The purpose of this article is to analyze the presence and absence of inversion and topicalization in Kurdish literature and its texts and to argue about how to explain the relationship between these processes based on sentence word order to classify the data; if the element preposed to the beginning of a sentence, it is considered preposing and if postponed to the end of the sentence it is considered postposing. The analysis has been based on information structure and pragmatics. In this article, to argue about the role of discoursal processes, inversion and topicalization in Kurdish have been studied from functional perspective. The following results can be revealed in both inversion and topicalization. Both of them match the marked topics and do not correspond with postposing. Topicalization is a process which is conditional and bound to preposing element. In both processes the commonest movement is preposing old information whether it is listener-old or discourse-old.

The position of words in a sentence and its effect on rhetoric is one of the most important topics that Abdul Qahir Jorjani has raised in "Nazm" theory. He examines the position of elements under the heading of "preposing and postposing", and, of course, in relation to definition and refinement. Jorjani’, s ideas are consistent with information construction and subject-information construction in Halliday's "Functional Grammar" theory which focuses on lexical arrangement in sentences. Vocabulary arrangement can be considered as one of the most prominent features and the basis of syntactic structure in the Garshaspnameh and the story of Bijan and Manijeh. Therefore, in this study, we have examined the prepositions and postpositions of the main elements of a sentence and analyzed the rhetorical function of each in about 3000 sentences of the two poems. In this regard, first we examine the frequency of preposing and postposing of the main elements in sentences which have a subject and also the sentences with a deleted subject in the mentioned range of two poems. Then we have entered the statistics in the tables representing the distribution in terms of number and percentage creating a precise analogy between the poems. Then, with reference to the table related to each section, we have analyzed the rhetorical function of the elements according to its position in the sentence. The results of the research suggest that in addition to compulsion in observing the meter, rhetorical intentions such as emphasis, paying tribute, humiliation, confinement, etc. have a significant effect on preposing and postposing the main elements of the sentence, and on the position and order of words in Ferdowsi and Asadi Tusi's poems. The Main rhetorical method of the two poets is their foregrounding of of the main elements, especially the verb as a means of emphasis.

This paper aims to investigate postposing in Modern spoken Persian. Persian is a verbfinal language; however, some constituents frequently follow the verb and appear in the post-verbal domain. Among the factors motivating this phenomenon, one of them is grammatical weight. The universal tendency proposed by typologists is the “ shortbefore-long principle” ; locating the heavy constituents after the light ones in order to ease the process of production and comprehension. Some studies advocate the position of long constituents before short ones in verb-final languages like Japanese and Korean. Based on the Persian spoken corpus, this research analyzes the postposed constituents according to their grammatical weight. It is observed that the heavier constituents are postposed more easily compared with the light ones; supporting the universal trend of placing heavy constituents after the light ones.

The present paper examines a phenomenon by means of which the main verb in yes-no questions in the spoken form of Persian can either optionally move to the front of the sentence or remain in-situ, intending to yield an interrogative interpretation. However, as the latest approaches to the study of the linguistic systems do not opt for optionality, the issue of the optionality of verb movement in such structures, which seems to be an unfortunate drawback, should be settled down in some way or another. More specifically, considering the theoretical framework of the paper, which is the feature checking mechanism within the Minimalist Program (Chomsky, 1981; 1982; 1993; 1995; 2000; 2001a-b), the optionality of verb-preposing in yes-no questions entails a contradiction in terms of the two-valued feature strength in the feature checking theory. A feature should be either [+ value] or [-value], and there is no in-between feature value. That is, a syntactic feature is either strong or weak, making the constituent it is associated with either move or remain in situ. Consequently, the optional movement of an element in syntax cannot be analyzed as having a strong and a weak feature simultaneously. To do away with this inconsistency regarding verb-preposing in yes-no questions in Persian, this paper proposes an alternative approach relying on the notion of Extended Projection Principle ([EPP]) feature. The EPP is considered by Chomsky (2000, 2000a) as a feature optionally assigned to the head of a syntactic phrase, providing the necessary impetus for the overt movement of such a projection or the constituent thereof. In fact, the EPP feature is taken to be a syntactic mechanism or a strong syntactic feature which induces the overt movement of a constituent to satisfy certain semantic and functional requirements. Turning to the Persian data, the adopted approach in this article considers checking the strong EPP-feature on the head of the focus phrase (FocP) as the trigger for verb-preposing in such constructions. In this approach, the difference between the verb fronting in yes-no questions, on the one hand, and its remaining in-situ, on the other hand, reduces to the optional selection of the EPP-feature from the lexicon by the head of the FocP. In the former case, after the verb has checked the strong EPP-feature on the head of FocP through movement to the Foco, it fails to move on to the head of CP due to the presence of the complementizer “ ke” (that) on the Co. Subsequently, the [-Q] feature on the Co is matched with the [+Q] feature of the verb through agree, hence checking the [-Q] feature of the Co. In the latter case, on the contrary, the [-Q] feature on the Co is checked against the [+Q] feature on the verb through agree only, with no movement involved.

The purpose of this corpus-oriented research is to investigate the effect of informative structure, grammatical function syntactic structure, verb type, grammatical weight and definiteness on the process of postposing in the spoken Sorani Kurdish language. Since the Kurdish language is an Iranian language like the Persian, it is a head-last language and verb ending sentences are considered unmarked but in the spoken language there is a greater tendency to produce marked sentences and postposing some constructions can be seen. In this research through relying on spoken corpus of Kurdish language taken from folklore collection (Ahmadi, 2020) and databased analysis, we have investigated the effective factors known by other researchers about the postposing process in the Kurdish language. This research shows that in Sorani spoken language, prepositional phrase constituent in indirect object and place adverb syntactic role with new informative structure move to after verb position and postposing occurs. In the case of predicate postposing, the type of copular verb is an effective factor. The direct object, subject, adverb of quantity and adverb of quality do not follow this principle except in limited cases that can be ignored. Grammatical weight and definiteness factors do not have effective role in postposing in this language.IntroductionEvery language has a special arrangement for the position of the constituents in the sentence. The important point is that the speaker unconsciously prefers an order of the constituents which makes it easier for the listener to process and understand the message. The speaker doesn’t always follow the predetermined linear order, and as a result, this leads to the production of a marked sentence. In fact, in marked sentences, there is a shift in sentence constituents from their original positions. One of the positions that constituents choose to move is the position after the verb. This displacement is known as postposing. In postposing, the constituent moves from the unmarked position to the marked one without any effect on the sentence meaning.The language under study in this article is Sorani Kurdish. As one of the Iranian languages, Kurdish like Persian is a verb-final language, and the verb-final sentences in this language are considered unmarked. However, in spoken Sorani Kurdish, there is a strong tendency to produce marked sentences and to postpose some constituents.     This analytical article uses a functional theoretical framework and a corpus-based approach to examine the spoken language of Sorani Kurdish in the Ravansar region. The data consists of folklore stories from the region that were recorded for this purpose. Given the frequency of postposing in the studied spoken language—and the lack of previous research in this area—it is important to investigate the factors influencing this process.     Many studies have been conducted in different languages about postposing and effective factors in this process. The most comprehensive research on colloquial Persian language has been carried out by Frommer (1981), Rasekh Mahand and Qhyasvand (2013), Izadi and Rasekh Mahand (2018). In English and Italian languages, studies have been conducted by Wasow (1991), Ward and Birner (2004). Yamashita and Chang (2001) have studied postposing in Japanese, and Haig (2022) has researched the Kurdish language.Methods The current study was conducted on the natural data from the Jafi dialect of the Sorani Kurdish language. These natural data are extracted from the collection of folk tales of  the city of Ravansar. This data source is available in recorded and archived form. The speech corpus in this study consists of 3835 sentences extracted from 90 folklore stories. Applying a quantitative method of research and a statistical analysis, the sentences were classified into two groups—marked and unmarked—based on whether the verb occurred at the end of the sentence or not. In this classification, the number of marked sentences was 3,436, while the number of unmarked sentences was 399. Among the 3436 marked sentences, 2865 of postposed constituents were prepositional phrase and the number of noun phrase was 571. The number and kind of postposed constituent by syntactic role were as follow: Adverb of place 1670, indirect object 1195, predicate 350, subject, direct object, adverb of time, adverb of quality, adverb of quantity overall was 187.Discussion and ConclusionIn this speech corpus, in terms of syntactic category, about 85%–90% of the postposed constituents are prepositional phrases, and in terms of grammatical role, they are primarily indirect objects and adverbs of place. The predicate ranks third, with a significant drop in frequency compared to the first two. The displacement percentage of direct object, subject, adverb of quality, adverb of quantity to the position after the verb compared to the previous three constructions is very small to the point that they can be considered accidental or exceptional. This research by investigating the effective factors in the postposing process such as grammatical weight, informative structure, familiarity, grammatical role, syntactic category and the type of relative verb, introduces informative structure, grammatical role and syntactic category as effective factors in postposing in this language and considers other factors ineffective.     In this language, prepositional phrases in two grammatical roles—indirect object and adverb of place—account for the highest percentage of postposing. Since these constituents, in both syntactic roles, convey new information from an informative structure perspective, their movement to the post-verbal position helps listeners process and understand the message more easily. In predicative sentences with linking verbs that express movement, change, and transformation, the predicate is also postposed. In these cases, the postposing of the predicate similarly serves to facilitate comprehension. This research concludes that semantics is the primary factor in determining the post-verbal positioning of constituents.Direct objects and subjects are not postposed, as they tend to express familiar or     assumed (old) information. The results show that the preferred linear order of constituents in Kurdish language is influenced by informative structure, syntactic category, syntactic role of constituents and the type of liking verb. Based on the statistical frequency of marked versus unmarked sentences in this research, we can draw the final conclusion that in spoken Kurdish, speakers have a strong tendency to postpose constituents conveying new information to a position after the verb. This facilitates easier transmission of the message and allows the listener to process and understand it more efficiently.Ethical ConsiderationsNot applicableFundingNot applicableConflict of interestThe authors declare no conflict of interest.

Persian owns a flexible syntax and is thought to be a free word order language. In this paper, employing a Role and Reference Grammar framework, we argue that constituent reordering in preposing and left-dislocation constructions of the Persian left-periphery is the result of the interface between information-discourse structure, on the one hand, and a certain syntactic position in the layered structure of the clause, on the other: topical, focused, and contrastive constituents are hosted respectively by the left-detached position, pre-core slot, and kontrast position. Bear in mind that each position requires a certain discourse condition to be met. We also show that non-canonical constituent orders at the Persian left-periphery are not merely a rearrangement of syntactic units for pragmatic reasons, they are in effect ‘ constituent ordering constructions’ in line with the notion of construction as proposed and defined in the RRG theory.

Insufficient scholarly inquiry exists regarding the function of genres and their pertinent discourse characteristics within the realm of Information Structure and its syntactic renderings in the Persian language. The present study, which is descriptive and corpus-based in nature, is designed to analyze three distinct genres of the Persian language –,specifically, political discourse, scientific discourse, and everyday conversation. The study aims to investigate the Information Structure present in these genres, as expressed through four key syntactic devices: clefting, pseudoclefting, passive voice, and preposing. In order to achieve the intended objective, one thousand distinct verbal expressions concerning each of the aforementioned genres were obtained from the multi-media database of the IRNA (Iranian News Agency) website and everyday dialogues amongst acquaintances and family members of the researchers, utilizing Lambrecht's theoretical framework for constructing the Information Structure. Following data collection, transcription was carried out and various syntactic devices were identified. Subsequently, descriptive statistics were utilized to analyze and understand the representation of these syntactic devices across different genre types. The findings indicated that there are distinct variations in the depiction of instruments across the three classifications of political discourse, scientific discourse, and commonplace discussions. This discovery may hold significance for scholars of linguistics and language theory.

The present study aimed to investigate diachronic changes in the frequency and function of marked syntactic structures, namely passive constructions, preposing, and cleft sentences that manifest information structural elements in Persian. The study examined these structures across three periods of Persian, i.e., Middle Persian, Dari, and Modern Persian. The data for Middle Persian is sourced from The Mēnōg-ī Khrad and Oshnar-I Dana, while for Dari, Tārīkh-i Bayhaqī and Safarnāma by Nasir Khusraw are used. For Modern Persian, written resources from various genres, such as short stories and scientific articles, are analyzed. The samples from each period are analyzed to determine the function and frequency of marked syntactic structures, which are then compared to identify any potential changes in their usage over time. The findings indicated that the frequency and function of these syntactic structures have changed over time. The findings suggested that passive constructions were commonly used across all three periods to present the patient as the pragmatic topic and maintain the topic-focus order. However, in modern Persian, passive construction was also used to emphasize the patient as the focus. Cleft constructions were not found in Middle Persian, but the increase in frequency of cleft constructions in Dari can be attributed to the fact that in this period, cleft sentences were used similarly to preposing, in order to observe the principle of separation of role and reference, rather than focusing on specific elements. Nonetheless, in modern Persian, cleft constructions were used to exclude other possibilities and emphasize the selected element as the focus. Preposing structures were used to present an element as the topic and provide new information about it. This study contributes to our understanding of language change and provides insights into the evolution of Persian syntax over time.

This article through studying the adverbial clauses order in Persian intends to show its relation with semantics, discourse, weight and iconicity. To do this, 1343 complex sentences including six semantic subtypes, i.e. temporal, conditional, causal, purposive, resultive and manner clauses, were selected. Statistical analysis based on corpus data from spoken and written Persian proved that the adverbial clauses exhibit a mixed pattern of pre- and postposing, although they often tend to precede the main clause. It was also shown that three of the four above-mentioned factors, namely semantics, discourse and iconicity influence the position of adverbial clauses. Semantics is the most important of competing forces, to be followed by iconicity which is especially effective on initial clauses. Weight, on the other hand, proved to be of no significance in the sequence of adverbial clauses.

This study investigates non-canonical syntax in the Persian language from a non-hierarchical perspective, emphasizing the significant role of information-structural triggers, including topic and focus, in shaping the non-canonical order of left-dislocated possessive constructions. We apply Optimality Theory (Prince & Smolensky, 1993, 2004) to account for the grammatical and pragmatic properties of these constructions. Additionally, we utilize Syntax First Alignment (Newson, 2004, 2010) to explore the constraints and discourse-pragmatic reasons for left-dislocated possessive constructions, particularly those related to left dislocation in Persian. While left dislocation may resemble preposing, it differs in that a co-referential pronoun occupies the canonical position of the marked constituent (Schiffrin & Hamilton, 2008). Dabir-Moghaddam (2005) explains that left dislocation involves moving an item to the sentence-initial position, with a resumptive pronoun taking its original place.