Quelle(s) fonction(s) pour donc en français oral ?: Du connecteur conséquentiel au marqueur de structuration du discours

The article investigates the multi-functional status of the French connective donc (‘so’) showing on the basis of a corpus analysis that the connective may be used to structure the discourse at different levels. The study distinguishes four main functions for donc: consequential, recapitulating, reformulating, and discursive. In the discourse situation, donc may acquire properly discursive functions reaching beyond its primary consequential function. This functional evolution partially parallels a loss of the specific semantico-syntactic features of consequential donc.