Chapter published in:
Reference: From conventions to pragmatics
Edited by Laure Gardelle, Laurence Vincent-Durroux and Hélène Vinckel-Roisin
[Studies in Language Companion Series 228] 2023
► pp. 71–87

Lions, flowers and the Romans

Exception management with generic and other count plurals

| Université Grenoble Alpes, LIDILEM

Research on generic bare plurals has frequently pointed out that even though they refer to the whole class, in characterizing sentences (e.g. birds fly) they commonly license exceptions (Krifka et al. 1995). While quantification and probability models have failed to account for all uses, the present chapter argues that the “generics-as-default” approach of psychologists (e.g. Leslie 2007) provides a more convincing frame. It further argues that generalization does not concern just generic plurals, but also specific ones: plurals convey “homogenization.” The study introduces the key notion of “negligibility” for exception management. Analyses of examples in context show the role of speaker knowledge and beliefs, as well as contextual perspective, in establishing what is negligible or not.

Keywords: generics, generalizations, number, count plurals, exceptions
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Shortcomings of existing proportion and probability accounts of exception management with plurals
    • 2.1Asher & Pelletier (2012): The “normal worlds” approach
    • 2.2Radden (2009): The “salient proportion” approach
    • 2.3Cohen (1996, 2004)’s probabilistic approach
    • 2.4Leslie (2007, 2008)’s generics as default approach: “Low-level intuitive deductions”
    • 2.5Further proposal: “Homogenization” and the notion of negligibility
  • 3.Exception management in specific contexts
    • 3.1Plurals with distributive predicates
    • 3.2Collective predicates
  • 4.Exception management in characterizing sentences
    • 4.1Preliminaries: Understanding characterizing sentences
    • 4.2Distributive predicates with essential properties
    • 4.3Distributive predicates with non-essential properties
    • 4.4Collective responsibility
    • 4.5Averages and alternatives
  • Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.228.04gar
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