Unexpected left dislocation: An English Corpus Study

The discourse function of the syntactic construction left dislocation in English has received significant attention. Prior research has identified at least three distinct form-function correlations underlying left dislocation. This paper examines left dislocation tokens from a corpus of spoken English recorded in South Philadelphia. From this emerges a fourth type of left dislocation not previously identified. We define this variety of left dislocation, termed the Unexpected Subject type, via a Centering Theory analysis of the surrounding discourse. This finding adds even greater diversity to the potential discourse functions underlying the left dislocation construction, and thus lends important support to the claim that the association between syntactic form and discourse function is arbitrary. Future research utilizing much larger corpora will not only allow us to hone the definition of the Unexpected Subject type, but may also reveal that there are indeed more discourse functions of the left dislocation construction that have not been identified.