60 ROBERT D. VAN VALIN, JR.
clauses which share a common topical participant; Dixon (1972) labelled
the corresponding constructions in Dyirbal "topic chains". Examples from
English are given in (40).(40) a. Mary¡ walked into the department store, (^0) { looked at a
couple of dresses, 0¡ bought one, 0¡ went up to the cof
feeshop, 0j ordered a cup of coffee and 0¡ rested her weary
feet.
b. Miltj strolled into the casino 0¡ wearing a fake beard, wig and
glasses, but 0¡ was immediately recognized by the security
people and 0¡was unceremoniously escorted back out to the
street.
Mary is the primary topical participant in (40a) and Milt is in (40b); they
function as pivot in each clause. Mary is an actor in each of the clauses in
(40a), and accordingly active voice is used in all clauses. In (40b), on the
other hand, Milt is an actor only in the first two clauses and the undergoer
in the last two; passive constructions are used to allow it to function as
pivot. It appears, then, that in topic chains like these, the choice of which
argument will function as pivot is affected by discourse pragmatic consider
ations, in particular by a desire to keep the primary topical participant in
the unmarked topic position in the clause. All of these clauses are predicate
focus constructions, and this is crucial, for it is difficult to have zero
anaphora in a clause following a non-predicate focus construction, as the
following examples from Lambrecht (1986, 1988) show.
(41) a. There's John¡ and he¡'s reading a book,
b. ^There's John¡ and (^0) { is reading a book.
John is sitting there and 0¡ is reading a book.
(42) Q: Who married Rosa?
a. JOHNJ did but hej didn't really love her.
b. ??JOHNJ did but 0j didn't really love her.
(43) Q: Did John marry Rosa?
A: Hej did, but /0^ didn't really love her.
(41a) is a presentational construction in which John is focal, and it is not
possible to have it as the antecedent for zero anaphora, as (41b) shows. In
(42a), John is a narrow focus (the answer to a WH-question) and likewise
cannot be an antecedent for zero anaphora, as (42b) shows. Contrast these
examples with (41c) and (43), in which John is clearly established as topical