Generative Approaches
Standard generative approaches to grammar argue that phonology and semantics cannot exchange information directly (See Fig. 1). Therefore, syntactic mechanisms including features and transformations include prosodic information regarding focus that is passed to the semantics and phonology.
Focus may be highlighted either prosodically or syntactically or both, depending on the language. In syntax this can be done assigning focus markers, as shown in (1), or by preposing as shown in (2):
(1) I saw f.
(2) f, I saw.
In (1), focus is marked syntactically with the subscripted ‘f’ which is realized phonologically by a nuclear pitch accent. Clefting induces an obligatory intonation break. Therefore in (2), focus is marked via word order and a nuclear pitch accent.
Focus also relates to phonology and has ramifications for how and where suprasegmental information such as rhythm, stress, and intonation is encoded in the grammar, and in particular intonational tunes which mark focus. Speakers can use pitch accents on syllables to indicate what word(s) are in focus. New words are often accented while given words are not. The accented word(s) forms the focus domain. However, not all of the words in a focus domain need be accented. (See for rules on accent placement and focus-marking). The focus domain can be either broad, as shown in (3), or narrow, as shown in (4) and (5):
(3) Did you see a grey dog or a cat? I saw f.
(4) Did you see a grey dog or a grey cat? I saw a grey f.
(5) Did you see a grey dog or a black dog? I saw a f dog.
The question/answer paradigm shown in (3)–(5) has been utilized by a variety of theorists to illustrate the range of contexts a sentence containing focus can be used felicitously. Specifically, the question/answer paradigm has been used as a diagnostic for what counts as new information. For example, the focus pattern in (3) would be infelicitous if the question was ‘Did you see a grey dog or a black dog?’.
In (3) and (4), the pitch accent is marked in bold. In (3), the pitch accent is placed on dog but the entire noun phrase a grey dog is under focus. In (4), the pitch accent is also placed on dog but only the noun dog is under focus. In (5), pitch accent is placed on grey and only the adjective grey is under focus.
Historically, generative proposals made focus a feature bound to a single word within a sentence. Chomsky and Halle formulated a Nuclear Stress Rule that proposed there to be a relation between the main stress of a sentence and a single constituent. Since this constituent is prominent sententially in a way that can contrast with lexical stress, this was originally referred to as "nuclear" stress. The purpose of this rule was to capture the intuition that within each sentence, there is one word in particular that is accented more prominently due to its importance - this is said to form the nucleus of that sentence.
Focus was later suggested to be a structural position at the beginning of the sentence (or on the left periphery) in Romance languages such as Italian, as the lexical head of a Focus Phrase (or FP, following the X-bar theory of phrase structure). Jackendoff, Selkirk, Rooth, Krifka, Schwarzschild argue that focus consists of a feature that is assigned to a node in the syntactic representation of a sentence. Because focus is now widely seen as corresponding between heavy stress, or nuclear pitch accent, this feature is often associated with the phonologically prominent element(s) of a sentence.
Sound structure (phonological and phonetic) studies of focus are not as numerous, as relational language phenomena tend to be of greater interest to syntacticians and semanticists. But this may be changing: a recent study found that not only do focused words and phrases have a higher range of pitch compared to words in the same sentence but that words following the focus in both American English and Mandarin Chinese were lower than normal in pitch and words before a focus are unaffected. The precise usages of focus in natural language are still uncertain. A continuum of possibilities could possibly be defined between precisely enunciated and staccato styles of speech based on variations in pragmatics or timing.
Currently, there are two central themes in research on focus in generative linguistics. First, given what words or expressions are prominent, what is the meaning of some sentence? Rooth, Jacobs, Krifka, and von Stechow claim that there are lexical items and construction specific-rules that refer directly to the notion of focus. Dryer, Kadmon, Marti, Roberts, Schwarzschild, Vallduvi, and Williams argue for accounts in which general principles of discourse explain focus sensitivity. Second, given the meaning and syntax of some sentence, what words or expressions are prominent?
Read more about this topic: Focus (linguistics)
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