Introduction

Alda Mari (1) , Claire Beyssade (1) , Fabio Del Prete (1, 2)

1 IJN - Institut Jean-Nicod
2 UNIMI - Università degli Studi di Milano = University of Milan

This introductory chapter is organized into three parts. The first part focuses on the syntactic structure and compositional interpretation of determiner phrases, and frames the ontological issues related to reference to kinds in this context. It addresses a series of ontological issues relevant to the analysis of natural language: in order to account for linguistic data, must we postulate the existence of kinds, viewed as a type of entities, distinguished from particulars or tokens? What is the relationship between kinds and sets of entities, between kinds and properties, between kinds and sets of properties? The second part is comprised of three sections which are dedicated respectively to the stage-level/individual-level distinction, to the contribution of unboundedness and plurality, and to the dispositional reading of generic sentences. The questions addressed in this part pertain to the relationship between genericity, habituality, abilities, and dispositions. The third part examines the type of generic sentences, opposing analytic vs synthetic judgments, and raises the question of the notion of normality. It comprises two sections. The first section addresses the issue of the linguistic manifestation of the analytic/synthetic distinction and investigates the sources of the available interpretations for indefinite generic sentences, bare plurals, and definite plural generics. The second section discusses the notion of normality, comparing the view of normality as a statistical fact and the view of normality as a normative one.

Mots clés: syntactic structure; determiner phrases; language; habituality; abilities; disposition; generic sentences; bare plurals; plural generics; normality

Domaines: Linguistique; Philosophie; Psychologie

Alda Mari, Claire Beyssade, Fabio Del Prete. Introduction. Alda Mari, Claire Beyssade, Fabio Del Prete. Genericity, Oxford University Press, pp.1-92, 2012, Oxford Studies in Theoretical Linguistics, 978-0-19-969180-7. ⟨10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199691807.003.0001⟩. ⟨hal-00992406⟩