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Abstract:
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One of the amazing characteristics of human language is self-reference, that is, referring to itself by means of itself. This language-with-language phenomenon is most evident in reported
discourse, where speech, thought, and perception tend to be interconnected. Hence, this paper
investigates reported speech (RS) and reported thought (RT) in Kavalan, an endangered Austronesian
language, by focusing on the quotative marker zin, which frames either a speech event or a mental event. Based on our present corpus, it is found that in narratives reported speech is nearly twice as frequent as reported thought, with instances of reported speech almost exclusively
framed by third person pronouns. In conversations, however, the situation is reversed, namely, reported thought is twice more frequent than reported speech, with instances of reported thought almost exclusively framed by first person pronouns. Our study shows that self-report of
thought is the norm in conversations while other-report of speech is predominant in narratives. |
