Interaction between grammatical phenomena and information structure in Northern Mansi

Abstract

This article provides an overview of grammatical phenomena that are related to information structure in Northern Mansi, such as passive voice, object agreement, variation of participant coding in ditransitive constructions, non-possessive uses of the 3sg possessive marker, zero-reference, and discourse particles. I provide both a survey of previous research on the topic as well as present my suggestions on expanding the information-structural approach to these phenomena by considering other discourse-relevant parameters, such as the referential status and animacy of the participants, text genre, and narrative strategies.