بررسی ساختی و کاربردشناختی جملات پرسشی جهت مند در مکالمات زبان فارسی (مقاله علمی وزارت علوم)
درجه علمی: نشریه علمی (وزارت علوم)
آرشیو
چکیده
اگرچه کاربرد ماهیتی جملات پرسشی، طرح سؤال است؛ اما این جملات می توانند کاربردهای متعدد دیگری را نیز در سطح کلام برجسته کنند. در این میان، گونه پرسش های سوی مدار بله-خیر که دربردارنده پرسش های بلاغی، تأکیدی، ضمیمه ای و جهت مند است نشان دهنده تمایل ضمنی پرسشگر به یکی از جواب ها است. مطالعه حاضر ضمن اشاره به برخی از تمایزات میان انواع پرسش های سوی مدار، به توصیف پرسش های جهت مند از منظر ساختی و کاربردشناختی در مکالمات روزمره فارسی پرداخته است. بررسی حاضر نشان داد که از منظر ساختی کلمات قطبی مثبت (مانند ترکیبات بعضی) و ساخت های ویژه (مانند ضمیمه های همپایگی یا چیز دیگه ای، یا همچین چیزی) و پاسخ های ضمیمه شده به انتهای پرسش از جمله عوامل جهت مندی مثبت به شمار می روند. از منظر کاربردشناختی، پرسش های جهت مند برای درخواست تأیید، بیان تعجب، انتقاد، مقدمه سازی و بیان اطلاعات، عنوان پیشنهاد یا درخواست کمک و درخواست توافق مفید واقع می شوند. این مطالعه نشان داد که انواع جهت مندی معرفتی، ایجابی و تمنایی در پرسش های فارسی وجود دارد و اینکه ساخت های مخصوص در کنار کاربرد مشخص در بافت موجب تبلور قطبیت یکسان یا معکوس میان پرسش و پاسخ آن خواهند شد.A Structural and Pragmatic Investigation of Conducive Interrogatives in Contemporary Persian Conversations
Abstract:
Not only do the interrogatives characteristically serve the pragmatic function of questioning, they are also used for a variety of other functions. Yes-no biased interrogatives, such as rhetorical, tag, and conducive interrogatives, imply that a particular answer is expected or desired. The current study describes conducive interrogatives from structural and pragmatic perspectives in contemporary Persian conversations. It is also aimed towards pointing out some differences among the types of biased interrogatives. The present research demonstrated that, from a structural point of view, assertive words (e.g., combinations of baɂzi ‘some’), some special constructions (e.g., the coordination tags of yā čize digeɂi ‘or something else’, yā hamčin čizi ‘or something like this’), and the wh- interrogatives with self-supplied answers are some factors for positive conductivity. From a pragmatic point of view, conducive interrogatives are helpful when requesting confirmation, expressing surprise, criticizing, introducing or presenting information, offering or asking for help, and reaching an agreement. The current study also attested to the existence of epistemic, deontic, and desiderative conductivity in Persian. Findings suggest that the incorporation of special constructions, in addition to particular usages in the context, will result in a matched or reversed polarity between the interrogatives and their answers.
Keywords: Interrogatives, Conducive Interrogatives; Biased Interrogatives; Rhetorical Interrogatives, Modality.
Introduction
Biased interrogatives are often yes-no interrogatives that are endowed with a built-in bias towards one answer rather than another (see Biber et al., 1999: 1113-1117). Interrogatives such as rhetorical, tag, and conducive can be deemed as representatives of biased interrogatives. In these structures, the questioner's confidence in his presuppositions or expectations may reach the point upon which s/he implies the answer in his/her question and therefore does not expect an answer from the audience, as for example in rhetorical interrogative (1), for instance. However, sometimes the questioner may be suspicious of his/her default information, in which case s/he often needs to get an answer from the audience while guiding the audlence to his/her desired answer, as, for example, in conducive interrogative (2).
xodā nāzer bar kāre=šān nist-Ø?
God observer over deed=PC.3PL NEG.COP.PRS-3SG
‘Isn’t God watching over their deeds?’
emruz pānzdahom ast-Ø?
today fifteenth COP.PRS-1SG
‘Is today the fifteenth?’ (Instead of the neutral question, what date is today?)
Several studies have been carried out to investigate conducive interrogatives in other languages, especially English (e.g., Bublitz, 1981; Piazza, 2002). Nevertheless, despite only few preliminary works on the types of rhetorical and tag interrogatives in Persian (e.g., Shamisa, 2016; Ghasemi, 2020), scant attention has been directed towards introducing and describing other types of biased interrogatives, particularly conducive type, as well as mulling over the distinction between biased interrogative types (such as examples 1 and 2). Therefore, the present study moves towards the structural and pragmatic investigation of conducive interrogatives in contemporary Persian, and seeks to find out: 1. what is the structure of conducive interrogatives in Persian? 2. What are the main functions of conducive interrogatives?
Materials and Methods
The present study strives to examine Persian conducive interrogatives using descriptive and explanatory methodology. In this regard, the data comes from 40 hours of modern Persian conversations, consisting of recorded files, radio and television programs, and internet surfing. We sifted the dataset to opt for yes-no interrogatives with a question intonation or a question mark. Through so doing, we left out sentences lacking these characteristics. Concerning the interpretation of the data, special attention was paid to the two variables of structure and function. The structural variable expressed characteristics such as the presence of certain constructions or special grammatical items with a pivotal role in highlighting conductivity and emergence of polarity. This point is investigated in this study to see whether or not the presence of these elements causes matched or reversed polarity between a question and its answer. Regarding the function variable, discourse functions and the corresponding speech acts were examined in conducive interrogatives.
Discussion and Conclusions
The following results were obtained from the present study:
In interrogative sentences, the degree of confidence of the questioner in the truth of his/her presuppositions is inversely related to the expectation of receiving an answer from the audience. Therefore, in biased interrogatives, the amount of response expectation is reduced from tags and conducive interrogatives to rhetorical ones.
The present research demonstrated that from a structural point of view, positive declarative interrogatives (as in ex. 3), assertive words (e.g., combinations of baɂzi ‘some’) (as in ex. 4), some special constructions (e.g., the coordination tags of yā čize digeɂi ‘or something else’, yā hamčin čizi ‘or something like this’) (as in ex. 5), and the wh- interrogatives with self-supplied answers (as in ex. 6) are some factors for a positive conductivity. Instead, some negative declarative interrogatives and negative conductivity items (such as hič ‘any’ combinations) generally indicate a negative conductivity.
qazā=t=o tamum kard-i?
food=PC.2SG=OM finished do.PST-2SG
‘Have you finished your food?’
vaqt.ā bāzār mi-raft-and?
sometimes market IPFV-go.PST-3PL
‘Did they sometimes go to the market?’
kenār=e bozorgrāh yā hamčin jāʔi bud-and?
beside=EZ highway or like somewhere COP.PST-3PL
‘Were they on the side of the highway or somewhere like that?’
sāat=e čand xob=e, čāhār?
clock=EZ what good=COP.PRS-3SG four
‘What time is good, four?’
From a pragmatic point of view, conducive interrogatives are helpful in contexts featured with requesting confirmation (as in ex. 7), expressing surprise (as in ex. 8), criticizing (as in ex. 9), offering or asking for help (as in ex. 10), introducing or presenting information (as in ex. 11), and reaching an agreement (as in ex. 12).
hanuz hamsare=t=ro mi-zan-i?
still wife=PC.2SG=OM IPFV-bit.PRS-2SG
‘Do you still beat your wife?’
hanuz zende ast-Ø?
still alive COP.PRS-3SG
‘Is he still alive?!’
ne-mi-tun-i sāf rānnandegi.kon-i?
NEG-IPFV-be.able.PRS-2SG straight drive.PRS-2SG
‘Can't you drive straight?’
kami čai mi-xor-i?
some tea IPFV-eat.PRS-2SG
‘Would you like to drink some tea?’
šenid-i šohar=e Azam xānum ye zan=e dige gereft-e Ø?
hear.PST-2SG husband=EZ Azam Mrs. one wife=EZ other take-PP COP.PRS-3SG
‘Have you heard that Azam's husband married another woman?’
ne-miš-e dotā=ro barā=m be-xar-i?
NEG-IPFV-be.possible.PRS-3SG two=OM for=PC.1SG SBJV-buy.PRS-2SG
‘Can't you buy both for me?’
Directive speech act was the most common act in conducive interrogatives. The reason for this lies behind forcing the audience to answer on the one hand and encouraging him towards the questioner's expected answer on the other. Both are the characteristic of conducive interrogatives.
Rhetorical and tag interrogatives are basically in reversed polarity with their answers (ex. 1). This is while the state of polarity between conducive interrogatives and their expected answers depends on the discursive functions of those interrogatives. In this regard, in more common applications, including requesting confirmation (ex. 7), expressing surprise (ex. 8), offering or asking for help (ex. 10), the matched polarity prevails between questions and answers. This is while in the applications of introducing or presenting information (ex. 11) and reaching an agreement (ex. 12) the polarity is reversed . Overall, conducive interrogatives are often positive and have the same polarity as their answer; therefore, the questioner expects the audience to provide him/her with a positive answer. Being in line with the intersubjective relationships among people in the conversation, this trend shows the cooperation of the discourse partners in reaching an agreement.
The current study also attested that in Persian biased interrogatives there are epistemic bias (a matter of the speaker thinking, expecting, or knowing that one answer is the right one) as in 8, deontic bias (a matter of the speaker judging that one answer ought to be the right one) as in 9, and desiderative conductivity (where the speaker wants one answer to be the right one) as in 12.
In the end, it should be acknowledged that various paralinguistic factors such as intonation and non-linguistic factors such as social and cultural variables (e.g., power relations and the physical context) can be responsible for interpreting a yes-no question as a biased question, representing the speaker's tendency to a certain answer.
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