'La verdad (es que)': Significado nuclear y atenuante

Abstract

The aims of this research are to define the attenuating function in the uses of la verdad (es que) and to evaluate the counter expectation value in the awakening of this pragmatic function. La verdad (es que) has been generally defined as a reinforcement discourse marker (Portolés, 1998; Fuentes 2009, 2012), even if some recent studies have shown that it is mostly used as an attenuating device (González & Maldonado, 2007; Soler, 2015a). Based on this assumption, the research analyses the attenuating uses of this construction in a corpus of synchronic oral and written texts in peninsular Spanish, which cover different genres and registers, in order to explain which discourse circumstances cause its pragmatic development. The results of this analysis suggest that the inferential process which the counter expectation value of la verdad (es que)draws, in two dimensions, explains the attenuation source in the interactional discourse.