Nina Haslinger

RTG PhD student associate, member since 2021

Project "Imprecise expressions in English and German"

Imprecision is a form of semantic context dependency that is distinct from vagueness, polysemy and contextual domain restriction. Standard examples of imprecise expressions include definite plurals (can we accept (1-a) if some, but not all of the windows are open?) and imprecise numerals (can we accept (1-b) if Anna owns 99 cars?)

(1)

a. The windows are open.

b. Anna owns 100 cars.

The goal of my project is twofold. First, I argue that imprecision is more pervasive than previously thought; in particular, I claim that distributive/cumulative "ambiguities" in sentences with multiple plural arguments are in fact an imprecision phenomenon. Second, I explore the consequences of a recent theory according to which imprecise sentences denote sets of multiple precise propositions, and interpreting an imprecise sentence in context involves selecting those propositions from the set that are relevant to the contextually salient issue or implicit question. I discuss different ways of implementing this idea in semantic composition and explore its interaction with semantics/pragmatics interface phenomena such as vagueness and scalar implicatures.

Current research interests

- Contextual constraints on cumulative readings

- Pragmatic constraints on imprecision

- Distinguishing typicality effects from context dependency in the semantics of conjunction (joint work with Magdalena Roszkowski)

- Homogeneity effects and scalar implicatures

- Imprecision in the semantics of total/partial predicate pairs (joint work with Mathieu Paillé)

- Differences and interactions between imprecision and vagueness

- Trivalent judgment tasks and presupposition cancellation (joint work with Clemens Steiner-Mayr and Maik Thalmann)

- Universal quantification in the DP cross-linguistically (joint work with Alain Hien, Emil Eva Rosina, Viola Schmitt and Valerie Wurm)

- Semantics of distributivity markers in German (joint work with Emil Eva Rosina, Viola Schmitt and Valerie Wurm)

- Semantics of DPs in the scope of opaque predicates: Intentional identity puzzles and beyond (joint work with Viola Schmitt)

Publications

In all the co-authored papers listed below, the authors are listed alphabetically.

2023

Haslinger, Nina & Mathieu Paillé. Comparing contextual shifts in total/partial predication and plural non-maximality. To appear in Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 27.

2022

Haslinger, Nina. Non-maximality and vagueness: Revisiting the plural Sorites paradox. In John R. Starr, Juhyae Kim and Burak Öney (eds.): Proceedings of SALT 32, 63-82.

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. Syntactic conditions on cumulative readings of German jeder (‘every’ ) DPs. Journal of Comparative Germanic Linguistics 25, 115–168.

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. What embedded counterfactuals tell us about the semantics of attitudes. In Mingya Liu (ed.): Natural Language Conditionals and Conditional Reasoning Volume 2, pp. 469-478. Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter.

Haslinger, Nina. Contextual restrictions on cumulativity. In Nicole Dreier, Chloe Kwon, Thomas Darnell and John Starr (eds.): Proceedings of SALT 2021, 283-303.

2021

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. Counterfactual attitude contents and the semantics of plurals in belief contexts. In Patrick Georg Grosz, Luisa Martí, Hazel Pearson, Yasutada Sudo and Sarah Zobel (eds.): Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 25, 394-411.

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. Distinguishing belief objects. In Marcin Wągiel and Mojmír Dočekal (eds.): Formal approaches to number in Slavic and beyond, pp. 252-274. Berlin: Language Science Press.

Haslinger, Nina, Eva Rosina, Magdalena Roszkowski, Viola Schmitt and Valerie Wurm. Cumulation cross-linguistically. In Marcin Wągiel and Mojmír Dočekal (eds.): Formal approaches to number in Slavic and beyond, pp. 220-249. Berlin: Language Science Press.

2020

Haslinger, Nina. Individuating beliefs: DP objects of attitude verbs and their domains of quantification. In Michael Franke, Nikola Kompa, Mingya Liu, Jutta L. Mueller and Juliane Schwab (eds.): Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 24, 305-322.

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. Cumulative readings of modified numerals: A plural projection approach. In Michael Franke, Nikola Kompa, Mingya Liu, Jutta L. Mueller and Juliane Schwab (eds.): Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 24, 323-340.

2019

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. Strengthened disjunction or non-classical conjunction? Snippets 37, 43-45.

2018

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. Scope-related cumulativity asymmetries and cumulative composition. In Sireemas Maspong, Brynhildur Stefánsdóttir, Katherine Blake & Forrest Davis (eds.): Proceedings of SALT 28, 197-216.

2017

Flor, Enrico, Nina Haslinger, Hilda Koopman, Eva Rosina, Magdalena Roszkowski and Viola Schmitt. Cross-linguistic evidence for a non-distributive lexical meaning of conjunction. In Alexandre Cremers, Thom van Gessel & Floris Roelofsen (eds.): Proceedings of the 21st Amsterdam Colloquium, 255-264.

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. Acquisition of semantic type flexibility: The case of conjunction. In Clemens Mayr & Edwin Williams (eds.), 11-11-17. Festschrift für Martin Prinzhorn (= Wiener Linguistische Gazette 82). 109-118.

Haslinger, Nina & Viola Schmitt. Stressed non-Boolean und (and) in German. Snippets 31, 13-14.