Problems for a uniform analysis of ancora in Italian
-
Daniele Panizza
Daniele Panizza is an Assistant Professor of Linguistics at the University of Messina, Department of Cognitive Sciences, Psychology, Education, and Cultural Studies. He has conducted theoretical and experimental work on several topics including the interpretation of numerals, scalar implicatures, scalar particles, Negative Polarity Items, and attitude verbs.
und
Yasutada Sudo
Yasutada Sudo is a Professor of Linguistics at the Department of Linguistics of University College London. He has worked on a number of topics on the semantics and pragmatics such as presupposition, implicature, plurality, question semantics, pronominal anaphora, focus semantics.
Abstract
The Italian additive particle ancora has uses that can be paraphrased by again and still in English. Michela Ippolito’s uniform analysis of still and again in English could be the foundation for a uniform analysis of the two uses of ancora, but we argue that it faces serious challenges. Her core idea is that still and again have the same presupposition about a past eventuality and differ only in the assertion such that still asserts that the same eventuality is still happening at the reference time while again asserts that another eventuality is. The idea has appealing features, but this analysis of again fails to entail the ‘discontinuity inference’ that the past eventuality came to an end before the reference time, and furthermore, this analysis of still is not general enough to account for examples where the presupposition and assertion are about different eventualities. Through the critical discussion, we will elucidate the specific issues that need to be solved in order to achieve a uniform analysis of the different uses of ancora.
About the authors
Daniele Panizza is an Assistant Professor of Linguistics at the University of Messina, Department of Cognitive Sciences, Psychology, Education, and Cultural Studies. He has conducted theoretical and experimental work on several topics including the interpretation of numerals, scalar implicatures, scalar particles, Negative Polarity Items, and attitude verbs.
Yasutada Sudo is a Professor of Linguistics at the Department of Linguistics of University College London. He has worked on a number of topics on the semantics and pragmatics such as presupposition, implicature, plurality, question semantics, pronominal anaphora, focus semantics.
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank the anonymous reviewer for constructive and useful feedback. All remaining errors are our own.
References
Beck, Sigrid. 2020. Readings of scalar particles: noch/still. Linguistics and Philosophy 43. 1–67. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10988-018-09256-1.Suche in Google Scholar
Bernard, Timothée & Lucas Champollion. 2024. Negative events and compositional semantics. Journal of Semantics 40. 585–620. https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/ffad018.Suche in Google Scholar
Greenberg, Yael. 2009. Presupposition accommodation and informativity considerations with aspectual still. Journal of Semantics 26. 49–86. https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/ffn009.Suche in Google Scholar
Greenberg, Yael. 2012. Event-based additivity in English and modern Hebrew. In Patricia Cabredo Hofherr & Brenda Laca (eds.), Verbal plurality and distributivity, 127–158. Berlin: De Gruyter.10.1515/9783110293500.127Suche in Google Scholar
Heim, Irene. 1990. Presupposition projection. In Rob van der Sandt (ed.), Reader for the Nijmegen workshop on presupposition, lexical meaning, and discourse process. Nijmegen: University of Nijmegen.Suche in Google Scholar
Homer, Vincent. 2021. Domains of polarity items. Journal of Semantics 38. 1–48. https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/ffaa006.Suche in Google Scholar
Ippolito, Michela. 2004. An analysis of still. In Robert B. Young (ed.), Proceedings of SALT 14, 127–144. Ithaca, NY: Linguistic Society of America.10.3765/salt.v14i0.2900Suche in Google Scholar
Ippolito, Michela. 2007. On the meaning of some focus-sensitive particles. Natural Language Semantics 15. 1–34. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11050-007-9004-0.Suche in Google Scholar
König, Ekkehard. 1977. Temporal and non-temporal uses of ‘noch’ and ‘schon’ in German. Linguistics and Philosophy 1. 173–198. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00351102.Suche in Google Scholar
König, Ekkehard. 2002. The meaning of focus particles: A comparative perspective. Abingdon: Routledge10.4324/9780203212288Suche in Google Scholar
Krifka, Manfred. 2000. Alternatives for aspectual particles: Semantics of still and already. In Lisa J. Conathan, Jeff Good, Darya Kavitskaya, Alyssa B. Wulf & Alan C. L. Yu (eds.), Proceedings of the twenty-sixth annual meeting of the berkeley linguistics society: General session and parasession on aspect, 401–412. Berkeley, CA: Berkeley Linguistic Society.10.3765/bls.v26i1.1125Suche in Google Scholar
Kripke, Saul. 2009. Presupposition and anaphora: Remarks on the formulation of the projection problem. Linguistic Inquiry 40. 367–386. https://doi.org/10.1162/ling.2009.40.3.367.Suche in Google Scholar
Löbner, Sebastian. 1989. German schon – erst – noch: An integrated analysis. Linguistics and Philosophy 12. 167–212. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00627659.Suche in Google Scholar
Michaelis, Laura A. 1993. Continuity’ within three scalar models: The polysemy of adverbial still. Journal of Semantics 10. 193–237. https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/10.3.193.Suche in Google Scholar
Mittwoch, Anita. 1993. The relationship between schon/already and noch/still: A reply to Löbner. Natural Language Semantics 2. 71–82. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01255432.Suche in Google Scholar
Nicolae, Andreea. 2017. A new perspective on the shielding property of positive polarity. In Dan Burgdorf, Jacob Collard, Sireemas Maspong & Brynhidur Stefánsdóttir (eds.), Proceedings of SALT 27, 266–281. Ithaca, NY: Linguistic Society of America.10.3765/salt.v27i0.4156Suche in Google Scholar
Soames, Scott. 1989. Presupposition. In Dov Gabbay & Franz Guenther (eds.), Handbook of philosophical logic, vol. IV, 553–616. Dordrecht: Reidel.10.1007/978-94-009-1171-0_9Suche in Google Scholar
Szabolcsi, Anna. 2004. Positive polarity – negative polarity. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 22. 409–452. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:NALA.0000015791.00288.43.10.1023/B:NALA.0000015791.00288.43Suche in Google Scholar
Tellings, Jos. 2017. Still as an additive particle in conditionals. In Dan Burgdorf, Jacob Collard, Sireemas Maspong & Brynhidur Stefánsdóttir (eds.), Proceedings of SALT 27, 1–21. Ithaca, NY: Linguistic Society of America.10.3765/salt.v27i0.4117Suche in Google Scholar
© 2025 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Thematic issue in pragmatics and philosophy (TIPP)
- Research Articles
- The cultural evolution of speech act norms
- On the unification of which-interrogatives and alternative-interrogatives
- A functional theory of proper names: Insights from quasi-proper names
- The foundational role of sound quality for understanding demonstratives
- Problems for a uniform analysis of ancora in Italian
- Speech act theory of quotation: Quotation indirect quotation and Japanese quasi-quotation
- Topicality, accessibility, and causality in anaphora resolution: An eye-tracking study of null and overt pronouns in Italian
- Clause-level coordination and discourse continuity in Tohono O’odham
- Obituary
- Istvan Kecskes, Distinguished Professor of the State University of New York, affectionate friend and mentor
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Thematic issue in pragmatics and philosophy (TIPP)
- Research Articles
- The cultural evolution of speech act norms
- On the unification of which-interrogatives and alternative-interrogatives
- A functional theory of proper names: Insights from quasi-proper names
- The foundational role of sound quality for understanding demonstratives
- Problems for a uniform analysis of ancora in Italian
- Speech act theory of quotation: Quotation indirect quotation and Japanese quasi-quotation
- Topicality, accessibility, and causality in anaphora resolution: An eye-tracking study of null and overt pronouns in Italian
- Clause-level coordination and discourse continuity in Tohono O’odham
- Obituary
- Istvan Kecskes, Distinguished Professor of the State University of New York, affectionate friend and mentor
