Tel Aviv University

We all have strong intuitions about a connection between Coordination and the notion of "equivalence" (Hebrew: , תוליקש). This is reflected by the fact that researchers often use terms like ‘parallelism’, ‘similarity’, or ‘symmetry’ when providing structural definitions of coordinated constructions (e.g., Azar 1977; Haspelmath, 2007; Van Valin 1990). Certain questions, such as the following, remain unaddressed in this connection: (1) What exactly is meant by "equivalence"? (2) What components go to make up structural equivalence? (3) Are all coordinated constructions equivalent? The present study aims to refine the notion of "equivalence" between two or more clauses combined by processes of coordination. Following Reinhart’s (1995) idea of equivalence as a means of narrative evaluation, I apply a set of carefully defined criteria to examine the equivalence relations between what Haspelmath terms coordinands in coordinated constructions occurring in a naturalistic sample of orally elicited Hebrew narratives. Analysis was applied to 300 coordinated constructions from three narrative samples (Picturebook-based narratives, Picture-series-based narratives, and Personalexperience narratives) and its main goal was to shed light on the relationship between coordinated constructions and the notion of equivalence by examining whether and, if so, how and to what degree, structural equivalence constitutes an organizing principle for processes of coordination in Hebrew narratives. The results of this study show that irrespective of narrative genre – equivalence scores of coordinated constructions come to around one-third of the maximal possible equivalence score. This finding raises a question as to the importance of structural equivalence as a characteristic of coordinated constructions.