Relating agent prominence to discourse prominence: DO-clefts in German

Abstract The article investigates the hypothesis that prominence phenomena on different levels of linguistic structure are systematically related to each other. More specifically, it is hypothesized relations in morphosyntax reflect, and contribute to, management discourse. This empirically based phenomenon agentivity clines, i.e. observation relevance features such as volition or sentience variable across constructions. While some constructions, including German DO-clefts, show a strong preference for highly agentive verbs, other basic active have no particular requirements regarding verb, except at least one feature should be present. Our predicts this discourse constraints felicitous use given construction, which turn, course, requires an explicit statement constraints. We propose original account DO-clefts using ‘Question Under Discussion’ framework. Here, we hypothesize render prominent implicit question from set alternative questions available point developing then yields question-answer pair changes thematic conclude with observations possibility relating morphosyntactic (high agentivity) (making Question Discussion by way clefting).