Professional Activities
CURRENT PROJECTS
1. The making of a construction:
The intransitivization of English reflexive constructions.
2. Or: Semantic meaning and discourse use.
3. Mapping some.
4. Preferred Argument Structure as
a scaffolding for grammaticizing adjuncts
(with Elitzur Dattner and Tal Linzen).
5. What does semanticization
involve?: The case of Hebrew xaval al ha-zman.
The thinking behind my current projects
My main interest lies in the
intricate relationship between grammar and discourse. I am intrigued by
questions pertaining to types of context-driven meanings, to various
grammar/pragmatics interfaces and to grammaticization. Each of these issues
problematizes the relationship between grammar
and natural discourse (language used in context).
Regarding the grammar/pragmatics
interfaces issue, I continue to explore the semantics versus pragmatics
division of labor for quantifier some and or constructions. For some
I argue that just like most, it too is an upper-bounded scalar
quantifier. Since quantifier some is not some’s dominant use, I
am working on mapping all the uses of English some into a variety of
sub-constructions. Cross-linguistic comparisons show a partial, but by no means
total overlap between the functions served by counterpart expressions.
Regarding or, I challenge the fundamental role attributed to the
distinction between exclusive and inclusive readings. Unlike my conclusion
regarding most, where I proposed to reverse the lexical and the
pragmatic meanings (of the upper bound and of the ‘all’ compatibility), for or,
the most general meaning may actually be even more minimal than the inclusive
meaning normally assumed. I will also suggest that we need to analyze the
disjunction as a set of constructions, each with its specific formal and
functional characteristics (a-lá Goldberg, 1995).
The same is true for reflexive
predicates in current English (The making of a construction: The
intransitivization of English reflexive constructions). My goal is to
demonstrate how discourse patterns can explain how come a construction
initially used for highly transitive predicates may end up as a construction
specialized for intransitivity. Ad hoc inferences turned part of the explicature
and generalized for the construction as a whole may become semantic. Such an
account is very much in tune with typological findings. It can explain why it
is that languages use reflexive constructions for similar, yet not identical
functions. In fact, grammaticization (including semanticization) is always a
primary target in my research. Such is my current work on Hebrew dative
constructions (with Elitzur Dattner and Tal Linzen), which adduces discourse
counts in support of Du Bois’ 1987 idea of complexity building as constrained
by Preferred Argument Structure (PAS). The point is that PAS constraints are
more rigidly applied in the initial stages of grammaticization. They are later
on relaxed.
Grammaticization also ties in
with my interest in distinguishing between
a variety of contextual meanings. In addition to conversational
implicatures and explicated inferences (inferences contributing to the
explicature, according to Relevance theory), I believe we need to consider
truth-compatible uncooperative inferences (introduced in Ariel, 2004). And in addition to bare linguistic meanings,
and to both minimal and maximal ‘what is said’ representations (explicatures),
we need to consider wise-guy interpretations and privileged interactional
interpretations (both introduced in Ariel, 2002, see also
Ariel, 2008:Chapter 7). Moreover, given a specific form which
routinely gives rise to a certain inference, we cannot take it for granted that
that inference will have the same cognitive and discoursal status on every
occasion. Rather, what is implicated in one context may be explicated on
another, or even only uncooperatively inferred (Relational
and independent and conjunctions – under review). In fact, it may very well be that the
discoursal prominence of propositions determines whether (and how strongly)
they contribute to truth evaluations (Ariel, 2010:9.6, first proposed by Bach, 1999). We also need to reconsider which inferred
meaning it is that is prone to semanticization. I propose that explicated
inferences (more so than implicatures) play a crucial intermediary role here
(Hebrew xaval al ha-zman).
References
Ariel,
Mira. 2002. Privileged interactional
interpretations. Journal of Pragmatics
34:1003-1044.
2004. Most. Language 80:658-706.
2008. Pragmatics and grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
2010. Defining pragmatics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Bach,
Kent. 1999. The myth of conventional
implicature. Linguistics and Philosophy
22:327-366.
Du
Bois, John W 1987. The discoiurse basis of ergativity. Language 63:
805-85.
Goldberg,
Adele E. 1995. Constructions: A construction grammar approach to argument
structure. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
MIRA
ARIEL, Ph.D.
Linguistics,
Tel Aviv University, Ramat Aviv, Tel Aviv, Israel, 69978
Phone No.: 972-3-6405026; Fax
No.: 972-3-5221044
Email: mariel@post.tau.ac.il
Site: http://www.tau.ac.il/~mariel