C02
Limits of cross-linguistic variability in the interpretation of underspecified structures
PI(s): Prof. Dr. Malte Zimmermann
The project continues looking at the limits of variability in semantic interpretation across language users and languages (German, English, Akan, Hausa, Igbo, Medumba). The focus is on the interpretation of underspecified structures, such as found in doubly quantified sentences (scope ambiguities) and in sentences with missing functional elements (article drop in DP and Serial Verb Constructions). Such sentences provide a good testing ground for hidden variability in that identical surface configurations may involve different structural derivations, as diagnosed by differences in interpretation. We will collect data in direct elicitation and in experiments, and we will begin with computationally modelling the quantitative experimental data.
in phase 1:
Limits of Variability in Interpretation
PI(s): Prof. Dr Malte Zimmermann & Prof. Dr. Alexander Koller
Project C02 focuses on the grammatical, cognitive and communicative factors underlying variability in semantic interpretation. The central empirical goal is the experimental investigation of subtypes of variability and limits of variability in semantic interpretation. Adopting a cross-linguistic perspective (German, English, Akan/Kwa/Niger-Congo), the project addresses two central questions.
The first question concerns the limits of intra- and interspeaker variability in interpretation (variability subtypes 3&4): Which strategies do language users employ for adapting their interpretation of utterances to the communicative needs at hand, and for evaluating utterances as felicitous and true in a given communicative setting? The empirical and theoretical focus is on the (un-)availability of structural, lexical, and evaluative adaptation processes in four semantic phenomena, distributed over four work packages:
- relative quantifier scope and the availability of inverse scope (WP1)
- the felicity and interpretation of bare SG count arguments (WP2)
- the accomodability of existence presuppositions (WP3)
- and the interpretation of counterfactual conditionals (AP4).
We will test for the (un-)availability of interpretations and adaptation procedures in relation to differences in communicative setting, on the one hand, and in relation to constraints imposed by the underlying grammatical systems, on the other. We are interested in identifying (i.) interpretive procedures that are systematically blocked across speakers and trials; and (ii.) interpretive procedures that depend on structural reanalysis. The identification of such cases will shed light on the workings of the syntax-semantics interface. In particular, it will help in evaluating the hypothesis that syntax is a largely autonomous structure-building system, immune to the requirements of the interpretive system.
The second question serves the same goal by adding a cross-linguistic perspective. We investigate which aspects of variability in semantic interpretation are constant across languages, and which ones are language-specific and constrained by the grammars of the underlying linguistic systems (variability subtype 1). Here, we focus on differences in word order (rigid vs flexible), in the inventory of functional markers for expressing (in-)definiteness on NPs, and in the functional interpretation of definite markers across languages. The empirical data will be collected in a series of offline experiments and statistically analyzed.
In sum, the project will contribute to a better understanding of which aspects of variability in interpretation depend on non-linguistic factors (communicative needs, processing), and which ones are contingent on, or altogether blocked by grammatical constraints of the underlying linguistic system.
Member
Giuliano Armenante
Prof. Dr. Malte ZimmermannPublications
Types of Publications
- Peer-Reviewed: Papers, Journals, Books, Articles of the CRC
- Talk or Presentation: Talks, Presentations, Posters of the CRC
- SFB-Related: not produced in connection with the CRC, but are thematically appropriate
- Other: Papers, Journals, Books, Articles of the CRC, but not peer-reviewed
| Author(s) | Title | Year | Published in | Type | Links |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Paape, D., & Zimmermann, M. | Conditionals on crutches: Expanding the modal horizon. | 2020 | In M. Franke, N. Kompa, M. Liu, J. L. Mueller, & J. Schwab (Eds.), Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 24 (Vol. 2, pp. 108-126). Osnabrück University. * DOI: 10.18148/sub/2020.v24i2.889 | Peer-Reviewed | |
| Philipp, M., & Zimmermann, M. | Empirical investigations on quantifier scope ambiguities in German. | 2020 | In M. Franke, N. Kompa, M. Liu, J. L. Mueller, & J. Schwab (Eds.), Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 24 (Vol. 2, pp. 145-164). Osnabrück University. * DOI: 10.18148/sub/2020.v24i2.914 | Peer-Reviewed | |
| Renans, A., & De Veaugh-Geiss, J. P. | Experimental Studies on it-Clefts and Predicate Interpretation. | 2019 | Semantics and Pragmatics, 12(Article 11), 1-50. DOI: 10.3765/sp.12.11 | Peer-Reviewed | |
| Destruel, E., & De Veaugh-Geiss, J. P. | (Non-)Exhaustivity in French c’est-Clefts. | 2019 | C. Pinon (ed.), Empirical Issues in Syntax and Semantics 12 (pp. 91–120). Paris: CSSP. | Peer-Reviewed | |
| De Veaugh-Geiss, J. P. | Cleft exhaustivity: A unified approach to inter-speaker and cross-linguistic variability. | 2020 | Dr. phil. Dissertation, University of Potsdam, Potsdam: Universitätsverlag. DOI: 10.25932/publishup-44642 | Other | |
| Paape, D., & Zimmermann, M. | Conditionals on crutches: Expanding the modal horizon. | 2020 | PsyArXiv Preprints. DOI: 10.31234/osf.io/tqg2e | Other | |
| Destruel, E., & De Veaugh-Geiss, J. P. | On the interpretation and processing of exhaustivity: Evidence of variation in English and French clefts. | 2018 | Journal of Pragmatics, 138(December 2018), 1-16. DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2018.09.009 | SFB-Related | |
| Paape, D. | Antecedent complexity effects on ellipsis processing. | 2018 | Dr. phil. Dissertation, University of Potsdam, Potsdam: Universitätsverlag. | SFB-Related | |
| Zimmermann, M., De Veaugh-Geiss, J. P., Tönnis, S., & Onea, E. | (Non-)exhaustivity in focus partitioning across languages. | 2020 | V. Hegedűs & I. Vogel (Eds.), Approaches to Hungarian (Vol. 16: Papers from the 2017 Budapest Conference, pp. 208-230 ). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. | SFB-Related | |
| Bombi, C., & De Veaugh-Geiss, J. | Quantitative data in the field: Two case studies on Akan. | 2018 | Poster presented at the Linguistic Evidence 2018 - Experimental data drives linguistic theory, Eberhard Karls University Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany. 15 February. | Talk or Presentation | |
| De Veaugh-Geiss, J., & Destruel, E. | (Non-)Exhaustivity in French c'est Clefts. | 2017 | Paper presented at the Colloque de Syntaxe et Sémantique à Paris (CSSP), Paris, France. 25 November. | Talk or Presentation | |
| De Veaugh-Geiss, J., & Philipp, M. | Fictional contexts for shifting (i) perspectives and (ii) evaluation worlds: Two case studies. | 2018 | Invited talk at the Workshop on ''Reflections on Methodology: Empiricism and Fiction'', Eberhard Karls University Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany. 12 October. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Paape, D., & Zimmermann, M. | Conditionals on crutches: Expanding the modal horizon. | 2019 | Poster presented at the Sinn und Bedeutung 24, University of Osnabrück, Osnabrück, Germany. 04 - 06 September. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Philipp, M. | Cross-linguistic Investigations on Quantifier Scope Ambiguities - Experiments on German and English. | 2020 | Poster presented at the Linguistic Evidence 2020, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany. 13 - 15 February. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Zimmermann, M., & Philipp, M. | Empirical Investigations on Quantifier Scope Ambiguities in German. | 2019 | Paper presented at the Sinn und Bedeutung 24, University of Osnabrück, Osnabrück, Germany. 04-06 September. | Talk or Presentation | |
| De Veaugh-Geiss, J. P. | nà-Cleft (non-)exhaustivity: Variability in Akan. | 2021 | Glossa: A Journal of General Linguistics, 6(1), 1-41. DOI: 10.16995/glossa.5698 | Peer-Reviewed | |
| Fanselow, G., Zimmermann, M., & Philipp, M. | Accessing the availability of inverse scope in German in the covered box paradigm. | 2022 | Glossa: A journal of general linguistics 7(1), 1-24. DOI: 10.16995/glossa.5766 | Peer-Reviewed | |
| Philipp, M., & Zimmermann, M. | On Trees Blocking Roads and Cameras Recording Burglars: An Experimental Comparison of the Availability of Inverse Scope in English and German. | 2022 | Linguistic Inquiry, Advance publication. DOI: 10.1162/ling_a_00493 | Peer-Reviewed | |
| Struck, A., & Kiémtore, A. | Exceed-comparatives have a 2-place semantics: Evidence from Jula (Mande; Manding). | 2024 | Poster presented at the 55th Annual Conference on African Linguistics (ACAL), McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada. 02-04 May. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Struck, A., & Weingartz, S. | The Long and Short of Exceed Comparatives: The View from Jula (Manding; Burkina-Faso) and Ndebele (Bantu; Zimbabwe). | 2024 | Paper presented at the TripleA 11 Workshop, LLING UMR 6310 CNRS & Université de Nantes, Nantes, France. 11-13 June. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Zimmermann, M., with Sande, H., & Jenks, P. | Definite Marking in Guébie (Kru): First data and a preliminary analysis. | 2022 | Paper presented at the DFG-Network Meeting: (In)Definiteness across domains, 2nd Meeting., University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany. 15-16 December. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Agodio, B. O., Jenks, P., Sande, H., & Zimmermann, M. | Definiteness Marking in Guébie (Kru). | 2023 | Paper presented at the 10th TripleA Workshop for Semantic Fieldworkers, University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany. 07-09 June. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Duah, R. A., & Zimmermann, M. | The Structure and meaning of (seeming) OBJ-sharing SVCs in Igbo and Akan. | 2023 | Paper presented at the 54th Annual Conference on African Linguistics (ACAL 54), University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA. 12-14 June. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Amaechi, M., Duah, R. A., & Zimmermann, M. | The structure and meaning of (seeming) OBJ-sharing SVCs in Igbo and Akan. | 2023 | Invited Keynote talk at the ALS-LSA Workshop: Complex/clustered predicates and argument structure in African languages, University of Massachussetts, Amherst, MA, USA. 28 June. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Onea, E., & Zimmermann, M. | A decompositional semantics for responsive attitude predicates: the case of to know. | 2023 | Paper presented at the Workshop: Theoretical and Computational Approaches to Decomposition and Presuppositions, Saarland University, Saarbrücken, Germany. 08 November. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Onea, E., & Zimmermann, M. | Towards a general equative-based analysis of attitude predicates. | 2024 | Paper presented at the DGfS Jahrestagung 2024: Sprache und Einstellung (AG1: (De-)composition and modification of attitude predicates), Ruhr University Bochum, Bochum, Germany. 28. February-01. March. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Zimmermann, M. | The clause-final determiner nó in Akan: Its distribution and discourse function from a formal discourse modelling perspective. | 2024 | Paper presented at the 5th meeting of the Network (In)Definiteness across Domains, Unoiversity of Ghana, Klegon, Ghana. 18-20 March. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Zimmermann, M. | Relative quantifier scope in English, German, and Akan: Determining factors and cross-linguistic parallels (and differences). | 2024 | Paper presented at the Workshop on VP-structure and Scope, University College, London, London, UK. 13 April. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Zimmermann, M., & Gobena, W. | Oromo Singulative Markers are Reference Markers. | 2024 | Paper presented at the The 55th Annual Conference on African Linguistics (ACAL 55), Mc Gill University, Montreal, QC, Canada. 02-04 May. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Lecavelier, J., & Zimmermann, M. | Question embedding without wh-interrogatives: A unified account. | 2024 | Paper presented at the Semantics and Linguistic Theory (SALT) 34, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA. 28-30 May. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Lecavelier, J., & Zimmermann, M. | Embedding questions in a language without wh-embedding. | 2024 | Invited talk at the MECORE Closing Workshop, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany. 19–21 June. | Talk or Presentation | |
| Zimmermann, M., & Kouankem, C. | Focus Fronting in a Language with In Situ Marking: The Case of Mǝ̀dʉ́mbà. | 2024 | Languages, 9(4), 117. DOI: 10.3390/languages9040117 | Peer-Reviewed | |
| Zimmermann, M. | Fake tense in Hausa counterfactuals: A novel argument for underspecified EXCL. | 2021 | In J. Rhyne, K. Lamp, N. Dreier, & C. Kwon (Eds.), Proceedings of Semantics and Linguistics Theory (SALT) 30 (pp. 125–145). Linguistic Society of America. DOI: 10.3765/salt.v30i0.4808 | Peer-Reviewed | |
| Zimmermann, M., Fricke, L., & Onea, E. | Embedded Questions are Exhaustive Alright, but… | 2022 | In A. Özgün & Y. Zinova (Eds.), Language, Logic, and Computation: 13th International Tbilisi Symposium, TbiLLC 2019, Batumi, Georgia, September 16–20, 2019, Revised Selected Papers (pp. 173-194). Dordrecht: Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-98479-3_9 | SFB-Related | |
| Zimmermann, M. | Verbal Number in Chadic, with Special Reference to Hausa. | 2021 | In P. Cabredo Hofherr & J. Doetjes (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Grammatical Number (pp. 597–626). Oxford Handbooks Online: Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198795858.013.29 | SFB-Related | |
| Philipp, M., & Ampofo, J. S. | Quantifier Scope Ambiguities in Akan. | 2024 | Journal of West African Languages, 51(2), 38-52. | SFB-Related | |
| Philipp, M. | Quantifier scope ambiguities in English, German, and Asante Twi (Akan): structural and pragmatic factors. | 2022 | Dr. phil. Dissertation, University of Potsdam, Potsdam: Universitätsverlag. DOI: 10.25932/publishup-61235 | SFB-Related |