SDV
SDV (Sprache und Datenverarbeitung) ISSN 0343-5202 ISBN 978-3-942158-54-1
International Journal for Language Data Processing
Sprache und Datenverarbeitung
Universitätsverlag Rhein-Ruhr
SDV (Sprache und Datenverarbeitung) 35.2/2011 und 36.1/2012
9 783942 158541
Formal approaches to discourse particles and modal adverbs Editor: Lotte Hogeweg, Eric McCready & Grégoire Winterstein
SDV Vol. 35.2/2011 und 36.1/2012
Sprache und Datenverarbeitung International Journal for Language Data Processing 35./36 Jahrgang 2011/2012
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Inhalt Lotte Hogeweg, Eric McCready & Grégoire Winterstein Formal approaches to discourse particles and modal adverbs: Editorial ...................................................................................................... 5-10 Upsorn Tawilapakul On the Role of the Particle lɛɛw45 in Thai ................................................. 11-28 Grégoire Winterstein Only without its scales ................................................................................ 29-47 Yurie Hara & Tomohide Kinuhata Osaka Japanese Nen: One-sided Public Belief and Paratactic Association ................................................................................. 49-70 Chungmin Lee Evidentials and Modals: What Makes them Unique .................................. 71-98 Regine Eckardt Particles as Speaker Indexicals in Free Indirect Discourse ........................ 99-119 Anna Chernilovskaya What Russian men do with exclamatives ................................................... 121-136 Eric McCready How to Coordinate on Pragmatic Content ................................................. 137-149
Adressen ..................................................................................................................... 151
Lotte Hogeweg, Eric McCready & Grégoire Winterstein
Formal approaches to discourse particles and modal adverbs1 The articles presented in this volume are the proceedings of the fourth workshop on formal approaches to discourse particles and modal adverbs, which took place in Ljubljana in August 2011. Discourse particles form a borderline case between semantics and pragmatics, and can thus be the source of new insights in both domains. Usually, the formal description of the meaning of discourse particles involves more dimensions than what is usually taken into account in semantic description. Therefore, their study gives clues about the articulation between various layers of meaning, especially given that the combination of discourse particles is possible, but not in an arbitrary manner. A proper account of the meaning of discourse particles is also a very promising avenue for computational linguistics since they are precious indicators for the disambiguation of discourse structure and speaker intentions. Probably one of the biggest challenges in the study of discourse particles is that of variety. First, the meanings conveyed by discourse particles cover a wide range of interpretations and effects. Among other things, discourse particles can convey intensification and emotivity, affect speech acts, bear on informational structure aspects or constrain the structure of the discourse they are used in. Another domain of great variation is that of the differences between languages. While some languages lexicalize a great number of particles (e.g. Japanese and German) others are much poorer in this domain, and between languages that do have discourse particles, the lexicalized meanings greatly differ. Finally, the formal approaches used to characterize properly the meaning of discourse particles also prove very varied and go from dynamic semantics to decision theory, quite often borrowing from several trends. All the papers presented in this volume are representative of this variety. The particles studied belong to several languages (Thai, Russian, Japanese, Korean, English and German) convey very different meaning (emphasis, exclusion, epistemic features etc.) and are analyzed in different ways, depending on the meaning conveyed by each particle. Tawilapakul, Winterstein and Hara and Kinuhata discuss the semantics of a particular particle. Tawilapakul’s contribution deals with the Thai particle lεεw45. This particle 1 We would like to thank the speakers and audience of the workshop on formal approaches to discourse particles and modal adverbs. In addition, we are very grateful to the program committee of the workshop and the reviewers of this special issue for their invaluable help and advice. Sprache und Datenverarbeitung 2(2011)/1(2012): S. 5-10
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is traditionally analyzed as a perfective aspect marker. Tawilapakul, however, argues that this traditional classification is empirically incorrect. For example, the particle can be used in combination with a progressive/imperfective marker yielding a progressive/ imperfective reading, as in (1). (1)
maa45 kam33laŋ33 wiŋ42 horse PROG run ‘The horse is running.’
(Tawilapakul, this volume)
The function of lεεw45 in such examples can therefore not be to mark perfectiveness. Rather, Tawilapakul argues, the particle creates emphasis on the change of state the topic of the sentence undergoes. Tawilapakul argues that lεεw45 triggers the presupposition that the proposition expressed in the host sentence was previously believed to be false. Following Zeevat’s (2002) analysis of discourse particles, Tawilapakul analyzes the choice for an utterance with or without lεεw45 in Optimality Theory. Winterstein discusses the meaning of only and argues against the claim made by several authors that only has a scalar component as part of its semantics. Those authors base this claim on the observation that the use of only is infelicitous in combination with an associate which takes in a position at the top of some scale (as in 2) and the observation that only does not exclude elements that are situated below the associate on a particular scale (as in 3, which does not entail that John doesn’t have a bachelor’s degree). (2) (3)
# John is only a top general a. John only has a master’s degree
(Winterstein, this volume) (Winterstein, this volume)
However, a scalar analysis of only cannot account for examples like (4), which Winterstein calls improvement readings of only. (4)
John only likes to drink single malt scotch (Winterstein, this volume)
Here, only does not mark that its associate takes in a low position on some scale. On the contrary, only seems to mark that its associate is at the top of the scale. To account for the improvement reading of only, Winterstein argues for a semantics of only without a scalar component. In line with Zeevat (2011), Winterstein argues that only P(x) superweakly presupposes that there is an alternative to x, y and it asserts that the predicate P does not hold for y. The scalar interpretation and the argumentative effect of only are byproducts of this simple exclusive meaning. Hara & Kinuhata address the Osaka Japanese particle nen and argue that it marks a sentence as an assertion or, in terms of Gunlogson (2003), that it publicizes that the proposition expressed by the host sentence is part of the speaker’s beliefs. Given this definition of the particle, it seems puzzling at first sight that nen can also be felicitously used in wh-questions. However, it can only be used with wh-questions in certain contexts. The defining characteristic of those contexts, Hara and Kinuhata argue, is that the speaker in those contexts expects the hearer to have an answer to the question. In general, questions pragmatically presuppose that the speaker assumes the hearer to have an answer to the question. According to Hara and Kinuhata, nen can attach to this presupposition,
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indicating that the speaker publicly commits to the assumption that the hearer knows the answer. Hence, nen is a particle that can attach to both the at-issue proposition of its host sentence as well as the presuppositional proposition. Interestingly, there seems to be a similarity between nen and the intonation of English questions as described by Bartels (1999). Bartels (1999) argues that the low phrasal tone L- can be seen as an ASSERT morpheme. Similar to wh-questions with nen, wh-questions uttered with the low phrasal tone give rise to the presupposition that there is an answer to the question. Lee’s paper is a partial overview of the inventory of evidential, reportative and modal markers in Korean. One of the markers discussed is the evidential marker -te. One of its characteristics is that the evidence indicated by -te is always acquired before speech time. When -te is combined with null tense marking the evidence can be direct, as in (5). When the evidence is direct, the person observing the evidence is always the speaker (5)
Pi-ka o-te-ra rain-NOM come- TE-DEC ‘[I saw] it was raining.’
(Lee, this volume)
However, -te with null tense can also be used with predicates whose instantiation is usually less directly observable, such as individual level predicates like be smart. In that case the evidence is inferential. The evidential marker -te can even be used with atemporal generic statements and statements about the future. In that case -te indicates the trustworthiness of the source of the evidence; -te can only be used when the information is based on a trustworthy authoritative source and not when it is just overheard. When -te is combined with past tense marking, as in (6), the event of raining in the past is inferred from the speaker’s own (direct) observation of the result of raining (e.g. a wet ground). (6)
Pi-ka o-ass-te-ra (Lee, this volume) rain- NOM come-PAST-te-DEC ‘[I inferred, based on my direct observation of the result evidence], that it (had) rained (already before my observation).
Note that the speaker still has to be the one making the observation (that leads to the inference). If -te is used with past tense a constraint holds that says that there must be discontinuity between the time at which the event was witnessed and the speech time. Another marker discussed by Lee is -tay. The marker -tay can be used in a simplex sentence and then it means something like I was told. It originated through contraction and grammaticalization from complex sentences with the higher subject as the source of information. Lee also goes into what happens when particles are combined. For example, when -te and -tay are combined, the perceiver of sensory observation is the original speaker of the reportative sentence (e.g. I was told that Mary is at home (as observed by the person who told it)). Two contributions discuss the role of discourse particles in particular environments, namely free indirect discourse and exclamatives. Eckardt discusses discourse particles in free indirect discourse. In free indirect discourse the perspective from which things
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are described seems to shift between the narrator of the story and the protagonist. This has been modeled (by, amongst others, Schlenker 2004) by assuming two utterance contexts, one for the narrator: C, and one for the protagonist: c. The class of indexicals can be divided into those that are shiftable and those that are non-shiftable. For example, pronouns and tense markers are always interpreted relative to C in free indirect discourse, while temporal adverbials can be interpreted relative to c. Eckardt argues that German particles belong to the shiftable indexicals; in free indirect discourse they indicate the narrators attitude towards the proposition. For example, ja in (7) indicates that the protagonist (not the narrator) believes that the addressee might already know the content of the sentence. (7)
Schloß und Riegel waren die ganze Zeit über offen gewesen! Die Alte hatte, wohl aus Vorsicht, hinter ihm nicht abgesperrt. Aber mein Gott! Er hatte ja auch Lisaweta gesehen und konnte sich doch denken, daß sie irgendwie hereingekommen war! Sie hatte ja nicht durch die Wand eintreten können! (Eckardt, this volume)
‘No lock, no bolt, all the time, all that time! The old woman had not shut it after him perhaps as a precaution. But, good God! Why, he had seen Lizaveta afterwards! And how could he, how could he have failed to reflect that she must have come in somehow! She could not have come through the wall!’
In this particular example, both the narrator and the protagonist have reason to believe that the reader already knows the content of the sentence so both an interpretation relative to c and an interpretation relative to C would satisfy the presupposition triggered by ja. Nonetheless, ja is interpreted as reflecting the protagonist’s point of view. To explain this, Eckardt argues that we need to look at the function of discourse particles rather than their truth conditional content. In the case of example (7), ja is used to make an argument and it is the protagonist who is trying to make a point in this fragment, and not the narrator. Eckardt furthermore shows that discourse particles and the majority of temporal indexicals are always interpreted relative to the same context in free indirect discourse, thereby confirming a coherent context of narration. The indexicals jetzt/now and hier/here, however, form an exception in that they are not necessarily interpreted relative to the same context as other shiftable indexicals. Chernilovskaya investigates the relation between expressive particles and exclamatives. Like exclamatives, expressive particles express the speaker’s attitude towards the content of the utterance. Exclamatives and utterances with expressive particles therefore come with two types of content: descriptive content and expressive content. In contrast to the common view of wh-exclamatives as degree-constructions, Chernilovskaya argues that wh-exclamatives express noteworthiness, either of the referent associated with the wh-word or of the proposition referred to with the wh-exclamative (at least in Russian, this latter option seems not to be available in English). Analyzed in terms of the model of Farkas and Bruce (2009) an exclamative updates the speakers Discourse Commitment Set with the descriptive content and the Common Ground directly with the expressive content. Chernilovskaya focuses on the Russian expressive particle nichego sebe. The
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Russian particle is similar in several respects to the English expressive particle man, as described by McCready (2009). Like man, nichego sebe can be uttered with two intonation patterns: with a pause after nichego sebe (the comma intonation) and with no pause after it (the integrated intonation). The effect of using nichego sebe in declarative clauses is also similar to the effect of English man. As McCready (2009) argues, comma man expresses the speaker’s attitude with respect to the proposition denoted by the host sentence and integrated man in addition performs degree intensification of some salient gradable predicate. As such, both nichego sebe and man with the comma intonation in combination with a declarative sentence convey the same meaning as a declarative exclamative (e.g. John has a car!), whereas nichego sebe and man with the integrated intonation in combination with a declarative sentence can be compared to a wh-exclamative (e.g. How tall John is!). This similarity could lead us to believe that expressive particles are lexicalized exclamative speech act operators. However, as Chernilovskaya argues, there are a couple of problems with such an analysis if we look at the Russian data. For instance, nichego sebe only expresses a subset of the attitudes that can be expressed by exclamatives. Furthermore, nichego sebe can be used in combination with a wh-exclamative, which would mean that the sentence is marked twice as an exclamative. Chernilovskaya proposes that expressive particles modify an exclamative speech act, specifying the range of attitudes exclamatives can express. Nichego sebe, for example, expresses unexpectedness, whereby nichego sebe with comma intonation expresses unexpectedness of a contextually salient proposition and nichego sebe with integrated intonation expresses unexpectedness of the proposition that forms the descriptive content of the exclamative. Finally, McCready deals with the context-dependent nature of certain types of expressions. His starting point is the analysis of Underspecified Emotive Content (UEC), as put forward by McCready (2011). The utterance in (8), for example, indicates that the speaker is not neutral with respect to the proposition expressed, but whether she holds a negative or positive attitude towards it is unspecified. (8) The police trashed the fucking OWS library
(McCready, this volume)
McCready (2011) models the reasoning process by which the speaker and hearer coordinate on a context in nonmonotonic logic followed by a game-based model of interpretation. In the present paper, McCready investigates whether this process could account for other phenomena involving underspecification as well, such as the problem of domain restriction in the interpretation of quantifiers. Domain restriction is different from UEC determination in that such restrictions are not unitarily selected by the speaker but are already present in the background of the context in which the quantifier is uttered. Therefore, a coordination game combined with a mechanism to narrow down the space of possibilities seems to be more appropriate for this type of problem. The space of possibilities is restricted by making some possibilities more salient than others, creating so-called focal points. McCready looks at the interpretation of gradable adjectives like tall to determine what mechanism lies behind the determination of such focal points.
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For gradable adjectives this comes down to finding the standard by which, in the case of tall, the height of a person is judged. McCready suggests that a mechanism of utility maximization causes biases towards particular resolutions of the contextual standard. For example, when talking about height relative to the NBA, it would be useful to learn that someone is 2.10 meters tall but not so useful to learn that he is 1.80 meters tall. As such, the focal points are themselves the result of a game model, rather than given as part of our world knowledge.
References Bartels, C. (1999). The intonations of English statements and questions. Garland Publishing. Chernilovskaya, A. (this volume). What Russian men do with exclamatives. Sprache und Datenverarbeitung: International Journal for language Data Processing. Eckardt, R. (this volume), Particles as Speaker Indexicals in Free Indirect Discourse. Sprache und Datenverarbeitung: International Journal for language Data Processing. Farkas, D. and Bruce, K. (2009). On reacting to assertions and polar questions. Journal of Semantics, 27, 81-118. Gunlogson, Christine. (2003). True to form: Rising and falling declaratives as questions in English. New York: Routledge. Hara, Y. and Kinuhata, T. (this volume). Osaka Japanese Nen: One-sided Public Belief and Paratactic Association. Sprache und Datenverarbeitung: International Journal for language Data Processing. Lee, C. (this volume). Evidentials and Modals: What Makes them Unique. Sprache und Datenverarbeitung: International Journal for language Data Processing. McCready, E. (2009). What man does. Linguistics and Philosophy, 31, 671-724. McCready, E. (2011). Emotive equlibria. Manuscript, Aoyama Gakuin University and UTAustin. McCready, E. (this volume). How to Coordinate on Pragmatic Content. Sprache und Datenverarbeitung: International Journal for language Data Processing. Schlenker, P. (2004). Context of thought and Context of utterance. A note on free indirect discourse and the historical present. Mind and Language 19(3), 279 - 304. Tawilapakul, U. (this volume). On the Role of the Particle lɛɛw45 in Thai, Sprache und Datenverarbeitung: International Journal for language Data Processing. Winterstein, G. (this volume). Only without its scales. Sprache und Datenverarbeitung: International Journal for language Data Processing. Zeevat, H. (2002). Explaining presupposition triggers. In K. van Deemter and R. Kibble (eds.) Information sharing: Reference and presupposition in language generation and interpretation. Stanford: CSLI Publications, pp.61-88. Zeevat, H. (2011). Expressing surprise by particles. Manuscript, University of Amsterdam.
Upsorn Tawilapakul
On the Role of the Particle lɛɛw45 in Thai1 Abstract This paper discusses the role of the particle lɛɛw45 in Thai. Conventionally, lɛɛw45 is regarded as a perfective aspect marker (Kanchanawan, 1978; Boonyapatipark, 1983; among others). The reappraisal of the role of lɛɛw45 in this paper, however, offers an argument against the conventional idea. The addition of lɛɛw45 is not mainly aimed at temporal effects. Rather, its presence generates a presupposition concerning the past belief about the state of the topic. The particle also plays a role as marker of counterexpectation. Applying optimality-theoretic pragmatics as proposed by Blutner (2000) and the presupposition constraints created by Zeevat (2002, 2004, 2009), the paper exhibits how the two alternatives are selected and rejected in different situations.
1 Introduction Several studies have been carried out in order to explore the operation of lɛɛw45. In the studies carried out by Kanchanawan (1978) and Boonyapatipark (1983), lɛɛw45 is regarded as a post-serial particle which acts either as a perfective aspect marker or a past time marker. Likewise, Scovel (1970) proposes that lɛɛw45 marks the completion of the event. Following these claims, in (1) it can be concluded that the addition of lɛɛw45 to the sentence generates perfectiveness, thereby asserting that the event ‘plaa33thɔɔŋ33 taay33’ or ‘die (the goldfish)’ already happened before the time of utterance. Also, the presence of lɛɛw45 enables the sentence to satisfy the truth-condition ‘the sentence is true if and only if there was a goldfish and it died at time t’ where t refers to the time of reference. (1)
plaa33thɔɔŋ33 taay33 lɛɛw45 goldfish die ‘The goldfish died (previously this goldfish was expected to be alive).’
Nonetheless, the perfectiveness as well as the completion of the above event can still be derived even when lɛɛw45 is omitted. The presence of lɛɛw45, in fact, offers other meanings which do not primarily concern temporality. Comparative analyses on the presence and the absence of lɛɛw45 in predicates of various types provide supporting evidence 1 I would like to express my gratitude to the audience at ESSLLI 2011’s workshop on discourse particles as well as anonymous reviewers for their fruitful comments. They contribute hugely to this investigation. Sprache und Datenverarbeitung 2(2011)/1(2012): S. 11-28
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for the current claim. Findings from the evidence suggest that both the zero- marked alternative and the alternative marked with lɛɛw45 yield the same temporal effects and only the latter gives extra meanings. The first piece of evidence lies in achievement predicates. In an achievement predicate, perfectiveness can be derived even if the sentence is left unmarked. This is shown in (2). (2)
plaa33thɔɔŋ33 taay33
goldfish die ‘The goldfish died (there was no expectation about this goldfish).’
The reason is that normally an achievement predicate carries a default natural end point. The lexical aspect of an achievement verb suggests that the event takes place and terminates within a small fraction of time. The complete run time of the event thus precedes the utterance time, inducing perfectiveness. The absence of lɛɛw45 in this type of predicate, therefore, does not affect the sentence’s value of being true in the truth- condition ‘the sentence is true if and only if there was a goldfish and it died at time t’ at all. The second piece of evidence is found in sentences where lɛɛw45 co-occurs with ongoing predicates. In order to make the current claim clear, a minimal pair comprising zero-marked and marked sentences are provided in (3) and (4). (3)
maa45 kam33laŋ33 wiŋ42
horse PROG run ‘The horse is running (there was no belief about this horse).’
(4)
maa45 kam33laŋ33 wiŋ42 lɛɛw45
horse PROG run ‘The horse is running now (previously this horse was not believed to be able to run).’
In Thai, progressiveness/imperfectiveness is marked by the addition of the imperfective aspect marker kam33laŋ33. In the unmarked version in (3), kam33laŋ33 suggests that the event time overlaps the reference time and the utterance time NOW. It thus depicts an ongoing impression of the event ‘run (the horse)’ and denotes progressive/imperfective aspect. The event only reports the current state of the horse and change of state is not implied. Considering (4), the co-occurrence of lɛɛw45 and kam33laŋ33 is likely to represent an illogical situation in which perfectiveness co-exists with imperfectiveness. However, in fact such illogical conflict does not occur since lɛɛw45 does not generate perfectiveness. Despite the presence of lɛɛw45, the impression that the event is ongoing at the utterance time still prevails and a progressive/imperfective readings, which is generated by kam33laŋ33, can still be derived. With the presence of lɛɛw45, the change of state of the horse is expressed. The particle suggests that prior to the reference time the horse was in the state of ‘not running’ but at the reference time it is in the state of ‘running’.
Tawilapakul: On the Role of the Particle lɛɛw45 in Thai
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The last piece of evidence is derived from stative predicates. Unlike an achievement, a state continuously runs on the time line that overlaps the reference time. A definite end point is thus not identified. Generally, the unmarked alternative suffices to report a state at reference time. This is illustrated in (5) in which the run time of the state ‘being clean (the house)’ overlaps both the reference time and the utterance time NOW. The sentence ‘baan42 sa22Ɂaat22’ or ‘the house is clean’ asserts that the house is currently in the state of ‘being clean’, thereby denoting imperfectiveness. The alternative marked with lɛɛw45 in (6) offers the same assertion while at the same time highlighting the change of state. Prior to the reference time NOW the house was in the state of ‘being dirty’ but at the reference time this state does not hold; the house is in the altered state of ‘being clean’. (5)
baan42 sa22Ɂaat22
house clean ‘The house is clean (there was no belief about this house) .’
(6)
baan42 sa22Ɂaat22 lɛɛw45
house clean ‘The house is clean now (previously this house was believed to be dirty).’
Besides change of state, a sentence marked with lɛɛw45 presupposes the previous belief/ expectation regarding the state of the topic. The asserted new state of the topic conflicts with the presupposed expectation representing the state of the topic before the reference time. This observation is clarified through the restatement of (1) shown in (7). Context is provided to give a clearer picture. (7)
Context: A and B bought a goldfish from a local pet shop. At the time of purchase the animal looked very healthy. The next morning, unfortunately, A found it dead in the tank. He immediately called B to tell the sad news concerning the goldfish.
A: plaa33thɔɔŋ33 taay33 lɛɛw45 goldfish die ‘The goldfish died (previously this goldfish was expected to be alive).’ Apart from signalling the change of state of the topic ‘goldfish’, lɛɛw45 also implies the expectation that before the event ‘die (the fish)’ took place there was an expectation that the goldfish would be alive. However, such past expectation is denied by the fact that the goldfish is now in the new state of being dead. The nature of both the presupposition and the counter-expectation conveyed by lɛɛw45 will be discussed in detail later. The findings from (1) to (7) have shown that, first of all, it is not always the case that lɛɛw45 marks the end point of an event or a state. It does not necessarily suggest perfectiveness. Therefore, the conventional claim that lɛɛw45 denotes perfectiveness or the completion of the event should be revised. Secondly, both the alternative marked with lɛɛw45 and the unmarked alternative denote the same temporal properties of an event or a state. Finally, while the unmarked alternative only reports a fact involving the topic, the marked alternative marks change of state, triggers presupposition and suggests denial.
