IntroductionPresupposition is originated in the field of viewpoint and it had been proposed simply by German thinker Ferge in 1892. Almost 50 years ago, presupposition entered the area of linguistics to become a significant strategy in semantics. Later in the early 1970s, Keenan presented presupposition to the pragmatics to explain a relationship between a speaker as well as the appropriateness of the sentence within a context (Levinson: 177). Therefore, presupposition could be distinguished in to two categories: semantic presupposition and sensible presupposition. This thesis is primarily centered on the exploration of presupposition in semantics from the perspectives of features and concerns of presupposition.
For the sake of looking for the strategies to the problems, the writer as well brings two pragmatic ideas of presupposition into debate.
Part I actually. Two Approaches to PresuppositionIn the linguistics, two approaches to presupposition are semantic and pragmatic. Semantic presupposition views the sentence associations in terms of real truth relations whilst pragmatic presupposition describes phrases as an interaction between individuals.
A. Semantic PresuppositionIn ordinary dialect, of course , to presuppose anything means to suppose it, and the narrower technological use in semantics is related to this kind of (Saeed: 93).
In semantics, the meaning of a sentence in your essay is based on the sentence on its own instead of anything constructed by participants. The semantic presupposition is only concerned with the truth value of the statements. For instance, a)John managed to remain in time.
b)John tried to remain in time. (Suo: 130)In the example, word a) presupposes sentence b), that is to say, whether it is true that John was able to stop in time, it must be accurate that David tried to remain in time. In the meantime, if this kind of proposition is false, the presupposition that John tried to stop in period still is present. However , the particular truth of sentence b) doesn’t notify anything about the result whether he ended in time or perhaps not. Depending on the research, we can pull a real truth table just for this presupposition: a bT ‘ TF ‘ TT or F TThis desk is an overt information of the real truth relations among sentence a) and b). If sentence a) is valid, then it is presupposition b) is also accurate. If word a) is usually false, then this truth of b) nonetheless survives. While if sentence in your essay b) is valid, sentence a) can be both true or perhaps false. The interpretation of presupposition in semantics is definitely on the basis of real truth relations.
N. Pragmatic PresuppositionCompared with semantic presupposition- a truth-relation approach, pragmatic presupposition is an interactional strategy in interpretation the sentence in your essay relations.
Stalnaker argues that presupposition is basically a pragmatic trend: part of the group of assumptions is created by members in a discussion, which this individual terms the most popular ground (Saeed: 101). This common earth is the shared knowledge distributed by equally speaker and hearer. For example , “I are afraid my car broke down. The presupposition on this utterance is that the speaker includes a car, which is known to the hearer. However , if the hearer originally doesn’t know the fact, on ability to hear the utterance, s/he can take it as being a common surface for a even more conversation. By virtue of context, appropriate presupposition can help the hearer understand the utterance of the presenter. During the conversation, both loudspeaker and hearer are doing the turn-taking and so they can depend within the former utterances to carry out a smooth interaction.
By comparison of semantic presupposition and pragmatic presupposition, we are able to gain a much better understanding of this kind of notion used in the linguistics. However , major of this thesis is for the presupposition in the semantics. As a result, the following parts will be centered on the semantic presupposition.
Part II. Features of Semantic PresuppositionIn semantics, presupposition possesses one of a kind features: staying different from entailment, presupposition is usually stable underneath negation. It really is produced not merely by the particular description, although also by presupposition triggers.
A. StabilitySemantic presupposition depends on the meaning of words and grammatical set ups to describe the facts relations among sentences and these elements don’t fluctuate too much via context to context. Consequently, presupposition is relatively stable and it remains to be constant beneath negation with the main sentence. This feature of semantic presupposition makes a distinction among entailment and presupposition. For instance , a)I borrowed my pal’s bike today.
b)I obtained something today.
If sentence a) holds true, it ensures the truth of sentence b), to be further, a) requires b). However , if we negate a) to form a’) then it no longer requires b), repeated as follows: a’) I don’t borrow my own friend’s bike today.
b’) I took out something today.
If it is fake that I obtained my friend’s bike today, it can certainly not tell whether I lent something today or certainly not. It might be authentic that I lent something instead of my pal’s bike, yet we simply don’t know.
In contrast, the presupposing sentence is constant actually under negation, for instance
c)My sister did marry last year.
d)I have a sister.
The pre-condition of sentence c) is d), if c) is true then simply d) has to be taken as a well known fact. In other words, word c) provides the presupposition in d) as well as the truth of c) ensures the truth of d) too. If killing c) while “My sibling didn’t get married last year. The presupposition that “I have a sister likewise survives.
This can be a difference among entailment and presupposition, particularly, the negation of an entailing sentence contributes to the failure of the entailment while stopping a presupposing sentence permits the presupposition to survive.
M. Presupposition TriggersOn the one hand, the existence of presupposition can obtain from the usage of a identity or distinct description. Alternatively, itcan become produced by particular words or sentence constructions, which are named presupposition triggers. Karttunen offers collected thirty-one kinds of activates but in the next section the writer will mainly focus on four types of these activates: factive verbs, change of state verbs, temporal condition and cleft sentences.
In the first place, verbs just like “regret, “deplore, “know and “agree will be under the class of factive verbs, for they presuppose the truth with the complement clause. For instance, a)Martha regrets/ won’t regret drinking John’s home brew.
b)Martha drank John’s home produce. (Suo: 131)Whether Martha regrets drinking John’s home produce or not really, it is a regarded fact that Martha drank John’s home produce. The word a) provides the presupposition in b). In comparison, no this sort of presupposition exists with the non-factive verb like “think. For example , c)Tom thought that Ruben was later.
d)John was late.
Sentence c) signifies that it is simply Tom’ personal opinion of John’s getting late. In fact, John may not be late plus the truth does not reveal through the sentence on its own. Therefore , sentence in your essay c) noesn’t need the presupposition in d) due to the non-factive verb “think. Secondly, the employments of verbs like “stop, “start, “begin and “finish indicate the modify of state. Hence, these types of lexical activates are considered to be change of state verbs, which describe the new state and presuppose the former express as well. For example, a)John stopped/ didn’t stop beating his wife.
b)John had been defeating his partner. (Suo: 131)The verb “stop means producing something end and here if perhaps John halted beating his wife, meaning he the actual action of beating his wife end. But if this individual didn’t quit, the occasion of defeating will always happen in the foreseeable future. No matter what the scenario is, phrase a) presupposes the fact b) that Steve had been defeating his wife as the previous state.
In addition, not only the lexical phrases trigger the presupposition, although also condition like temporary clauses may well produce presupposition. For example , a)Linda went to the supermarket ahead of she attained her good friends.
b)Linda met her friends.
The temporary clause marked by the conjunction “before demonstrates that Linda attended the superstore first and then went to fulfill her close friends. In effect, sentence a) states the fact that Linda seriously met her friends. It really is this temporal clause that ensures the fact of word b) and in addition triggers the presupposition in b).
Lastly, syntactic composition such as cleft sentence could also act as a trigger to get the production of certain types of presupposition. For example , a)It was the noises that irritated me.
b)What annoyed myself was the noise.
c)Something frustrated me.
Inside the example, the cleft development in a) and the pseudo-cleft in b) share the presupposition in c). Regardless of how the syntax changes, the essence of the sentence continues to be unchanged. What sentence a) and b) intend to anxiety is that there is something annoyed me personally.
By means of the features like steadiness and presupposition triggers, the real intention in the utterances may be investigated. If the speaker alterations the predicate “has to “hasn’t, or “does to “doesn’t, the presupposition for the utterance is the same, for presupposition is of balance. Presupposition triggers can be used as a tool to provide the substance of the phrase, no matter what lexical words and constructions happen to be applied.
Portion III. Concerns of Semantic PresuppositionIn semantics, this truth-based approach gives rise to problems for the presupposition, such as, presupposition failure, the defeasibility of presupposition and theprojection difficulty.
A. Presupposition FailureOn the foundation of real truth condition, it has been taken for granted that the name or perhaps definite description being used identifies the sont sur le marché entity in the field of semantics. Yet , if the known as or explained entity won’t exist, this causes trouble for this truth-relation approach, which is known as presupposition failure. This example is by now the most discussed one out of this books: a)The California king of Italy is balding.
b)There is a King of France. (Saeed: 96)According to the criterion of truth connection, no doubt word a) presupposes sentence b), if it is authentic that there is a King of France. But once there is no Ruler of France, that is to say, the sentence b) is false, the problem is aroused, for it is definitely uncertain whether this presupposition survives or not. Will be the sentences just like a) the case or false, or just in a gray location, neither authentic nor phony? This questionable situation to get truth-based procedure results in the truth value distance.
For this kind of a problem, Russell offers a famous solution to make an analysis of this kind of definite information as 3 expressions the following: The King of France is bald is true if and only in the event that: a)at least one thing is definitely the kingb)at the majority of one thing is a kingc)whatever is a king can be bald. (Saeed: 97)From the Russell’s examination, we know that if you have no California king of Italy, it contributes to the falsity of this idea that the King of France is balding. Thus, you cannot find any gray location between true or bogus, no fact value distance. However , it seems to be too complex to use these preconditions for the reason of one identity and it may cost great attempts to analyze the preconditions anytime meet with this kind of kind of claims.
In comparison with fact relation procedure, it may be less problematic to get an interactional approach. During the communication between your individuals, whenever an unfamiliar term or distinct description happens, the hearer can interrupt the loudspeaker so as to sign the failing of the dialogue. For instance, the speaker says to someone, “Mr. Hong will bring us to dinner next Friday. If the hearer doesn’t understand Mr. Hong, it may cause confusion. Since the chat continues, the hearer can ask the speaker whom Mr. Hongis. As for the speaker, s/he can take an instantaneous response to clean up the misunderstanding.
The presupposition failure in semantics comes from the thin question with the truth benefit of assertions about non-existent entities, when in pragmatics, the attention is paid to the more standard question of what conventions license a speaker’s mentioning use of name or particular description.
B. DefeasibilityOne from the peculiar things about presupposition is that it is delicate to context, either immediate linguistic circumstance or the fewer immediate discourse context, or in situations where contrary assumptions are produced. In particular context, the presupposition is cancelled and this sensation is known as defeasibility. Two factors result in presupposition cancellation: one is the linguistic context as well as the other one is background assumption about the world.
One kind of presupposition defeasibility arises in certain types of linguistic context. For example , You say that someone in this area loves Jane. Well maybe so. However it certainly isn’t Fred who also loves Martha. And this certainly basically John… (We continue in this way until we now have enumerated all of the people inside the room). For that reason no one in this room enjoys Mary. (Suo: 135)In the example, each one of the cleft content (it certainly isn’t Fred, etc . ) are supposed to presuppose that there is someone in this space who loves Mary, for presupposition is usually constant underneath negation. Nevertheless , the loudspeaker intends to persuade the hearer there is no one from this room who have loves Martha by lording it over out the choices. Therefore , the presupposition that someone in this room enjoys Mary is defeated with this counterfactual presumption.
Here is one other example of the same kind: a)John didn’t are able to pass his exams.
b)John tried to move his examinations.
c)John didn’t manage to go his examinations. In fact this individual didn’t actually try.
Sentence a) has got the presupposition in b), but since put a) into this kind of a statement as c), the prior presupposition is definitely abandoned. Not knowing the real simple fact, if an individual makes the utterance that David didn’t are able to pass his exams, it could leave the hearer an effect that at least one time he attempted to pass his exams. About hearing the truth the hearer will know John’s failure for the examinations is due to his lack of initiatives in his study. Thus, the presupposition may be cancelled within certain situations.
The additional kind of presupposition defeasibility is usually caused by the general knowledge on the planet. For instance, a)She cried prior to she done her thesis.
b)She finished her thesis. (Saeed: 187)As mentioned above, the temporal clause functions like a trigger to get the presupposition. Sentence a) with before-clause presupposes that indeed the girl finished her thesis. Nevertheless , if the action-word in the main terms is converted to “die, the situation will probably be totally different. As an example, c)She passed away before she finished her thesis.
d)She finished her thesis. (Saeed: 187)Since her death forwent the event of finishing her thesis, it truly is certain that she never completed the thesis. It is common impression that people tend not to conduct items after they perish. Even if sentence c) is definitely expressed with before-clause, it will not have the presupposition in d). As a result of backdrop belief inside the real world, the previous presupposition that she done her thesis is blocked in this framework.
C. Projection ProblemLangendoen and Savin suggest that the group of presuppositions from the complex whole is the basic sum in the presuppositions in the parts, we. e. in the event S0 can be described as complex word containing phrases S1, S2,… Sn because constituents, then a presuppositions of S0 sama dengan the presuppositions of S1 + the presuppositions of S2… + the presuppositions of Sn (Levinson: 191). For example , S0: John stopped accusing Martha of defeating her partner.
S1: Ruben accused Martha of beating her partner.
S1²: John judged that it was bad for Jane to defeat her partner.
S2: John stopped performing it.
S2²: Before time T, John achieved it. (Suo: 136)In the case, sentence S0 is the complicated sentence which includes two parts S1 and S2, being more specific, in the statement that John halted accusing Jane of beating her spouse, two connotations can be construed: one is that John accused Mary of beating her husband and the other is that David stopped performing it. The presupposition of S1 is S1², namely, S1 presupposes that John evaluated that it was bad for Mary to beat her husband. While S2 has got the presupposition in S2², that is to say, S2 presupposes that before time Big t, John achieved it. Thus, the presuppositions of S0 will be the presupposition of S1 in addition to the presupposition of S2.
To tell the truth, this simple solution to the presuppositions of complex phrases is far from correct and it turns out being impossible to adopt it like a formula. Employing this solution, it is hard to forecast exactly which in turn presuppositions in the parts survive in the whole presupposition of the sophisticated sentences. This kind of compositional is actually called the projection problem for the presuppositions.
The projection problem in the presuppositions has two elements: on the one hand, presuppositions remain in the linguistic circumstance while entailments disappear. On the other hand, presuppositions happen to be cancelled in some contexts in which entailments make it through.
The 1st aspect of the projection is actually the your survival of presuppositions and termination of entailments in the same context. As mentioned above, negation is known as a typical example for the distinction among presupposition and entailment, to get presupposition is stable underneath negation while entailment just isn’t. However , you will find other scenarios in which presupposition remainsand entailment disappears. As an example, a)Mr. Brownish bought four books.
b)There is a Mister. Brown.
c)Mr. Brown bought three books.
d)It may be possible that Mr. Brown bought four literature.
e)Mr. Dark brown could have bought four catalogs.
In this example, sentence a) presupposes sentence b) and entails sentence in your essay c). When it is true that Mr. Darkish bought 4 books, the precondition for this proposition there is a Mr. Brown should also be true. And if he already bought four literature, he is supposed to have bought three books. Nevertheless , when the modal operators or modal verbs are stuck in the first statement, the entailment of a) goes away while the presupposition b) nonetheless exists. Mainly because modal workers like “possible, “probable and modal verbs like “could, “should are thought to be a kind of conjecture. The employments of them reveal speaker’s uncertainty regarding his utterances.
Another condition of the same kind is the mixture sentences created by the réunificatrice “and, “or, “if… then and what not. For example, a)The two students handed down in the home work late once again this Monday.
b)A student handed inside the homework later this Monday.
c)The two students handed down in the groundwork late prior to.
d)If both students handed in the home work late once again this Monday, their instructor will get angry.
The form word “again utilized in the sentence a) presupposes that the two students presented with in the home work late just before. If two students presented with in the groundwork late, it must entail the particular one of them passed in the homework late. Hence, sentence a) presupposes c) and also requires b). Yet , if sentencea) is inlayed in a complicated sentence like d), the utterance a) can only be regarded as a great assumption inside the complex whole. Hence, the previous entailment is usually abandoned in the new mixture sentence nevertheless the presupposition that they did ahead of still survives.
The additional aspect of the projection problem is that presupposition is blacklisted while entailment still is out there in certain contexts. If the predicates of the utterances are the verbs of propositional attitude just like “want, “believe, “imagine, “dream and so on, the stopping of presupposition appears to take place. For instance, a)Tom believes your dog is the president of America.
b)There is a present president of America.
In this model, sentence a) entails that Tom believes something, however it doesn’t have the presupposition that there is a present leader of America. The verb like “believe is only a non-factive action-word, which won’t ensure the reality of the complement. In addition, the work of it can leave the hearer an effect that the particular speaker says is just a personal opinion. As a result, the presupposition is blocked because of the action-word “believe. Another example is given as follows: a)I dreamed which i was a A language like german and that My spouse and i regretted becoming a German.
b)I was a A language like german.
In the sentence in your essay a), the speaker won’t shoulder the responsibility of uttering it by using the verb “dream. The application of “dream indicates this utterance cannot be taken seriously being a fact. Nevertheless , sentence a) still includes that “I dreamed something, nevertheless doesn’t presuppose that “I was a German born. In this situation, the complex sentences with certain verbs of propositional attitude block their very own presuppositions yet maintain the entailments.
By means of analyzing the problems of presupposition in the field of semantics, we can draw a conclusion this truth relationship approach is definitely farfrom adequate to describe the relationships among presupposing and presupposed sentences. Admittedly, the void of presupposition isn’t only being mentioned in semantics but as well in the pragmatics.
Part 4. Pragmatic Theories of PresuppositionAs for practical presupposition, several theories have been put forward by simply linguists including Stalnaker, Gazdar and what not. Among these ideas, two of choices the most developed theories that deal with the defeasibility plus the projection complications. Both theories assume that presuppositions are part of the conventional which means of expression, instead of semantic inference.
The first theory has been produced by Karttunen and Peters, which can be expressed in the framework of Montague grammar. In the Montague grammar, clauses are built up from their constituents from the bottom up rather than in the top down as in transformational generative grammar (Levinson: 207). The basic idea in this theory is that sentences are built up from their parts and the connotations conveyed in these sentences happen to be subject to what, clauses and so forth, but in the presuppositions, symbolism are connected with these triggers. According to Karttunen and Peters’ theory, presuppositions are actually non-cancellable.
The meaning expressions that capture the presuppositional content material of each presupposition-triggering item will be related with every single constituent a heritage manifestation. If there is a predicate just like propositional attitude verb, it’ll have a traditions expression that blocks the presuppositions ascending to be presupposition of the whole sentence. In such instances, presupposition just isn’t in fact cancelled, but it is blocked during the process of derivation by the heritage expression. For instance , a)Bush believes that Kerry’s attitude regarding terrorism is dangerous.
b)Kerry has an attitude about terrorism.
The subordinate clause of sentence a) presupposes that Kerry has a attitude about terrorism. However , the verb “think has got the heritage expression which helps prevent this presupposition from getting the presupposition of the complete.
The additional theory is usually proposed simply by Gazdar, by which presuppositions are in reality cancelled. On the early level of derivation, the presuppositions of any kind of complex sentence in your essay will incorporate all the potential presuppositions with the parts. Then a canceling system will begin to operate and it only selects these presuppositions which are in line with all the sélections already inside the context. With this theory, the generations of presuppositions adhere to a special order: first the entailments of what are explained are included with the framework, then the conversational implicatures, in support of finally the presupposition (Levinson: 213). In each step, these presuppositions that contradict the previous propositions will be eliminated through selection and later the ones staying consistent with all of them will make it through. For example , a)If there is a Ruler of England, the Full of England doesn’t any more live in Versaills.
b)The speaker knows that there is also a King of France.
c)It is consistent with all the loudspeaker knows that there is not a California king of France. (Suo: 143)In the sentence a), the clause that “the California king of England doesn’t any further live in Versaills has the potential presupposition in b). However , the conditional sentence a) entails that there is not a King of Portugal. Based on the special order in Gazdar’s theory, this entailment gets into into the context before the potential presupposition. Hence, this potential presupposition is definitely cancelled with out entering into the context.
Even though the two hypotheses are rival to each other, both of them offer evidence for the defeasibility of presupposition and projection issue. However , actually in the field of pragmatics, adequate answer to the presupposition is not obtained, which in turn needs additional developments.
ConclusionIn the discipline of linguistics, we can übung into the presupposition from two perspectives, specifically, semantic presupposition and practical presupposition. This thesis largely focuses on the interpretation of presupposition in semantics. The writer presents the features of semantic presupposition like stability under negation and presupposition triggers after which makes a great analysis with the problems aroused by this truth-based theorysuch because presupposition inability, defeasibility and projection issue. To solve these types of problems, two theories concerning the pragmatic presupposition are reviewed. Although both of them offer the explanations for the difficulties of presupposition, they are certainly not considered to be sufficient solutions. The further innovations of presupposition rely on the complex communications between semantics and pragmatics.
References
Levinson, Stephen C. Pragmtics. Beijing: Foreign Language Instructing and Exploring Press, june 2006.
Saeed, Steve I. Semantics. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Researching Press, 2005.
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