The meanings of personal pronouns: De se interpretation of long -distance anaphora in Icelandic and other languages.
Item
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Title
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The meanings of personal pronouns: De se interpretation of long -distance anaphora in Icelandic and other languages.
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Identifier
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AAI3144133
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identifier
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3144133
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Creator
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Reeves, Ruth.
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Contributor
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Adviser: William McClure
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Date
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2004
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Language, Linguistics
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Abstract
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This study investigates the distribution and interpretation of long-distance anaphors. The central thesis of the analysis is that MMA lexically bear a pronominal features akin to the first person pronoun feature. This feature gives rise to an interpretation which can be characterized as 'relativized first person' as in the interpretation of Malcolm thinks Makiko likes him as Malcolm thinks: Makiko likes me. This interpretation is known in the literature as de se .;Chapter One presents the distribution of the Icelandic MMA, and the basic semantic characteristics and distribution of de se pronouns.;Chapter Two shows that MMA belong to the same class as first and second person pronouns. The proposed Binding Theory categorizes the closed class of referring expressions (those characterized by the closed class of &phis;-features) by morphological shape: mono-morphemic or bi-morphemic. Thus MMA, as well as PRO, and pro are subject to the same binding constraints as traditional pronouns.;A theory of context determination is advanced; it provides lexical axioms for first and second person pronouns, and for MMA. The context theory also provides a semantics for the bits of language that prompt point-of-view shifts. Logophoric, de dicto and de se interpretations are shown to follow from the same semantic mechanism. The lexical axiom for MMA is substantiated by two kinds of evidence: semantically, its de se interpretation; morphologically, first person verbal agreement patterns seen with nominative MMA in Kannada. An expression which is not a member of the lexicon, one which can occur syntactically with no phonological matrix, is predicted to be a vehicle of either first or second person feature assignment. Semantic confirmation is shown by the de se interpretation of subject-controlled PRO and the concealed imperative interpretation of some object-controlled PRO. Morphological confirmation: the first and second person verbal agreement patterns seen in certain Kannada pro constructions.;Chapter Three is a review of the literature on MMA. It discusses the intersection of various versions of Binding Theory with the structural accounts. It presents two semantic accounts which relate properties inherent in MMA to the semantic properties of the domains in which they are found.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
