Contrastive Focus and Contrastive Topic in Information Structure——With Comments on the Characteristics of Topical Focus

This paper compares two important subcategories in information structure,namely,contrastive focus and contrastive topic.Though both subcategories perform the pragmatic function of contrasting,they are quite different both formally and functionally.We argue that the concept of "topical focus" proposed by Xu Liu is actually identical to contrastive topic,rather than focus.We also analyze why these two subcategories could easily get confused and present a different view on the nature of the contrastive NP following lian in the lian clause in Chinese.