The Right Periphery in Colloquial Hebrew: Modality and Language Contact Driven Effects

Abstract

The article discusses structural and functional properties of non-canonical constituents in the right periphery in Modern Hebrew, by comparison with their left periphery correlates. It is argued that the left periphery constructions are evident in both written and spoken modalities and that the right periphery constructions characterize the spoken modality. The discourse functions of both constructions are shown to follow from their respective modality constraints. It is suggested that the late emergence of the right periphery structures in Modern Hebrew might be due to their existence in the languages with which Hebrew was in contact.