Connecting Information Structure and Discourse Structure through ``Kontrast'': The Case of Colloquial Russian Particles -TO, ŽE, and VED'

The notion of kontrast, or the ability of certain linguistic expressions to generate a set of alternatives, originally proposed by Vallduví and Vilkuna (1998) as a clause-level concept, is re-analyzed here as connecting the level of information packaging in the clause and the level of discourse structure in the following way: kontrast is encoded at the clausal level but has repercussions for discourse structure. This claim is supported by evidence from the distribution properties of three colloquial Russian particles -to, že, andved' which are analyzed as unambiguous markers of kontrast. Both the placement of these particles at the clausal level and their role in discourse are viewed as consequences of the type of the kontrast set and the cognitive status of information marked by each particle.