The semantics and probabilistic pragmatics of deadjectival intensifiers

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Abstract

Intensifiers (e.g. horribly in horribly warm) are usually deadjectival adverbs. I show that the lexical content of the adjectival base, and in particular its evaluative meaning, is directly relevant for the degree intensifying function of these adverbs. In particular, I highlight two generalisations that have remained unaccounted for so far. First, evaluative adjectives with a negative evaluative meaning tend to turn into deadjectival intensifiers expressing high degree, while adjectives with a positive meaning make intensifiers of medium degree. Second, negative modal adjectives can form deadjectival intensifiers, but positive ones cannot. I will argue that a relatively simple intersective semantics for evaluative and modal adverbs accounts for these observations, but that we can only show this if we supplement that semantic analysis with a probabilistic pragmatic component.
Original languageEnglish
Article number2
Pages (from-to)1-39
Number of pages39
JournalSemantics and Pragmatics
Volume17
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jan 2024

Funding

This research was funded by the Dutch Research Council (NWO) , grant VC.GW17.112, which I gratefully acknowledge. Thanks to Elena Castroviejo, Berit Gehrke, Dan Lassiter, Takanobu Nakamura, Hazel Pearson, Ciyang Qing and Stephanie Solt for numerous comments that helped me improve this paper. Thanks to Johannes Korbmacher for help with German data.

FundersFunder number
Dutch Research Council (NWO)VC.GW17.112

    Keywords

    • intensifiers
    • degree semantics
    • vagueness
    • bleaching
    • rational speech act

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