Information Structure and Direct Object Indexation in Persian Fatemeh Bahrami Department of Linguistics, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran Vali Rezai Department of Linguistics, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran Abstract—Object indexation is a grammatical phenomenon in which a clitic pronoun, co-referential with the free nominal object, appends to the verb. Optionality of indexation in Persian leads us to consider the role of pragmatic factors in its occurring. The present study aims at investigating the influence of information structure on direct object indexation in Persian. To do this, the data of standard spoken Persian including 540 cases were extracted from various resources and then analyzed within the framework of Role and Reference Grammar. The high frequency of topical direct object indexation confirms the role of information structure in direct object indexation. Analyzing the few cases of focal direct object indexation indicated that all cases of both topical and focal object indexation necessarily involve identifiable referents. Hence, the basic requirement in direct object indexation in Persian is identifiability of its referent. Considering the syntactic position of direct object in Persian clauses shows strong overlap of topical and focal objects. The post-core slot only belongs to the topical direct object and focal object cannot be placed there. Therefore, in order to identify the pragmatic relations of direct object in a clause, considering the context of the discourse is highly important. Index Terms—object indexation, information structure, topic, focus, identifiability I. INTRODUCTION Object indexation occurs when a co-indexed clitic is placed on the verb beside the overt accusative noun phrase in the clause (Belloro, 2007, p. 72). This grammatical phenomenon is also available in Persian. In the following transitive clauses, in addition to the obligatory subject agreement marker, a pronominal clitic which is co-referential with the object is also joined to the verb. (1) mɑn dɑniɑl o 1 tanhɑ bozorg.eʃ 2 kɑrdɑm I Daniel OM lonely large.obj index3SG do.PAST.1SG I raised Danial by myself. (2) behʃɑd pesɑr.e ʔɑqɑye moxtɑri ro miʃnɑs.i.ʃ Behshad son.EZ Mr.EZ Mokhtari OM know.PRES.2SG.obj index3SG Do you now Behshad, Mr Mokhtari’s son? The point to be mentioned in these structures is that joining these pronominal clitic is optional; but this does not mean that all accusative noun phrases can be freely indexed. Rather, it seems that discoursal factors such as definiteness, identifiability and information structure of object noun phrases are also effective in indexation. In the present study, we are to investigate the indexation of direct object in Persian using the functional approach of Role and Reference Grammar; the issue not having been adequately considered in structuralist approaches due to ignoring pragmatic aspects of language. Considering relatively free word order of clause elements in Persian on the one hand, and optionality of direct object indexation on the other hand, the information structure theory in Role and Reference Grammar seems to provide an appropriate tool for analyzing this grammatical phenomenon in Persian. In this study, we aim at answering the question of whether the pragmatic relationship of a direct object (its focus structure) and the object’s referent status in terms of identifiability are effective in indexation. The second question is whether the topical and focal objects occupy different positions in the clause. To do this, after a brief review of some studies done on this issue, the theoretical framework is introduced in section 3. Afterwards, Persian examples are investigated and analyzed according to information structure theory. 1 . "râ", "ro" and "o" are allomorphs of the same morpheme i.e "object marker" 2 . Object Indexation Marker can join to the verbal or preverbal component of a compound verb ISSN 1799-2591 Theory and Practice in Language Studies, Vol. 4, No. 3, pp. 551-561, March 2014 © 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER Manufactured in Finland. doi:10.4304/tpls.4.3.551-561 © 2014 ACADEMY PUBLISHER