Interpersonal Grammar in Spanish

Abstract

This chapter develops a carefully reasoned analysis of Spanish resources enacting the negotiability of propositions and proposals. Following a review of the ways in which English and French structure the negotiability of moves in conversation, the chapter turns to Spanish – demonstrating that it is the Predicator function, realised by verbal group resources, that manages the negotiability of the clause (with respect to those resources ‘most at risk’ in the exchange). The chapter shows that functions such as Subject or Finite have no place in the interpersonal grammar of a Spanish clause and closes with an overview of basic negotiatory structures in Romance languages, from the perspective of functional language typology.