Self-organising Logic of Structures as a Basis for a Dependency-based Dynamic Semantics Model Cover Image

Self-organising Logic of Structures as a Basis for a Dependency-based Dynamic Semantics Model
Self-organising Logic of Structures as a Basis for a Dependency-based Dynamic Semantics Model

Author(s): Maciej Tomasz Piasecki
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies
Published by: Instytut Slawistyki Polskiej Akademii Nauk
Keywords: Dynamic Semantics; compositionality; reference; quantification; anaphora; Polish; variableless semantic representation

Summary/Abstract: We present Self-organising Logic of Structures (SLS), a semantic representation language of high expressive power, which was designed for a fully compositional representation of discourse anaphora following the Dynamic Semantics paradigm. The application of SLS to the description of possible meanings of Polish multiple quantifier sentences is discussed. Special attention is paid to the phenomena of: cardinality dependency/independency of Noun Phrase quantifiers and variety of quantification. Semantic representation based on several formal operators is proposed. They can be combined in many different ways, if one takes a purely theoretical perspective. However, in the paper we show that this huge number is practically reduced in the language use and is governed by several constraints motivated by the analysis of Polish language data. The Hypothesis of Local Range of Cardinality Dependency is formulated as an alternative to representations based on quantifier rising technique. SLS provides a multi-layered language description of interlinked representation of several semantic phenomena: quantification, reference, presupposition and anaphora.

  • Issue Year: 2013
  • Issue No: 13
  • Page Range: 25-55
  • Page Count: 31
  • Language: English