handout

Ivona Kučerová 

UCL, ivona@alum.mit.edu 

Sinn und Bedeutung 12 

Oslo September 22, 2007 

Givenness and Maximize Presupposition 

1 The basic pattern 

Czech: a free word order language; under certain circumstances everything goes; 

however, there is a direct relation between the word order of an utterance and its 

information structure: 

(1) An example of a basic word order and a derived order: 

a. SVO: Chlapec našel lízátko. 

boy.Nom found lollipop.Acc 

b. OVS: Lízátko našel chlapec. 

lollipop.Acc found boy.Nom 

(2) Possible interpretations: 

a. SVO: Chlapec našel lízátko. 

boy.Nom found lollipop.Acc 

(i) ‘A boy found a lollipop.’ ←− new > new 

(ii) ‘The boy found a lollipop.’ ←− given > new 

(iii) ‘The boy found the lollipop.’ ←− given > given 

(iv) #‘A boy found the lollipop.’ ←− # new > given 

b. OVS: Lízátko našel chlapec. ←− given > new 

lollipop.Acc found boy.Nom 

‘A boy found the lollipop.’ 

What we learn: 

• basic word order is felicitous in multiple contexts 

• derived word order is restricted (usually only one interpretation) 

• there is a partition between given and new elements that can in principle fall 

at any point of the structure 

(3) The first generalization: 

a. # new > given 

b. ̌given > new 

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BUT: not every word order is possible with a particular interpretation: 

(4) e.g., if the object and the verb are given and the subject is new: 

a. ̌O V S 

b. # V O S 

(5) The second generalization: 

In a given context and with a particular interpretation, there is only one 

felicitous order. 

(6) The third generalization: 

An utterance maybe be divided into domains. Within any domain there can 

be a partition between given and new. 

−→ domains correspond to chunks that have been argued to be propositional 

(7) a. Do you know anything about Petr and Marie? 

b. Náhodou jsem slyšel, že Petrovi 

accidentally Aux.1sg heard that Petr.Dat 

Marii | zaměstnali v ABB. 

Marie.Acc employed.1pl in ABB 

| říkala 

told 

nějaká 

some 

paní, 

lady 

že 

that 

‘I accidentally heard that some lady told Petr that Marie got employed 

in the ABB.’ 

(8) a. Do you know what Mary did with her famous boat? 

b. Marie | se pokusila lod’ | prodat. 

Marie REFL tried boat to-sell 

‘Marie tried to sell the boat (but no one wanted to buy it).’ 

c. Marii | nařídil soud lod’ | prodat. 

Marie.Dat ordered court.Nom boat.Acc to-sell 

‘(You won’t believe it but) a court ordered Marie to sell the boat.’ 

−→ a rather complex data pattern that so far has not been properly characterized 

Desiderata: 

• to characterize the word order restriction and its relation to information structure 

• to explain it 

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2 Existing proposals 



The Prague school: 

an old tradition going back to the beginning of the 20th century (Mathesius’ Prague 

lectures, 1908; Mathesius [1929] 1983; Daneš 1954; Firbas 1964; Sgall et al. 1980, 

among others): 

• any utterance is divided between a given and a new part (topic – focus, theme 

– rheme) 

A modern way to read Mathesius: 

• anything can be chunked into partitions 

• the partition may fall at any place 

• accounts for ambiguity of certain strings 

Limitations: 

• cannot account for restrictions on word order within a given or new chunk 

(any word order should go as long as there is a partition) 

• cannot account for the domains (minor point: this could be accommodated) 

Cartographic approaches (Rizzi, 1997, 2004, among others): 

• there is a designated functional projection on the main sentential spine: if an 

item is to be interpreted as given/new it must move to the projection 

Limitiations: 

• cannot account for restrictions on word order within a given or a new part 

• the fact that the partition can fall at any point is unexpected 

• cannot account for cases where the partition is not on the main spine – and 

yet the partition is relevant for the main spine: 

(9) Yesterday Marie | and Paul came to school. 

Yesterday 

Marie 

and 

Paul 

came to school 

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3 The proposal 



Basic intuition: 

structures are divided into domains and any domain can be partitioned at any position 

within the domain [this we learned from basic word orders] (≈ Mathesius’ 

tradition) 

−→ there is a point in the structure from which everything up is given 

A formalization: G(iven)-operator 

−→ an operator that marks elements in its scope as given; the operator recursively 

propagates upwards and it terminates on an atomic semantic type – in our case on 

type t (or < s, t >) [a simplifying assumption] 

(10) G-operator: 

G(B) = 

{ λA α : Given(A).G(B A) B is of type < α, β > for some α, β 

other than s, t 

B for B of type < s, t > 

(11) < s, t > 

given 

given 

G 

new 

new . . . 

What the G-operator does for us: 

• once the operator starts propagating upwards it doesn’t stop unless it reaches 

the edge of a domain → structures are divided into domains in which given 

precedes new 

• the operator can be inserted at any place → a partition can fall at any place 

A note on interpretation of givenness: For concretness, I follow Sauerland (2005) 

in assuming that givenness gives rise to an existential presupposition (cf. Schwarzschild 

1999). My interest lies in how givenness applies compositionally, the actual lexical 

entry is not crucial. 

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−→ this is how we get the interpretation and the partitions in a basic word order but 

what happens if only the object is given and the subject and the verb are new? 

(12) Only object is given (S V | O): 

Option I: G operator inserted on O: 

< s, t > 

subject 

verb 

object 

G . . . 

−→ Presupposition failure 

As we have seen in (2), the word order must change: 

(13) S V O → O G V S 

BUT: why do we need to change the order? Why can’t we simply omit the operator? 

−→ violation of Maximize presupposition (Heim, 1991; Sauerland, 2007): 

(14) Maximize Presupposition 

In context C used the most informative presupposition satisfied in C. 

−→ the only way to resolve the conflict between Maximize Presupposition and Presupposition 

failure is to reorder the structure (cf. Wagner 2005, To appear b) 

Question: why is not movement always possible? 

−→ independent restrictions on syntactic movement (Minimize Move) (for further 

details see Kučerová 2007): 

• syntactic restrictions on movement (e.g., Path Containment of Pesetsky 1982) 

• economy condition on movement: movement is licensed only if it gives rise 

to an otherwise unavailable interpretation Reinhart, 1995, 2006; Fox, 1995, 

2000 

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4 Interim summary 



The ingredients of the proposal: 

• Independently motivated from other areas: 

– Maximize Presupposition 

– Presupposition Failure 

– economy condition on Move 

• A new component: 

– the G-operator 

Two basic situations: 

• I: Basic word order: we plug in a G-operator that marks everything upwards 

as presupposed 

• II: if there is given below new we must reorder – only then a G-operator can 

be inserted 

−→ movement arises as a solution to a conflict between Maximize Presupposition 

and Presupposition Failure 

A side-note: If a language does not have a recursive G-operator, for example English, 

this type of conflict does not arise and reordering is not expected. 

The rest of the talk: 

• more on domains 

• further predictions 

• Appendix: the evaluation component 

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5 Establishing the domains 



Prediction: If the G-operator terminates on an atomic semantic type, given elements 

should gather on the closest left edge corresponding to an atomic type. 

Finite clauses correspond to propositions 

−→ prediction: given elements do not move out of a finite clause 

(15) For a long time I didn’t know what was going on with Mary. But then. . . 

a. mi Petr řekl, že Marii potkalo velké štěstí. 

me Petr.Nom told that Marie.Acc met big happiness 

‘Peter told me that Marie got extremely lucky. (She won a lottery.)’ 

b. #Marii mi Petr řekl, že potkalo velké štěstí. 

Marie.Acc me Petr.Nom told that met big happiness 

Infinitives correspond to proposition (in a technical sense; there is no tense) 

−→ prediction: given elements do not move out of infinitival domains 

(16) What happened to the antique chair you got many years ago from Mary? 

a. Petr se pokusil / chtěl / dokázal tu židli 

Petr REFL tried wanted managed that chair 

‘Petr tried/wanted/managed to burn the chair.’ 

b. #Tu židli (se) Petr pokusil / chtěl / dokázal 

that chair (REFL) Petr tried wanted managed 

‘Petr tried/wanted/managed to burn the chair.’ 

spálit. 

burn.Inf 

spálit. 

burn.Inf 

Analytic versus synthetic tense formation: different tenses in Czech have different 

morphological formation ( Present is synthetic (finite verb) but Future is analytic 

(auxiliary + infinitive)) 

−→ prediction: assuming that a tense auxiliary selects for a proposition, there is a 

difference in locality of movement of given elements between the Present tense and 

the Future tense 

(17) Present: given elements move to the left edge 

a. What is happening to the book? 

b. Tu knihu | dává Marie Petrovi. ← synthetic 

the book.Acc gives Marie.Nom Petr.Dat 

‘Marie gives the book to Petr.’ 

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(18) Future: given elements may move only locally: 

a. What will happen to the book? 

b. Marie bude tu knihu dávat 

Marie.Nom will the book.Acc give.Inf 

‘Marie will give the book to Peter.’ 

c. #Tu knihu bude Marie dávat 

the book.Acc will Marie.Nom give.Inf 

‘Marie will give the book to Peter.’ 

Petrovi. ← analytic 

Petr.Dat 

Petrovi. 

Petr.Dat 

Past: 3rd person versus 1st and 2nd person: in the Past tense, only 1st and 2nd 

person have an overt auxiliary, there is no auxiliary for 3rd person 

−→ prediction: given elements move further in sentences with 3rd person 

(19) 3sg.: 

(20) 1pl.: 

a. What happened to the boat that got demaged in the last storm? 

b. Lod’ opravil jeden technik. 

boat.Acc repaired one technician.Nom 

‘A technician repaired the boat.’ 

a. What happened to the boat that got demaged in the last storm? 

b. Jeden technik a já jsme lod’ opravili . 

one technician.Nom and I Aux.1pl boat.Acc repaired 

‘A technician and I repaired the boat.’ 

Small clauses correspond to propositions as well 

−→ prediction: given elements do not move out of small clauses 

(21) a. Why does Peter look so happy? 

b. Marie je na Petra pyšná 

Marie.Nom is of Petr proud 

‘Marie is fond of Peter.’ 

c. #Na Petra je Marie pyšná. 

of Petr is Marie proud 

. 

Notice: All infelicitous examples with a fronted given element are grammatical but 

they mean something different (usually topic or contrastive reading); for example, 

Mary is fond of Peter, not of Bill., (21-c), or As to the chair, Peter wanted to burn it, 

but he definitely wanted to keep the table., (16-b) 

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6 Further predictions: Coordination 



Question: What happens if movement is not only disprefered but it is not allowed? 

−→ in the previous cases, Minimize move was a violable constraint: it was possible 

to violate it in order to resolve the conflict between Maximize Presupposition and 

Presupposition Failure – this is not an option anymore 

What do we expect: 

• either Maximize Presupposition or Presupposition failure will be violated 

• or there is another strategy that can be used to solve the conflict 

A case to look at: syntactic islands 

−→ the predictions are not easy to test because islands often coincide with an 

atomic type – we cannot be sure whether there is a G-operator that terminates on 

the edge of the island 

Exception: Coordination (because it preserves its type) 

Two cases to consider: 

• Case I: a coordination adjoined to an atomic semantic type 

• Case II: a coordination not adjoined to an atomic semantic type 

Prediction for case I: 

there should be no problem with a DP coordination if it is adjoined to an atomic semantic 

type (e.g., a coordinated subject) −→ the structure should be well formed as 

long as the given part of the coordination precedes the new part of the coordination: 

(22) Na programu byla diskuse o nové učitelce. context 

on program was discussion about new teacher 

‘The topic of the program was a discussion about a new teacher.’ 

(23) Učitelku a (její) žáky to překvapilo. ←− ̌DP & DP 

teacher and her students it surprised 

‘The teacher and (her) students were surprised by it.’ 

(24) #Žáky a učitelku to překvapilo. ←− # DP & DP 

students and teacher it surprised 

‘A teacher and (her) students were surprised by it.’ 

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−→ notice that the right structure must be merged – it cannot be derived by movement 

−→ Question: how is the right structure selected? [appendix] 

Prediction for case II: 

unclear: 

• inserting a G-operator will necessarily lead to Presupposition failure: 

new 

given 

G and new 

new 

• if no G-operator is inserted the Maximize presupposition maxim will be violated 

What we find: 

(25) #To se nelíbilo ani učitelce ani žákům. ←− # new > DP & DP 

it REFL not-liked nor teacher nor students 

‘Neither a teacher nor students were happy about it.’ 

Is there any way out? −→ the given element must be pronominalized: 

(26) a. To se nelíbilo ani jí ani žákům. ̌pronoun 

it REFL not-liked nor her nor students 

‘Neither she nor students were happy about it.’ 

b. To se nelíbilo ani té učitelce ani žákům. ̌that DP 

it REFL not-liked nor that teacher nor students 

‘Neither the/that teacher nor students were happy about it.’ 

Why should pronominalization be relevant? 

A proposal: If a lexical entry of α gives rise to a presupposition, there is no need 

to introduce the presupposition by the G-operator. 

There is still more to be discovered. . . 

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7 The evaluation component 



(27) Reference set for Maximize Presupposition evaluation 

For purposes of Maximize Presupposition, the reference set, toward which 

Maximize presupposition is evaluated, consists of all derivations 

a. that are based on the same numeration and free insertion of G-operator, 

and 

b. that make the same assertion. 

−→ the pronominalization cases teach us what must be in the reference set – a possibility: 

pronouns are DP ellipses (Elbourne, 2005), or pronouns are pronunciation 

of φ-features (cf. Heim To appear) 

Parameters of the evaluation: 

(28) SYNTAX: 

a. the reference set may contain only grammatically well-formed structures 

b. the optimal structure has the smallest number of movement necessary 

to obtain an otherwise unavailable semantic interpretation (Reinhart, 

1995; Fox, 1995, 2000; Reinhart, 2006) 

(29) INTERPRETATION: 

a. a presupposed element must be marked as given (either lexically or 

by a G-operator) [≈ Maximize Presupposition] 

b. a new element cannot be marked as given [≈ Presupposition Failure] 

References 

Daneš, František. 1954. Příspěvek k rozboru významové výstavby výpovědi [a 

contribution to the analysis of the semantic structure of the utterance]. Studie a 

práce lingvistické I:263–274. 

Elbourne, Paul D. 2005. Situations and Individuals. MIT Press. 

Firbas, Jan. 1964. On defining the theme in functional sentence perspective. 

Travaux linguistiques de Prague 1:267–280. 

Fox, Danny. 1995. Economy and scope. Natural language semantics 3:283–341. 

Fox, Danny. 2000. Economy and semantic interpretation. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT 

Press. 

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Heim, Irene. 1991. Artikel und Definitheit. In Semantik: Ein internationales Handbuch 

der zeitgenössischen Forschung, 487–535. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 

Heim, Irene. To appear. Features on bound pronouns. In Phi-theory: Phi-features 

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142. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 

Pesetsky, David. 1982. Paths and categories. Doctoral Dissertation, MIT. 

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fails, and how a presuppositional account of givenness works. In Proceedings 

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Sauerland, Uli. 2007. Implicated presuppositions. In Sentence and context, ed. 

Anita Steube. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 

Schwarzschild, Roger. 1999. GIVENness, AvoidF and other constraints on the 

placement of accent. Natural language semantics 7:141–177. 

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XVI. Ithaca, NY: CLC Publications. 

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