A generic subject: The interplay of morphosyntax and the human conceptual system

Thesis

How can we account for our extensive knowledge about the world, given that we individually experience very little of it? This thesis considers the mechanisms involved in the acquisition of generic statements. One approach to explain this feat, in light of our limited direct experience of instances of kinds, suggests that language gives us the tools to go beyond our environment. This thesis argues that variation in the morphosyntactic make-up of a generic subject can affect our understanding of how properties are linked to a kind. One significant challenge for the acquisition of generic subjects is the lack of an overt marker, which means that no generic subject unambiguously encodes genericity. Still, generic subjects can easily be interpreted generically in novel concept acquisition tasks instead of being assigned episodic reference. Experimental research has addressed this puzzle from developmental perspectives Gelman et al. (2010); Prasada (2000); Cimpian et al. (2011) and quantificational ones (e.g. the covert generic operator gen, Carlson, 1989; Krifka et al., 1995). The findings are novel as this thesis pays special attention to previously less investigated singular generic subjects. It considers number and definiteness and their links to the human conceptual system as the main variables of the make-up of generic subjects. Comparing the morphosyntactic differences of bare plural, indefinite singular, and definite singular subjects experimentally shows that they each raise expectations of tight category-property links, modulated by other available cues. To better understand the developmental trajectory of generic subjects, this thesis compares adult and child participants’ responses to learning about novel kinds. This includes indefinite and definite singular subjects, for which children receive comparatively little input and which are normally deemed highly ambiguous between generic and episodic interpretations. This thesis concludes that our conceptualisation of novel kinds is dependent on morphosyntactic cues, but crucially, this is further modulated by additional information, such as pre-existing world knowledge, phonological or visual cues.

Authors: Fuellenbach, Kim

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-6r4my6a9b
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: acquisition; genericity; psycholinguistics; kind reference; morphosyntax
• Subjects: Psycholinguistics; Linguistics