This paper first develops a theoretically motivated view of narrative as a special form of inferential, cooperative human communication, of the role that the past tense plays in the intersubjective coordination of narrators and readers, viz. that of ‘curtailing’ the immediate argumentative applicability of the represented situation, and of its relation to viewpoint management. In three case studies, it is subsequently shown how this helps to elucidate certain effects of present and past tense alternations in stories. While these effects are (...) multi-faceted and highly text-specific, there is a common denominator of the use of the past tense in the dimension of narrator-reader communication in the narratives. The analysis supports an independently motivated conception of intersubjectivity that assigns a special status to ‘coordination with other minds’, apart from senders and addressees. (shrink)

Coordinating different viewpoints is an essential part of human interaction. Languages have evolved conventional ways of supporting this process: many linguistic items are somehow involved in viewpoint management, ranging from morphological elements and lexical units to grammatical constructions and narrative patterns. In this paper we propose a conceptual model for analysing how particular instances (or combinations) of such linguistic items can be used to coordinate the viewpoints of signallers, addressees, and third parties involved in an interaction event. In essence, our (...) model augmentsLangacker’s (1987)“viewing arrangement” through the addition of a third dimension to the existing two. We discuss the details of our model using a range of examples from spoken discourse, newspaper articles, and literary fiction, and end by placing it in broader discussions on human social cognition. (shrink)