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Re: "dark horse"(revised)
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sues
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Sep 14, 2009 03:53 PDT
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Hi Damien, Tami
I like the last part of your definition best Damien. That works for phrases like "He IS a funny one, isn't he." when something unusual or unexpected has been done by the He here. :-)
Sue
________________________________
From: Damien Hall <djh-@york.ac.uk>
To: phone-@topica.com
Sent: Monday, 14 September, 2009 10:09:23 PM
Subject: RE: [phonlist] "dark horse"(revised)
Dear Tami
You asked:
| | Would you tell me why the be-verb has the nuclear accent whereas 'dark horse' fails to be accented? Thank you very much in advance.
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I think it's basically to do with contrast. Neither 'dark' nor 'horse' is accented because neither of those elements is contrasted with anything (in that they are instances of the idiom _dark horse_ 'someone who, possibly surreptitiously, has done something / habitually does things which are not expected but are advantageous to that person, and usually are admired by the person giving the label') (I'm sure I could have defined it more succinctly than that!). That is, there is no idiom 'white horse' (etc) which could have caused 'dark' to receive contrastive stress, and no idiom 'dark cow' (etc) which could have caused 'horse' to receive contrastive stress. Furthermore, as 'dark horse' is an idiom, it may in any case be opaque to phonological processes such as division so that only one element of it can receive contrastive stress.
On the other hand, in my opinion, the be-verb receives stress in these sentences because it is contrasting the situation in question with the normal state of affairs, which is that most people (by definition) are not dark horses.
Hope that helps!
All the best
Damien
-- Damien Hall
University of York
Department of Language and Linguistic Science
Heslington
YORK
YO10 5DD
UK
Tel. (office) +44 (0)1904 432665
(mobile) +44 (0)771 853 5634
Fax +44 (0)1904 432673
BORDERS AND IDENTITIES CONFERENCE, JAN 2010:
http://www.york.ac.uk/res/aiseb/bic2010/
http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/lang/people/pages/hall.htm
--
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