Quantification forms a significant aspect of cross-linguistic research into both sentence structu... more Quantification forms a significant aspect of cross-linguistic research into both sentence structure and meaning. This book surveys research in quantification starting with the foundational work in the 1970s. It paints a vivid picture of generalized quantifiers and Boolean semantics. It explains how the discovery of diverse scope behavior in the 1990s transformed the view of quantification, and how the study of the internal composition of quantifiers has become central in recent years. It presents different approaches to the same problems, and links modern logic and formal semantics to advances in generative syntax. A unique feature of the book is that it systematically brings cross-linguistic data to bear on the theoretical issues, discussing French, German, Dutch, Hungarian, Russian, Japanese, Telugu (Dravidian), and Shupamem (Grassfield Bantu), and pointing to formal semantic literature involving quantification in around thirty languages.
" Linguistics: An Introduction to Linguistic Theory ... more " Linguistics: An Introduction to Linguistic Theory is a textbook, written for introductory courses in linguistic theory for undergraduate linguistics majors and first year graduate students. Twelve major figures in the field bring their expertise to each of the core areas of the field morphology, syntax, semantics, phonetics, phonology, and language acquisition.
In seminal work, Zeijlstra has proposed that the sentential negative marker in strict negative co... more In seminal work, Zeijlstra has proposed that the sentential negative marker in strict negative concord languages is a meaningless particle (uNeg) that invokes a silent negative operator (iNeg) at the periphery. Negative concord items (NCI) are also supposed to have uNeg. This paper puts forth new arguments to the effect that the Hungarian negative marker NEM has uNeg, but NCIs do not. Their relation to negation is indirect; they are existentials that need to be exhaustified, which in turn requires an intervening negation to maintain logical coherence (Chierchia 2013). This eliminates the appearance of redundancy in the negative marker co-occurring with NCIs. The analysis combines features of Zeijlstra's proposal for strict NC and Chierchia's proposal for non-strict NC. Hungarian is a true NC hybrid that has an overt counterpart (SEM) of Chierchia's NEG. Hybridity proves that these features can coexist.
This paper highlights a small selection of cases where cross-linguistic insights have been import... more This paper highlights a small selection of cases where cross-linguistic insights have been important to big questions in the theory of semantics and the syntax/semantics interface. The selection includes (i) the role and representation of Speaker and Addressee in the grammar; (ii) mismatches between form and interpretation motivating high-placed silent operators for functional elements; and (iii) the explanation of semantic universals, including universals pertaining to inventories, in terms of learnability and the trade-off between informativeness and simplicity.
According to the classical description of obviation, the subject of a subjunctive is disjoint in ... more According to the classical description of obviation, the subject of a subjunctive is disjoint in reference from the attitude-holder subject of the immediately higher clause.
*Je veux que je parte. I want that I leave.SUBJ ‘I want for me to leave’
Inspired by Ruwet (1984/1991) and Farkas (1988; 1992), I present data from Hungarian where obviation in certain subjunctives is plainly lifted, and data where obviation occurs in indicatives. I argue that obviation is not the result of competition with another construction, and point to promising potential accounts in terms of a clash in semantics or pragmatics. My aim is to contribute desiderata for a theory of obviation and exemptions from obviation in fairly informal terms.
This paper points out naturally-occurring examples, primarily in Hungarian but also to a more lim... more This paper points out naturally-occurring examples, primarily in Hungarian but also to a more limited extent in English, in which disjunction (i) has a conjunctive force but (ii) its use highlights that the list is not intended to be exhaustive. The preliminary analysis is in terms of recursive proposition strengthening by exhaustification without a scalar alternative, assimilating exemplifications to known cases of conjunctively interpreted disjunctions in other languages.
Rawlins (2013: 160) observes that both unconditionals and more classical free choice can be meta-... more Rawlins (2013: 160) observes that both unconditionals and more classical free choice can be meta-characterized using orthogonality, but does not actually unify the two. One reason may be that in English, different expressions serve in these roles. By contrast, in Hungarian, AKÁR expressions serve as NPIs, FCIs, and unconditional adjuncts, but not as interrogatives or free relatives. This paper offers a unified account of the Hungarian data, extending Chierchia 2013 and Dayal 2013. The account produces the same unconditional meanings that Rawlins derives from an interrogative basis. This result highlights the fact that sets of alternatives arise from different morpho-syntactic sources and are utilized by the grammar in different ways, but the results may fully converge.
The paper discusses two types of quantifier particles in Hungarian that both participate in reite... more The paper discusses two types of quantifier particles in Hungarian that both participate in reiterated constructions. One type follows and the other precedes its host, which makes it easy to compare them. The particles that follow their hosts are argued to be heads on the clausal spines of independent propositions. Host+particle does, but need not, occur in reiterations, and the particles do not build quantifier words. In contrast, the particles that precede their hosts are argued to be quantifier-phrase internal. Particle+host must occur in reiterations, and the particles build quantifier words. The two types of reiterated constructions also differ in having their own distinctive internal "connectives" and in forming strict vs. non-strict negative concord expressions. The paper focuses on syntax, with some attention to semantics. It argues for propositional coordination for both types, and propositional quantification for the second type. Constituent-size reiterations are derivable via ellipsis, raising the question whether they are necessarily so derived. The paper concludes with data from Bosnian, French, Japanese, Malayalam, Mandarin, Persian, Russian, Sinhala, Telugu, and Turkish, which indicate the cross-linguistic interest of recognizing the two types of particle constructions.
Bartos et al. eds. Boundaries Crossed... (Springer), 2018
Surányi (2006) observed that Hungarian has a hybrid (strict + non-strict) negative concord system... more Surányi (2006) observed that Hungarian has a hybrid (strict + non-strict) negative concord system. This paper proposes a unified analysis of that system within the general framework of Zeijlstra (2004, 2008) and, especially, Chierchia (2013), with the following new ingredients. Sentential negation nem is the same full negation in the presence of both strict and non-strict concord items. Preverbal senkìn-one' type negative concord items occupy the specifier position of either nem`not' or sem`nor'. The latter, sem spells out is`too, even' in the immediate scope of negation; is/sem are focus-associating heads on the clausal spine. Sem can be seen as an overt counterpart of the phonetically null head that Chierchia dubs NEG; it is capable of invoking an abstract (disembodied) negation at the edge of its projection.
The additive presupposition of particles like too/even is uncontested, but usually stipulated. Th... more The additive presupposition of particles like too/even is uncontested, but usually stipulated. This paper proposes to derive it based on two properties. (i) too/even is cross-linguistically focus-sensitive, and (ii) in many languages, too/even builds negative polarity items and free-choice items as well, often in concert with other particles. (i) is the source of its existential presupposition, and (ii) offers clues regarding how additivity comes about. (i)-(ii) together demand a sparse semantics for too/even, one that can work with different kinds of alternatives (focus, subdomain, scalar) and invoke suitably different further operators.
Carlson (1983, 2006) observes that functional elements often present mismatches in form and inter... more Carlson (1983, 2006) observes that functional elements often present mismatches in form and interpretation that lexical elements do not.
In many languages, the same particles that form quantifier words also serve as connectives, ad... more In many languages, the same particles that form quantifier words also serve as connectives, additive and scalar particles, question markers, roots of existential verbs, and so on. Do these have a unified semantics, or do they merely bear a family resemblance? Are they aided by silent operators in their varied roles -- if yes, what operators?
I dub the particles “quantifier particles” and refer to them generically with capitalized versions of the Japanese morphemes. I argue that both MO and KA can be assigned a stable semantics across their various roles. The specific analysis I offer is motivated by the fact that MO and KA often combine with just one argument; I propose that this is their characteristic behavior. Their role is to impose semantic requirements that are satisfied when the immediately larger context is interpreted as the meet/join of their host’s semantic contribution with something else. They do not perform meet/join themselves. The obligatory vs. optional appearance of the particles depends on whether the meet/join interpretations arise by default in the given constellation. I explicate the proposal using the toolkit of basic Inquisitive Semantics.
Formal semantic analyses often take words to be minimal building blocks for the purposes of compo... more Formal semantic analyses often take words to be minimal building blocks for the purposes of compositionality. But various recent theories of morphology and syntax have converged on the view that there is no demarcation line corresponding to the word level. The same conclusion has emerged from the compositional semantics of superlatives. In the spirit of extending compositionality below the word level, this paper explores how a small set of particles (Japanese ka and mo, Chinese dou, and Hungarian vala/vagy, mind, and is) form quantifier words and serve as connectives, additive and scalar particles, question markers, and existential verbs. Our main question is whether the meanings of these particles across the varied environments are highly regular, or they are lexicalized with a variety of different meanings that bear a family resemblance. This paper does not reach definitive conclusions, but it raises analytical possibilities using Boolean semantics and Inquisitive Semantics (the semantics of alternatives). It also draws attention to systematic similarities and some differences between the multiple uses of mo and dou that have not been studied in the literature, and reviews accounts in terms of maximality and additivity.
One of the insights of dynamic semantics in its various guises (Kamp 1981, Heim
1982, Groenendij... more One of the insights of dynamic semantics in its various guises (Kamp 1981, Heim
1982, Groenendijk & Stokhof 1991, Kamp & Reyle 1993 among many others) is that
interpretation is sensitive to left-to-right order. Is order sensitivity, particularly the default left-to-right order of evaluation, a property of particular meanings of certain lexical items (e.g., dynamically interpreted conjunction) or is it a more general feature of meaning composition? If it is a more general feature of meaning composition, is it a processing ‘preference’ or should it be captured as a ‘harder’ constraint on the type of meanings and operations over meanings involved in natural language interpretation? This squib draws attention to the symmetrical A-too B-too construction (found in a variety of languages, e.g., Hungarian, Japanese, Romanian, Russian) in this context. It argues that any semantic analysis of its main ‘symmetrical-meaning’ characteristic should also allow for subtler interactions between this construction and items that are clearly sensitive to evaluation-order effects, e.g., anaphoric adjectives like next and other. We suggest that the notion of postsupposition embedded in a broader dynamic framework is better able to account for both the symmetric nature of this construction, its non-symmetric variant A-too, and its interaction with items that are evaluation-order sensitive. We briefly compare this proposal with a couple of possible alternative accounts.
In many languages, the same particles build quantifier words and serve as connectives, additive a... more In many languages, the same particles build quantifier words and serve as connectives, additive and scalar particles, question markers, existential verbs, and so on. Do the roles of each particle form a natural class with a stable semantics? Are the particles aided by additional elements, overt or covert, in fulfilling their varied roles? I propose a unified analysis, according to which the particles impose partial ordering requirements (glb and lub) on the interpretations of their hosts and the immediate larger contexts, but do not embody algebraic operations themselves.
Mauritian Creole (MC) is a French lexifier creole with Kwa and Bantu substrate languages. In the ... more Mauritian Creole (MC) is a French lexifier creole with Kwa and Bantu substrate languages. In the early nineteenth century MC lost the French determiners le/la 'the' and du (partitive 'some'), often incorporating them into the noun stems, and became, in stark contrast to French, a language that allows bare count and mass nouns in argument positions. Diana Guillemin's book is dedicated to the documentation and theoretical analysis of that change, as well as the new system of determiners and quantifiers that subsequently emerged in MC. G is a native speaker of MC, but the study is primarily corpus-based, with over eighty text sources, ranging from eighteenthcentury documents to Baissac's ( , 1888 collections to recent internet posts. The analysis is carried out using current formal semantic and generative syntactic theories.
The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Syntax, 2nd ed., 2017
The focus of the chapter is weak islands (WI), i.e. selective islands. Strong (absolute) islands ... more The focus of the chapter is weak islands (WI), i.e. selective islands. Strong (absolute) islands are considered only to set the stage for the discussion of WIs. Up until the late 1980s nothing much beyond wh-islands had been thought to be a WI. Beginning with Relativized Minimality, an ever-growing range of WIs has been recognized. Thus, theories of weak islands have mushroomed, each coming with a significant set of new data and important new connections to other domains. The chapter emphasizes the correspondence between data sets and theories. Less attention is given to proposals that primarily recast the theoretical account of some narrow range of data.
Section 2 explains the distinction between absolute versus selective islands. Section 3 introduces a range of classical strong islands and various types of explanations, among them subjacency, repair by ellipsis, and processing. Sections 4, 5, and 6 enumerate the kind of extractions that are sensitive to WIs and the factors that induce a WI. Under the rubric of weak-island sensitivity, it discusses arguments vs. adjuncts, referential or existentially presupposing vs. non-referential expression, D-linking, individual vs. non-individual expressions and how many-phrases, functional readings and event-related readings, split constructions, negative polarity licensing, and cross-sentential anaphora. Under the rubric of weak-island inducers, it considers intervention effects due to wh-islands, negatives and other affective operators, response stance and non-stance in contrast to volunteered stance predicates, extraposition islands, VP-adverbs, and finally quantifier scope islands. Section 7 is devoted to various theories of islands, starting with ECP and subjacency, moving on to Relativized Minimality. Theoretical problems and the diversity of the data motivate the transition to the scope theory that comes in two versions, the algebraic semantic and the dynamic semantic ones. Section 8 concludes.
Quantification forms a significant aspect of cross-linguistic research into both sentence structu... more Quantification forms a significant aspect of cross-linguistic research into both sentence structure and meaning. This book surveys research in quantification starting with the foundational work in the 1970s. It paints a vivid picture of generalized quantifiers and Boolean semantics. It explains how the discovery of diverse scope behavior in the 1990s transformed the view of quantification, and how the study of the internal composition of quantifiers has become central in recent years. It presents different approaches to the same problems, and links modern logic and formal semantics to advances in generative syntax. A unique feature of the book is that it systematically brings cross-linguistic data to bear on the theoretical issues, discussing French, German, Dutch, Hungarian, Russian, Japanese, Telugu (Dravidian), and Shupamem (Grassfield Bantu), and pointing to formal semantic literature involving quantification in around thirty languages.
" Linguistics: An Introduction to Linguistic Theory ... more " Linguistics: An Introduction to Linguistic Theory is a textbook, written for introductory courses in linguistic theory for undergraduate linguistics majors and first year graduate students. Twelve major figures in the field bring their expertise to each of the core areas of the field morphology, syntax, semantics, phonetics, phonology, and language acquisition.
In seminal work, Zeijlstra has proposed that the sentential negative marker in strict negative co... more In seminal work, Zeijlstra has proposed that the sentential negative marker in strict negative concord languages is a meaningless particle (uNeg) that invokes a silent negative operator (iNeg) at the periphery. Negative concord items (NCI) are also supposed to have uNeg. This paper puts forth new arguments to the effect that the Hungarian negative marker NEM has uNeg, but NCIs do not. Their relation to negation is indirect; they are existentials that need to be exhaustified, which in turn requires an intervening negation to maintain logical coherence (Chierchia 2013). This eliminates the appearance of redundancy in the negative marker co-occurring with NCIs. The analysis combines features of Zeijlstra's proposal for strict NC and Chierchia's proposal for non-strict NC. Hungarian is a true NC hybrid that has an overt counterpart (SEM) of Chierchia's NEG. Hybridity proves that these features can coexist.
This paper highlights a small selection of cases where cross-linguistic insights have been import... more This paper highlights a small selection of cases where cross-linguistic insights have been important to big questions in the theory of semantics and the syntax/semantics interface. The selection includes (i) the role and representation of Speaker and Addressee in the grammar; (ii) mismatches between form and interpretation motivating high-placed silent operators for functional elements; and (iii) the explanation of semantic universals, including universals pertaining to inventories, in terms of learnability and the trade-off between informativeness and simplicity.
According to the classical description of obviation, the subject of a subjunctive is disjoint in ... more According to the classical description of obviation, the subject of a subjunctive is disjoint in reference from the attitude-holder subject of the immediately higher clause.
*Je veux que je parte. I want that I leave.SUBJ ‘I want for me to leave’
Inspired by Ruwet (1984/1991) and Farkas (1988; 1992), I present data from Hungarian where obviation in certain subjunctives is plainly lifted, and data where obviation occurs in indicatives. I argue that obviation is not the result of competition with another construction, and point to promising potential accounts in terms of a clash in semantics or pragmatics. My aim is to contribute desiderata for a theory of obviation and exemptions from obviation in fairly informal terms.
This paper points out naturally-occurring examples, primarily in Hungarian but also to a more lim... more This paper points out naturally-occurring examples, primarily in Hungarian but also to a more limited extent in English, in which disjunction (i) has a conjunctive force but (ii) its use highlights that the list is not intended to be exhaustive. The preliminary analysis is in terms of recursive proposition strengthening by exhaustification without a scalar alternative, assimilating exemplifications to known cases of conjunctively interpreted disjunctions in other languages.
Rawlins (2013: 160) observes that both unconditionals and more classical free choice can be meta-... more Rawlins (2013: 160) observes that both unconditionals and more classical free choice can be meta-characterized using orthogonality, but does not actually unify the two. One reason may be that in English, different expressions serve in these roles. By contrast, in Hungarian, AKÁR expressions serve as NPIs, FCIs, and unconditional adjuncts, but not as interrogatives or free relatives. This paper offers a unified account of the Hungarian data, extending Chierchia 2013 and Dayal 2013. The account produces the same unconditional meanings that Rawlins derives from an interrogative basis. This result highlights the fact that sets of alternatives arise from different morpho-syntactic sources and are utilized by the grammar in different ways, but the results may fully converge.
The paper discusses two types of quantifier particles in Hungarian that both participate in reite... more The paper discusses two types of quantifier particles in Hungarian that both participate in reiterated constructions. One type follows and the other precedes its host, which makes it easy to compare them. The particles that follow their hosts are argued to be heads on the clausal spines of independent propositions. Host+particle does, but need not, occur in reiterations, and the particles do not build quantifier words. In contrast, the particles that precede their hosts are argued to be quantifier-phrase internal. Particle+host must occur in reiterations, and the particles build quantifier words. The two types of reiterated constructions also differ in having their own distinctive internal "connectives" and in forming strict vs. non-strict negative concord expressions. The paper focuses on syntax, with some attention to semantics. It argues for propositional coordination for both types, and propositional quantification for the second type. Constituent-size reiterations are derivable via ellipsis, raising the question whether they are necessarily so derived. The paper concludes with data from Bosnian, French, Japanese, Malayalam, Mandarin, Persian, Russian, Sinhala, Telugu, and Turkish, which indicate the cross-linguistic interest of recognizing the two types of particle constructions.
Bartos et al. eds. Boundaries Crossed... (Springer), 2018
Surányi (2006) observed that Hungarian has a hybrid (strict + non-strict) negative concord system... more Surányi (2006) observed that Hungarian has a hybrid (strict + non-strict) negative concord system. This paper proposes a unified analysis of that system within the general framework of Zeijlstra (2004, 2008) and, especially, Chierchia (2013), with the following new ingredients. Sentential negation nem is the same full negation in the presence of both strict and non-strict concord items. Preverbal senkìn-one' type negative concord items occupy the specifier position of either nem`not' or sem`nor'. The latter, sem spells out is`too, even' in the immediate scope of negation; is/sem are focus-associating heads on the clausal spine. Sem can be seen as an overt counterpart of the phonetically null head that Chierchia dubs NEG; it is capable of invoking an abstract (disembodied) negation at the edge of its projection.
The additive presupposition of particles like too/even is uncontested, but usually stipulated. Th... more The additive presupposition of particles like too/even is uncontested, but usually stipulated. This paper proposes to derive it based on two properties. (i) too/even is cross-linguistically focus-sensitive, and (ii) in many languages, too/even builds negative polarity items and free-choice items as well, often in concert with other particles. (i) is the source of its existential presupposition, and (ii) offers clues regarding how additivity comes about. (i)-(ii) together demand a sparse semantics for too/even, one that can work with different kinds of alternatives (focus, subdomain, scalar) and invoke suitably different further operators.
Carlson (1983, 2006) observes that functional elements often present mismatches in form and inter... more Carlson (1983, 2006) observes that functional elements often present mismatches in form and interpretation that lexical elements do not.
In many languages, the same particles that form quantifier words also serve as connectives, ad... more In many languages, the same particles that form quantifier words also serve as connectives, additive and scalar particles, question markers, roots of existential verbs, and so on. Do these have a unified semantics, or do they merely bear a family resemblance? Are they aided by silent operators in their varied roles -- if yes, what operators?
I dub the particles “quantifier particles” and refer to them generically with capitalized versions of the Japanese morphemes. I argue that both MO and KA can be assigned a stable semantics across their various roles. The specific analysis I offer is motivated by the fact that MO and KA often combine with just one argument; I propose that this is their characteristic behavior. Their role is to impose semantic requirements that are satisfied when the immediately larger context is interpreted as the meet/join of their host’s semantic contribution with something else. They do not perform meet/join themselves. The obligatory vs. optional appearance of the particles depends on whether the meet/join interpretations arise by default in the given constellation. I explicate the proposal using the toolkit of basic Inquisitive Semantics.
Formal semantic analyses often take words to be minimal building blocks for the purposes of compo... more Formal semantic analyses often take words to be minimal building blocks for the purposes of compositionality. But various recent theories of morphology and syntax have converged on the view that there is no demarcation line corresponding to the word level. The same conclusion has emerged from the compositional semantics of superlatives. In the spirit of extending compositionality below the word level, this paper explores how a small set of particles (Japanese ka and mo, Chinese dou, and Hungarian vala/vagy, mind, and is) form quantifier words and serve as connectives, additive and scalar particles, question markers, and existential verbs. Our main question is whether the meanings of these particles across the varied environments are highly regular, or they are lexicalized with a variety of different meanings that bear a family resemblance. This paper does not reach definitive conclusions, but it raises analytical possibilities using Boolean semantics and Inquisitive Semantics (the semantics of alternatives). It also draws attention to systematic similarities and some differences between the multiple uses of mo and dou that have not been studied in the literature, and reviews accounts in terms of maximality and additivity.
One of the insights of dynamic semantics in its various guises (Kamp 1981, Heim
1982, Groenendij... more One of the insights of dynamic semantics in its various guises (Kamp 1981, Heim
1982, Groenendijk & Stokhof 1991, Kamp & Reyle 1993 among many others) is that
interpretation is sensitive to left-to-right order. Is order sensitivity, particularly the default left-to-right order of evaluation, a property of particular meanings of certain lexical items (e.g., dynamically interpreted conjunction) or is it a more general feature of meaning composition? If it is a more general feature of meaning composition, is it a processing ‘preference’ or should it be captured as a ‘harder’ constraint on the type of meanings and operations over meanings involved in natural language interpretation? This squib draws attention to the symmetrical A-too B-too construction (found in a variety of languages, e.g., Hungarian, Japanese, Romanian, Russian) in this context. It argues that any semantic analysis of its main ‘symmetrical-meaning’ characteristic should also allow for subtler interactions between this construction and items that are clearly sensitive to evaluation-order effects, e.g., anaphoric adjectives like next and other. We suggest that the notion of postsupposition embedded in a broader dynamic framework is better able to account for both the symmetric nature of this construction, its non-symmetric variant A-too, and its interaction with items that are evaluation-order sensitive. We briefly compare this proposal with a couple of possible alternative accounts.
In many languages, the same particles build quantifier words and serve as connectives, additive a... more In many languages, the same particles build quantifier words and serve as connectives, additive and scalar particles, question markers, existential verbs, and so on. Do the roles of each particle form a natural class with a stable semantics? Are the particles aided by additional elements, overt or covert, in fulfilling their varied roles? I propose a unified analysis, according to which the particles impose partial ordering requirements (glb and lub) on the interpretations of their hosts and the immediate larger contexts, but do not embody algebraic operations themselves.
Mauritian Creole (MC) is a French lexifier creole with Kwa and Bantu substrate languages. In the ... more Mauritian Creole (MC) is a French lexifier creole with Kwa and Bantu substrate languages. In the early nineteenth century MC lost the French determiners le/la 'the' and du (partitive 'some'), often incorporating them into the noun stems, and became, in stark contrast to French, a language that allows bare count and mass nouns in argument positions. Diana Guillemin's book is dedicated to the documentation and theoretical analysis of that change, as well as the new system of determiners and quantifiers that subsequently emerged in MC. G is a native speaker of MC, but the study is primarily corpus-based, with over eighty text sources, ranging from eighteenthcentury documents to Baissac's ( , 1888 collections to recent internet posts. The analysis is carried out using current formal semantic and generative syntactic theories.
The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Syntax, 2nd ed., 2017
The focus of the chapter is weak islands (WI), i.e. selective islands. Strong (absolute) islands ... more The focus of the chapter is weak islands (WI), i.e. selective islands. Strong (absolute) islands are considered only to set the stage for the discussion of WIs. Up until the late 1980s nothing much beyond wh-islands had been thought to be a WI. Beginning with Relativized Minimality, an ever-growing range of WIs has been recognized. Thus, theories of weak islands have mushroomed, each coming with a significant set of new data and important new connections to other domains. The chapter emphasizes the correspondence between data sets and theories. Less attention is given to proposals that primarily recast the theoretical account of some narrow range of data.
Section 2 explains the distinction between absolute versus selective islands. Section 3 introduces a range of classical strong islands and various types of explanations, among them subjacency, repair by ellipsis, and processing. Sections 4, 5, and 6 enumerate the kind of extractions that are sensitive to WIs and the factors that induce a WI. Under the rubric of weak-island sensitivity, it discusses arguments vs. adjuncts, referential or existentially presupposing vs. non-referential expression, D-linking, individual vs. non-individual expressions and how many-phrases, functional readings and event-related readings, split constructions, negative polarity licensing, and cross-sentential anaphora. Under the rubric of weak-island inducers, it considers intervention effects due to wh-islands, negatives and other affective operators, response stance and non-stance in contrast to volunteered stance predicates, extraposition islands, VP-adverbs, and finally quantifier scope islands. Section 7 is devoted to various theories of islands, starting with ECP and subjacency, moving on to Relativized Minimality. Theoretical problems and the diversity of the data motivate the transition to the scope theory that comes in two versions, the algebraic semantic and the dynamic semantic ones. Section 8 concludes.
This paper seeks to illustrate the advantages of not treating phonological words as distinguished... more This paper seeks to illustrate the advantages of not treating phonological words as distinguished building blocks in compositional semantics. Following Bobaljik 2012, we derive the relative readings of amount superlatives in two steps, [[[d-many] comparative] superlative]. The existence of two comparative constructions is revealed, involving more vs. the more. Each builds a different superlative construction, explaining the conflicting intuitions about superlatives in the literature, as well as puzzles relating to the definite article in superlatives.
Baltic International Yearbook of Cognition, Logic and Communication, 2010
Quantification over individuals, times, and worlds can in principle be made explicit in the synta... more Quantification over individuals, times, and worlds can in principle be made explicit in the syntax of the object language, or left to the semantics and spelled out in the meta-language. The traditional view is that quantification over individuals is syntactically explicit, whereas quantification over times and worlds is not. But a growing body of literature proposes a uniform treatment. This paper examines the scopal interaction of aspectual raising verbs (begin), modals (can), and intensional raising verbs (threaten) with quantificational subjects in Shupamem, Dutch, and English. It appears that aspectual raising verbs and at least modals may undergo the same kind of overt or covert scopechanging operations as nominal quantifiers; the case of intensional raising verbs is less clear. Scope interaction is thus shown to be a new potential diagnostic of object-linguistic quantification, and the similarity in the scope behavior of nominal and verbal quantifiers supports the grammatical plausibility of ontological symmetry, explored in Schlenker .
1 BACKGROUND NOTIONS IN LATTICE THEORY AND GENERALIZED QUANTIFIERS* Anna Szabolcsi Department of ... more 1 BACKGROUND NOTIONS IN LATTICE THEORY AND GENERALIZED QUANTIFIERS* Anna Szabolcsi Department of Linguistics UCLA Many papers in this volume build on certain elementary notions of lattice the-ory and generalized quantifier theory; often, their empirical ...
A well-known observation is that (1) has a reading on which every building scopes over a r eman, ... more A well-known observation is that (1) has a reading on which every building scopes over a r eman, but (2) does not:
Page 336. 9 QUANTIFIERS IN PAIR-LIST READINGS* Anna Szabolcsi Department of Linguistics UCLA In t... more Page 336. 9 QUANTIFIERS IN PAIR-LIST READINGS* Anna Szabolcsi Department of Linguistics UCLA In this paper the term pair-list reading will be applied to both types (1) and (2): (1) Who did every dog bite? 'For every dog, who did it bite?' (2) Who did six dogs bite? ...
Page 1. ANNA SZABOLCSI AND FRANS ZWARTS WEAK ISLANDS AND AN ALGEBRAIC SEMANTICS FOR SCOPE TAKING*... more Page 1. ANNA SZABOLCSI AND FRANS ZWARTS WEAK ISLANDS AND AN ALGEBRAIC SEMANTICS FOR SCOPE TAKING* ... 0 1993 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. Page 2. 236 ANNA SZABOLCSI AND FRANS ZWARTS ...
This paper examines how pronouns interpreted as identity maps fit into a framework of dynamic sem... more This paper examines how pronouns interpreted as identity maps fit into a framework of dynamic semantics.
This paper discusses two syntactico-semantic features that some languages of the Danube basin sha... more This paper discusses two syntactico-semantic features that some languages of the Danube basin share, presumably due to areal influence rather than genetic or typolog ical relatedness. One is the preposing of multiple interrogative phrases in Romanian, Serbo-Croatian, and Hungarian. The other is the existence in Serbo-Croatian and Hun garian of negative polarity items whose licensors do not include clause-mate negation. These phenomena indicate that linguistic contact (if indeed that is the culprit) can impact quite subtle and high-level properties of grammar.
The traditional ideal of formal elegance requires that the treatment and other quantificational p... more The traditional ideal of formal elegance requires that the treatment and other quantificational phenomena be designed to be entirely ge turns out, however, that natural language quantifiers do not behave unif One possible reaction is to maintain the general formulations and sup them with filters. A more explanatory strategy may be to devise sp mechanisms that immediately give correct results. The following heurist proposed in Szabolcsi (1994a, 658):
Handouts for a one-week special course in Advanced Issues in Cognitive Science and Linguistics, a... more Handouts for a one-week special course in Advanced Issues in Cognitive Science and Linguistics, a Masters Program at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona. Topics: (I) Clause-internal scopal diversity and scope transparency, (II) What looks like one QP may turn out to be two QPs that interact with other logical operators, (III) The busy lives of quantifier particles, (IV) Existential? Universal?, (V) Universals of the logical vocabulary and what might explain them: learnability and communicative utility.
In many languages of the world, the topic and the focus of the sentence, the scope relations amon... more In many languages of the world, the topic and the focus of the sentence, the scope relations among quantifiers and negation, and the role of the speaker and addressee are made transparent by word order and various suffixes on the verb. They are integral parts of the grammar. We study data from languages from Hungarian to Kathmandu Newari from the perspective of theoretical linguistics and ask what they tell us about how the syntax/semantics interface works in universal grammar.
Consolidated slide set, New York University. -- This course is an introductory survey of linguist... more Consolidated slide set, New York University. -- This course is an introductory survey of linguistics-the scientific study of language. Language is a social phenomenon, but all human languages share many specific structural properties. Analyzing data from English and other languages, we examine some fundamental properties of the structure and interpretation of words and sentences, and the sound system. Building on these foundations, we discuss the brain representation, processing, and acquisition of language, language change, dialects and sociolects, and Signed Languages. (Updated in 2023)
Undergraduate, Linguistics, New York University, 2020
Syllabus In many languages of the world, the topic and the focus of the sentence, the scope relat... more Syllabus In many languages of the world, the topic and the focus of the sentence, the scope relations among quantifiers and negation, and the role of the speaker and addressee are made transparent by word order and various suffixes on the verb. They are integral parts of the grammar. We study data from languages from Hungarian to Kathmandu Newari from the perspective of theoretical linguistics and ask what they tell us about how the syntax/semantics interface works in universal grammar. The goals of the course Participants gain expertise in the foundations of the syntax of left periphery (operators) and of the logic used in the literature on quantification; Participants read primary literature and advanced handbook articles; Participants look beyond English in theoretical research in syntax and semantics; Participants actively discuss theory and analyses with classmates and the instructor; Participants write a short research paper (or work on a take-home exam). The course will present six topic blocks, on average two weeks long each, depending on complexity and students' interests. Topics may be added/removed. See the tentative calendar on the next page, followed by some summaries or abstracts for the main readings.
Undergraduate, Linguistics, New York University, 2020
This course prepares students for graduate-level coursework in semantics and the syntax-semantics... more This course prepares students for graduate-level coursework in semantics and the syntax-semantics interface, and generally aims to build interest and confidence in formal semantics. It starts with building a solid foundation in propositional and predicate logic, elements of the lambda calculus, and intensionality. It shows how those tools are useful in accounting for long-distance meaning relationships, quantification, and information structure, and branches out into dynamic and inquisitive semantics. Students are encouraged to write a short term paper. The core text is Winter 2016, Elements of Formal Semantics, but the chapters of this book do not serve as "lesson plans." The course will cover both more and less than the book, and we'll slow down or speed up, depending on the participants' background and interests. There's no such things as having "too much" or "too little" previous experience with formalism.
The course presupposes a working knowledge of set theory, propositional and predicate logics. Par... more The course presupposes a working knowledge of set theory, propositional and predicate logics. Participants complete a 20-page problem set by August 20. This course is an introduction to formal semantics, the approach used in this department, and aims to prepare you for Semantics II, various seminars, and in general for reading and contributing to the literature. Formal semantics employs logical and mathematical tools to devise precise and well-understood analyses of linguistic phenomena and to gain general insights. In the first block, roughly up to mid-October, we introduce some basic tools, always critically examining how well they are suitedd to the linguistic tasks (propositional and predicate logics, lambdas, type theory, operations in partially ordered sets, generalized quantifier theory). In the second block, roughly till the end of October, we use these tools to develop techniques of quantification and binding, bringing in more syntax/semantics interface considerations. We also discuss foundational issues pertaining to meaning, including intensionality and dynamic semantics. In the third block, roughly covering November, we turn to a large family of phenomena that involve "alternatives" of various sorts: questions, focus, implicatures, negative polarity, and free choice. The traditional analyses of many of these were pragmatic, but much of that pragmatics has successfully infiltrated and transformed semantics proper. One surprising result has been a new analysis of some natural language conjunctions and universals as strengthened disjunctions and existentials. The two weeks of December are left open in case we needed more time for the above, for discussing topics of your choice, and for presentations of your course projects. Requirements and deadlines
This course prepares students for graduate-level coursework in semantics and the syntax/semantics... more This course prepares students for graduate-level coursework in semantics and the syntax/semantics interface. It starts with building a solid foundation in predicate logic and elements of the lambda calculus, and moves on to use Pauline Jacobson's Compositional Semantics textbook. Jacobson adopts an approach whereby the syntax builds the expressions while the semantics simultaneously assigns each a model-theoretic interpretation. Alongside this approach, the author also presents a competing view that makes use of an intermediate level, Logical Form. The course will discuss questions and relative clauses, quantifiers in various positions, and binding.
This course studies Hungarian from the perspective of theoretical linguistics, and asks what it t... more This course studies Hungarian from the perspective of theoretical linguistics, and asks what it tells us about the syntax/semantics interface in universal grammar. Hungarian is known as a language that wears its semantics on its syntactic sleeve. Constituent order transparently identifies the topic and the focus of the sentence, and disambiguates the scopes of operators like "everyone," "rarely," and "not." English, in contrast, signals those pragmatic and semantic relations by subtle intonational clues, if at all. Thus Hungarian offers a laboratory in which to isolate and study some otherwise elusive phenomena, and enables one to ask to what extent they are strictly part of grammar, what tools natural languages use to express them, in what ways natural languages vary in this domain, and so on.
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This paper puts forth new arguments to the effect that the Hungarian negative marker NEM has uNeg, but NCIs do not. Their relation to negation is indirect; they are existentials that need to be exhaustified, which in turn requires an intervening negation to maintain logical coherence (Chierchia 2013). This eliminates the appearance of redundancy in the negative marker co-occurring with NCIs.
The analysis combines features of Zeijlstra's proposal for strict NC and Chierchia's proposal for non-strict NC. Hungarian is a true NC hybrid that has an overt counterpart (SEM) of Chierchia's NEG. Hybridity proves that these features can coexist.
*Je veux que je parte.
I want that I leave.SUBJ
‘I want for me to leave’
Inspired by Ruwet (1984/1991) and Farkas (1988; 1992), I present data from Hungarian where obviation in certain subjunctives is plainly lifted, and data where obviation occurs in indicatives. I argue that obviation is not the result of competition with another construction, and point to promising potential accounts in terms of a clash in semantics or pragmatics. My aim is to contribute desiderata for a theory of obviation and exemptions from obviation in fairly informal terms.
I dub the particles “quantifier particles” and refer to them generically with capitalized versions of the Japanese morphemes. I argue that both MO and KA can be assigned a stable semantics across their various roles. The specific analysis I offer is motivated by the fact that MO and KA often combine with just one argument; I propose that this is their characteristic behavior. Their role is to impose semantic requirements that are satisfied when the immediately larger context is interpreted as the meet/join of their host’s semantic contribution with something else. They do not perform meet/join themselves. The obligatory vs. optional appearance of the particles depends on whether the meet/join interpretations arise by default in the given constellation. I explicate the proposal using the toolkit of basic Inquisitive Semantics.
1982, Groenendijk & Stokhof 1991, Kamp & Reyle 1993 among many others) is that
interpretation is sensitive to left-to-right order. Is order sensitivity, particularly the default left-to-right order of evaluation, a property of particular meanings of certain lexical items (e.g., dynamically interpreted conjunction) or is it a more general feature of meaning composition? If it is a more general feature of meaning composition, is it a processing ‘preference’ or should it be captured as a ‘harder’ constraint on the type of meanings and operations over meanings involved in natural language interpretation? This squib draws attention to the symmetrical A-too B-too construction (found in a variety of languages, e.g., Hungarian, Japanese, Romanian, Russian) in this context. It argues that any semantic analysis of its main ‘symmetrical-meaning’ characteristic should also allow for subtler interactions between this construction and items that are clearly sensitive to evaluation-order effects, e.g., anaphoric adjectives like next and other. We suggest that the notion of postsupposition embedded in a broader dynamic framework is better able to account for both the symmetric nature of this construction, its non-symmetric variant A-too, and its interaction with items that are evaluation-order sensitive. We briefly compare this proposal with a couple of possible alternative accounts.
Section 2 explains the distinction between absolute versus selective islands. Section 3 introduces a range of classical strong islands and various types of explanations, among them subjacency, repair by ellipsis, and processing. Sections 4, 5, and 6 enumerate the kind of extractions that are sensitive to WIs and the factors that induce a WI. Under the rubric of weak-island sensitivity, it discusses arguments vs. adjuncts, referential or existentially presupposing vs. non-referential expression, D-linking, individual vs. non-individual expressions and how many-phrases, functional readings and event-related readings, split constructions, negative polarity licensing, and cross-sentential anaphora. Under the rubric of weak-island inducers, it considers intervention effects due to wh-islands, negatives and other affective operators, response stance and non-stance in contrast to volunteered stance predicates, extraposition islands, VP-adverbs, and finally quantifier scope islands. Section 7 is devoted to various theories of islands, starting with ECP and subjacency, moving on to Relativized Minimality. Theoretical problems and the diversity of the data motivate the transition to the scope theory that comes in two versions, the algebraic semantic and the dynamic semantic ones. Section 8 concludes.
This paper puts forth new arguments to the effect that the Hungarian negative marker NEM has uNeg, but NCIs do not. Their relation to negation is indirect; they are existentials that need to be exhaustified, which in turn requires an intervening negation to maintain logical coherence (Chierchia 2013). This eliminates the appearance of redundancy in the negative marker co-occurring with NCIs.
The analysis combines features of Zeijlstra's proposal for strict NC and Chierchia's proposal for non-strict NC. Hungarian is a true NC hybrid that has an overt counterpart (SEM) of Chierchia's NEG. Hybridity proves that these features can coexist.
*Je veux que je parte.
I want that I leave.SUBJ
‘I want for me to leave’
Inspired by Ruwet (1984/1991) and Farkas (1988; 1992), I present data from Hungarian where obviation in certain subjunctives is plainly lifted, and data where obviation occurs in indicatives. I argue that obviation is not the result of competition with another construction, and point to promising potential accounts in terms of a clash in semantics or pragmatics. My aim is to contribute desiderata for a theory of obviation and exemptions from obviation in fairly informal terms.
I dub the particles “quantifier particles” and refer to them generically with capitalized versions of the Japanese morphemes. I argue that both MO and KA can be assigned a stable semantics across their various roles. The specific analysis I offer is motivated by the fact that MO and KA often combine with just one argument; I propose that this is their characteristic behavior. Their role is to impose semantic requirements that are satisfied when the immediately larger context is interpreted as the meet/join of their host’s semantic contribution with something else. They do not perform meet/join themselves. The obligatory vs. optional appearance of the particles depends on whether the meet/join interpretations arise by default in the given constellation. I explicate the proposal using the toolkit of basic Inquisitive Semantics.
1982, Groenendijk & Stokhof 1991, Kamp & Reyle 1993 among many others) is that
interpretation is sensitive to left-to-right order. Is order sensitivity, particularly the default left-to-right order of evaluation, a property of particular meanings of certain lexical items (e.g., dynamically interpreted conjunction) or is it a more general feature of meaning composition? If it is a more general feature of meaning composition, is it a processing ‘preference’ or should it be captured as a ‘harder’ constraint on the type of meanings and operations over meanings involved in natural language interpretation? This squib draws attention to the symmetrical A-too B-too construction (found in a variety of languages, e.g., Hungarian, Japanese, Romanian, Russian) in this context. It argues that any semantic analysis of its main ‘symmetrical-meaning’ characteristic should also allow for subtler interactions between this construction and items that are clearly sensitive to evaluation-order effects, e.g., anaphoric adjectives like next and other. We suggest that the notion of postsupposition embedded in a broader dynamic framework is better able to account for both the symmetric nature of this construction, its non-symmetric variant A-too, and its interaction with items that are evaluation-order sensitive. We briefly compare this proposal with a couple of possible alternative accounts.
Section 2 explains the distinction between absolute versus selective islands. Section 3 introduces a range of classical strong islands and various types of explanations, among them subjacency, repair by ellipsis, and processing. Sections 4, 5, and 6 enumerate the kind of extractions that are sensitive to WIs and the factors that induce a WI. Under the rubric of weak-island sensitivity, it discusses arguments vs. adjuncts, referential or existentially presupposing vs. non-referential expression, D-linking, individual vs. non-individual expressions and how many-phrases, functional readings and event-related readings, split constructions, negative polarity licensing, and cross-sentential anaphora. Under the rubric of weak-island inducers, it considers intervention effects due to wh-islands, negatives and other affective operators, response stance and non-stance in contrast to volunteered stance predicates, extraposition islands, VP-adverbs, and finally quantifier scope islands. Section 7 is devoted to various theories of islands, starting with ECP and subjacency, moving on to Relativized Minimality. Theoretical problems and the diversity of the data motivate the transition to the scope theory that comes in two versions, the algebraic semantic and the dynamic semantic ones. Section 8 concludes.