Abstract
This paper addresses the semantics and pragmatics of singular and plural nominals in languages that manifest a binary morphological number distinction within this category. We review the main challenges such an account has to meet, and develop an analysis which treats the plural morpheme as semantically relevant, and the singular form as not contributing any number restriction on its own but acquiring one when in competition with the plural form. The competition between singular and plural nominals is grounded in bidirectional optimization over form-meaning pairs. The main conceptual advantage our proposal has over recent alternative accounts is that it respects Horn's 'division of pragmatic labor', in that it treats morphologically marked forms as semantically marked, and morphologically unmarked forms as semantically unmarked. In our account, plural forms are polysemous between an exclusive plural sense, which enforces sum reference, and an inclusive sense, which allows both atoms and sums as possible witnesses. The analysis predicts that a plural form is pragmatically appropriate only in case sum values are among the intended referents. To account for the choice between these two senses in context we invoke the Strongest Meaning Hypothesis, an independently motivated pragmatic principle. Finally, we show how the approach we develop explains some puzzling contrasts in number marking between English three/more children and Hungarian harom/tobb gyerek ('three/more child'), a problem that has not been properly accounted for in the literature so far.
Highlights
This paper addresses the semantics and pragmatics of singular and plural nominals in languages that manifest a binary morphological number distinction within this category
The question addressed in this paper is a simple one: What is the difference in meaning between singular and plural nominals in languages such as English, where this distinction is morphologically marked?1 The issue is to characterize the semantic difference between the pair in (1), as it pertains to information conveyed by the contrast in number
The semantics and pragmatics of the plural in languages with a morphological number distinction has been a problem on the semantics agenda since McCawley (1981) raised the question of how to reconcile the morphological markedness of the plural, with its seemingly unmarked semantics
Summary
The question addressed in this paper is a simple one: What is the difference in meaning between singular and plural nominals in languages such as English, where this distinction is morphologically marked?1 The issue is to characterize the semantic difference between the pair in (1), as it pertains to information conveyed by the contrast in number. The interpretation of the plural nominal in (1b) is labelled exclusive because its reference is restricted to sums, excluding atoms: (1b) is interpreted as claiming that Mary saw more than one horse. We have established that an account of number interpretation has to explain why plural forms are susceptible to both exclusive and inclusive readings, and one has to understand why particular linguistic environments favor one or the other shade of meaning, while at the same time predicting the sensitivity of plural forms to sum reference in all contexts. An immediate solution to the inclusive plural problem illustrated in (3a-c) is sketched in Krifka 1989 Plural forms, he suggests, are semantically indifferent to the atom/sum distinction while singular forms involve number semantics that imposes atomic reference. This reversal is worth striving for because it reconciles the semantics of number with Horn’s division of pragmatic labor, an issue we turn to
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