Abstract
The formal semantics of plurals — which goes back to at least Bennett (1974) — has the work of Link (namely, 1983 and 1984) as a crucial landmark. His ideas about a lattice-theoretical definition of the domain of discourse undoubtedly shed a new light on the thought about plurality in natural languages and was the origin of a rich literature. However, several questions that derive precisely from the wealth of the denotations made available by Link’s new framework have not yet, to my knowledge, been addressed in a systematic way and thus remain unanswered. Three of such questions will be addressed here:
-
(i)
given the variety of individuals that can be in the denotations of nominals — simple atoms, complex atoms and i-sums -, what individuals can count for a distributive reading (henceforth, DR), or, reducing to the really puzzling point, can i-sums be the relevant individuals in A ∩ B, where A and B are the sets denoted by the relevant nominal and the relevant predicative expression?
-
(ii)
under what (linguistic) circumstances can — atomic or non-atomic — individuals in the denotation of a nominal structure become parts of a plural individual being considered in a collective reading (henceforth, CR)?
-
(iii)
what are the factors that determine whether or not an NP can be assigned a DR, a CR or both?
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Bach, E. & R. Cooper (1978): ‘The NP—S Analysis of Relative Clauses and Compositional Semantics’, Linguistics and Philosophy 1, 145–150.
Barwise, J. & R. Cooper (1981): ‘Generalised Quantifiers and Natural Languages’, Linguistics and Philosophy 4, 159–220.
Bennett, M. (1974/1975): Some Extensions of a Montague Fragment of English. PhD diss., UCLA. Dist. Indiana University Linguistics Club, 1975.
van Benthem, J. (1986): Essays in Logical Semantics. D. Reidel, Dordrecht.
Gillon, B. (1987): ‘The Readings of Plural Noun Phrases in English’, Linguistics and Philosophy 10, 199–219.
Higginbotham, J. (1981): ‘Reciprocal Interpretation’, Journal of Linguistic Research 1, 97–117.
Hoeksema, J. (1983): ‘Plurality and Conjunction’ In A. Ter Meulen (ed.) Studies in Modeltheoretic Semantics. Foris, Dordrecht.
Kamp, H. & U. Reyle (1993): From Discourse to Logic, An Introduction to Model-theoretic Semantics of Natural Language, Formal Logic and Discourse Representation Theory. Kluwer, Dordrecht.
Ladusaw, W. A. (1982): ‘Semantic Constraints on the English Partitive Construction’ In D. P. Flickinger, M. Macken & N. Wiegand (eds.) Proceedings of the First West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics. Department of Linguistics, Stanford University.
Lightfoot, D. (1982): The Language Lottery, Toward a Biology of Grammars. The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA.
Link, G. (1983): ‘The Logical Analysis of Plurals and Mass terms: A Lattice—theoretical Approach’ In R. Bäuerle, C. Schwarze & A. von Stechow (eds.) Meaning, Use and Interpretation of Language. de Gruyter, Berlin.
Link, G. (1984): ‘Hydras, On the Logic of Relative Constructions with Multiple Heads’ In F. Landman & F. Veltman (eds.) Varieties of Formal Semantics. Foris, Dordrecht.
Link, G. (1987): ‘Generalized Quantifiers and Plurals’ In P. Gärdenfors (ed.) Gen-, eralized Quantifiers, Linguistic and Logic Approaches. D. Reidel, Dordrecht.
Peres, J. (1987a): Para urna Semantica Formal da Quantificaçâo Nominal NâoMassiva. Dissertation, University of Lisbon.
Peres, J. (1987b/1989): ‘A semantic argument for an NP—S’ analysis of relative structures’ In W. Bahner, J. Schildt e D. Viehweger (eds.) Proceedings of the Fourteenth International Congress of Linguists, Berlin/GDR, August 10 — August 15, 1987. Akademie—Verlag, Berlin.
Roberts, C. (1987): Modal Subordination, Anaphora and Distributivity. Dissertation, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Scha, R. (1984): ‘Distributive, Collective and Cumulative Quantification’ In J. Groenendijk, T. M. V. Janssen & M. Stokhof (eds.) Truth, Interpretation and Information. Foris, Dordrecht.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1998 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Peres, J.A. (1998). Issues on Distributive and Collective Readings. In: Hamm, F., Hinrichs, E. (eds) Plurality and Quantification. Studies in Linguistics and Philosophy, vol 69. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-2706-8_9
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-2706-8_9
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-90-481-4943-8
Online ISBN: 978-94-017-2706-8
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive