LINGUIST List 11.2498

Sat Nov 18 2000

Qs: Quantifiers/Slavic Lang, "Garden Path Anaphora"

Editor for this issue: Karen Milligan <karenlinguistlist.org>



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Directory

  • Giuliana Giusti, quantifiers in slavic languages
  • Josef Meyer, examples of "garden path anaphora"

    Message 1: quantifiers in slavic languages

     Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2000 13:59:07 +0100
    From: Giuliana Giusti <giustiunive.it>
    Subject: quantifiers in slavic languages


    I am interested in the topic of the syntax of quantity expressions in slavic languages.

    I am particularly interested in what has been produced in the last 10 years and in particular if anybody has already approached the field from a minimalist perspective.

    I will be obliged of any help I can get in my search

    best,

    giuliana giusti Dipartimento di Studi Linguistici e Letterari Europei e Postcoloniali Palazzo Cosulich Zattere, Dorsoduro 1405 30125 Venezia tel. +39 - 041 - 2577816 http://helios.unive.it/~lingdida/giusti.html

    Message 2: examples of "garden path anaphora"

     Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2000 17:11:47 +1100 (EST)
    From: Josef Meyer <jmeyerics.mq.edu.au>
    Subject: examples of "garden path anaphora"


    Hello,

    My apologies to those of you who end up receiving more than one copy of this message.

    I am currently looking at what I will refer to as "garden path anaphora". I am using this term to refer to cases in which the reader/hearer will tend to have a strong preference for resolving an anaphoric expression in one way, and then be forced to an alternative interpretation on encountering a subsequent utterance. The following is a slightly contrived example to illustrate what I mean:

    1. Robert gave Steven a paper last week. He thought that it provided a good method for dealing with indirect anaphora. Steven disagreed.

    2. Robert gave Steven a paper last week. He thought that it provided a good method for dealing with indirect anaphora. Robert had actually given Steven the paper for another reason entirely.

    I would argue that the interpretation in example (1) is the default, where "he" fairly clearly refers to "Robert". By my reading, example (2) shows that this initial preference can be overturned. What I am looking for is a set of examples of cases where something like this occurs in real texts. I am not expecting this sort of thing to be very common. The few people I have asked seem to think that they have seen examples of this, but can't remember where. I'll post a summary of any results I receive.

    Thanks,

    - jo

    -

    Josef Meyer

    | Division of Information and | http://www.mri.mq.edu.au/~jmeyer | | Communication Sciences, | jmeyerics.mq.edu.au | | Macquarie University, NSW | Phone: +61 2 9850 6344 | | 2109, Australia | Fax: +61 2 9850 9529 |