summary of conditions (was Re: PSAT Glitch)

[Dennis R. Preston]

>arnold,

If you publish this exposé, we will all be even more grateful to you
for your hard work in exposing the well-known (among linguists) soft
underbelly of pre- (and primarily pro-) scriptivism.

dInIs


>this is a summary of all the perplexities that i know about in the
>interpretation of the Possessive Antecedent Proscription (PAP),
>using as a starting point the minimal formulation
>
>   PAP: possessives cannot serve as antecedents for (personal)
>     pronouns.
>
>
>1.  query: just personal pronouns, or are other anaphors restricted?
>this is an issue for formulations in which implicit/implied/imagined
>antecedents play a role, since such formulations ought to apply not
>only to personal pronouns, but also to other definite anaphors:
>
>   personal pronouns. PAP certainly rejects:
>     Morrison's books made her famous.
>     Morrison's success meant that she could afford a new car.
>
>   the + Nom.  maybe PAP rejects:
>     Morrison's books made the writer famous.
>     Morrison's success meant that the writer could afford a new car.
>
>   this/that + Nom.  maybe PAP rejects:
>     Morrison's books made this/that writer famous.
>     Morrison's success meant that this/that writer famous.
>
>   zero definite anaphors.  maybe PAP rejects:
>     The army's treatment of anyone who joined ___ was scandalous.
>     The recruits' complaint suggested that only two ___ had been injured.
>
>   anaphoric adverbials there/then.  maybe PAP rejects:
>     Norway's snowy beauty is famous, but I never go there in the
>       winter.
>     The afternoon's heavy traffic doesn't bother Chris, who sleeps
>       soundly then, despite the noise.
>
>2.  query: is only (forward) anaphora constrained by the PAP, or is
>cataphora ("backward anaphora") also constrained?  formulations in
>terms of implicitness should apply equally to both.
>
>   maybe PAP rejects:
>     Just before he fell, John's last thought was that
>       the sidewalk needed fixing.
>
>3.  query: are only possessive *noun* [well, really, NP] antecedents
>prohibited, or are possessive pronouns prohibited as well?
>formulations in terms of implicitness might affect both, depending on
>whether "he" is viewed as being merely implicit in "his" (etc.) or
>whether "he" is viewed as actually named in "his" (for those who claim
>that "Sam" is merely implicit, and not actually named, in "Sam's").
>
>   possessive NP antecedent.  PAP certainly rejects:
>     Sam's books made him a millionaire.
>
>   possessive pronoun antecedent.  maybe PAP rejects:
>     His books made him a millionaire.
>
>3'.  query: if 3rd person possessive pronoun antecdents are
>prohibited, are 1st and 2nd person possessive pronoun antecedents also
>prohibited?
>
>   maybe PAP rejects:
>     My success pleases me.
>     Our mistakes mean that we have to work over the weekend.
>     Your books should make you famous.
>
>4.  query: are only non-possessive pronouns ineligible as anaphors, or
>are possessive pronouns also unavailable?  (the handbooks go both
>ways.  "implicitness" has been argued to *allow* possessive-possessive
>linkages.)
>
>   non-possessive anaphor.  PAP certainly rejects:
>     Mary's success made her famous.
>
>   possessive anaphor.  maybe PAP rejects:
>     Mary's success made her family proud.
>
>5.  query: are only dependent possessive antecedents proscribed, or
>are independent, free-standing, ones also prohibited?  independent
>possessives function as Subject/Direct Object/Object of P, but also
>as Determiner ("adjective" in the handbooks); which function takes
>precedence?
>
>   dependent possessive antecedent.  PAP certainly rejects:
>     No one read the books that Tom wrote,
>       but Carrie's books made her famous.
>
>   independent possessive antecedent.  maybe PAP rejects:
>     No one read the books that Tom wrote,
>       but Carrie's made her famous.
>
>6.  query: are *any* of the NPs in a "group genitive" (one ending in
>something other than the head N of the phrase) eligible to be
>antecedents for a pronoun?  the head N doesn't have -'s, isn't
>"possessive"; some other word does have -'s, is "possessive".  how
>does the "implicitness" criterion apply here?
>
>   maybe PAP rejects one or another of the anaphors (it, she, there)
>   in the following:
>     People have different attitudes towards the city they live in.
>       In fact, my friend from Chicago's opinions about it have
>       changed over the years she has lived there.
>
>7.  query: is the PAP merely a special case of some larger
>generalization about implicitness of antecedents?  the handbooks
>provide a large number of possibly related types of examples, some
>involving antecedents that are merely "in the air", others involving
>pronouns of the "summarizing" type ("Chris disappeared into thin air,
>which astonished me"), and a few at least superficially similar to
>PAP violations:
>
>7a.  anaphoric island violations, in which some phonologically
>similar, and morphologically related, material is available in the
>sentence, but no actual XP that could serve as an antecedent for a
>pro-element is available.
>
>   I wanted to be a violinist, but my parents wouldn't buy me one.
>   The violinist stunned us by playing it with such extraordinary
>     skill.
>   I was surprised at Kim's savage criticism of the students, since
>     I myself would certainly never do that. ['criticize the students
>     savagely']
>
>7b.  N+N compounds with count N as first element.  this first element
>is normally unavailable as an antecedent for pronouns (though proper
>and mass first elements, both of which could be construed with NP,
>rather than mere N, interpretations, are often available as
>antecedents, depending on the pragmatics of the situation).
>
>   We couldn't schedule the piano recital,...
>     because we couldn't find one.
>     because it was out of tune.
>
>arnold (zwicky at csli.stanford.edu)

--
Dennis R. Preston
Professor of Linguistics
Department of Linguistics & Germanic, Slavic,
      Asian & African Languages
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48824-1027
e-mail: preston at msu.edu
phone: (517) 353-9290