2.5 An alternative proposal for a unified account
2.5.3 A unified account of personal pronouns as indefinites
Having set the stage in the previous subsections, I now turn to propose a unified account of all uses of first and second person singular personal pronouns.66 The proposal is based on the formal analysis of impersonal pronouns as Heimian indefinites (cf. Section 2.3), and the syntactic structure proposed in Elbourne (2008). The basic strategy at the heart of the account is, more or less, to assimilate personal pronouns to impersonal pronouns.
Semantically, I suggest, pronomial structures are Heimian indefinites that contribute descriptive content based on a contextually determined relation in the sense of Nun-berg (1993). The relation links the contextually contributed index to a free variable, which may then be bound by various quantifiers and operators, just like for impersonal
66A previous version of this account is discussed inZobel(2010).
pronouns. The pragmatic differences between personal and impersonal pronouns ob-served in Section1.4 are captured by placing different restrictions on the domain from which the values of the variable may be taken. In the case of personal pronouns, the domain is restricted by the three components proposed byNunberg(1993); impersonal pronouns, on the other hand, are only restricted to animate individuals. Note that this means that impersonal and personal pronouns are not analyzed completely identically.
In the course of the following proposal, I focus exclusively on German first person singular ich and second person singular du. But, the account should be applicable to other personal pronouns that allow for referential and impersonal uses, as well.
Examples (114) and (115) repeat Nunberg’s proposal forI and you.
(114) The components of I:
a. deictic component: the index is the speaker in c
b. relational component: restricts the possible relations to those that relate the index to semantic values that the speaker instantiates
c. classificatory component: constrains the final referent to singular, ani-mate etc. individuals
(115) The components of you:
a. deictic component: the index is the addressee in c
b. relational component: restricts the possible relations to those that relate the index to semantic values that the speaker instantiates
c. classificatory component: constrains the final referent to singular, ani-mate etc. individuals
Even though the restrictions that are jointly placed on the final semantic contribution of first and second person singular pronouns are quite restrictive, Nunberg’s account provides enough freedom and flexibility to derive the impersonal uses. The crucial feature of the account in this respect is the inbuilt mechanism of deferral.
As a starting point, I assume that the components for German first and second person singular pronouns are as specified in (114) and (115). Some adaptations of these specifications will become necessary in the course of the following discussion, though.
As stated above, I adopt Elbourne’s (2008) general syntactic structure, and I assume that the values picked by the deictic component and the relational component are attributed as values to the two free variables, i and R, as well. Since I pursue an analysis of the impersonal uses of first and second person singular pronouns as Heimian indefinites, I adapt Elbourne’s structure by replacing the pronominal form by a free variable. This results in the structure in(116), which is assumed to be common to (at least) first and second person singular pronouns in all of their uses.
(116) [ x[ R2 i1 ] ]
x . . . free variable contributed by the pronoun i . . . models Nunberg’s index
R . . . models the contextually determined relation between x and i
Since I remove the pronominal form, which Elbourne assumes to feature in the un-derlying complex structure, I have to say something about how I assume pronominal spell-out to work. For the adapted account, I adopt a view on pronominal spell-out sim-ilar to that argued for in Kratzer (2009). Following work in Harley and Ritter (2002) and others, Kratzer assumes that the semantic contribution of personal pronouns is built up from featural building blocks, i.e. φ-features. The pronominal form itself is not part of the computation, but is only the phonological form chosen at Spell-Out relative to the φ-feature composition present in the syntax. For the current proposal, this means that the pronominal form spells out the entire complex structure in (116).
In accordance with the change proposed for the underlying syntactic structure, the semantic type of the variable R needs to be adjusted, as well. Since the variables x and i range over individuals and are therefore expressions of type e, the relational variable has the semantic type he,he, stii. The syntactic structure in (116)is therefore interpreted as in (117).67
(117) J[x [R i ]]K
g,w,c = JR K
g,w,c(Ji K
g,w,c)(JxK
g,w,c) = λw.R(i)(x)(w)
The specific semantic contributions of ich or du in their various uses depend on the values chosen for R and i and the binder of the free variable.
The value for i is the speaker in c, i.e. cS, in the case of ich, and the addressee in c, i.e. cA, in the case of du. That is, the values ofi distinguish the two pronominal forms.
The different uses of a single pronominal form are distinguished by the different values for R and the operators binding the free variable x.
For the impersonal uses, the free variable x is bound by a generic operator Gen at sentence level. Krifka et al. (1995) propose that the generic operator relates two open propositions, which form the restrictor and the scope (or: matrix) of the generic operator. The restrictor specifies which variables are bound by Gen, and which are closed existentially, see (118).
(118) Gen [x1, . . . xi;y1, . . . , yj](Restrictor[x1, . . . xi]; Matrix[{x1}, . . .{xi}, y1, . . . , yj])⇔ Gen [x1, . . . xi; ](Restrictor[x1, . . . xi];∃y1, . . . , yj[Matrix[{x1}, . . .{xi}, y1, . . . , yj]]) (Krifka et al. 1995:26)
67The values that are contextually determined by the variable assignment g forR and iare again written asRandi.
Generic quantification over individuals has been assumed to express universal quantifi-cation over normal or typical individuals. For the moment, I adopt this interpretation.68 Consider examples (119) and (120)—specifically the material that is translated by the indefinite noun phrase.
(119) Ich
‘A (national team of a) soccer nation has to be able to dominate such a team.’69
‘A teamsimply has to want to win more than the opponent.’70
These examples show that for the impersonal use, the restrictor of Gen contains the expression [λw.R(i)(x)(w)] contributed by the pronoun, the predication contributed by the associatedals-phrase, and possibly other non-focused material (cf. Krifka et al.
1995). For a fully specified account, though, the value for R and the role of the classificatory component still need to be determined.
The main ingredient in Nunberg’s account of deferred reference is the contextu-ally contributed relation restricted by the relational component. The only restriction Nunberg attributes to the relational component is that the relation needs to be “in-stantiated” by the index. That is, no matter which value is chosen as the final semantic value for the pronoun, the index has to be in some sense part of its denotation.
Examples (119) and (120) both express generalizations about soccer teams. This means that in both cases, the variable x has to range over a set of individuals which contains soccer teams. If this were not the case, the additional restriction introduced via the als-phrase, which is also interpreted in the restrictor of Gen, would result in the empty set. Hence, the question regarding the value of R for (119) and (120) is as follows: Which relations relate the speaker or the addressee to individuals of various forms, including soccer teams, and are instantiated by the speaker or the addressee?
I propose that the value for R is an identification relation that relates individuals to sets of individuals with whom they empathize (cf. Moltmann 2006,2010a). Hence, for the impersonal uses I fix the value forR as the following “identifies-with”-relation, which I take to be a semantic primitive.
68The semantics of generic sentences and Gen is discussed in detail in Chapter3.
69http://www.rp-online.de/public/comments/index/aktuelles/sport/fussball /nationalelf/wm/dfb/744344
70 http://www.netzathleten.de/Sportmagazin/Star-Interviews/Interview-mit-Eishockey-Bundestrainer-Uwe-Krupp-Besser-spielen-als-in-Bern/5761358233643659016/head
(121) λye.λxe.λw.identifies-with(y)(x)(w)
For this relation, Nunberg’s instantiation requirement holds since every individual can be assumed to stand in an empathic relation to himself. Moreover, R can be seen as modelling the speaker- and participant-oriented pragmatic effects described in Section 1.4, which are based on the speaker’s and the addressee’s empathy.
I now turn to the classificatory component for the impersonal uses, which has been neglected so far. Elbourne (2008) proposes to model the featural restrictions con-tributed by the classificatory component as presuppositions on the meaning of the entire complex structure (cf. Section 2.5.2). This fits with Nunberg’s original proposal, who suggests that the classificatory component restricts the final semantic value rather than the value for the index, see (122). Here, a plural demonstrative is accompanied with a gesture to a single sample plate.
(122) In a china shop:
These are over at the warehouse, but those I have in stock here.
(Nunberg 1993:24)
Similarly in the case of first person plural we, the index (i.e. the speaker) is a singu-lar individual, but the classificatory component restricts the final semantic value to pluralities.
For the classificatory component of impersonally used personal pronouns, I need to depart from Nunberg’s original proposal. As discussed in Section 1.2, the impersonal uses are morphologically indistinguishable from their referential uses, and share the same agreement patterns, i.e. they share the same morphosyntactic features. Therefore, I suggest that the classificatory component of ich and du in all of their uses contains the respective sets of morphosyntactic features (φ-features) proposed inKratzer(2009):
the feature set forich is{[1st],[singular]}, the one fordu is{[2nd],[singular]}. Consider the interpretation proposed for these features in Kratzer (2009).
(123) a. J[1st]NK
g,w,c = the speaker(s) of c b. J[2nd]NK
g,w,c = the addressee(s) ofc c. J[singular]K
g,w,c =λx :x is an atom. x
Since [1st] and [2nd] contribute the speaker and the addressee, respectively, I assume that the classificatory component does not exclusively restrict the final semantic value of a personal pronoun (pace Nunberg). In fact, the contributions of the person features, [1st] and [2nd], are the values that Nunberg assigns to the index. I propose, therefore, that the classificatory component depends on the pronoun’s morphosyntactic behavior, and is responsible for restricting both the index (via person features) and the final semantic value (via presuppositional features). Furthermore, the component regulates
morphosyntactic agreement and phonological spell-out. For reasons of space, I leave a detailed proposal for the connection between feature-based theories, like Kratzer (2009), and the account proposed in Nunberg (1993) for further investigation.
So, if only the presuppositional features restrict the overall interpretation of personal pronouns, the truth-conditional contribution for impersonally used first person singular ich and second person singular du come out as in (124). The schematic proposal for the truth-conditional content of sentences containing impersonally used ich and du, respectively, are given in(125).71,72
(124) a. JichK
g,w,c =λw.identifies-with(cS)(x)(w), defined if x is atomic b. JduK
g,w,c =λw.identifies-with(cA)(x)(w), defined if x is atomic (125) a. Gen [x; ](identifies-with(cS)(x) & φ;ψ)
‘All normal individuals who the speaker incidentifies with, and who are φ are ψ.’
b. Gen [x; ](identifies-with(cA)(x) & φ;ψ)
‘All normal individuals who the addressee in c identifies with, and who are φ are ψ.’
In addition to the generic operator Gen, adverbs of quantification and the existential quantifier contributed by existential closure (cf. Diesing 1992) can also bind the free variablex contributed in the pronomial structure. Ifx in(124) is bound by an adverb of quantification, the result is a quantificational variability reading.
The referential use—including the deferred reference use—ofich anddu are captured when the variable x is bound by the existential quantifier contributed by existential closure. The standard referential uses and the deferred reference cases only differ with respect to the value assigned to the relation variable R.
For the referential use, I follow Elbourne (2008) in assigning the identity relation, [λw.λye.λxe.y = x in w], to R. Referentially used ich and du consequently have the following general structure.73
(126) a. Referential use of ich: λw.x=cS inw, defined if x is atomic b. Referential use of du: λw.x=cA in w, defined if x is atomic
The compositional derivation of the truth-conditional content of episodic sentences con-taining standard referential uses ofich anddu involves two non-standard combinatorial mechanisms: First, because of a type clash, the complex pronominal structure always
71To improve readability, presuppositions are not included in a formula whenever possible.
72Since so far no compositional account for the meaning of generic sentences exists, no step-by-step derivation of the truth-conditions in(125)will be given.
73Note that the referential uses and the deferred ostension readings of personal pronouns in this account come out as quantificational, due to the analysis of personal pronouns as Heimian indefinites.
This is one of the flaws of this account that will be discussed below in Section2.6.
has to be raised. A trace that is co-indexed with the free variablexis introduced in the position from where the structure is moved, but is crucially not bound by a λ-binder.
Second, the open proposition contributed by the pronominal structure and the open proposition resulting from the rest of the sentence are conjoined by a generalized ver-sion of predicate modification. The co-indexed variables in the resulting single open proposition are then existentially bound via existential closure at the clause level. This results in the following schematically given truth-conditional content.
(127) a. λw.∃x[x=cS inw & P(x)(w)]
b. λw.∃x[x=cA in w& P(x)(w)]
Note that referentially used personal pronouns in generic sentences are interpreted in the scope of the generic operator, where they are by default existentially bound, see (118).
The truth-conditional content given in (127) is logically equivalent to the truth-conditional content of sentences in which the first or second person singular pro-nouns contained in them were interpreted direct-referentially. That is, after evalu-ating the propositions with respect to the actual world, w0, the expression ∃x[x = cS inw0 & P(x)(w0)] is equivalent to P(cS)(w0). This is the case since there is only one individual that is identical to the speaker, and this is the speaker herself. Analo-gously, the expression ∃x[x=cA inw0 &P(x)(w0)] is equivalent to P(cA)(w0).
The deferred ostension readings are also accounted for if the value of the relational variable R is a contextually determined relation, other than the identity relation. The schematic truth-conditional content of sentences containing deferred ostension uses of a first person singular pronoun is given in (128).
(128) λw.∃x[R(cS)(x)(w) & P(x)(w)]
Depending on the contextual value assigned toR, different sets of individuals are related to the speaker, and hence different instances of deferred reference arise.
In sum, I propose to model the personal pronouns ich anddu as Heimian indefinites with an underlying structure that was adapted fromElbourne(2008). Conceptually, the account is based on the three-component account proposed in Nunberg (1993). More specifically, I propose that first and second person singular pronouns are expressions that relate an individual variable to the speaker and the hearer, respectively. The different uses of both pronouns arise from different combinations regarding (i) the binder of the individual variable and (ii) the relation assumed to hold between the variable and the speaker/the hearer.
Note that even though the standard referential uses of ich and du are modelled as existentially quantifying expressions, they are definite in the sense ofAbbott(2014) (cf.
Section 2.4): they can be only used to refer to a single individual which the addressee
can identify. The same holds for the deferred reference cases, although identifiabil-ity depends on the choice of relation. The impersonal uses, however, are decidedly not definite—but see the discussion on the (in)definiteness of noun phrases in generic sentences in Section2.4.