Íslenskt mál og almenn málfræði - 2020, Qupperneq 158

(93)a. Það er liðinn hálfur dagurinn. (Ice.)
expl is gone half day.def
‘Half the day is gone.’
b. Það er hálfur dagurinn liðinn.
expl is half day.def gone
(94)a. Det kunde gå hela eftermiddagen. (Swe.)
expl could go whole afternoon.def
‘The whole afternoon could pass.’
b. Det kunde hela eftermiddagen gå.
expl could whole afternoon.def go (NDC)
It is debatable whether the examples presented in section 5.3 should be
considered as presentational sentences. In some sense they introduce a
new situation with a so far unmentioned referent, but unlike the data dis-
cussed in sections 1–4, they do not assert or deny the existence of this
referent. Rather, they express a new fact involving a referent which is
normally available and which hence can be referred to by a definite DP.
We have chosen not to identify the definite DPs as pivots (they are not
in bold) and think of these types as different kinds of impersonal con-
structions.
5.4 Summary
In this section we briefly discussed three constructions where Icelandic
and Swedish differ. We think that the presentational clefts used in
Swedish are bona fide presentational sentences and that they provide a
useful strategy for overcoming the restriction on transitive verbs in pre-
sentational sentences in that language. They are apparently not used in
Icelandic to the same extent, but then Icelandic has the option of IP-
pivots for Agents of transitive verbs. The expressive construction is proba -
bly not a presentational sentence given that we find pronominal subjects
in this type. Finally the examples with trapped definite DPs in Icelandic
are not presentationals but another way of making a situation dependent
all-focus utterance.
There is another interesting type, discussed briefly in Engdahl et al.
(2018) in connection with example (95) from Rögnvaldsson (1984:365)
(see also Sigurðsson 1989:295f., 2010 and Thráinsson 2007:324ff.).
Engdahl, Sigurðsson, Zaenen and Maling158