Dissertation
Dynamics, Free Choice, and Presupposition in Japanese and English Disjunctions
This dissertation examines the differences in the semantic properties of the English disjunction (φ or ψ) and the Japanese disjunction (φ ka ψ). It discusses three ‘non-classical’ semantic properties of these disjunctions: dynamics, Free Choice, and presupposition projection/filtering. The comparison reveals the following facts:
• Ka and or show the same behavior for presupposition projection/filtering.
• Ka fails to exhibit the dynamic behavior (i.e., the effect of the local context).
• Ka fails to validate the Wide-scope Free Choice inference.
The aim of this dissertation is to account for the above observations. The claim is summarized as follows. The contrasts between or and ka boil down to the presence/absence of what I call flexible interpretation of the disjuncts. Given an evaluation point c, a disjunction φ ∨ ψ allows the flexible interpretation if the value of φ ∨ ψ w.r.t. c is determined by the value of φ w.r.t. c′ and that of ψ w.r.t. c′′, where c′ and c′′ are somehow identified based on c. On the other hand, a disjunction is subject to the fixed interpretation if the value of disjunction given c is determined by the values of φ and ψ w.r.t. c itself. I claim that or allows the flexible interpretation, while ka is subject to the fixed interpretation. This difference is instantiated as the presence/absence of the dynamic interpretation and the (un)availability of the interpretation called split disjunction (Aloni 2022). They are respectively discussed in Chapters 2 and 3. The formalizations implemented with slightly different forms in these chapters will be unified in 4.
In Prep.
This paper tackles the anaphora in (1b):
(1) a. A man saw a donkey, and a girl saw a monkey.
b. Each of them caught it.
I argue that the resolution of this anaphora necessitates (i) destructive update and (ii) a new definition of conjunction in dynamic semantics.
This squib discusses a disjunction with conflicting presuppositions -- cases where the presuppositions of the disjuncts contradict each other.
Though the observation is not new, I show that the case poses a challenge for semantic analyses of presupposition projection.
To Appear
This paper compares the dynamic properties of disjunctions in English and Japanese and argues that a Japanese disjunction, p ka q, lacks the local context for the second disjunct in the assertion dimension.
Some reconstruction effects are by default semantic (In Proceedings of WCCFL 42)
Investigating three types of scrambling in Japanese, this paper argues:
・Semantic Reconstruction must be available to interpret scrambling
・Semantic Reconstruction is available for every intermediate landing site of scrambling
Dynamics and Alternatives of Unconditional (John work with Hajime Mori and Yu Hashimoto, In Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 28)
This paper discusses the Bishop Sentence in unconditional sentences in Japanese and proposes a compositional semantics that combines Alternative Semantics and Update Semantics.
The Local Context of Disjunction Is Not Universal: A Case Study of Japanese (In Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 28)
This paper reports a preliminary investigation on differences between English and Japanese disjunctions, implying that the latter lacks the local context.
An updated analysis is proposed in ny SALT34 paper.
2024
Plug-negation in Update Semantics (In Logic and Engineering of Natural Language Semantics 20, 307-320)
This paper discusses a disjunction with an obligatory exhaustification, and argues that exhaustification must employ plug-negation (negation that cancels presupposition) to avoid an unwelcome presupposition projection.
Telescoping in Incremental Quantification (In Proceedings of SALT 33, 500-519)
Bumford (2015, S&P) proposes Incremental Quantification in dynamic semantics and discusses its empirical benefits. However, the proposal loses the standard account for telescoping (van den Berg 1994). This paper aims to overcome this dilemma.
Distribution relative to events in dynamic semantics (In Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 27, 712-728)
This paper tackles the anaphora in (1b):
(1) a. A man saw a donkey, and a girl saw a monkey.
b. Each of them caught it.
I argue that the resolution of this anaphora necessitates quantification over event participants. An updated analysis is proposed in my In Prep. paper.
Crossover Effects with Set Indices: Evidence from Japanese Scrambling (Joint work with Yuta Tatsumi)
Definite Description for Tenses: More Analogy between Pronouns and Tenses. (In Proceedings of GLOW in Asia 13. 270-278)
2022
Against Syntactic Neg-raising: Evidence from Polarity-Reversed Ellipsis in Japanese (In Proceedings of Japanese/Korean Linguistics 29, 351-359).
Unifying Concessive Conditionals and Unconditionals in Japanese (In University of Pennsylvania Working Paper in Linguistics 28: Proceedings of Annual Penn Linguistics Conference 45. 214-220.)
2020
A Source of Defeasibility: Evidence from Japanese Object Experiencer Predicates (In Proceedings of Japanese/Korean Linguistics 27 225-238)
2019
Prospective Result of Causative Predicates: A Uniform Analysis (In Proceedings of Pacific Asia Conference on Language, Information and Computation 33. 263-270)