Emotional and emotive language: modal particles and tags in unified Berlin

Braber, N. ORCID: 0000-0003-2611-1190, 2006. Emotional and emotive language: modal particles and tags in unified Berlin. Journal of Pragmatics, 38 (9), pp. 1487-1503. ISSN 0378-2166

Preview

Text 196351_371 Braber Prepublisher.pdf Download (96kB) | Preview

Abstract

This paper endeavours to show the relationship between emotion and language, in particular with respect to the use of modal particles in German. Modal particles have long been considered insignificant fillers without a specific function and as such, not worthy of linguistic investigation. This is clearly a view which cannot be sustained. Modal particles have been found to illustrate the speaker’s opinion of what is being said; in addition, they may add emphasis. Certain German modal particles (especially halt and eben) are examined as they occur in a corpus of utterances containing accounts of highly emotional events, related to East and West Berliners’ experiences after the fall of the Berlin Wall and German unification. By reviewing spoken accounts of events which were life-changing for one side, but only nominal for the other, thereby producing different emotions, the article demonstrates the use of these modal particles. The analysis suggests that there is a direct link between emotion and the way these speakers of German use their language.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Journal of Pragmatics
Creators:	Braber, N.
Publisher:	Elsevier (not including Cell press)
Date:	2006
Volume:	38
Number:	9
ISSN:	0378-2166
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1016/j.pragma.2005.10.003 DOI
Rights:	© 2006 Elsevier B.V.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Arts and Humanities
Record created by:	EPrints Services
Date Added:	09 Oct 2015 10:32
Last Modified:	09 Jun 2017 13:32
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/14483

Actions (login required)

Edit View

Views

Downloads