Relational Nouns, Have-sentences, and Context

Michael Freedman, Yale

Abstract

This paper proposes that there is a connection between the ambiguity associated with have-sentences (e.g. John has a sister) and the context-dependency associated with relational nouns. In the analysis proposed here, the relevant denotations of relational nouns and have contain free variables whose value is derived contextually. The different resolutions of these variables account for the ambiguities in have-sentences and the non-resolution of the variables in relational nouns explains the cases of infelicity.

At the heart of my analysis is the simple premise that the denotation of have-sentences is like the denotation of sentences with regular transitive verbs. The relation expressed by have is underspecified between several possession-like relations; context specifies how the relational-type free variable for have is interpreted.

To motivate this analysis of have-sentences, I will also argue that the possessor argument of relational nouns is largely context-dependent, drawing inspiration from Condoravdi and Gawron’s (1996) analysis of relational predicates like local and win. The relational noun will be treated like a sortal noun, allowing the ordinary derivation of sentences with transitive verbs to take place (contra Partee, 1999; Beavers et al., 2008).

This treatment of have-sentences and relational nouns shows that a simple semantic analysis is possible, and perhaps preferable. Independently motivated pragmatic mechanisms (Zeevat, 2009), are applied to the semantic form in order to get the correct empirical results; an optimality theoretic system is applied which is based on the presupposition projection accounts of Heim (1982) and Van der Sandt (1992). Four constraints are used to obtain the correct readings: FAITH, PLAUSIBILITY, *NEW, and RELEVANCE.