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0. Introduction
Since the sixties, particles have aroused the interest of linguists far and wide. The
various classifications into parts of speech or word classes that particles have
undergone in the recent years will not be discussed here. Most of what will be
discussed will be illustrated with German Abtnungspartikeln (~ modal particles?),
and, for reasons of economy, with German aber, but it should be clear from the
beginning that it will hold true for particles of other classes as well and not only for
German but also for other languages.
Instead of discussing particle classifications and the respective criteria1, I would
like to raise the basic question of what are Abtnungspartikeln good for or why one
uses Abtnungspartikeln. This question has not really been considered in this direct
way and that is why I think it is particularly (!) suitable for a new look at an old
subject.
1. Problems of definition
When speaking of particles in a general way, we have good reasons to avoid a too
restrictive definition. Instead, we will enumerate some denominations in German,
French, and English. They roughly circumscribe the range of the words that this
article will be about and they will already reveal to a certain degree what the
authors think they are good for.2 The particles that I am going to treat are called in
German:
Abtnungspartikeln, Modalpartikeln, Satzpartikeln, Gliederungssignale, illokutive
Partikeln, diskursorientierende Partikeln, Einstellungspartikeln, diskursive
Partikeln, Gesprchswrter.
In French:
modalisateurs, particules expressives, apprciatifs, argumentatifs, particules
illocutoires, adverbes de phrase, connecteurs, mots de la communication,
charnires du discours (de discours), particules nonciatives, marqueurs, adverbes
expltifs.
In English:
pragmatic markers, discourse particles (as in this volume), discourse markers,
interpersonal markers, argumentative markers, presentative particles,
parentheticality markers, modal particles, adverbial connectives, connectives,
modal discourse particles, elusive particles, particles of truth, contrastive and setevoking particles, sentence-structure particles, down toners.
I recall the results of an experiment presented in the preface of the Kleine deutsche
Partikellehre (Weydt et al. 1983: chapter 0, 1112). Two dialogues, held between
two young people, were presented to our informants. The first, dialogue A,
contained a relatively large number of Abtnungspartikeln. The second one,
dialogue B, was identical to A except that all particles had been removed from it. It
is still grammatically correct. A teacher could not find any grammatical mistakes.
Here is a section of this dialogue:
[...]
[...]
England!
Y: War ich auch, aber jetzt wohn' ich in
quatschen.
quatschen.
X: Ja eben, aber sag' mal, wo fhrt denn der X: Ja, aber sag', wo fhrt der 9.30 Uhr-Zug
9.30 Uhr-Zug eigentlich ab?
ab?
[...]
[...]
Both dialogues were presented to informants who were asked to read them and
judge them relative to a given matrix which contained the features natural,
rejecting, warm, wooden, smooth, authentic, difficult to make contact with, friendly.
The results are shown in figure 1.
Dialog A
0 1 2
natrlich (natural)
abweisend (rejecting)
warm (warm)
hlzern (wooden)
flssig (smooth)
echt (authentic)
kontaktschwach 3
freundlich (friendly)
5 6
5,7
1,7
4,4
Dialog B
0 1 2 3 4
2,8
3,3
2,7
1,4
5,0
6,0
5,7
2,7
2,7
2,4
4,0
5,7
3,7
We have repeated the experiment often, with native German speakers as well as
with non-native speakers of German, and every time the results were very similar.
The differences in values assigned to the dialogues A and B must be explained by
the difference in the presence or absence of particles.
How should this be interpreted? One can see that the matrix contains two different
qualities. The first is a complex value, which may be labeled authenticity. It
answers the question Do Germans really speak like this? The respective values are:
natrlich ('natural'), flssig ('smooth'), echt ('authentic'). The answer for dialogue A
is Yes. In such a situation, they do speak with and not without particles. Dialogue A
is much more authentic than dialogue B.
The second value is a social one and shows up in the other features. It can be
labeled friendliness. Compared to B, dialogue A is conceived of as friendly and
warm, neither rejecting nor stiff, nor unsociable.
A conclusion that could be drawn and a first answer to the title question could then
be that the speakers use particles in their speech when and because they want to be
friendly, and if they don't use them, their particleless speech is strange. (It will be
the task of this article to ask whether this is an acceptable statement).
However, this conclusion leads to a number of difficulties. The first is the
phenomenon of over-summativity. The overall impact of particles does not coincide
with the meaning of only one of them. Neither eigentlich nor doch, nor denn nor
any of the other particles are friendly in and of themselves. If one does not want to
give up this first conclusion, then one would have to try seriously to explain how
particles which are not friendly bring about friendliness. The second problem is that
while particles may have friendly effects, they frequently do not. They can appear
in utterances meant to hurt the partner. Was hast Du denn jetzt schon wieder
gemacht?! (What did you do this time?!) and Haben sie berhaupt einen
Fhrerschein? (Do you even have a driver's license?) can be very aggressive.
In order to find out how particles act in speech and to answer the title question of
what Abtnungspartikeln are good for it is useful to observe how the meanings of
the particles function and how they act in conversation.
2. It is not the function of particles to tone down the utterance in oral discourse.
This claim corrects a frequent idea about particles, above all on German
Abtnungspartikeln. For example James (1983), who calls eigentlich "one of the
voluntary markers of imprecision". Similarly, Grevisse (1993: 920) describes the
function of particles like bien, donc, un peu, voir as expltifs: "Ils servent
seulement renforcer ou attnuer lexpression. Certains participent aussi la
fonction phatique." It is very commonly said that particles fulfill the function of
down toners5 and that they are used in a general way and without having a
specific meaning, in order to make the utterance in which they occur imprecise and
vague. This in turn is said to be one way a speaker can take the sharpness from
utterances, in order to prevent a so called FTA (face threatening act), or at least to
make it less threatening. In reality, however, eigentlich and the other
A widespread opinion says that it is their task, to structure the dialogue (Glich
1970: 270) and to help the hearer interpret the others turn. When these words are
Gliederungssignale, they lose their original meaning. Mais, when used as
Gliederungssignal (or, more exactly, as an opening-up signal, Erffnungssignal),
no longer expresses, following Glichs contrast, puis and alors do not contain
temporal relationships (Glich 1970: 297). We disagree with this theory. In
deference to the space it would require to argue against it in detail, let it suffice to
say briefly that that we could not find any example where a particle is a
Gliederungssignal, instead of conserving its original meaning. There is no
alternative of Gliederungssignal or particle with original (primary) meaning.
Instead, a certain particle can fulfill the function of a Gliederungssignal because of
the fact that it maintains its original meaning. It is able to structure the dialogue, as
it means something. Lets take again the example of the French conjunction mais.
According to Glich (1970: 77), (the same holds true for English but, German aber
and probably for Dutch maar), used as Gliederungssignal no longer carries any
adversative meaning. ...hat es seine ursprngliche lexikalische Bedeutung in vielen
Fllen aufgegeben zugunsten seiner Erffnungsfunktion. If its only function were
to open up a turn, it could be replaced, without changing the context conditions, by
any other opening up signal. This, however, is not the case. Mais can only occur in
cases which are compatible with its original, constant meaning. It demands a
context which fits its meaning, and that explains why we can predict the context
conditions for every occurrence.
10
b
a
a aa
mais
(aber, but)
11
Explanation: The pattern may be condensed into the formula: 'against the
expectation'. This explains the usage of mais as an adversative, coordinating
conjunction. Il est grand, mais faible, He is big, but weak. Er ist gro, aber
schwach. Hej is groot maar dapper. There are many more examples in Foolen
(1993). The speaker assumes that the hearer concludes that in general, the one who
is big is also strong. By using mais he warns the hearer not to think in the
anticipated direction. - Thesis 4 admits restrictions of usage. In some languages, the
respective particle may appear in the imperative: In a scene, where a victim of an
accident lies on the ground covered with blood, one of the bystanders may say in
French, Mais occupez-vous de cet homme!, which is not possible in German: *Aber
helfen Sie dem Mann. The underlying idea which justifies the usage of mais is:
You don't seem inclined to help. However, you should help. On the other hand,
there are restrictions of but and mais in their respective languages which do not
exist in German. In German one can combine aber with oder ('or'), which is not
possible in English or French. Sie brauchen jetzt neue Reifen, oder aber sie geben
die Reise auf. *Il vous faut de nouveaux pneus, ou mais vous abandonnez le
voyage. *You need new tires, or but you give up going on your trip. The basic
meaning also explains the usage of aber as Abtnungspartikel in German and of
maar in Dutch, and as Gliederungspartikel: but structures while signaling a
contrast to the expectation.
When checking if all the empirically appearing occurrences of a particle are
compatible with the hypothesis about its meaning, one has to consider carefully the
reasons for the apparent semantic deviance. Sometimes one can find reasons which
seem to present counter-evidence to the assumed meaning. One of these is irony.
Aber, used as Abtnungspartikel in an affirmative clause, expresses not only
12
surprise, but a surprise that the content of the sentence is given excessively. The
speaker it astonished, not about the fact, the that, but about its extent, the how
much. An apparent counter example could be seen in the following case: A sees a
small man and says: Guck mal, der ist aber gro! (Look, that man is aber tall!).
The use of aber can be explained by irony, where the designated reality is the
contrary of what is said.
13
the other can say: Da hattet ihr aber eine schne Aussicht! ('There you had aber a
beautiful view!'), due to the fact that they both see it at that moment.
The description, therefore, must be given on two levels. The overall meaning,
which holds for all occurrences, is relatively abstract. It explains the coherence of
all uses and guarantees its identity. The specific meaning is richer and deploys more
subtle semantic rules which control differentiated usages. The specific rules often
appear in the lexicon as numbered variants. 6
14
15
your name because something within the situation motivates me to ask this
question') is just awkward and not amiable at all.
Denn indicates that the content of the sentence in which it appears points back
to something that can be found in the preceding context (for a more detailed
16
explanation see Weydt and Hentschel (1983) and Hentschel and Weydt
(1983)).
17
(a)
There are two potential reasons, a and a', for b (not going to the beach). a' is
not the decisive one, because a alone causes b (' that you want to cancel the
trip is not the important point, but the fact that I have no time').
18
19
high initial
expectation
reality
low initial
expectation
Let's return to the question posited in section 2 of how an amiable effect is brought
about.
You see that dialogue A is full of elements which position the utterance in the
context. We have indictors like:
-I say this and I know that you know the answer. Its precisely your preceding
utterance which made me ask you this: denn.
I say this, knowing that you know it already, and that you agree: ja (summary
of shared idea).
I say this and I am surprised about the extension of the fact which is expressed
in the sentence: aber.
Saying this I presume that you will be surprised about what Im saying
because it is new for you: vielleicht.
20
These particles have in common that they create a network of relationships between
the actual hearer and the actual speaker. They transform the dialogue into a
common speech, make it become more than a simple sequence of: I say - you say.
The actual speaker, A, expresses that he not only makes his contribution in an
authentic way, but models it in such a way that it takes into account the other's, B's,
perspective. Instead of making an independent statement, he continues Bs idea. He
is aware of what B thinks and believes, and he bases his contribution on Bs
assumed state of mind. Therefore, the dialogue, instead of being an exchange of
independent turns, let alone of mutual feedings with bits of information (I give you
some information, and then you give me some information, etc.) becomes a
cooperative process of both interlocutors. Each in turn expresses by use of
Abtnungspartikeln that she/he respects and/or considers the other's view; each
utterance is based on the preceding one. In a certain sense, the dialogue, even in its
individual steps, is a common work, a creation of both partners.
When such a dialogue occurs, it conveys to the partners a feeling of profound
satisfaction. The feeling exists, even if they disagree in content, because they
realize that the one understands (or at least tries to understand) the other. They
cooperate in the effort to understand each other and try to make each other
understood. It is this very feeling which is an important factor in bringing about the
features of friendliness and amiability.
In summary: Abtnungspartikeln and related linguistic elements are used as
specific instruments for the partners' cooperation. They help them to make the
actual intention of an utterance clear and to assign it its function in the developing
21
interplay. Speakers who express by using particles that they earnestly try to
cooperate, are conceived of as friendly, sociable, amiable and able to make contact.
4. Broader perspective
There are languages which have a large inventory of Abtnungspartikeln and their
speakers use them frequently (languages like German, Dutch, White Mountain
Apache, Guaran, Toura, Kera) and others which dont (like English and the
Romance languages). No one, however, would claim that only Germans, Dutch,
Touras, Kera, and Guaran-speakers are able to be friendly and amiable when
22
speaking and conversing with each other. This raises an interesting new problem for
comparative linguistics, namely how to deal with the tertium comparationis
friendliness in language comparison. If someone has to judge a translation of a
literary work, where, for example in the German original a friendly speaker shows
his good intentions by using Abtnungspartikeln, then he has to ask how the same
effect is brought about in the target language. It may be reached by means which
are specific for that particular language.
Without going into details, let me just mention two specific means in other
languages which are candidates for this purpose.8 In French (the hexagonal
variation, not the Canadian), using a form of reference to the partner is much more
common than in other languages. It is rather unpersonal and unfriendly to say: Au
revoir ('Good bye'), instead of Au revoir, Madame. One may even omit Au revoir or
Bonjour and just greet: Madame! or Monsieur. French mothers correct their
children ironically repeating the phrase: Au revoir qui? ('Good bye, who?'). The
social process is essentially the same. By using the partner's name or title, the
speaker shows that he takes his specific presence into account.
In Spanish, the threefold pronoun system esto, eso, aquello which expresses if the
thing belongs to the own sphere, to the partner's or to neither of them may serve the
same purpose.
References
23
Berger, T.
1998 Partikeln und Hflichkeit im Russischen. In Slavistische Beitrge 375: 2953.
Foolen, A.
1993 De betekenis van partikels. Nijmegen: PhD. Diss.
Grevisse, M.
1993 Le bon usage. (Treizime dition refondue par A. Goosse). Paris: Duculot.
Glich, E.
1970 Makrosyntax der Gliederungssignale im gesprochenen Franzsisch.
Mnchen: Fink.
Held, G. (ed.)
(forthcoming) Partikeln und Hflichkeit.
Hentschel, E.
1986 Funktion und Geschichte deutscher Partikeln. Ja, doch, halt und eben.
Tbingen: Niemeyer.
24
Hentschel, E.
1991 Aspect versus particle: Contrasting German and Serbo-Croatian.
Multilingua 101 (2): 139-149.
Hentschel, E.
(forthcoming) Wenn Partikeln frech werden. In Partikeln und Hflichkeit, G.
Held (ed.).
25
James, A. R.
1983 Compromisers in English: A cross-disciplinary approach to their
interpersonal significance. Journal of Pragmatics 7 (2): 191-206.
Mtrich, R.
1993 Lexicographie bilingue des particules illocutoires de l'allemand. Gppingen:
Kmmerle.
Sasse, H.-J.
1993 "Syntactic categories and subcategories. In Syntax. Ein internationales
Handbuch zeitgenssischer Forschung, J. Jacobs et al. (eds.), 646-686. Berlin etc.:
de Gruyter.
Weydt, H.
1969 Abtnungspartikel. Die deutschen Modalwrter und ihre franzsischen
Entsprechungen. Bad Homburg vor der Hhe: Gehlen.
Weydt, H.
1983 Aber, mais und but. In Partikeln und Interaktion, H. Weydt (ed.), 148-159.
Weydt, H.
1984 Techniques of request: In quest of its universality. In The Tenth LACUS
26
Weydt, H.
1993 Was ist ein gutes Gesprch? In Dialoganalyse, IV. Referate der 4.
Arbeitstagung. Basel 1992, H. Lffler (ed.), 3-19. Tbingen: Niemeyer.
Weydt, H.
2001 Partikelforschung/Particules et modalit In Lexikon der Romanistischen
Linguistik, G. Holtus et al. (eds.), 782-801. Tbingen: Niemeyer.
Weydt, H.
(forthcoming) "(Warum) spricht man mit Partikeln berhaupt hflich?". In
Partikeln und Hflichkeit, G. Held (ed.).
Weydt, H. et al.
1983 Kleine deutsche Partikellehre. Stuttgart: Klett.
Weydt, H. (ed.)
1983 Partikeln und Interaktion. Tbingen: Niemeyer.
Weydt, H. (ed.)
1989 Sprechen mit Partikeln. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter.
27
For the criteria and problems of classification see Hentschel and Weydt (2002).
For a cross linguistic definition of "particle" see Hentschel and Weydt (1995) and Weydt (2001).
For a discussion of this problem and the potential criteria of definition see Weydt (2001: 2.1 Zum
I dont know where the origin of the term down toner as a linguistic term lies. It may be a calque, a
loan translation, of the German Ab-tnung (ab = down, Tnung = toner). If that were the case, it would
be a rather bad translation, German ab- here, not having the meaning of down, tnen not of to tone.
The expression abtnen was taken from the art of painting, where abtnende Farben means
shadowing colors. These paints lend the painting a certain nuance.
6
The fact that particles often appear without polite effects is pointed out in Berger (1998) and
Hentschel (forthcoming).