We are happy to announce a talk by Klaus von Heusinger (Köln) 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: May 28, 2026
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm c.t.
Title: Island constraints for conceptual anaphora
Abstract:
Conceptual anaphors, as in (1), from Morton Ann Gernsbacher (1991: 82), can access antecedents in negative contexts, in contrast to individual anaphors, which cannot.
(1) I want a new Harley Sportster. They are really powerful, but they’re gas-efficient.
In this talk, we compare the accessibility of antecedents for individual versus conceptual (“sense”) anaphors in (i) lexical islands, (ii) pseudo-incorporated nouns, and (iii) intensional contexts. We report results from an acceptability judgment study and an eye-tracking study. Our initial findings suggest that neither individual nor conceptual anaphors can access nouns within lexical islands. Furthermore, conceptual anaphors appear to be insensitive to pseudo-incorporated and intensional contexts, whereas individual anaphors are sensitive to these contexts.