Targeted Construction Storyboard: Sisi Makes Money

“Sisi Makes Money” is a storyboard to be used in targeted production tasks in linguistic fieldwork, see Burton & Mathewson (2015) for details concerning the methodology. The dataset consists of a pdf with the image panels as well as a plain-text file with the script.

[Strang Burton & Lisa Matthewson (2015), "Targeted Construction Storyboards in Semantic Fieldwork," in M. Ryan Bochnak & Lisa Matthewson (eds.), Methodologies in Semantic Fieldwork (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 135-156.]

DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.10664152

::Sisi Makes Money::

DESCRIPTION: Lethabo's friend Sisi needs some money. Lethabo gives her some ideas about how to get it.

This storyboard aims to elicit teleological / circumstantial possibility modal expressions and their interactions with causal structures.

TAGS: modality, circumstantial possibility, teleological possibility

CREATED BY: Thera Marie Crane

ILLUSTRATED BY: Matilda Carbo

The pdf can be modified. Please cite the original version when using or adapting.

The creation of this storyboard was financed by the Finnish Research Council grant "Accommodating Linguistic Diversity in Conversation: Modal Expressions and Multilingualism in South Africa“.

The format of this introduction is copied directly (and modified) from zenodo.org (by Vera Hohaus)

 

::Sisi Makes Money::

1.    Lethabo and her friend Sisi are talking [note: names can change!]
2.    Sisi says: I need money.
3.    Lethabo says: If you want money, you can rob a bank 
4.    Lethabo says: But if you rob a bank, you might go to jail. 
5.    Lethabo says: If you want to make lots of money, you can go to university.
6.    Lethabo says: If you have a university degree, you can get a good job. 
7.    Lethabo says: If you get a good job, you’ll make lots of money.
8.    Lethabo says: But going to university takes a long time.
9.    Lethabo says: If you want to earn money quickly, you can get some chickens.   
10.    Lethabo says: If you have chickens, you can sell their eggs.
11.    Lethabo says: Or, you can wait until the eggs hatch so you can sell the chicks. 
12.    Sisi says: Yes, I will get chickens and sell the eggs.
13.    Sisi says: Can you give me some money so I can buy the chickens?