Getting at discourse referents

Abstract

I examine how discourse anaphoric uses of the definite pronoun it contrast with similar uses of the demonstrative pronoun thai. Their distinct contexts of use are characterized in terms of two contextual features-perslstence of grammatical subject and persistence of gr,~mmatical form-which together demonstrate very clearly the interrelation among lexical choice, grammatical choices and the dimension of time in signalling the dynamic attentional state of a discourse.