A Relevance-theoretic Approach to the Discourse Marker Hasa ‘now’ in Jordanian Arabic

Abstract

The study aims at investigating the discourse marker hasa ‘now’ in Jordanian Arabic using relevance theory. The study also examined the grammaticalization of hasa and how it developed to be a discourse marker. The study also explored the functions of hasa in Jordanian Arabic. The data, which consisted of 500 tokens of hasa ‘now,’ were collected from Jordanian radio programs, personal communications, and interviews with native speakers of Jordanian Arabic. The study found out that hasa ‘now’ was developed from the phrase hay ilsaʕah ‘this hour’ by the process of grammaticalization. The study also found out that the lexical meaning of hasa as an adverb meaning ‘now’ developed to be a discourse marker serving different functions. The study also showed that hasa limits the hearer to a possible interpretation of utterances, which helps the hearer to reach the optimal relevance.