15 research outputs found
The does not encode an anaphoric index: Evidence from kind uses
Two types of semantic theories concerning referring uses of the English definite article the have historically held sway: (i) uniqueness theories, where the is taken to uniquely describe a referent within some contextually restricted domain, and (ii) familiarity theories, where the picks out a previously mentioned referent. Here, we focus on an observation made in Reed (2024) on the anaphoric potential of the definite article in kind-denoting contexts: namely, that it is limited when compared to occurrences of the in anaphoric individual-denoting contexts as well as to occurrences of other referring expressions (e.g., that) in anaphoric kind-denoting contexts. Based on these data, we argue for an analysis of the definite article that makes crucial use of domain restriction rather than anaphoric indices.
Anaphoric variability in Kannada bare nominals
Though Kannada bare nominals are commonly used in contexts where they behave like definite descriptions, the definite reading of the bare noun is unavailable (or highly dispreferred) in certain anaphoric environments despite the presence of a suitable antecedent. In this paper, we observe that these are usually contexts where it is unclear whether the sentence topic contains the intended referent. We formalize this characterization within a situational-uniqueness based account for definiteness, and explain the limited uses of anaphoric bare definites as an interaction between this view of definiteness and an ambiguity analysis of the Kannada bare noun wherein they are capable of denoting kinds/indefinite entities as well, in addition to definites
Two types of pluractionality within Kannada verbal reduplication
Motivated by certain distributional and interpretive contrasts between Kannada reduplicated verbs carrying perfective vs. imperfective aspect-marking, here we pursue a view of these two constructions as instantiating two types of cross-linguistically attested pluractionalities — namely, event-external and event-internal pluractionality respectively. Such a characterization of Kannada reduplicated verbs allows us to borrow into their analysis several aspects of existing proposals for event-external and event-internal pluractionality, which in turn enables natural explanations for (many of) their distributional idiosyncracies
An Experimental Investigation of the Role of Uniqueness and Familiarity in Interpreting Definite Descriptions
In this study, we follow a long line of researchers in asking about the precise role of uniqueness and familiarity in the semantics of the English definite article the. We attempt to answer this question experimentally, by observing how definite descriptions behave in contexts where a speaker potentially uses an incorrect description, as in Donnellan’s classic martini scenario, where a speaker incorrectly believes there is a unique referent for their chosen description. In particular, we investigate how hearers interpret definite descriptions in contexts that are systematically manipulated to vary in whether they do or don\u27t contain a unique referent satisfying the description, and whether the referent has or has not been made familiar via previous linguistic mention. Our experimental results reveal that both uniqueness (construed as uniqueness with respect to the common ground between the interlocutors) and familiarity (construed as strong familiarity or anaphoricity) can act as helpful cues to the hearer during the interpretation of a definite description. However, their effects are graded, with the presence of uniqueness leading to greater referential success than the presence of familiarity. We discuss the implications of these results on several existing standard theories of definiteness, and implement a version of the Rational Speech Acts model to help explain the ways in which the observed behavioral data cannot be fully explained on these theories
Clausal Restructuring in the complex nominal
Restructuring of infinitival complements within complex VPs, or Verbal Restructuring, is a well-known cross-linguistic phenomenon. In contrast, there is a dearth of empirical evidence for restructured complements within complex NP/DPs, even though the theory posits equivalence between nominal and verbal domains. Here, we provide novel evidence for the presence of restructuring within complex NP/DP complements in Kannada light verb constructions, and claim on this basis that clausal restructuring within the nominal domain is a possibility in natural languages
The semantics of (in)definiteness in bare vs. non-bare nominals: A study of Kannada and English
This thesis investigates the semantics of two classes of definite expressions in English and Kannada, namely (i) ordinary definite descriptions — expressed using the definite determiner 'the' in English, and the determinerless bare nominal in Kannada, and (ii) demonstrative descriptions — expressed using overt demonstrative determiners in both languages. Alongside this contribution, this work also serves as the first detailed study of bare noun phrases in Kannada, a language without overt definite and indefinite articles.
In English, I report results from a set of experiments testing the comprehension and production of definite and demonstrative expressions ('the book' and 'that book' respectively), within contexts that vary in whether the intended referent is uniquely described (uniqueness), whether it has been previously mentioned (familiarity), and how recently it was mentioned. The results of these experiments favor a probabilistic hybrid account of 'the' that integrates effects of uniqueness as well as familiarity of the potential referents, winning over traditional, categorical accounts that rely solely on uniqueness or familiarity.
In Kannada, based on a close investigation of (in)definite bare nominals, I propose an account of these nominals as items that are underspecified for (in)definiteness, relying on a specific mechanism for domain restriction to predict whether a definite or indefinite reading arises in a given context. I present this as an alternative to the uniqueness-familiarity dichotomy that has recently been posited in other languages with bare nominal arguments, where the definite bare nominal is claimed to lexically presuppose standard uniqueness while the demonstrative presupposes familiarity. One main conclusion that emerges is that there isn’t a strict independence of definite vs. indefinite meanings in bare nominals. Consequently, the distribution of their definite uses cannot be studied separately of their indefinite uses. I show that a similar mechanism can be extended to English definite descriptions as well, supplemented by the assumption that 'the' contributes a presupposition of 'determined reference'. This successfully explains the experimental findings reported in this thesis.
Finally, a unified analysis of the indefinite readings in Kannada bare nominals is developed, closely interfacing with the literature on semantic incorporation and crosslinguistic verbal plurality operators
Asymmetries between uniqueness and familiarity in the semantics of definite descriptions
In over a century of research into the English definite article "the", two main theoretical factors have been identified as relevant to its meaning: namely, (i) uniqueness and (ii) familiarity. The identification of these factors has led to an extensive debate in semantics about which of them is more fundamental to the meaning of "the". In this paper, we contribute to this debate by introducing novel data obtained through two controlled psycholinguistic experiments. We manipulated uniqueness and familiarity of potential referents, examining how these factors affect the comprehension and production of English definite descriptions. The behavioral results reveal an asymmetry between these two factors, with familiarity being a weaker cue than uniqueness – a pattern that is unexpected under any existing theory of definiteness. We close with a discussion of possible extensions to existing theories in light of this result, as well as avenues for future work