Grammatical constraints on focus alternatives? The case of gender in Czech

Journal article

This paper examines the interaction of grammatical gender and focus in speakers’ linguistic competence and processing. We adopt the theory that analyses focus as the inducement of alternative meanings. Based on previous research on Romanian, we tested whether gender restricts focus alternatives through gender-marked numerals in Czech. However, the results of our acceptability judgement experiment found no effects of gender. We raised the possibility that the effects of gender were located the processing of focus instead. We conducted a speeded acceptability judgment experiment, which found effects of gender but in the opposite direction; gender matched items were less acceptable. Finally, we conducted a probe recognition experiment to examine the representation of focus alternatives in the mind. The results revealed no effects of gender. Overall, the research reported in this paper make us decrease our credence in the hypothesis that gender interacts with focus alternatives.

Authors: Lacina, R; Husband, EM

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Masaryk University
• Journal: Linguistica Brunensia More from this journal
• Volume: 74
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 20-61
• Publication date: 2026-08-30
• Acceptance date: 2026-01-06
• DOI: 10.5817/LB2026-42544
• EISSN: 2336-4440
• Language: English
• Keywords: focus alternatives; Czech; acceptability judgements; probe recognition; grammatical gender