Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung
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Foreword
Full text linkWe are pleased to present the Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 29, held at the ConsorzioUniversitario Mediterraneo Orientale (C.U.M.O) in Noto, Italy, from September 16-20, 2024.The conference was jointly organized by the Università degli Studi di Messina, Università degliStudi di Enna “Kore”, and the Leibniz-Zentrum Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft (ZAS). [...
Non-specific and dependent indefinites: When -nibud’ meets po
Full text linkThis contribution examines two classes of special indefinites, non-specific and dependent, with a focus on Russian, which features both a wh-based non-specific indefinite (-nibud’) and a dependent indefinite (po). The first part of the work shows how these two types of indefinites share various distributional similarities and constraints, yet differ in terms of which operators license them. The second part presents a formal analysis couched in a team semantics framework that treats non-specific indefinites as requiring evaluation-level plurality (variation) and dependent indefinites as being dependent on their licensor (informational dependence). This formalization captures the empirical patterns in Russian and unifies insights from prior analyses, accounting for differences in scopal behavior, (in)compatibility with modal operators, and interactions with plurality and distributivity
Negativity induced differences in the semantic-pragmatic behavior of expressive adjectives
Full text linkExpressive Adjectives (EAs) (e.g., damn, blasted) express a negative speaker attitude toward a discourse referent. EAs are typically treated as a homogeneous class in semantic and pragmatic literature, mainly focusing on damn as the prototypical EA. The presumed behavior of damn is then generalized to all other EAs, neglecting the potential impact of meaning variations among EAs on their interpretation. This article addresses this shortcoming by investigating how different degrees of negativity in EAs affect their interpretation and acceptability. We report three studies: a valence rating study that establishes a negativity hierarchy of common EAs; a forced-choice study showing that EA negativity interacts with utterance-internal emotional cues in EA-interpretation; and an acceptability rating study showing that differently negative EAs vary in their compatibility with positive referents. While some results remain inconclusive, the findings challenge earlier generalizations on EA behavior and highlight the necessity for future research on EA processing to take these distinctions into account
An experimental investigation of the homogeneity of conjunctions
Full text linkNominal conjunctions in English are associated with the all or nothing homogeneity inference. There are two main approaches to explain the interpretations: the first derives homogeneity as implicatures (Magri, 2014; Bar-Lev and Fox, 2020), the second provides a trivalent account (Schwarzschild, 1993; Križ, 2015; Križ and Spector, 2021). The two accounts differ in their predictions on the existence of gaps and the status of positive and negative sentences in non-uniform contexts. We report two experiments investigating adults’ interpretation of nominal conjunctions in English. The experiments reveal that participants provide gappy judgments for sentences with conjunctions, and the gaps for positive and negative sentences in non-uniform contexts are symmetric. We discuss how the findings of the two experiments are expected on a trivalent approach to homogeneity and the open challenges they pose for the implicature approach
Projection without lexically-specified presupposition: A model for \u27know\u27
No full textWe present an analysis—formalized as a computational cognitive model—of the projection of the content of the clausal complement of know in utterances of negated declaratives. Our model, formulated within the Bayesian Rational Speech Act framework (Frank and Goodman, 2012), derives projection from lexical entailments of know and sensitivity to the Question Under Discussion (QUD; as do Abrusán, 2011, and Simons et al., 2017), as well as reasoning about utterance informativity relative to private speaker assumptions (Qing et al., 2016; Warstadt, 2022). Crucially, our model predicts projection for know without encoding the inference via a lexically-specified constraint on the Common Ground. The model goes beyond existing analyses by also making predictions about the projection of the content of the clausal complement of nonfactive think, as well as other types of inferences. We find support for three qualitative predictions of our model in two experiments that measured the projection inferences participants draw about utterance content
Comparison among degrees or individuals?: A view from Japanese \u27ichiban\u27 superlatives
No full textTwo distinct denotations have been proposed for the superlative morpheme -est in the literature, differing in whether comparison is made among degree sets (2-place -est) or individuals (3-place -est). This paper investigates cross-linguistic evidence for this distinction. We argue that the Japanese superlative morpheme ichiban (literally ‘No.1’) exclusively employs the 3-place -est denotation, which compares individuals rather than degrees. Our empirical focus is on two types of modal superlatives in Japanese, with further implications for the (un)availability of elative superlatives and the negation of existence usage in this language
Why \u27not numeral NP\u27 requires \u27but\u27 but not \u27not many NP\u27
No full textThis paper observes that negated numerals require but (e.g. Not three *(but four) students arrived), whereas not many doesn’t (e.g. Not many students arrived). Drawing on the additional observation that negated non-quantifier DPs require but (e.g. Max eats not spinach *(but chard)), I propose that constituent negation presupposes that the utterance containing the negation must entail a true alternative utterance, if there exists such a true alternative. This is generally satisfied by an overt but-phrase, except with the not-many-sentence because it entails an alternative sentence on its own–Some students arrived. I also take the contrast between not many and negated numerals as evidence that they have different types of assertion, in support of Kennedy (2013, 2015): many asserts at least n, while numerals assert at least n and at most n at the same time. Therefore, in contrast to not many, which entails some, not three does not entail not one or not two, and thus requires the but-phrase to introduce the true alternative
Definite plurals in comparatives
Full text linkThis paper investigates the interpretation of comparative constructions containing definite plurals. We identify an asymmetry between the matrix clause and the than-clause. In the matrix clause, definite plurals give rise to a homogeneity effect, as expected by all theories of homogeneity. In contrast, definite plurals in the than-clause do not trigger such an effect; instead, their interpretation is typically similar to than-clauses containing universal quantifiers. Adopting the truth-value gap approach to homogeneity, we propose that the homogeneity presupposition is locally accommodated within the than-clause, yielding complementary truth conditions for affirmative and negative comparative constructions
Embedding definites instead of questions: The case of Spanish and French
Full text linkSpanish and French may use relativised constructions introduced by a definite and a demonstrative, respectively, as complements of question-embedding verbs. We argue that these constructions are the intensional versions of the respective headless RCs in those languages: DPs (not interrogative CPs) encoding number-neutral maximality. These combine with question-embedding predicates as concealed questions (similar to I know the temperature of the lake), analysed as individual concepts (Romero, 2005). The cross-linguistic implication is that some languages recruit concealed questions as a generalised question-embedding strategy, with DPs taking up the functional space usually associated to wh-interrogatives
Neglect-Zero Effects in the Interpretation of Quantifiers and Disjunction
Full text linkThis paper presents a cross-experimental comparison investigating the interpretation and processing of four semantic/pragmatic phenomena, for which natural language interpretation deviates from literal meaning. In particular, we compared so-called neglect-zero phenomena in the case of quantifier interpretation – both for empty restrictors and empty scope sets – as well as distributivity inferences of disjunction embedded under universal quantification to the interpretation of scalar implicature in the case of some. The experiments employed a timed question-answering task which allowed us to test the just-mentioned phenomena embedded in polar questions. The data lend support to a broad differentiation of the phenomena into 1) presupposition violation in the case of empty restrictors, 2) neglect-zero effects for empty quantifier scope and distributivity inferences, and 3) negation of scalar alternatives for some