Diesing's mapping hypothesis

[Stephen Wechsler]

Molly Diesing's (1992) 'mapping hypothesis' related phrase structure to
semantics in a particular way:  material under VP goes in the nuclear
scope, material under IP in the restrictive clause.  She supported this
idea with data from German in which the word order affects the
interpretation, purportedly in the way predicted by this theory.

Hye-Won Choi 1996 noted some problems for Diesing:  that the scrambling
(of definites out of VP) is optional; and contrastive foci scramble
regardless of specificity.  Choi proposes an OT-LFG account.

Apart from Choi's critique, how has Diesing's hypothesis fared?  Has it
been debunked, attacked, confirmed?  Are there (other) alternative
analyses of the facts in HPSG or LFG?

thanks,
Steve


Stephen Wechsler
Assoc. Prof., Univ. of Texas, Calhoun Hall 403
http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~wechsler/
ph: (512) 232-7683 / fax:  (512) 471-4340

postal address:
Linguistics Department/ 1 University Station B5100/ Austin, TX
78712-1196