Interpreting long-distance reflexives:
A neo-Gricean pragmatic approach
Yan Huang
Department of Linguistics
University of Reading
The aim of this paper is twofold: firstly to provide a critical
review of both the phenomenology and the many and diverse generative
analyses of long-distance reflexivisation; and secondly and more
importantly to present a new approach to the interpretation of
long-distance reflexives, one couched in a neo-Gricean pragmatic
theory of anaphora (Huang 1987, 1991, 1994, in preparation, Levinson
1987, 1991).
I shall start by offering a critical overview of the phenomenology
of long-distance reflexivisation, focusing on both its universal and
language-particular properties. One interesting finding of this
survey is that exceptions to subject orientation, the
locality/Xo-Xmax status of reflexives correlation, and the absence of
phi-features/blocking effect connection are unexpectedly attested in
a wide range of genetically unrelated and structurally diverse
long-distance reflexivisation languages. I shall then proceed to
evaluate a number of influential generative analyses of long-distance
reflexivisation including Manzini and Wexler's (1987)
parameterisation analysis, Cole and his associates' (1994, 1996)
head-movement analysis, Reinhart and Reuland's (1993) marking of
reflexivity analysis, and Progovac's (1993) relativised SUBJECT
analysis. Finally, I shall provide a new formal analysis of the
interpretation of long-distance reflexives in terms of neo-Gricean
pragmatic theory. The basic idea underlying this approach is that the
interpretation of long-distance reflexives can largely be dictated by
the systematic interaction of some general pragmatic principles such
as Levinson's (1987, 1995) Q-, I- and M-principles, constrained by
general consistency conditions (such as background assumptions,
meaning-nn and entailments) on conversational implicatures. I shall
demonstrate that by utilising these principles and the resolution
mechanism organising their interaction, many patterns of preferred
interpretation regarding long-distance reflexives including the
logophoric effect in a wide variety of languages can be given a more
elegant and satisfactory explanation.
Main references:
Cole, P. and Sung, L-M. (1994). Head movement and long-distance reflexives. Linguistic Inquiry 25.
Huang, Y. (1991). A neo-Gricean pragmatic theory of anaphora. Journal of Linguistics 27.
Huang, Y. (1994). The Syntax and Pragmatics of Anaphora. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Huang, Y. (1996). A note on the head movement analysis of long-distance reflexives. Linguistics 34.
Huang, Y. (in prep.). Anaphora: A Cross-linguistic Study. To be published by Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Levinson, S.C. (1991). Pragmatic reduction of binding conditions revisited. Journal of Linguistics 27.
Manzini, M.R. and Wexler, K. (1987). Parameters, binding theory, and learnability. Linguistic Inquiry 18.
Progovac, L. (1993). Long-distance reflexives: movement-to-Infl versus relativised SUBJECT. Linguistic Inquiry 24.
Reinhart, T. and Reuland, E. (1993). Reflexivity. Linguistic Inquiry 24.