uses of Tswana applicative verb forms that support the hypothesis of a prototypical relationship between the syntactic role of object and the pragmatic role of focus. In its canonical use, the applicative suffix of Tswana can be defined as licensing the presence of a direct object representing a participant that cannot figur in the construction of the same verb in its non-derived form. One of the non-canonical uses of applicative verb forms examined in this paper involves no change in the valency of the verb: in Tswana, as in other Southern Bantu languages, the use of the applicative form of the verb may simply indicate the focalization of a locative complement or adjunct. This non-canonical use of applicative verb forms must be related to other facts of Tswana, and more generally of Bantu languages, suggesting that in Bantu syntax the immediate post-verbal position, grammaticalized as the obligatory position of the objects of transitive verbs, is primarily a focus position.
The contribution of African linguistics towards a general theory of focus. Update and critical review
This cross-theoretical review of the study of focus in African languages identifies a number of trends of general theoretical, typological and methodological significance concerning, for instance, the definition and extension of the category of focus' itself, the proper context in which it ought to be studied, and its systematic relationship to other constructions such as relatives. Findings formulated in terms of different theoretical frameworks, often taken to be mutually inconvertible, are shown to complement each other. A number of proposals for future research are summarized in the conclusion.
CONSTITUENT STRUCTURE, NATURAL FOCUS HIERARCHY AND FOCUS TYPES IN TOURA
The aim of this contribution is threefold: (i) to show how the complex, morphemically marked focus System of Toura, a language spoken by 25ΌΟΟ people in the mountains of Western Ivory Coast (Bearth 1971), interacts with the rigid configurational SOV constituent structure typical of Mande languages, (ii) to argue that traditional focus-typological parameters drawing on the concepts of informativity or salience fail to account for the functional properties of the Toura focus System, and (iii) to propose an alternative account based on the interaction of logico-semantic parameters with conversational variables. As a contribution to the universal typology of focus phenomena, I shall adduce evidence from Toura in favor of recognizing counter-assertive, counterpresuppositional and counter-implicational types s separate focus categories.