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Aspects of modality
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
It is a cross-linguistically robust fact that the same modal auxiliaries come in different flavors: epistemic, deontic, ability, teleological... This fact is neatly captured in a system where each modal has a single lexical ...
Is there a human right to democracy?
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
My dissertation asks whether there is a human right to democracy. This is a difficult question, not least because there is no consensus about either what democracy requires or how to interpret human rights. The introduction ...
De de se
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
In this dissertation, I argue against a unitary treatment of individual de se ascription. Based on consideration of Yoruba logophors and English dream-report pronouns, I show that one mechanism is best analyzed as binding ...
A list of initials and finals in Wôpanâak
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
This paper consists primarily of lists of initial, medial and final verb morphemes in Wôpanâak. There are also lists of special initials and finals that function in different ways. Along with these lists are brief descriptions ...
Syntax and discourse in the acquisition of adjunct control
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
(cont.) I suggest that the control principles are intact, and that a separate aspect of grammar is responsible for these non-adult interpretations. I argue that adjunct attachment height, which is crucial to determining ...
Interactions with context
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
My dissertation asks how we affect conversational context and how it affects us when we participate in any conversation -- including philosophical conversations. Chapter 1 argues that speakers make pragmatic presuppositions ...
On the interpretation of concealed questions
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
Determiner phrases have the ability to act as "concealed questions" (CQs), embedded questions in sentences like John knows the time (i.e., John knows what time it is). The fact that know and wonder differ in their ability ...
Decompositionality and identity
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
The Scope of quantificational phrases (QPs) is often not represented in surface structures, in the sense that a constituent that is, on the surface, sister to a QP is not necessarily interpreted as its argument semantically. ...
Some ways that a thing can go wrong : malfunctions, disorders and perversions
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
"Selection and Artifacts" is about how artifacts acquire functions. According to Karen Neander, the function of an artifact is the purpose for which it is designed or built. But I argue that in order for an artifact to ...
The syntactic and semantic roots of floating quantification
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006)
Through the study of floating quantifiers in a variety of languages, I demonstrate that floating quantification is not a uniform phenomenon and outline a series of puzzles that force us to adopt a two-part analysis. I argue ...