Abstract
In this paper, a formal semantic account of the simple past tense in text is
offered. The contributions to the interpretation of text made by the text's
syntactic structure, semantic content, aspectual classification, world knowledge
of the causal relations between events, and Gricean pragmatic maxims
are all represented within a single logical framework. This feature of the
theory gives rise to solutions to several puzzles concerning the relation
between the descriptive order of events in text and their temporal relations
in interpretation.
offered. The contributions to the interpretation of text made by the text's
syntactic structure, semantic content, aspectual classification, world knowledge
of the causal relations between events, and Gricean pragmatic maxims
are all represented within a single logical framework. This feature of the
theory gives rise to solutions to several puzzles concerning the relation
between the descriptive order of events in text and their temporal relations
in interpretation.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 941-973 |
| Journal | Linguistics: An Interdisciplinary Journal of the Language Sciences |
| Volume | 30 |
| Issue number | 5 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Nov 2009 |