Presuppositions in Context Athulya Aravind

199 Pages·2017·1.9 MB·English

Presuppositions in Context
by
Athulya Aravind
SubmittedtotheDepartmentofLinguisticsandPhilosophy
inpartialfulfillmentoftherequirementsforthedegreeof
DoctorofPhilosophy
atthe
MASSACHUSETTSINSTITUTEOFTECHNOLOGY
September2018
©MassachusettsInstituteofTechnology2018. Allrightsreserved.
Author ....................................................................
DepartmentofLinguisticsandPhilosophy
August30,2018
Certifiedby................................................................
MartinHackl
AssociateProfessorofLinguistics
ThesisSupervisor
Certifiedby................................................................
DanielFox
Anshen-ChomskyProfessorofLanguageandThought
ThesisSupervisor
Acceptedby ...............................................................
AdamAlbright
LinguisticsSectionHead,DepartmentofLinguisticsandPhilosophy
2
PresuppositionsinContext
by
AthulyaAravind
SubmittedtotheDepartmentofLinguisticsandPhilosophy
onAugust30,2018,inpartialfulfillmentofthe
requirementsforthedegreeof
DoctorofPhilosophy
Abstract
This dissertation is about the acquisition of presupposition. The specific focus is on the
interplay between presuppositional content as hardwired in the semantics of particular ex-
pressionsandtheconversationalcontextsinwhichutterancescontainingthoseexpressions
may be used. A series of behavioral experiments examine what children in the preschool
age range know about the pragmatic principles governing presupposition, and how they
cometoacquirethisknowledge.
The dissertation is organized into two thematic halves. The first half investigates the
conditions that govern when presupposing something is appropriate, hence allow for the
use of a presupposition triggering expression. Specifically, I ask: do young children know
the common ground requirement—the formal requirement that presuppositions be previ-
ouslyestablishedcommonknowledge—anddotheyknowwhenandhowthisrequirement
can be violated? Two sets of experiments, using two presupposition-carrying expressions
with importantly divergent properties (too and the), reveal that children, like adults, gen-
erate a default expectation that a presuppositional sentence be uttered to a listener who
alreadytakesforgrantedthepresupposition. However,theyholdontothisexpectationeven
in circumstances where adult speakers do not. Unlike adults, children do not expect that
anotherwise‘neutral’listenermightaccommodateaspeaker’sinformativepresupposition.
Together,thesefindingspointtoadevelopmentalpathwheretheformalrequirement—that
presuppositionsbepresuppositions—isacquiredbeforeanunderstandingthattherulecan
bebentandhow.
Thesecondhalfexaminestheconditionsthatmakemarkingofpresuppositionsobliga-
tory,hencerequiretheuseofapresuppositiontriggeringexpression. Arechildrensensitive
to Maximize Presupposition! (Heim 1991) as a principle governing competition and utter-
ancechoice? TheabilitytodeployMaximizePresupposition! inanadult-likewayshowsa
more protracted developmental trajectory. Moreover, children’s ability to rule out presup-
positionally weaker sentences seems to vary across competition environments. Taking the
non-uniformity in development as signaling non-uniformity in the underlying phenomena,
I develop an alternative account for a pair of expressions commonly thought to compete
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for Maximize Presupposition!: another vs. a. Ultimately, I suggest that Maximize Pre-
supposition! is one of several pragmatic principles that lead to competition and selection
of structures imposing the strongest contextual requirement. Children have command of
some of these conditions, but not others. The acquisition trajectories are modulated by
various factors, including the type of requirement imposed on the context (e.g. that some
proposition is salient vs. accepted common belief) and the types of knowledge that are
pre-requisites(e.g. knowledgeofidiosyncraticpropertiesofthelexicon).
ThesisSupervisor: MartinHackl
Title: AssociateProfessorofLinguistics
ThesisSupervisor: DanielFox
Title: Anshen-ChomskyProfessorofLanguageandThought
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Acknowledgments
Theseacknowledgmentswillinevitablybeinadequateandincomplete. Therearepeopleto
whomIowebiggerdebtsthanIamabletoputintowords. Therearepeoplewhosenames
areomittedherefornoreasonotherthanmypoormemory.
First, to my committee: Martin Hackl, Danny Fox, Irene Heim, Kate Davidson, and
Ken Wexler. Their influence goes well beyond the bounds of this document. They have
provided models for being a scholar, teacher, colleague and person that I can only hope to
emulate. I am especially indebted to my co-chairs, Martin Hackl and Danny Fox. I could
spend many pages detailing all the ways in which Martin’s mentorship, collaboration and
friendship have enriched my life at MIT, but I am told acknowledgments should remain a
respectablelength. Hisinfluenceonmythinkingissopervasivethatheisaco-conspiratorin
allofmyintellectualactivity,evenwhenhisnameisnotexplicitlyattachedtotheproducts.
This dissertation owes much of its shape to arguments with Danny. The best parts of it
are those where he won the argument. (The worst are probably those where he pretended
thatI’dwon.) Thoughnotamemberofthecommittee,JonAnderMendiareadversionsof
this document at its least polished and most punishing. Throughout, he has been the most
exactingcriticandmymostardentsupporter.
Thestateofmycareerisdue,innosmallpart,tothefollowingpeople. DavidPesetsky
advised all of my work in syntax, provided crucial guidance in navigating academia and
advocatedonmybehalf. Ifheisonyourteam,you’vealreadywon,andIfeelveryluckyto
havehadhimonminetheselastfiveyears. IhavebenefitedfromSabineIatridou’scounsel,
highstandardsandtoughloveatvariousimportantchoice-points,bothinresearchandlife,
and as she’ll never let me forget, I owe her my first paycheck. Jill de Villiers took a risk
andhiredmetomanageherlanguagedevelopmentlabatatimewhenIknewnothingabout
languagedevelopmentorlabs,andshechangedmylife.
ItishardformetoimaginehowmyworkandlifewouldhaveturnedouthadInotbeen
part of the community I belong to. I am grateful to the members of MIT Linguistics for
allowingmetocarryoutmyworkwhereI’dmostwantto: amongthem. Thankyoualsoto
thelinguisticscommunityatUMassAmherst,withwhomIwasfortunateenoughtospend
every other weekend for most of my graduate career. My yoga community, especially my
teachers Carol and Solange, kept tabs on me and made sure I spent a few hours a week
thinking of something other than the uncertainties of my future—thank you. Thanks also
to my now-scattered community of non-linguist friends—for their continued support and
interesteveninthosepartsofmylifetheybarelyunderstand,forthebreathsoffreshair,for
theoccasionalremindersofhowstupidlyfunweusedtobe(andstillcanbewhenwetry).
Sharing an office with my cohort, ling-13, gave me the first glimpse into the ideal
environment to do science: one where camaraderie and mutual respect take the front-seat,
even in disagreement. For friendship, thank you: Chris Baron, Nico Baier, Aron Hirsch,
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Loes Koring, Ted Levin, Daniel Margulis, Sophie Moracchini, Chris O’Brien, Ezer Rasin,
Milena Sisovics, Carrie Spadine, Juliet Stanton, Coppe van Urk, and Sam Zukoff. Many
wonderful things have happened to me because I was lucky enough to come to MIT; the
bestsuchthing,withoutquestion,hasbeenMichelleYuan.
Finally, my family—my partner Jon Ander Mendia, my sister Abhaya Aravind, my
parents Aravind Ghosh and Jayasree Kesavan—for accepting me as I am, without regard
to my deeds. Now this deed is done, and being able to share it with them is the sweetest
reward.
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Contents
1 Introduction 15
1.1 Overviewandgoals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
1.2 Presuppositionsandanti-presuppositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
1.2.1 Theconversationalcommonground . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
1.2.2 Presuppositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
1.2.3 Anti-presuppositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
1.3 Outlineofthedissertation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
2 Knowingwhentopresuppose 25
2.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
2.1.1 Thecommongroundrequirement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
2.1.2 Informativepresuppositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.1.3 Roadmapofthechapter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
2.2 Pragmaticsofpresuppositionsandchildlanguage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
2.3 Experimentaldesignandpredictions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
2.3.1 Sketchoftheparadigm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
2.3.2 Selectionofpresuppositiontriggers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
2.3.3 Predictions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
2.4 Adults . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
2.4.1 Experiment1A:Too . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
2.4.2 Experiment1B:The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
2.4.3 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
2.5 Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
2.5.1 Experiment2A:Too . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
7
2.5.2 Experiment2B:The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
2.5.3 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
2.6 GeneralDiscussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
2.6.1 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
2.6.2 Communicative(non-)egocentrism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
2.6.3 Uniformityacrosstriggers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
2.6.4 Learningthefelicitycondition? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
3 Knowingwhentoaccommodate 63
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
3.2 Thetheoreticaldebate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
3.2.1 Accommodation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
3.2.2 Criticismandalternatives. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
3.2.3 Theroleofchildlanguage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
3.3 Logicoftheparadigm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
3.4 Adults . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
3.4.1 Participants,MaterialsandProcedure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
3.4.2 Resultsanddiscussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
3.5 Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
3.5.1 Predictions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
3.5.2 Participants,MaterialsandProcedure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
3.5.3 Resultsanddiscussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
3.6 GeneralDiscussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
3.6.1 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
3.6.2 Theoreticalimplications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
3.6.3 Learninghowtoaccommodate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
4 Maximizingpresuppositions 93
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
4.2 Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
4.2.1 Theoreticalbackground . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
4.2.2 Developmentalbackground . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
4.2.3 Testenvironments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
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4.3 Bothvs. all . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
4.3.1 Experiment1A:ElicitedProduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
4.3.2 Experiment1B:FelicityJudgment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
4.3.3 DiscussionofExperiments1Aand1B . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
4.4 Anothervs. a . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
4.4.1 Experiment2A:ElicitedProduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
4.4.2 Experiment2B:FelicityJudgment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
4.4.3 DiscussionofExperiments2Aand2B . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
4.5 GeneralDiscussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
4.5.1 Non-uniformityacrosstestenvironments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
4.5.2 Competitionandcomplexity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
4.5.3 Excursion: Bothvs. allandtheFrenchproblem . . . . . . . . . . . 135
4.6 Summaryandnextsteps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
5 Obligatorypresuppositionselsewhere 141
5.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
5.2 Insufficiencyofextantaccounts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
5.2.1 MaximizePresupposition! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
5.2.2 Unwantedexhaustivityimplicatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
5.2.3 Localsummary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
5.3 Proposal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
5.3.1 Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
5.3.2 Furtherassumptions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
5.3.3 Ill-formednessoftheindefinite . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
5.3.4 Well-formednessofanother . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
5.3.5 Extensiontootherenvironments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
5.3.6 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
5.4 Implicationsforchildlanguage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
5.4.1 Whatchildrenknow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
5.4.2 Whatchildrendon’tknow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
5.4.3 Competitioneffectsinchildlanguage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
5.5 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
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6 Conclusions 177
6.1 Summaryoffindings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
6.2 TheoreticalImplications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
6.3 DevelopmentalImplications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
6.4 FutureWork . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
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