This corpus-based study shows an innovative way of analysing causal intersentential relations (]SR’s) in English, taking a global discourse view and moving beyond the limitations of previous studios. This stance has helped te a) identify the existence of alternative means of signalling causal ISR’s, besides con unas, such as: a great proportion of integrated intrinsic signals, certain peripheral signals and extrinsie signals; and it) (o establish a wide variety of factors which are vital for an adequate understanding of this aspect of discourse, but which hayo hardly been considered in previous accounts. Some of these factors refer to: 1) programme aspects of mho signalising of ISR’s; 2) the modifications the basic causal TSR moaning through mho use of integrated signals; 3) how thc oxplicit signalling of causal ISR’s is intimately intermingled with questions of most macrostructuring of discourse; and 4) the prospective nature of some signals.

Peer reviewed