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<p>Demonstratives can be used to locate a referent in space but they can also be used to refer to discourse referents located in the common ground. In English, proximal demonstratives are used for novel referents (indefinite specific <i>this</i>) while distal <i>that</i> can be used to refer to familiar referents. The empirical goal of this paper is to explore whether a similar pattern is found in other languages. To this end, we explored the use of demonstratives in 22 languages and found that this correlation is robust: if demonstratives are used for both spatial and grounding purposes, it is always the proximal demonstrative that is used for novel discourse referents and the distal demonstrative that is used for familiar discourse referents. The cross-linguistic solidity of this ‘Spatial-Grounding Correlation’, invites the conclusion that it is grammatically conditioned. We develop an analysis according to which the grounding use of spatial demonstratives is syntactically derived, utilising the Nominal Interactional Structure, independently motivated in Ritter and Wiltschko (<CitationRef CitationID="CR71">2018</CitationRef>, <CitationRef CitationID="CR72">2019</CitationRef>, <CitationRef CitationID="CR74">2024</CitationRef>).</p>

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Demonstratives locate referents in common space and ground: A comparative syntactic approach

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  • 发表日期：

    2025年7月15日

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  • Valentina Colasanti,
  • Martina Wiltschko

摘要

Demonstratives can be used to locate a referent in space but they can also be used to refer to discourse referents located in the common ground. In English, proximal demonstratives are used for novel referents (indefinite specific this) while distal that can be used to refer to familiar referents. The empirical goal of this paper is to explore whether a similar pattern is found in other languages. To this end, we explored the use of demonstratives in 22 languages and found that this correlation is robust: if demonstratives are used for both spatial and grounding purposes, it is always the proximal demonstrative that is used for novel discourse referents and the distal demonstrative that is used for familiar discourse referents. The cross-linguistic solidity of this ‘Spatial-Grounding Correlation’, invites the conclusion that it is grammatically conditioned. We develop an analysis according to which the grounding use of spatial demonstratives is syntactically derived, utilising the Nominal Interactional Structure, independently motivated in Ritter and Wiltschko (2018, 2019, 2024).