Optional word omission, such as that omission in complement and relative clauses, has been argued to be driven by produc-tion pressure (rather than by comprehension). One particularly strong production-driven hypothesis states that speakers insert words to buy time to alleviate production difficulties. I present evidence from the distribution of disfluencies in non-subject-extracted relative clauses arguing against this hypothesis. While word omission is driven by production difficulties, speakers may use that as a collateral signal to addressees, informing them of anticipated production difficulties. In that sense, word omission would be subject to audience design (i.e. catering to addresseesÂ’ needs).
Cite as: Jaeger, T.F. (2005) Optional that indicates production difficulty: evidence from disfluencies. Proc. Disfluency in Spontaneous Speech (DiSS 2005), 103-108
@inproceedings{jaeger05_diss,
author={T. Florian Jaeger},
title={{Optional that indicates production difficulty: evidence from disfluencies}},
year=2005,
booktitle={Proc. Disfluency in Spontaneous Speech (DiSS 2005)},
pages={103--108}
}