15.2641, Diss: Semantics: Kim: 'Event Structure...'

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LINGUIST List: Vol-15-2641. Thu Sep 23 2004. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 15.2641, Diss: Semantics: Kim: 'Event Structure...'

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1)
Date: 23-Sep-2004
From: Min-Joo Kim < kim at northwestern.edu >
Subject: Event Structure and the Internally-headed Relative Clause Construction in Korean and Japanese


	
-------------------------Message 1 ----------------------------------
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:22:55
From: Min-Joo Kim < kim at northwestern.edu >
Subject: Event Structure and the Internally-headed Relative Clause Construction in Korean and Japanese


Institution: University of Massachusetts at Amherst
Program: Department of Linguistics
Dissertation Status: Completed
Degree Date: 25-Jun-1905

Author: Min-Joo Kim

Dissertation Title: Event structure and the internally-headed relative clause
construction in Korean and Japanese

Linguistic Field(s): Semantics

Subject Language(s):
Japanese (Code: JPN)
Korean (Code: KKN)


Dissertation Director(s):
Kyle B Johnson
Angelika Kratzer
Christopher Potts
Ellen Woolford

Dissertation Abstract:

This dissertation investigates how syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic
factors interact to produce the Internally-Headed Relative Clause
(IHRC) construction in Korean and Japanese.

The IHRC construction differs from the more familiar
Externally-Headed Relative Clause (EHRC) construction in several
ways. First, unlike an EHRC, an IHRC's content restricts the content
of the matrix clause rather than that of the semantic head. Second,
its interpretation is heavily influenced by the discourse context in
ways not seen with the EHRC. Third, unlike the head of an EHRC, the
head of an IHRC does not correspond to any overt syntactic phrase and
hence needs to be determined by language users based on the relative
clause's content, the matrix predicate's semantics, and the discourse
context.

The literature offers an abundance of sensitive analyses of the IHRC
construction, but it leaves two central questions unanswered: what
determines the interpretation of the construction? And, if pragmatic
principles play a role, how do they interact with the morphosyntax
and the semantics?

I answer these questions with an event-based semantic analysis. I
show that the construction's interpretation is determined partly by
grammatical factors (e.g., the embedded clause's aspect and the
matrix predicate's semantics) and partly by pragmatic factors (the
discourse context and the discourse participants' world knowledge).
In particular, I isolate two sources of the semantic variability of
the construction.

First, the matrix clause contains a pronominal definite description,
whose denotation contains a free relation variable. The value of this
variable is determined by the embedded clause's event structure, the
matrix predicate's semantics, and the discourse context.

Second, the relative operator that occurs in this construction
connects the content of the embedded clause with that of the matrix
clause, establishing either a temporal or a causal relation between
them, depending on whether the embedded clause describes a temporary
state or a permanent state.

This study establishes important connections between the semantics of
a definite description and event structure, thereby solving a
particularly challenging formal-linking problem, one that afflicts
existing E-type pronoun analyses of the IHRC construction. In
addition, it provides a constrained but flexible interpretive
mechanism for the construction, eliminating the need for many of the
extra-grammatical constraints that characterize existing treatments.



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