Page 236 - Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Language

Reference
Grosz B J, Pollack M E, Sidner C L 1989 Discourse. In: Posner M I (ed.) Foundations of Cognitive Science. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA
Hankamer J, Sag I 1976 Deep and surface anaphora. Lin 7:391-428
Heim I A 1988 The Semantics of Definite and Indefinite Noun Phrases. Garland Publishing, New York
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(ed.) Syntax and Semantics 7: Notes from the Linguistic
Underground. Academic Press, New York
Lasnik H 1989 Essays on Anaphora. KJuwer, Dordrecht Reinhart T 1983 Anaphora and Semantic Interpretation.
Croom Helm, London
Sells P 1987 Aspects of logophoricity. Lin 18:445-79 Wasow T 1979 Anaphora in Generative Grammar. E. Story-
Scientia, Ghent
The term 'definite expression' is used to describe a class of words and phrases whose semantical behavior resembles that of multiplicative expressions. Typical examples are proper names and noun phrases of the forms the n N (where n is a numeral), the N, singular or plural, as the case may be, this N, that N, these N, those N, and both (N). Although there is no watertight test for membership in this class, definite expressions characteristically do not occur in existential state- ments of the form There isIare NP (X), as shown by the ill-formed sentences * There are the three students sick and *There are both children, which contrast sharply with There are three students sick and There are two children. In addition, only definite expressions can appear as part of a partitive noun phrase. Thus, the occurrence of the sheriffs in the expression some of the sheriffs is completely acceptable, whereas the indefinite noun phrase many sheriffs immediately causes ungrammatically (cf. *some of many sheriffs).
Besides being multiplicative, definite expressions also behave in a semantically uniform way when com- bined with a negated verb phrase. The resulting sen- tence of the form NP (NEG VP) invariably entails one of the form NEG (NP VP). For this reason, defi- nite noun phrases are said to validate the conditional schema NP (NEG VP) -> NEG (NP VP). As a conse- quence, the sentence Bothfeet are not ulcerated logi- cally implies It is not the case that both feet are ulcerated. Noun phrases which exhibit this type of
behavior are said to be consistent in that they exclude that two sentences of the form NP VP and NP (NEG VP) are both accepted as true or both as false. In practice, what this amounts to is that with a definite noun phrase as subject the use of predicate negation invariably implies sentence negation. The class of definite expressions so defined appears to have a nega- tive counterpart and is therefore more accurately referred to as the class of positive definite expressions. To be sure, negative definite expressions are also con- sistent in nature, but they form a subset of the class of antiadditive expressions. Typical examples are neither (N), noneofthenN(wherenisanumeral),andnone of her N (where N is plural), none of which can occur in an existential statement of the form There is/are NP (X). It should be noted that, according to the definitions given above, homomorphic and anti- morphic expressions are definite as well; the former being positive definite, the latter, negative definite. Consequently, reflexive pronouns, transitive verbs, and intransitiveverbs must all be regarded as belong- ing to the class of positive definite expressions. The negative adverb not and the negative auxiliary didn '/, on the other hand, are properly treated as members of the class of negative definite expressions.
Bibliography
Barwise J, Cooper R 1981 Generalized quantifiers and natu- ral language. Linguistics and Philosophy 4:159-219
The term 'deixis,' from the Greek word for pointing, refers to a particular way in which the interpretation of certain linguistic expressions ('deictics' or 'index-
icals') is dependent on the context in which they are produced or interpreted. For example, / refers to the person currently speaking, you to the intended recipi-
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Definite Expressions F. Zwarts
Deixis S. Levinson