SWITCH-REFERENCE OR COORDINATION? A QUANTITATIVE APPROACH TO CLAUSE LINKAGE IN LAKOTA.

Switch-reference is commonly regarded as a typologically special, and structurally isolated, mechanism of clause linkage. This view, however, is challenged by the data on clause linkers in Lakota, which have previously been analyzed either as coordinators or as switch-reference markers. The corpus-based investigation of their functional and semantic features conducted in this study reveals that Lakota clause linkers exhibit characteristics of both coordinators and switch-reference markers. The hybrid status of these elements is best accounted for in a model in which switch-reference is redefined as one of several subcomponents of the principle of discourse cohesion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]