We are happy to announce a talk by Stephanie Solt (ZAS) in the Semantics Colloquium.
The talk will take place on campus in IG 4.301.
If you wish to participate virtually via Zoom, please contact Lennart Fritzsche for the link.
Date: July 10, 2025
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm c.t.
Title: Three classes of polarity (in)sensitive degree modifiers (joint work with Andreea Nicolae)
Abstract:
Among degree modifiers that compose with relative gradable adjectives, we observe three patterns of polarity sensitivity. Modifiers such as fairly and pretty are positive polarity items; those such as (all) that are negative polarity items; and those such as very are acceptable in both positive and negative contexts.
(1) Aliona is / *isn’t fairly tall.
(2) Bona *isn’t / is (all) that tall.
(3) Clea is / isn’t fairly tall.
These patterns can be observed in a range of typologically related and unrelated languages.
Items such as fairly and (all) that can be classified as attenuating polarity items (Israel 1996), a broad class that is not well accounted for by leading semantic theories of polarity sensitivity (e.g. Chierchia 2013). We demonstrate that their behavior can nonetheless be captured in an alternative-based semantic framework, by supplementing strength-based competition with a second mechanism, namely simplicity-based competition.
Our central claim is that degree modifiers are blocked when they fail to make a non-trivial semantic contribution relative to the simpler unmodified form (e.g. Dora is tall). We demonstrate that this approach can account for the three patterns exemplified in (1)-(3), and discuss how it might be extended to other classes of degree modifiers, as well as some open questions and puzzles that remain.