Donkey disjunctions and overlapping updates

This paper is devoted to an analysis of anaphoric dependencies in disjunctive sentences, and consequences for the understanding of the ∃/∀ ambiguity observed with donkey anaphora. The primary focus is on donkey disjunctions, which are sentences where a (negated) existential in an initial disjunct appears to bind a pronoun in a later disjunct, such as "Either there\u27s no bathroom, or its upstairs". The main empirical focus is that donkey disjunctions, like donkey anaphora, exhibit the ∃/∀ ambiguity, and more generally oscillate between homogeneous and heterogeneous readings in a context-sensitive fashion. The paper then proceeds in two steps: first, a principled analysis of donkey disjunctions is developed in the context of a Bilateral Update Semantics (BUS). BUS, by default, generates heterogeneous readings for donkey anaphora/donkey disjunctions (i.e., ∃ readings, in a positive context). In order to account of homogeneous readings, the conjecture is that sentences may be interpreted exhaustively relative to their negations. This has non-trivial consequences due to the non-classicality of BUS — specifically, a failure of the Law of Non-Contradiction

Movement and interpretation of quantifiers in internally-headed relative clauses

This paper addresses the semantic typology of internally-headed relative clauses using a case study of two West African languages, Atchan (Kwa) and Bùlì (Gur). Both languages exhibit syntactically-similar relatives, involving overt movement of the head. However, quantifiers on the head are interpreted differently in the two languages. In Atchan, quantifiers on the relative-clause head take the entire relative clause as their restriction; in Bùlì, quantifiers on the head take only the head noun as their restriction. I propose that the former is interpreted via NP reconstruction and Trace Conversion, the latter via DP reconstruction. The empirical difference between these two languages motivates a revision to the typology developed by Grosu (2012), which tightly links head movement and the Atchan-like quantifier interpretation pattern. This work further supports a a modular view in which languages can adopt different strategies to interpret movement-involving structures

Focus on demonstratives: Experiments in English and Turkish

This paper deals with an unexpected contrast between demonstrative descriptions and definite descriptions on their anaphoric uses. If two (or more) discourse referents are introduced in the preceding sentence, it is perfectly natural to refer to one of them in the following sentence using a definite description. Use of demonstrative descriptions in the same context, however, is degraded, with existing accounts of anaphoric demonstratives and definites providing no explanation for this contrast. We present experimental evidence from two languages, one with definite determiners (English) and one without (Turkish), and show that the acceptability of demonstratives depends independently both on (i) whether one or two NPs are introduced in the initial sentence, and (ii) whether the follow-up sentence introduces a new situation or not. We propose a focus-driven information structural approach to demonstratives to account for this pattern. Following Dayal & Jiang (2021) (building on Schwarz 2009) in assuming that definite and demonstrative expressions in anaphoric contexts are similar in including an anaphoric index argument, we argue that demonstratives essentially differ in evoking focus alternatives on the index argument

Epistemic bias anti-lincenses NPIs in polar questions

There is general agreement that the distribution of any is unrestricted in polar questions. I argue that this is not the case: in contexts where there is epistemic bias in favor of the prejacent of a polar question, the question exhibits the same behavior as a declarative with respect to the licensing of any. I provide an account for this observation in terms of intervention: epistemic bias forces polar questions to be parsed as having a silent modal E which intervenes between any and the question operator whether that otherwise licenses any

On the emergence of an aspectual NPI: comparative polysemy and the case of Diyari marla

Cross-linguistically, morphological material that expresses comparison (e.g. more) appears to be colexified with aspectual (“phasal”) adverbs that, under negation, encode the termination of some eventuality (CESSATIVEs, e.g. *(not)...anymore). Using data drawn from the Diyari language of central Australia, we propose a diachronic trajectory for the lexical item marla ‘very, truly’. This word first developed a comparative semantics and, subsequently, a cessative reading restricted to negative polar contexts. This proposal moves us towards a lexical entry that permits for the unification of comparative and aspectual readings for items which exhibit this polysemy and—on the basis of robust pragmatic principles— predicts their polarity-sensitive distribution cross-linguistically

Semifactives in comparatives

This is more complicated than I realized. How are we to understand the status of realize\u27s complement in a sentence like this? What sort of relationship must this complement bear to its matrix environment, in light of realize\u27s status as a cognitive factive or semifactive predicate (Kiparsky & Kiparsky 1970; Karttunen 1971)? Comparative constructions, I suggest, do much to illuminate the nature of semifactives and the semantic–pragmatic status of their clausal complements. Specifically, I propose that semifactives support graded awareness—knowledge of something less, but not more, than the full truth with respect to some question or issue—while requiring that their complement be informationally consistent with the matrix environment, rather than presupposed true. The picture that emerges fits naturally with pragmatic approaches to presupposition generation and projection (Beaver 2010; Simons, Beaver, Roberts & Tonhauser 2017; Degen & Tonhauser 2022) and depends on sensitivity to scalar polarity and orientation (Kennedy 2001)

Are there “weak” definites in bare classifier languages?

This paper motivates a new view on the typology of definiteness that integrates (quasi-)names. The primary data is drawn from Cantonese and Bangla, where both bare classifier constructions and bare nominals are recruited for definite expressions. We argue that these bare nominals, while often analyzed as the so-called “weak”/unique definites in other languages, are indeed name-like expressions akin to the quasi-name Mom in English, in contrast with the definite descriptions denoted by bare classifier constructions. We propose that quasi-names, as well as proper names, are derived by a definite determiner that encodes a functional relation between the discourse participants and the referent. We further discuss cases where quasi-names compete with definite descriptions and proper names. The findings not only suggest that names should be brought into the picture, but also shed light on how pragmatic principles interact and determine the choice of referring expressions

Arguments, Suppositions, and Conditionals

Arguments and conditionals are powerful means natural languages provide us to reason about possibilities and to reach conclusions from premises. These two kinds of constructions exhibit several affinities—e.g., they both come in different varieties depending on the mood; they share some of the same connectives (i.e., ‘then’); they also allow for similar patterns of modal subordination. In the light of these affinities, it is not surprising that prominent theories of conditionals—old and new suppositionalisms and dynamic theories of conditionals—as well as certain reductive theories of arguments tend to semantically assimilate conditionals and arguments. In this paper, I shall marshall some linguistic evidence as well as some theoretical considerations for thinking that, despite these similarities, arguments and conditionals should be given a different semantics. In the final part of the paper, extending and improving on Kocurek & Pavese 2022, I make some progress outlining a framework that has the potential to capture the affinities of conditionals and arguments, while modeling their differences too

Generality, genericity and subjective predicates: What propositional attitude verbs, alien viruses, and COVID can tell us

In uttering a subjective opinion like Donuts are tasty, is a speaker expressing her own opinion or also making a generalization about people-in-general? While researchers largely agree that generic readings of subjective predicates exist, there is no consensus on how central genericity is for theories of subjective meaning. We report a psycholinguistic study that tests what influences the level of prevalence that comprehenders attribute to opinions, expressed with subjective predicates, about unfamiliar information. Specifically, if you overhear an alien expressing an opinion about an unfamiliar virus (e.g. The zorgavirus is dangerous), how many other aliens do you think share this alien\u27s opinion? We find that the perceived generalizability of subjective predicates is modulated by the presence/absence of embedding under propositional attitude verbs (whether the speaker is explicitly mentioned with I think/consider) and by participants\u27 extra-linguistic attitudes, namely their anxiety levels about COVID. This work uncovers a new link between subjective predicates and humans’ egocentric cognitive biases

Referring and quantifying without nominals: headless relative clauses across languages

Nominals can be used to refer to or quantify over individuals, while clauses convey propositional content, with the exception of set-denoting restrictive headed relative clauses. This well-attested crosslinguistic syntax/semantics mapping needs to be broadened. Recent crosslinguistic findings show that headless relative clauses—embedded argument or adjunct clauses with a missing constituent—are widely attested and are used to refer to or quantify over individuals, similar to nominals. The present work contributes to the investigation of the syntax/semantics interface of different varieties of headless relative clauses and begins to develop a much-needed close comparison with the syntax/semantics interface of nominals in order to establish which principles are at play in both families of constructions