SEMANTICS-12: Types of Reference

[@antoineghannoum]

Hello Professor! Is this sentence generic or specific and why? "People who live in glass houses should not throw stones." Thanks and best regards Antoine Ghannoum

[@leoyoung6689]

I am still confused by the distinction of specific indefinite reference and definite reference.

[@ayinesk5205]

If you don't know the definite reference, there would be a failure of communication, since there is a gap of understanding between what the speaker expects you to say and what you know. But with a specific indefinite reference, if you don't know exactly what the person in front of you wants to hear, it won't put a problem to the conversation.

[@rihabmalik9342]

The comparison is between 1:Non-specific indifinite reference and specific indifinite reference or the first one and definite.R....am confused .... 😇.I think sth is wrong ...

[@yohanakonzo]

what about constant reference and variable reference I still get confused on such

[@farhanamjad8774]

How "this" can be indefinate reference?

[@arcomarco7131]

Because it's not defining this person. You only know that he is in this class one of let say 15. if you went to his class you couldn't identify this man.

[@ylin7907]

The use of "this" as an indefinite reference is more pragmatic than it is conventionally syntactic or semantic. It is also more of a relatively modern descriptive way of usage than a textbook prescriptive one. "This" right here is used to introduce the presence of an individual still unknown to the listener, so pragmatically it resembles the indefinite article "a". The special feature of "this" as an indefinite determiner is that it carries a more emphatic undertone vis-à-vis the default "a". You might ask, "Isn't 'this' a demonstrative?" Well, it depends on how you use it. In this toy sentence "There's this person in my class who always talks back to the teacher," you can see clearly that the "this" cannot be replaced by the other single demonstrative "that" (which will result in extended-sense ungrammaticality), proving itself not to be strictly demonstrative in the context; instead it functions as an indefinite article like "a". If you swap in "a" for "this", you'll find the sentence expressing the exact same meaning, despite subtle pragmatic differences. In sum, "this" in the case above is a pragmatic device and an abstract form of deixis (the use of a word or phrase whose meaning depends on who is talking, who they are talking to, where they are, etc.), employed to conjure up the vague image of an individual as if it were right around the interlocutors' as they speak. A more dynamic way to introduce something/someone into a discourse indeed!