'Apparently' in an English-Swedish Cross-linguistic Perspective

Abstract

Evidential markers have the function of indicating the source of information or evidence on which a statement is based. The aim of the present paper is to identify and disentangle the different evidential and epistemic meanings of the evidential adverb apparently through the lens of its translations into Swedish and other languages (German and French) in parallel corpora. The empirical findings from the translations show that apparently can cover many types of evidence and degrees of epistemic commitment. The evidential and epistemic modal meanings of apparently are separate but related to each other. The correspondences show that apparently has the evidential meanings inferential justification and hearsay (reportive justification). As shown by the correspondences, apparently can also have epistemic modal meanings indicating partial epistemic support. The correspondences of apparently as a seem-type verb used as a catenative have a hedging or downtoning function. The correspondences show that apparently can also situate an event in the domain of unreal or ‘what is apparent rather than real’. In terms of epistemic modality apparently has the meaning of neutral support where it represents epistemic meanings that can be characterized as completely uncertain or complete ignorance.