2008/12/05 by Christine Gunlogson · 2 citations
Arts and Humanities · #Discourse Analysis in Language Studies #Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies #Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation
paper · doi:10.1075/bjl.22.06gun
openalex publication_date 2008/12/05 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/26
This paper addresses certain restrictions on the use of declaratives as questions in English. Declaratives are taken to express commitment by the speaker, even in a questioning use. The analysis traces the restrictions to two distinct contextual factors: (i) a general principle requiring that a commitment have a recognized source , i.e., a discourse agent who plausibly has independent evidence supporting the content committed to; (ii) specific to a questioning interpretation, the need for the context to support the inference that the speaker’s commitment depends upon the addressee’s anticipated confirmation. Rising intonation contributes a very general element of meaning, indicating that the utterance it marks is contingent upon some discourse condition obtaining; the specific conditions required for a questioning interpretation instantiate one such type of contingency. The proposals are modeled via elaboration of standard contextual structures in a possible-worlds framework.