Sorting the World : : On the Relevance of the Kind/Object-Distinction to Referential Semantics / / Olav Mueller-Reichau.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter DGBA Backlist Complete English Language 2000-2014 PART1
• VerfasserIn: Mueller-Reichau, Olav,
• Place / Publishing House: Berlin ;, Boston : : De Gruyter, , [2013]; ©2011
• Year of Publication: 2013
• Language: English
• Series: Linguistics & Philosophy , 4
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (165 p.)

The basic hypothesis of this book is that linguistic reference to kinds should be seen as reference to sortal concepts, i.e. cognitive categories for identifying and classifying objects. Viewed that way, kinds serve as the interface between the conceptual system and the grammatical system. Kind-level predicates differ as to whether they presuppose (e.g. to be extinct) or entail (e.g. to invent) the existence of objects, with crucial consequences for the interpretation of indefinite argument noun phrases. Moreover, object reference always involves underlying kind reference, but kind reference does not always involve object reference. This asymmetry, once recognized, proves useful in solving otherwise puzzling problems in semantic composition.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Chapter 1: Genericity – the standard view -- Chapter 2: Kinds as sortal concepts – from a cognitive perspective -- Chapter 3: Kinds as ontological primitives – from a semantic perspective -- Chapter 4: Spatiotemporal localisation – type-token theories of genericity -- Chapter 5: Indefinite reference to kinds – the pumpkin crusher puzzle -- Chapter 6: Lexical classes of predicates – normal and Carlsonian kind-level predicates -- Chapter 7 Overt and covert articles – a kind-based DRT approach to the semantics of noun phrases -- References