Klaus von Heusinger

Specificity and Definiteness in Sentence and Discourse Structure

The paper gives a contrastive analysis of the two semantic categories specificity and definiteness .I ta rgues against the traditional picture that assumes that specific expressions are a subclass of indefinite NPs. The paper rather assumes that the two categories are independent of each other. Definiteness expresses the discourse pragmatic property of familiarity, while specificity mirrors a more finely grained referential structure of the items used in the discourse. A specific NP indicates that it is referentially anchored to another discourse object. This means that the referent of the specific expression is linked by a contextually salient function to the referent of another expression.

Existence : semantics and syntax

The Interpretation of the Copula.- Towards a Dynamic Account of BE in English.- Constituent Questions and the Copula of Specification.- Predication and Equation in Copular Sentences: Russian vs. English.- On Davidsonian and Kimian States.- Existential Sentences Across Languages.- Focus and the Basic Function of Chinese Existential You-Sentences.- Existential Sentences, BE, and the Genitive of Negation in Russian.- Negative Quantification and Existential Sentences.- Existence and the Interpretation of Noun Phrases.- Existence, Maximality, and the Semantics of Numeral Modifiers.- Existential Import.- Referentially Anchored Indefinites.- On Singular Existential Quantifiers in Italian.

Verbal semantics and the diachronic development of DOM in Spanish 1

The use of the marker a with a direct object in Spanish is an instance of Differential Object Marking (DOM), which is cross linguistically a well-documented phenomenon. In Spanish, there are two main dimensions that determine amarking of direct objects: (i) the semantic and (discourse) pragmatic properties of the direct object, such as animacy, definiteness, specificity and topicality; and (ii) the lexical semantics of the verb, such as aktionsart properties and selectional restrictions with respect to the position of the direct object. Diachronically, a-marking spreads along the Referentiality Hierarchy from personal pronouns and proper names to definite and finally indefinite noun phrases, a process that has been well examined. In this study, I focus on the influence of theThe use of the marker a with a direct object in Spanish is an instance of Differential Object Marking (DOM), which is cross linguistically a well-documented phenomenon. In Spanish, there are two main dimensions that determine amarking of direct objects: (i) the semantic and (discourse) pragmatic properties of the direct object, such as animacy, definiteness, specificity and topicality; and (ii) the lexical semantics of the verb, such as aktionsart properties and selectional restrictions with respect to the position of the direct object. Diachronically, a-marking spreads along the Referentiality Hierarchy from personal pronouns and proper names to definite and finally indefinite noun phrases, a process that has been well examined. In this study, I focus on the influence of the

The Reference of Indefinites

In this paper I argue that indefinite NPs have a more complex referential nature than is usually supposed, and that this structure must be reflected in their semantic representation. According to the classical view due to Frege and Russell, an indefinite NP is represented by an existential quantifier, a variable, the restriction and the occurrence of the variable in the argument position of the main predicate. Hence, there is no clear correspondence to the indefinite NP on the surface. Sentence (1) is translated into the formula (2a), in which the indefinite NP a man corresponds to the variable x in the argument position of the predicate walk and in the predication man(x). The formula specifies that the intersection of the two sets denoted by the predicates is non-empty. The model-theoretic interpretation (2b) links the variable x to an object d that fulfills both predicates, treating the attributive material man on par with the assertive material walk. Hence, at the representational level, the indefinite NP is not represented as an independent expression. This conception has been widely accepted in semantics and can be found in current semantic theories.

Discourse Prominence and Pe -marking in Romanian

Referential expressions are used to introduce and continue reference to entities with particular referential properties, but also with particular discourse properties. In this paper we investigate the referential and discourse properties of pe-marked indefinite direct objects in Romanian, which are an instance of Diff erential Object Marking (DOM). Pe-marking is generally obligatory for definite noun phrases but optional for indefinite ones. The optionality of pe marking with indefinite descriptions constitutes the focus of the present article. We will show that, on the one hand, pe with indefinite descriptions allows the realization of referential properties such as specific or wide scope readings, but that on the other hand, pe also signals discourse prominence, in particular in such contexts where referential properties are neutralized. We assume three parameters for discourse prominence, namely referential persistence, the topic-shift potential and the type of anaphoric referring expressions. We used these three parameters in a web-based story continuation experiment. The findings of the experiment revealed several interesting patterns: (i) that pe -marked direct objects are referentially more persistent than their unmarked counterparts, (ii) that pe -marked direct objects show a systematic preference to become topics two or three sentences after being introduced in the discourse, and (iii) that (modified) definite NPs were chosen to refer back to the referent of the marked as well as to the referent of the unmarked direct object. On the basis of the first two parameters we conclude that the relevant discourse contribution of pe is to signal to the hearer that subsequent information about that referent will follow, whereas the third parameter indicates that the referent of the pe -marked indefinite is not necessarily associated with a high level of activation. The general findings of the experiment support Kehler et al.s (2008) intuition to differentiate between referential persistence and the activation level of the referent.

Triggering and blocking effects in the diachronic development of DOM in Romanian

Abstract According to recent studies, the diachronic development of differential object marking (DOM) in Romance is expected to start from elements high on the definiteness scale and spread steadily to elements low on the definiteness scale, whereby each development step is facilitated by fine-grained semantic distinctions which act as triggering conditions (cf. von Heusinger and Kaiser 2005). In Romanian the expected line of development can be observed until the 19th century, however this unidirectional evolution is surprisingly reversed around the 19th–20th century: the conditions for the marking of indefinite direct objects with the preposition pe are more restrained today than two centuries ago. In this study we present the diachronic development of DOM in Romanian based on a diachronic corpus consisting of Bible translations from different centuries. We shall contend that the transition of DOM from one referential category to another, such as from proper names to definite NPs and from definite NPs to indefinite NPs is enabled by some distinction in the category DOM is spreading to. For instance in 16th century Romanian DOM spreads to definite NPs such that first NPs having a strong unique interpretation get pe-marked while other definite NPs receive DOM only in a later step involving the neutralization of this transitory distinction. However, Romanian data show that such a fine-graded distinction may not only occur in the category DOM is spreading to but also inside of referential categories already pe-marked. In this case the transitory distinction may trigger a regress in DOM. This is the case in the 19th century, when specific indefinite NPs are often pe-marked and a new semantic distinction between different types of referential anchoring involves a re-interpretation of the semantic import of pe-marking such that a certain part of indefinite direct objects systematically lose DOM. We shall argue that the trigger of this new semantic distinction is the independent development of the Romanian clitic doubling system which DOM gets strongly correlated to: the correlation between clitic doubling and DOM combines two slightly different semantic features, which we shall model by the fine structure of specificity. The combination of these features leads to pragmatically motivated language change.

Words in Time: Diachronic Semantics From Different Points of View

Meanings of words are constantly changing, and the forces driving these changes are varied and diverse. The collection focuses on meaning change as a topic of interdisciplinary research. Distinguished scholars in diachronic semantics, general linguistics, classical philology, philosophy of language, anthropology and history offer in depth studies of language internal and external factors of meaning change. This broad range of perspectives, unprecedented in research publications of recent years, is a pioneering attempt to mirror the multi-facetteous nature of language as a formal, social, cognitive, cultural and historical entity. The contributions, each exploring the research issues, methods and techniques of their particular field, are directed towards a broader audience of interested readers, thus enhancing interdisciplinary exchange.

The Salience Theory of Definiteness

The salience theory of definiteness combines the best features of the uniqueness theory and the familiarity theory to a novel concept of definiteness. A definite expression refers to the most salient element of a given set. Thus, this theory does not suffer from the notoriously problematic uniqueness condition nor from the often too globally interpreted familiarity condition. The paper provides the theoretical and empirical foundations for the salience theory of definiteness and illustrates its range by successfully analyzing different uses of definite noun phrases.

Underspecification in the semantics of word-formation : the case of denominal verbs of removal in Italian

Abstract This article analyzes a case of Italian word formation in which the semantics of the derived words appears to contain mutually exclusive ambiguities. Italian productively derives verbs of removal from nouns. These verbs have the general semantic form A removes X from Y. There are two subtypes that differ in whether the nominal base is taken to be the figure or the ground: scremare ‘to skim’ (crema ‘cream’) is a figure verb, and scarcerare ‘to release from prison’ (carcere ‘prison’) is a ground verb. Current analyses are at a loss to give a uniform account for the semantics of derivational processes of these two kinds. In this article, such an analysis is proposed. It is based upon the model of lexical semantics known as two-level semantics. Two-level semantics makes a distinction between a layer of meaning, which is defined by grammar, and a level of interpretation, which is based upon conceptual knowledge. We propose that the derivation of Italian denominal verbs of removal of both types starts from a single underspecified representation, which is then specified at the conceptual level; depending on the concept type of the base, the denominal verb is either a figure verb or a ground verb. This study is an example of how the semantics of language-specific morphology may be embedded in cognitive structure.

Salience and anaphoric definite noun phrases

Abstract This paper presents an original view of salience as semantically related sets of ordered discourse referents and illustrates it on the particular semantics of anaphoric definite noun phrases. Salience is one of the main aspects of discourse structure. Indefinite as well as definite noun phrases dynamically update this salience structure, which in turn determines the anaphoric relations between antecedents and anaphoric terms. Salience is modeled by interrelated sets of ordered discourse referents. Each predicate that is associated with a discourse referent has its own (local) salience structure, while the global salience structure of a discourse consists of all the local structures and semantic relations between the given predicates. Referring expressions dynamically update the local salience structures of such related predicates. The main factors that determine the update-process are the descriptive content of the referring expression, and additionally, the semantic relations between the predicates.