Discourse motivations of mental construal and the expression of stance in speech: a case study of English

Despite the use of the temporal indicator then in the above example, there is no obvious temporal link with the previously mentioned event, but rather, a close look at (or a comment on) the internal perceptual experience.

The discussed contrast between clauses with P- and S-subjects as associated with the distinction between event-frames and internal experiences, respectively, is reflected in different functions of the adverb now in these clauses. Thus, the use of now in a P-subject clause, as in (36), puts the described epistemic event (was aware) on a temporal plane with respect to the previously mentioned event (he said):

(36) "You know, ” he said, and he was aware now that his words were a little slurred (Du Maurier D., The Rendezvous (Stories'), p. 110).

The use of now with the preceding and in the above example signals that there is a point in time (now) that separates the stance event (he was aware) from the prior speech event (he said). This use of now fits the definition of the adverb that is formulated in Cambridge Dictionary of the English Language in the following way: “used in stories or reports of past events to describe a new situation or event” (Cambridge Online: http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/now).

Unlike (36), the use of now in the example below introduces the point at which the prior event(s) are interpreted rather than located in a temporal sequence:

(37) London must have gone raving mad. He'd told them -- that was the joke -- he 'd told them to leave her alone. And now it was clear that [...] from the very moment he left England [...] some fool had gone round [...] paying the bills, settling the grocer, the landlord; above all Liz (Le Carrй J., The Spy who Came In from the Cold, p. 191).

In (37), the clause with anticipatory it construes the epistemic positioning of the character (it was clear that) as an internal experience where now marks the point of mental apprehension which results from the analysis of the prior event (he 'd told them to leave her alone). In this context, the adverb now can be defined in the following way: “used when describing a situation that is the result of what someone just said or did” (Cambridge Dictionary Online: http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/now). The connotation of result that is introduced by now into the sentence as a whole comes from the implication of mental awareness and the associated sense of mental processing, or analysis, that is activated by anticipatory it in this discursive context. The connotation of analysis, in turn, contributes to the realization of narrative strategy of commenting on the epistemic experience by contrast with the strategy of reporting a similar experience (it was clear that -- he was aware that) in a temporal sequence.

Conclusion

The conducted study of alternations in uses of stance-clauses headed by subjects that refer to either participants or abstract setting as two distinct types of conceptual archetypes has shown that cognitive differences between the linguistic units signifying the two conceptual structures (typically, personal pronouns vs. anticipatory it) are rooted in the discursively relevant facets of these structures and are motivated in actual discourse by communicative distinctions made in the context of speech. It has been established that the choice of stance expressions with participant- and setting-subjects is motivated, respectively, by the distinctions that arise in discourse between actual and mentally represented types of reality, the contrast between reference-making and viewing as types of cognitive events and the distinction between event-schemas and mental experiences. As evidenced by linguistic data, these discursively relevant distinctions are related to narrative and dialogic strategies that are used in literary texts for the expression of stance with the alternative stance-clauses.

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