Subjectivity in Spanish Discourse: Explicit and Implicit Causal Relations in Different Contexts

Abstract

Corpus-based studies in various languages have demonstrated that some connectives are used preferentially to express subjective versus objective meanings, for example, omdat vs. want in Dutch. However, Spanish connectives have been understudied from this perspective. Moreover, most of the studies of subjectivity have focused on explicit relations and little is known about the subjectivity of implicit coherence relations. In addition, the role that context plays in the meaning and use of causal relations and their connectives is still under discussion. This study analyzes Spanish causal explicit and implicit relations in different contexts by carrying out manual text analyses, focused on subjectivity. 360 backward relations marked by three prototypical causal connectives and 120 backward implicit relations were extracted from academic and journalistic contexts. The analytical model is based on an integrative approach to subjectivity. Statistical analyses reveal no systematic profiles of Spanish connectives in terms of subjectivity. Furthermore, a significant three-way interaction between subjectivity, context, and linguistic marking is observed. Based on a solid corpus analysis, this study reveals new insights into the expression of subjectivity in Spanish discourse relations.