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Pronominal typology and the de se/de re distinction

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Abstract

This paper investigates how regular pronominal typology interfaces with de se and de re interpretations, and highlights a correlation between strong pronouns (descriptively speaking) and de re interpretations, and weak pronouns and de se interpretations. In order to illustrate this correlation, I contrast different pronominal forms within a single language, null versus overt pronouns in Kutchi Gujarati, and clitic versus full pronouns in Austrian Bavarian. I argue that the data presented here provide cross-linguistic comparative support for the idea of a dedicated de se LF as argued for by Percus and Sauerland.

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  1. Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1102, Blindern, 0317, Oslo, Norway

    Pritty Patel-Grosz

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Preliminary ideas that this paper is based on grew out of a course I co-taught on de se at the 26th ESSLLI in 2014. I thank my co-instructor, Hazel Pearson for helpful comments and lengthy discussions, and the audience for valuable feedback. I am immensely grateful to Patrick Georg Grosz for copious amounts of fine-grained remarks concerning the technical aspects of this paper and detailed discussions about the Austrian Bavarian data. Thanks also to Malte Zimmerman and three anonymous Linguistics and Philosophy reviewers. The research in this article was partially funded by the Collaborative Research Center SFB 833 (Projects B2 and C4) of the German Science Foundation (DFG) at the University of Tübingen.

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Patel-Grosz, P. Pronominal typology and the de se/de re distinction. Linguist and Philos 43, 537–587 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10988-019-09274-7

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