Abstract

In this paper, we provide a comprehensive survey of the space of possible analyses of the phenomenon of quantifier domain restriction, together with a set of considerations which militate against all but our own proposal. Among the many accounts we consider and reject are the ‘explicit’ approach to quantifier domain restriction discussed, for example, by Stephen Neale, and the pragmatic approach to quantifier domain restriction proposed by Kent Bach. Our hope is that the exhaustive discussion of this special case of context-dependence will provide guidelines for how to decide, for an arbitrary case of context-dependent discourse, whether it should be treated syntactically, semantically, or pragmatically.

Citations