Epistemic sentence-initial constructions as incongruity markers: English “it is ironic [that]” vs Persian “bāmaze ast [ke]”

Abstract

This article compares the sentence-initial constructions it is ironic that in English with the Persian bāmaze ast ke [lit. with.taste is that] to argue that such framing clauses seem to be ‘epistemic phrases’ expressing event knowledge of speakers, being utilised in the form of extraposed initial constructions for focus-marking. They are discourse markers that are intended to frame perception of event incongruity and are submitted as a matter of intersubjective deliberation in the form of sentence-initial phrases in the sense that they mark the speaker’s orientation towards what they (are about to) say—presenting speakers’ epistemic knowledge of events and the conceptual (in)coherence of the world.