The Temporal Structure of Discourse: the Syntax and Semantics of Temporal Then

This paper presents an analysis of the discourse representation of tense. I argue that temporal interpretation across sentences in discourse is subject to the same principles as temporal interpretation within sentences, and that there is thus no need to posit independent principles to account for the discourse behavior of tense. This approach makes possible an analysis of the temporal adverb then. The semantic dependency that then induces between sentences in discourse is argued to be identical to the dependency that holds within sentences in temporal adjunct clause constructions. In order to explain how the meaning of then differs depending on its position, I claim that then associates different times in tense structure depending on its syntactic position, resulting in different interpretations. This analysis accounts for interpretive parallels between discourse sequences with then and temporal adjunct clauses, and it predicts the interaction of temporal then with perfect tenses, future readings of present tense, and infinitival clause constructions.

[1]  D. Schiffrin,et al.  Anaphoric then: aspectual, textual, and epistemic meaning , 1992 .

[2]  Alex Lascarides,et al.  Discourse Relations and Defeasible Knowledge , 1991, ACL.

[3]  E. Thompson,et al.  The syntax of tense , 1996 .

[4]  Hans Reichenbach,et al.  Elements of symbolic logic , 1948 .

[5]  F. Pianesi,et al.  TOWARD A SYNTAX OF TEMPORAL REPRESENTATIONS , 1991 .

[6]  C. Clifton,et al.  Filling gaps: Decision principles and structure in sentence comprehension , 1983, Cognition.

[7]  Lyn Frazier,et al.  Parsing modifiers: Special purpose routines in the human sentence processing mechanism? , 1990 .

[8]  Mark Steedman,et al.  On not being led up the garden path : The use of context by the psychological syntax processor , 1985 .

[9]  Ray Jackendoff,et al.  Semantic Interpretation in Generative Grammar , 1972 .

[10]  K. Rayner,et al.  Making and correcting errors during sentence comprehension: Eye movements in the analysis of structurally ambiguous sentences , 1982, Cognitive Psychology.

[11]  J. Kimball.  Seven principles of surface structure parsing in natural language , 1973 .

[12]  Noam Chomsky,et al.  The Minimalist Program , 1992 .

[13]  Janet D. Fodor,et al.  The sausage machine: A new two-stage parsing model , 1978, Cognition.

[14]  C. Clifton,et al.  The independence of syntactic processing , 1986 .

[15]  B. Partee.  Nominal and temporal anaphora , 1984 .

[16]  Lyn Frazier,et al.  ON COMPREHENDING SENTENCES: SYNTACTIC PARSING STRATEGIES. , 1979 .

[17]  Sheila Glasbey,et al.  Distinguishing between events and times: Some evidence from the semantics of then , 1993 .

[18]  H. Kamp,et al.  Tense in Texts , 1983 .

[19]  E. Hinrichs.  Temporal anaphora in discourses of english , 1986, Linguistics and Philosophy.