Question-Answer Tests

The distinction between given and new information is the core of research on information structure since most of well-known languages are sensitive to this distinction. The mini discourse context of question-answer pairs helps narrow down the seemingly messy discourse-related syntactic phenomena into rather simple tidy patterns because the answer part consists of two parts, one part conveying given information identical with the information told in the question part while the other part conveying new information (also called semantic focus in Jackendoff (1972)) filling the communicative gap between interlocutors.83 Whether this bipartition affects syntax stands out in the answer part. In English, it has no bearing on syntax, with only prosody affected. Squliq Atayal however is more sensitive to this bipartition.

The interrogative sentences in Squliq Atayal usually employ pseudo-cleft constructions with fronted interrogative words as the nominal predicate of matrix clauses in the sentence-initial position; most important of all, if fronted interrogative words are arguments, they must be the grammatical subjects of the embedded nominal clauses, which trigger the subject-verb agreement on thematic roles in this language. If

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Question-answer tests are the groundwork for the Question Under Discussion models of information structure, in which either explicitly-asked or implicitly-understood questions are the basic building blocks of information structure (Velleman & Beaver 2016). For instance, the discourse-tree in Büring (2003) has discourse move as a node, the relationship between two discourse moves as a branch, and answering move as a terminal node.

interrogative arguments are not grammatical subjects, they must stay in-situ, remaining at the normal position of its grammatical functions. In other words, in-situ interrogative arguments are not pseudo-clefted. Details of the formation of interrogative sentences will be discussed in Chapter 8. In question-answer tests, interrogative words in the question part are placed in three different positions, serving as three different grammatical functions: pseudo-clefted (preposed) subject, (in-situ) object and (in-situ) oblique actor.

The following sentences from (158) to (161) constitute the first test of the question-answer pair, in which the question part contains a pseudo-clefted (fronted) interrogative word:

(158) Q: ima’ (qu’) wal m-ihiy tali’? who Nom Aux.Pt AV-hit Tali ‘Who hit Tali?’ <E>

(159) A: watan (qu’) wal m-ihiy tali’. Watan Nom Aux.Pt AV-hit Tali ‘The one who hit Tali was Watan.’ <E>

(160) A:# wal m-ihiy tali’ (qu’) watan. Aux.Pt AV-hit Tali Nom Watan ‘Watan hit Tali.’ <E>

(161) A: wal bhy-an watan qu’ tali’. Aux.Pt hit-LV Watan Nom Tali ‘Tali was hit by Watan.’ <E>

If the answer part is made with a pseudo-cleft construction as in (159), it will be discourse-pragmatically perfect. This answer consists of two parts: one is the pseudo-clefted nominal watan (marked in green), which conveys the information unknown to the addressee, and the other is the embedded clause (qu’) wal mihiy tali’

‘the one who hit Tali’ (marked in red), which offers the information shared with the question part and with the addressee. If the answer part is not a pseudo-cleft construction, like the sentence in (160), wherein the given information becomes the predicate while the new information becomes the grammatical subject, this answer part will not be discourse-pragmatically appropriate at all even though it is syntactically grammatical while isolated in grammaticality judgments. If the voice marking of the answer part is altered to be LV, as presented in (161), wherein the new information becomes an oblique actor while the rest of the sentence still conveys given information, the answer part will still manifest discourse-pragmatic appropriateness.

The second test of question-answer pair is composed of the sentences from (162) to (166), as shown below:

(162) Q: cyux k-m-ut nanu’ qu’ tali’? Aux.Prog AV-kill what Nom Tali ‘What is Tali killing?’ <E>

(163) A: cyux k-m-ut ngta’ qu’ tali’. Aux.Prog AV-kill chicken Nom Tali ‘Tali is killing a chicken.’ <E>

(164) A:* ngta’ cyux k-m-ut qu’ tali’. chicken Aux.Prog AV-kill Nom Tali <E>

(165) A: ngta’ (qu’) cyux kut-an (na’) tali’. chicken Nom Aux.Prog kill-LV Obl Tali ‘What is being killed by Tali is a chicken.’ <E>

(166) A:# cyux kut-an (na’) tali’ (qu’) ngta’. Aux.Prog kill-LV Obl Tali Nom chicken <E>

object of the AV verb kmut ‘kill’. This interrogative sentence does not involve

pseudo-clefting. If the answer part replaces the interrogative word with new information in the object position, like ngta’ ‘chicken’ in (163), it is discourse-pragmatically appropriate without a doubt. The second answer in (164) is ungrammatical because as will be shown in Chapter 8, grammatical objects cannot be pseudo-clefted. If the voice marking of the answer part is altered to be LV and the new information is pseudo-clefted, as shown in (165), the answer will be discourse-pragmatically appropriate. By contrast, as shown in (166), if the new information is not pseudo-clefted, remaining in situ as the subject, the answer part will be discourse-pragmatically inappropriate even though it is syntactically grammatical.

The last test of question-answer pairs starts with a question sentence containing an interrogative word as the oblique actor, like ima’ ‘who’ in (167).

(167) Q: wal kut-an ima’ qu’ ngta’ qani? Aux.Pt kill-LV who Nom chicken this ‘By whom was this chicken killed?’ <E>

(168) A: wal kut-an watan qu’ ngta’ qani. Aux.Pt kill-LV Watan Nom chicken this ‘This chicken was killed by Watan.’ <E>

(169) A:* watan wal kut-an qu’ ngta’ qani. Watan Aux.Pt kill-LV Nom chicken this <E>

(170) A:# wal k-m-ut ngta’ qani qu’ watan. Aux.Pt AV-kill chicken this Nom Watan ‘Watan killed this chicken.’ <E>

(171) A: watan (qu’) wal k-m-ut ngta’ qani. Watan Nom Aux.Pt AV-kill chicken this ‘The one who killed this chicken is Watan.’ <E>

New information, as watan (marked in green) in (168), can substitute the oblique interrogative word of the question part, forming a discourse-pragmatically appropriate answer part. The second answer sentence in (169) is ungrammatical because obliques cannot be pseudo-clefted. If the answer part of the same proposition is expressed with an AV sentence, like (170), it will result in discourse-pragmatic inappropriateness since the new information watan is located in the subject position. However, there will be no problem if the new information is pseudo-clefted, removed from the subject position, as illustrated in (171).

The above three tests of question-answer pairs show that whether an answer sentence is discourse-pragmatically appropriate depends upon the position of new information. To be more specific, the new information of the answer part cannot be placed in the (sentence-final) subject position; that is, it cannot be a subject. As long as this restriction is violated, even grammatically correct sentences cannot be the answer part.