Chapter 4. Intersubjectification and textual emphasis in the use of definite article + proper name in Spanish

This paper is intended to be an interdisciplinary investigation of the status of proper names, although it takes linguistics as its point of departure. In this study I will define proper names in terms of the currently developing Radical Construction Grammar, as promoted by Croft (to appear). Starting from the referential and semantic functions of proper names, I discuss the opposing theses of the language philosophers John Searle and Saul Kripke, and then formulate my position that proper names are assigned an ad hoc referent in an ad hoc name-giving act, i.e. not on the basis of a concept or predication as with common nouns. This ad hoc assignment can be repeated several times, so numerous people can be called John. Proper names do not have asserted lexical meaning but do display presuppositional meanings of several kinds: categorical (basic level), associative senses (introduced either via the name-bearer or via the name-form) and grammatical meanings. Language specifically, this referential and semantic status is reflected in the occurrence of proper names in certain constructions. I thus claim that close (or 'restrictive') appositional patterns of the form [definite article + noun + noun], e.g. the poet Burns, are relevant to the definition of proper names in English and also to the categorical (often basic level) meaning of the name. From proper names we can also derive nouns that appear as a special kind of common noun, e.g. another John. From a methodological viewpoint it is imperative to distinguish here between (proprial) lexemes or lemmas in isolation (dictionary entries) and proprial lemmas in their different functions (prototypically: proper name, nonprototypically: common noun or other). To corroborate the above theses, I will adduce recent psycholinguistic and especially neurolinguistic evidence. The overall argument will be based mainly on material from Germanic languages, especially English, Dutch and German.

Download Full-text

The Problem of the Missing Article in the Use of ‘God’

Religious Studies ◽

10.1017/s0034412500022691 ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 30 (1) ◽

pp. 17-27

Author(s):

Rien Op Den Brouw

Keyword(s):

Noun Phrase ◽

Definite Description ◽

Prepositional Phrase ◽

Definite Article ◽

Third Place ◽

The Third ◽

Proper Nouns ◽

Proper Name ◽

Christian Discourse

This article is concerned with the use of ‘God’ in Judaeo-Christian discourse. The debate over ‘God’ has mainly centred on the puzzling issue of whether ‘God’ is a proper name with no descriptive connotation at all or whether it is a descriptive term with unique reference. In my view four things have to be taken into account in analysing the use of this term. In the first place, the term ‘God’ is a speech or communication phenomenon. Any treatment of this term should therefore consider the intentions, purposes, beliefs that a speaker has in using this word. In the second place, in Christian theistic discourse this term occurs both with and without modification. ‘The God of Israel’ is an example of ‘God’ with modification. It can be analysed as a noun phrase in which ‘God’ fulfils the function of HEAD, ‘the’ is a definite article filling the DETERMINER slot, and ‘of Israel’ is a prepositional phrase functioning as POSTMODIFIER. The use of only the term ‘God’ is an example without modification. In the third place, when Christians use ‘God’, either with or without modification, they use it to refer to, to describe or address one particular being. In the fourth place, when they use ‘God’ without modification, they do not use this term with an (in-) definite article. In this article three accounts of the term ‘God’ will be discussed: the proper name analysis, the definite description analysis, and the title-phrase analysis. Grammatically speaking, among the defenders of any of these analyses there is an agreed consensus on the classification of ‘God’ as a noun, but there is a disagreement about whether ‘God’ belongs to the category of proper nouns or to that of common nouns. Those adopting one of the last two analyses assume that ‘God’ is a common noun. This article presents an inquiry into the strengths and weaknesses of each of the three analyses. In brief, the question we are seeking to answer is the following: what kind of term is ‘God’ and what is a Christian saying when he says ‘God’?

Download Full-text

Can the Messiahship of Jesus Be Read off Paul's Grammar? Nils Dahl's Criteria 50 Years Later

New Testament Studies ◽

10.1017/s0028688510000020 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 56 (3) ◽

pp. 396-412

Author(s):

Matthew V. Novenson

Keyword(s):

General Term ◽

Definite Article ◽

Proper Name

It is half a century since Nils A. Dahl wrote his important essay ‘Die Messianität Jesu bei Paulus’, in which he determines that χριστός in Paul is effectively a proper name, not a title, on the basis of four negative philological observations: it is never a general term; it is never a predicate of the verb ‘to be’; it never takes a genitive modifier; and it characteristically lacks the definite article. The purpose of this article is to reconsider what each of these observations entails about the messiahship of Jesus. My thesis is that, while all four observations are significant for understanding Paul's thought, they do not constitute proper criteria for assessing the role of the messiahship of Jesus therein.

Download Full-text

Definition

Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy ◽

10.4324/9780415249126-y057-1 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

G. Aldo Antonelli

Keyword(s):

Definite Article ◽

Good Definition ◽

Rational Animal ◽

Real Nature ◽

Proper Name ◽

Identity Statement ◽

The One ◽

Definition Of ◽

In Virtue Of ◽

Implicit Definitions

A definition is a statement, declaration or proposal establishing the meaning of an expression. In virtue of the definition, the expression being defined (the ‘definiendum’) is to acquire the same meaning as the expression in terms of which it is defined (the ‘definiens’). For example, ‘Man is a rational animal’ determines the meaning of the term ‘man’ by making it synonymous with ‘rational animal’. Classical theory maintains that a good definition captures the ‘real nature’ of what is defined: ‘A ‘‘definition’’ is a phrase signifying a thing’s essence’ (Aristotle). Historically, philosophers have come to distinguish these ‘real’ definitions from ‘nominal’ definitions that specify the meaning of a linguistic expression rather than signify the essential nature of an object, ‘making another understand by Words, what Idea, the term defined stands for’ (Locke). A further distinction can be drawn between contextual or implicit definitions, on the one hand, and explicit definitions, on the other. Often a definition fixes meaning directly and explicitly: for example, the definition of a proper name might well take the form of an explicit identity statement (‘Pegasus = the winged horse’) and a definition of a predicate is usually given (or can be re-cast) in the form of an equivalence (‘For every x: x is a man if and only if x is a rational animal’). But sometimes the meaning of a term is specified in context, by way of the meaning of larger expressions in which the term occurs. A paradigmatic example of this is Bertrand Russell’s analysis of the meaning of the definite article.

Download Full-text

Presuppositions as pragmemes: The case of exemplification acts

Intercultural Pragmatics ◽

10.1515/ip-2020-0003 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 17 (1) ◽

pp. 53-75

Author(s):

Alessandro Capone

Keyword(s):

Contextual Information ◽

Noun Phrases ◽

Definite Description ◽

Definite Article ◽

External Reality ◽

Proper Name

AbstractThis paper is an example of how contextual information interacts with the interpretation of noun phrases (NPs) in discourse. When we encounter an NP escorted by the definite article or a proper name, the expectation is triggered that the speaker is referring to some referent x that the hearer can normally identify. Strawson and Russell have agreed that a referent must be associated with a definite description so that the assertion containing it can be said to be true. In the case where a description does not refer to anything, the assertion is considered by Russell to be false, while Strawson says that the issue of truth or falsity does not arise. In this paper, we examine a case in which contextual information interacts with the interpretation of NPs in discourse and the hearer is not expected to identify a referent when hearing a proper name. In this case, the issue of truth or falsity does not arise, because the hearer does not identify the referent. In fact, s/he does not intend for the discourse to about a referent at all. These situations are primarily represented by sentences uttered during the course of a grammar lecture, in which the lecturer is explaining a rule of language and does not focus on external reality. The hearers are aware of this focus and do not process the NP (in general a proper name) to identify a specific referent. This discourse is of three types, which will be discussed at the end of this paper.

Download Full-text

The growing distance between proper names and common nouns in German: On the way to onymic schema constancy

Folia Linguistica ◽

10.1515/flin-2017-0012 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 51 (2) ◽

Author(s):

Damaris Nübling

Keyword(s):

Proper Names ◽

Specific Treatment ◽

Body Schema ◽

Word Formation ◽

Definite Article ◽

Gender Assignment ◽

Profound Change ◽

Proper Name ◽

History Of ◽

Linguistic Units

AbstractThe aim of this article is twofold. Firstly, it shows that the history of German proper name inflection is a story of profound change. Proper names started out being inflected like common nouns; later, the reduction of their inflectional endings eventually resulted in a distinct declension class of proper names. Furthermore, gender assignment in proper names is different from that of common nouns, and today proper names may be accompanied by classifiers that have evolved from the definite article. Additionally, proper names show particularities concerning their syntactical behavior, word-formation processes, and orthography. While (most of) these developments provide evidence for change, they can, at the same time, be functionally interpreted as strategies to preserve the name shape for reasons of recognition. A second aim of this article is therefore to show that, as proper names are specific linguistic units, they deserve specific treatment. Most of the changes serve to stabilize the “name body” (schema consistency) and to mark morphological boundaries.

Download Full-text

"ROSE" is Faster Than "rose": Proper Name Advantage Using Ambiguous Words

PsycEXTRA Dataset ◽

10.1037/e537052012-489 ◽

2004 ◽

Author(s):

Remo Job ◽

Francesca Peressotti ◽

Roberto Cubelli ◽

Lorella Lotto

Keyword(s):

Ambiguous Words ◽

Proper Name

Download Full-text

Extinction and Thalassal Regression

Oxford Literary Review ◽

10.3366/olr.2019.0268 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 41 (1) ◽

pp. 107-126

Author(s):

Philippe Lynes

Keyword(s):

Jacques Derrida ◽

Death Drive ◽

Organic Life ◽

Extinction Event ◽

Proper Name ◽

Zero Degree

This essay examines certain intersections between writing and extinction through an eco-deconstructive account of the psychoanalysis of water. Jacques Derrida has often drawn attention to the interplay between the sound ‘O,’ and ‘eau,’ in Maurice Blanchot's own proper name, as well as in his novels, récits and theoretical works; both the zero-degree of organic excitation towards which the death drive aims and the question of water. Sandor Ferenczi's notion of thalassal regression suggests that the desire to return to the tranquility of the maternal womb parallels a response to a traumatic prehistoric extinction event undergone by organic life once forced to abandon its aquatic existence. Through Gaston Bachelard's Water and Dreams: An Essay on the Imagination of Matter, however, one can double the imaginary of water along the axes of a personal death organic life defers and delays, and an impersonal extinction it cannot. Derrida's unpublished 1977 seminar on Blanchot's 1941 novel Thomas the Obscure, however, allows us to imagine an exteriority to extinction, the possibility

Download Full-text