Abstract

The premise of this dissertation is that theorists must rethink the disciplinary boundaries that exclude linguistics from informing literary theory. This dissertation provides an interdisciplinary argument to show that readers rely not only on their world knowledge to interpret narrative texts, but that there are also text-based cues present in the text itself that are not simply the product of the readers' interpretation. The basis for the premise is the integration of ideas from Paul Ricoeur and Robert Longacre. In particular, the fact that there is a relationship between Ricoeur's emplotment, the organization of events, and Longacre's notion of a grammar of discourse, the grammatical structure of narrative texts, provides Longacre the opportunity to inform literary theory. Text-based cues mark the hierarchical organization of information, the progression towards peak, and patterns of participant reference. Through the convergence of lexical, syntactic, and semantic cues, the author moves the reader forward from the beginning, through the middle, to the end of the story. In this way the grammar of discourse closes the distance between author and reader. The detailed argument from Hausa narrative presented in the dissertation shows also that the principles of discourse grammar are not configurational but are pragmatic; thus, there is additional support for the need for a pragmatics module to supplement the Principles and Parameters Theory of syntax