Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to use an anaphoric notion of presupposition for solving the problem of zero argument anaphora. Since Shopen (1973) it has been known that many missing arguments have an anaphoric interpretation, but it has not been known how this interpretation arises. I argue that these arguments are involved in presuppositions. On an anaphoric account of presuppositions as in van der Sandt (1992) or Kamp and Roßdeutscher (1992), it can be shown that the zero arguments acquire an anaphoric interpretation through the presuppositions. The analysis rests on the principle that the Discourse Representation Structure for the presupposition is proper, so that the discourse referents for the zero arguments are in its universe and must be anchored to discourse referents in the context.
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The paper is based on research in theÉSPRIT BRA projectDYANA-2. An extended version forms part of theDYANA-2 deliverable R2.2.A Part II (Kamp 1993). I have benefitted from frequent presentations to the Formal Linguistics Group in Oslo and, in particular, from regular discussions with Helle Frisak Sem and Kjetil Strand. Also, thanks are due to Ede Zimmermann and to Manfred Krifka and Manfred Pinkal for valuable comments.
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Saeboe, K.J. Anaphoric presuppositions and zero anaphora. Linguist Philos 19, 187–209 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00635837
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00635837