A generally accepted universal definition of Discourse Particles (DIPs) underscores that

• they lack a propositional meaning,
• hey qualify the discourse process rather than the structure of utterances,
• they anchor the speaker’s message in her attitudes / feelings in an indirect or implicit way.

This anchoring can happen with the help of gestures and prosodical devices. A usual sub-categorization distinguishes the nuclear DIPs from the peripheral DIPs, the latter ones being an open class, with more or less propositional uses depending on the context. One can also distinguish 2 types of DIPs according to whether (i) they contribute to the structural organization (at the sentence or the text level) ; (ii) they qualify the cognitive aspects of language, or the interactional and cultural process involved. Concentrating on type (i), this paper will show how DIPs, core elements in orally transmitted languages of the Information Structuring process, and especially of the pre- and postrhematic detached constructions, tend to become an endangered species when an oral language is suddenly introduced into new communication fields – written style and the media. Examples will be taken from a few Finno-Ugric and Indo-European languages.


References

• FERNANDEZ-VEST M.M.Jocelyne, 1994, Les particules énonciatives dans la construction du discours, Paris, PUF, coll. Linguistique nouvelle, 283 p.
•  - 2005, « Information structure and typological change : Northern Sami challenged by Indo-European models », in M.M.J. Fernandez-Vest (dir.), Les langues ouraliennes aujourd’hui. Approche linguistique et cognitive – The Uralic languages today. A cognitive and linguistic approach, Préface de Claude Hagège, Paris, Ed. Honoré Champion, Bibl. de l’Ecole des Hautes Etudes, N° 340, p. 563-576.
• - in press 2008, « Typological evolution of Northern Sami : spatial cognition and Information Structuring », Suomalais-Ugrilaisen Seuran Aikakauslehti – Journal de la Société Finno-Ougrienne, SUSA- JSFOu 92, 21 p.
• FERNANDEZ-VEST M.M.Jocelyne & CARTER-THOMAS Shirley (éds.). 2004. Structure informationnelle et Particules Enonciatives – essai de typologie, Paris, Ed. L’Harmattan, coll. Grammaire & Cognition 1-2, 362 p.