Re: The opposite of resumptive

René Uittenbogaard wrote:
> You mean constructions like this?
>
> - It was not clear whether he knew or not.
>
> In Dutch we call this a "provisional subject".
Sometimes known as the "anticipatory subject' in English, tho I believe
it's more commonly known as "extrapositive it".

> René
>
>
> Remi Villatel <maxilys@...> wrote:
>
>> The boy hit the ball. I saw it. ("it" is resumptive.)
This is not what I have understood by 'resumptive'. Isn't just plain
'anaphor'?

I thought 'resumptive' denoted:
1. an overt pronoun appearing in a relative clause in its 'logical'
position, instead of a gap; an example from Trask is:
"That's the woman that I didn't know if _she_ was coming or not." Some
languages like Welsh use resumptive pronouns in most relative clauses.
2. I what is called _left-dislocation_, the pronoun occurs in the
non-dislocated part, e.g. "This book, I really like it".

So in "The ball, the boy hit it" and "The ball which the boy hit it I
saw over there", the pronoun _it_ is resumptive. IME resumptive pronouns
are frequently used by some Brit speakers in relative clauses beginning
with "which".

>> I saw this: The boy hit the ball. ("this" isn't resumptive.)
Nope - AFAIK it's cataphor

--
Ray
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