{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/99221"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/99221","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"A contextual analysis of definite and indefinite interpretations of tense","abstract":"This dissertation analyzes tense, in particular the past tense, within English in the framework of formal semantics. Previous tense theories are either indexical or quantificational—whether tenses refer to time or an existentially quantified time interval prior to the time of utterance suffices for a past tense morpheme. This dissertation proposes that tense has both interpretations, definite and indefinite, and which interpretation a tense has depends on whether tense denotes salient times in the context. Tense involves a free variable over times and is assigned its value via an assignment function. Two different readings are achieved by two different types of assignment function: an assignment function fixed by the context assigns salient times to definite tenses, and another type of assignment function for indefinite tenses, which agrees with the function fixed by the context. In a discourse, times denoted by tenses and temporal adverbials are added to the context as salient. There may be multiple time intervals that are contextually salient, and these are available for the interpretation of subsequent temporal elements. That is, they may work as an antecedent of anaphoric adverbials, be assigned to definite tenses, or possibly, be involved in complex tenses without further proposing a fourth time, as some previous theories have done. The system in this dissertation, with both definite and indefinite interpretations of tense, successfully ac-counts for some dynamic temporal phenomena without overlooking either quantificational or indexical aspects of tense. Also, this dissertation affirms that tenses are interpreted within a limited domain and shows how temporal domains are selected and shifted in discourse. Temporal adverbials are analyzed as well and some previously raised problems are solved in the analysis. Immediately is also investigated, which shows sensitivity to the size of relevant temporal domains and characterizes the interval between the two events it connects. This dissertation presumes that tense is contextual and relationally determined by time intervals in the context. Contentious ideas in previous tense theories are unified in this dissertation with regard to definiteness, which has been a more robust concept for nominals, and such a framework makes a tense theory more flexible and comprehensive. This theory provides novel intuitions about various temporal phenomena in a discourse, which are contextually and pragmatically shaped.","abstract_html":"This dissertation analyzes tense, in particular the past tense, within English in the framework of formal semantics. Previous tense theories are either indexical or quantificational—whether tenses refer to time or an existentially quantified time interval prior to the time of utterance suffices for a past tense morpheme. This dissertation proposes that tense has both interpretations, definite and indefinite, and which interpretation a tense has depends on whether tense denotes salient times in the context. Tense involves a free variable over times and is assigned its value via an assignment function. Two different readings are achieved by two different types of assignment function: an assignment function fixed by the context assigns salient times to definite tenses, and another type of assignment function for indefinite tenses, which agrees with the function fixed by the context. In a discourse, times denoted by tenses and temporal adverbials are added to the context as salient. There may be multiple time intervals that are contextually salient, and these are available for the interpretation of subsequent temporal elements. That is, they may work as an antecedent of anaphoric adverbials, be assigned to definite tenses, or possibly, be involved in complex tenses without further proposing a fourth time, as some previous theories have done. The system in this dissertation, with both definite and indefinite interpretations of tense, successfully ac-counts for some dynamic temporal phenomena without overlooking either quantificational or indexical aspects of tense. Also, this dissertation affirms that tenses are interpreted within a limited domain and shows how temporal domains are selected and shifted in discourse. Temporal adverbials are analyzed as well and some previously raised problems are solved in the analysis. Immediately is also investigated, which shows sensitivity to the size of relevant temporal domains and characterizes the interval between the two events it connects. This dissertation presumes that tense is contextual and relationally determined by time intervals in the context. Contentious ideas in previous tense theories are unified in this dissertation with regard to definiteness, which has been a more robust concept for nominals, and such a framework makes a tense theory more flexible and comprehensive. This theory provides novel intuitions about various temporal phenomena in a discourse, which are contextually and pragmatically shaped.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Park, Seong Eun"],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"Ph.D.","degree_level":"Dissertation","degree_discipline":"Linguistics","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Lasersohn, Peter","Yoon, James","Ionin, Tania","Schreiner, Sylvia"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2018,"date_issued":"2018-03-13T15:25:21Z","date_published":"2018-03-13T15:25:21Z","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:37Z","subjects":["Tense","Semantics","Context","Salience","Context update","Temporal domain","Temporal adverbials"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["Copyright 2017 Seong Eun Park"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/2142/99221","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Lasersohn, Peter","Yoon, James","Ionin, Tania","Schreiner, Sylvia"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Park, Seong Eun"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2018-03-13T15:25:21Z","2020-03-14T09:15:22Z","2017-12-06","2017-12"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Linguistics"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Dissertation"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Ph.D."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Tense","Semantics","Context","Salience","Context update","Temporal domain","Temporal adverbials"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2017 Seong Eun Park"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/99221"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["This dissertation analyzes tense, in particular the past tense, within English in the framework of formal semantics. Previous tense theories are either indexical or quantificational—whether tenses refer to time or an existentially quantified time interval prior to the time of utterance suffices for a past tense morpheme. This dissertation proposes that tense has both interpretations, definite and indefinite, and which interpretation a tense has depends on whether tense denotes salient times in the context. Tense involves a free variable over times and is assigned its value via an assignment function. Two different readings are achieved by two different types of assignment function: an assignment function fixed by the context assigns salient times to definite tenses, and another type of assignment function for indefinite tenses, which agrees with the function fixed by the context. In a discourse, times denoted by tenses and temporal adverbials are added to the context as salient. There may be multiple time intervals that are contextually salient, and these are available for the interpretation of subsequent temporal elements. That is, they may work as an antecedent of anaphoric adverbials, be assigned to definite tenses, or possibly, be involved in complex tenses without further proposing a fourth time, as some previous theories have done. The system in this dissertation, with both definite and indefinite interpretations of tense, successfully ac-counts for some dynamic temporal phenomena without overlooking either quantificational or indexical aspects of tense. Also, this dissertation affirms that tenses are interpreted within a limited domain and shows how temporal domains are selected and shifted in discourse. Temporal adverbials are analyzed as well and some previously raised problems are solved in the analysis. Immediately is also investigated, which shows sensitivity to the size of relevant temporal domains and characterizes the interval between the two events it connects. This dissertation presumes that tense is contextual and relationally determined by time intervals in the context. Contentious ideas in previous tense theories are unified in this dissertation with regard to definiteness, which has been a more robust concept for nominals, and such a framework makes a tense theory more flexible and comprehensive. This theory provides novel intuitions about various temporal phenomena in a discourse, which are contextually and pragmatically shaped.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2019-12-01","The student, Seong Eun Park, accepted the attached license on 2017-12-01 at 16:54.","The student, Seong Eun Park, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2017-12-01 at 16:58.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2017-12-06 at 15:17.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #11808 on 2018-03-13 at 09:56:41","Made available in DSpace on 2018-03-13T15:25:21Z (GMT). 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Previous tense theories are either indexical or quantificational—whether tenses refer to time or an existentially quantified time interval prior to the time of utterance suffices for a past tense morpheme. This dissertation proposes that tense has both interpretations, definite and indefinite, and which interpretation a tense has depends on whether tense denotes salient times in the context. Tense involves a free variable over times and is assigned its value via an assignment function. Two different readings are achieved by two different types of assignment function: an assignment function fixed by the context assigns salient times to definite tenses, and another type of assignment function for indefinite tenses, which agrees with the function fixed by the context. In a discourse, times denoted by tenses and temporal adverbials are added to the context as salient. There may be multiple time intervals that are contextually salient, and these are available for the interpretation of subsequent temporal elements. That is, they may work as an antecedent of anaphoric adverbials, be assigned to definite tenses, or possibly, be involved in complex tenses without further proposing a fourth time, as some previous theories have done. The system in this dissertation, with both definite and indefinite interpretations of tense, successfully ac-counts for some dynamic temporal phenomena without overlooking either quantificational or indexical aspects of tense. Also, this dissertation affirms that tenses are interpreted within a limited domain and shows how temporal domains are selected and shifted in discourse. Temporal adverbials are analyzed as well and some previously raised problems are solved in the analysis. Immediately is also investigated, which shows sensitivity to the size of relevant temporal domains and characterizes the interval between the two events it connects. This dissertation presumes that tense is contextual and relationally determined by time intervals in the context. Contentious ideas in previous tense theories are unified in this dissertation with regard to definiteness, which has been a more robust concept for nominals, and such a framework makes a tense theory more flexible and comprehensive. This theory provides novel intuitions about various temporal phenomena in a discourse, which are contextually and pragmatically shaped.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2019-12-01","The student, Seong Eun Park, accepted the attached license on 2017-12-01 at 16:54.","The student, Seong Eun Park, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2017-12-01 at 16:58.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2017-12-06 at 15:17.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #11808 on 2018-03-13 at 09:56:41","Made available in DSpace on 2018-03-13T15:25:21Z (GMT). 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