Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung
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Vagueness, Overlap, and Countability
Get PDFWe propose a novel semantic analysis of the mass/count distinction, within a new framework combining the theory of mereology with Probabilistic Type Theory with Records, Prob-TTR (Cooper et al. 2014)). While the notions akin to VAGUENESS (Chierchia 2010) and OVERLAP (Landman 2011) are needed to ground this distinction, neither on its own is sufficient to accommodate the whole range of data, especially the puzzling intra- and crosslinguistic variation in count vs. mass encoding. This variation becomes tractable, if we generally treat the grammatical differences between mass and count nouns as following from the interaction of two notions: namely, VAGUENESS sharpened in terms of graded (probabilistic) type judgements, and DISJOINTNESS relative to a probability threshold. As a result, in the form-denotation mappings, this leads us to a novel semantic classification of nouns into four classes. The mass/count distinction is a bipartite grammatical distinction manifested in the standard diagnostics like a direct combination with numerals, the indefinite article and quantifiers like every, much, among others
Hebrew kol: a universal quantifier as an undercover existential
Get PDFConstructions containing the Hebrew determiner kol have a prominent interpretation as involving universal quantification. In light of this, it has traditionally and almost unarguably been considered to be truth-conditionally a universal quantifier. The goal of this paper is to argue that contrary to the widely accepted analysis, kol is an existential quantifier and that the universal import of constructions containing kol results from grammatical strengthening. Such an argument is backed by kol’s interpretation in Downward-Entailing environments, its behavior as a Free Choice item and more importantly, its indefinite interpretation in interrogatives. The proposal is carried out using a mechanism of exhaustification and the assumption that kol is special among existential quantifiers in lacking a scalar (i.e., universal) alternative
Vertical representation of quantifier domains
Get PDFWe show via American Sign Language (ASL) productions of singular indefinites, plural pronouns, and negative quantifiers that ASL can use space to convey set size and quantifier domain restriction, and moreover, that sets are interpreted as increasingly larger as they are signed higher in space. Such overt markings of domain size are more than simply emphatic, participating in adverbial quantifier binding and exhibiting more systematicity than emphasis in English. We discuss our findings in light of previous research on the semantic use of sign height in ASL, and speculate on the origin of such a strategy in sign languages
Random Choice Modality: Spanish \u27Uno Cualquiera\u27
No full textAcross languages, we find indefinites that signal that an agent made a random choice. This paper paves the way towards a better understanding of these ‘random choice indefinites’ by investigating the type of modality expressed by Spanish uno cualquiera. We propose that the random choice effect of uno cualquiera comes about because this item requires the agent’s decision to have a particular content
Past Participle Formation and the Eventive/Adjectival Passive in Russian
Get PDFThe main question addressed in this article is how to explain the differences in the interpretation between short and long forms of past passive participles in predicative positions in Russian. The main observation is that short form participles in predicative position can yeild either an eventive or a stative passive interpretation, whereas long forms can only be interpreted statively. Apart from this, long and short participles exhibit a number of empirical differences, such as availiability of un-prefixation, various modifiers, etc. This paper proposes a formal compositional analysis of participle formation which involves two distinct operators in the derivation of long and short forms. An adjectivizing head A derives long participles and existentially binds an event variable of the underlying verb, whereas a participial head Prt derives short participles and existentially binds an external argument of the input structure. The proposed analysis accounts for the observed empirical differences between long and short past passive participles in Russian
A Pragmatic Solution to the Paradox of Absolute Adjectives
Get PDFThis paper presents a new solution to a longstanding puzzle in the study of the semantics of gradable adjectives: the paradox of absolute adjectives. Absolute adjectives (AAs: ex. empty, straight, dry, wet, bent. . . ) display a semantic behaviour that appears to be a hybrid between the behaviour of members of the relative adjectival class (RAs: ex. tall, short, expensive. . . ) and the non-scalar adjectival class (NSs: ex. atomic, prime, hexagonal. . . ). I argue that this behaviour creates a puzzle for the formal analysis of the basic lexical meaning of these expressions: do they have a semantic denotation that is of the same type as relative adjectives or of the same type as non-scalar adjectives? I argue that there are empirical reasons for adopting a treatment of the semantics and pragmatics of AAs in which these predicates have a semantics that is more parallel to NSs than RAs. Finally, I provide a new solution to the paradox of absolute adjectives within the Delineation TCS framework, which is a non-classical logical system developed by Burnett (2012b) for analyzing the interaction between context-sensitivity, imprecision and gradability with adjectival predicates
An Unaccusativity Diagnostic at the Syntax-Semantics Interface: \u27there\u27-Insertion, Indefinites and Restitutive \u27again\u27
No full textThis paper argues that the unaccusativity mismatch observed in theliterature concerning the availability of there-insertion points to a syntacticdifference between two classes of unaccusatives. The paper shows that thetheme argument of change-of-location unaccusatives occupies Spec,ResultP,while that of change-of-state unaccusatives occupies Spec,vP. Insertion ofthere is blocked in the latter case, as the theme and the expletive compete forthe same position
Performative Verbs and Performative Acts
Get PDFSearle (1989) posits a set of adequacy criteria for any account of the meaning and use of performative verbs, such as order or promise. Central among them are: (a) performative utterances are performances of the act named by the performative verb; (b) performative utterances are self-verifying; (c) performative utterances achieve (a) and (b) in virtue of their literal meaning. He then argues that the fundamental problem with assertoric accounts of performatives is that they fail (b), and hence (a), because being committed to having an intention does not guarantee having that intention. Relying on a uniform meaning for verbs on their reportative and performative uses, we propose an assertoric analysis of performative utterances that does not require an actual intention for deriving (b), and hence can meet (a) and (c)
On the Relation between Coherence Relations and Anaphoric Demonstratives in German
Get PDFRecent research suggests that pronoun interpretation is guided by the semantic coherence relations between clauses. However, it is not yet wellunderstood whether coherence effects extend to other anaphoric expressions beyond pronouns. We report an experiment on German, a language in which human antecedents can be referred to both with personal and demonstrative pronouns. How do anaphoric demonstratives – whose referential properties have been argued to be complementary to pronouns – fit into coherence-based views? Our results suggest that although coherence does not modulate the antecedent choice of anaphoric demonstratives to the same extent that it influences pronoun interpretation, demonstratives interact with coherence-related processing by guiding comprehenders’ expectations of coherence relations
Foreword
Get PDFIn these volumes, we are very pleased to present a collection of papers based on talks and posters at Sinn und Bedeutung 22, which took place in Berlin and Potsdam on September 7-10, 2017, jointly organized by the Leibniz-Centre for General Linguistics (ZAS) and the University of Potsdam. SuB22 received 183 submitted abstracts. Out of these, the organizing committee selected 39 oral presentations in the main session, 4 oral presentations in the special session ‘Semantics and Natural Logic’, and 24 poster presentations. There were an additional 6 invited talks. In total, 58 of these contributions appear in paper form in the present volumes. We would like to take this opportunity to thank the many colleagues who helped to make SuB22 a success: our fellow organizers Guillermo Del Pinal, Mira Grubic, Manfred Krifka and Malte Zimmermann, without whom the conference would not have been possible; the nearly 200 reviewers from around the world; our invited speakers Márta Abrusán, Amy Rose Deal, Danny Fox, Hannes Leitgeb, Louise McNally and Philippe Schlenker; staff members Anja Gollrad, Ines Mauer and Azura Frömming, who dealt with countless practical details; our student assistants Carla Boos, János Litzinger, Norman Brackmann, Marius Küch and Henry Salfner, who ably supported us in the preparation phases and during the conference, as well as Meredith Alongi, Jordan Chark and Elizabeth Pankratz, who served as editorial assistants in the production of these proceedings; and of course the presenters, session chairs and audience members. We would also like to acknowledge financial support from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (grant KR 951/13-1), the Leibniz-Centre for General Linguistics, and the University of Potsdam, as well as surplus funds from SuB21 from the University of Edinburgh. We look forward to seeing everyone in September 2018 in Barcelona for SuB23! Berlin, July 2018 Uli Sauerland and Stephanie Sol