Representing discourse in clausal syntax: The ki particle in Pharasiot Greek

Abstract

In Pharasiot Greek, an Asia Minor Greek dialect, a certain particle copied from Turkish, ki, is employed in a number of seemingly unrelated constructions. Close scrutiny, however, reveals that in each of these constructions, ki is employed as a device geared to influencing the interlocutor’s epistemic vigilance. Based on the Cartographic Approach which defends the syntactization of the interpretive domains, I propose that this unique semantics of ki should be represented in the clause structure. Following recent work which advocates the existence of a pragmatic field—Speech Act Phrase (SAP) in particular—above the CP-layer, where discourse and pragmatic roles are mapped onto syntax, I propose that ki is the overt exponent of SA 0 and is further endowed with a [+ sentience] feature indexing the speaker as the sentient mind. The apparent differences between various construction types which involve ki—hence, in which SAP projects—then reduce to whether the [+ sentience] feature on SA 0 is checked by an internally or externally merging category in Spec, SAP.