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Marking imprecision, conveying surprise: Like between hedging and mirativity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 August 2018

ANDREA BELTRAMA  and
EMILY A. HANINK
ANDREA BELTRAMA*
Affiliation:
University of Konstanz
EMILY A. HANINK*
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
*
Author’s address: University of Konstanz, Universitätstrasse 10, 78464 Konstanz, Germanyandrea.beltrama@uni-konstanz.de
Author’s address: University of Chicago, 1115 E. 58th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USAeahanink@uchicago.edu
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Abstract

Mirative expressions, which mark surprising information (DeLancey 1997), are often expressed through linguistic forms that are also used to encode other, seemingly unrelated, meanings – e.g. evidential markers that mark lack of direct evidence (Turkish: Slobin & Aksu 1982, Peterson 2010; Cheyenne: Rett & Murray 2013; Cuzco Quechua: Faller 2002; Ostyak: Nikolaeva 1999; among others). In this paper, we show that the English particle like features a parallel polysemy between a mirative use and its better-known hedging use, which expresses weakened commitment to the strict denotation of a linguistic expression. After presenting several diagnostics that point to a genuine empirical difference between the hedging and mirative functions of like, we propose that both uses widen the size of a contextually restricted set, admitting elements that were previously excluded. More specifically, hedging like expands the set of ‘similar enough’ interpretations that we can apply to a linguistic expression in a context, including interpretations that we would normally consider to be too different from the context at hand. Mirative like, on the other hand, expands the set of worlds that we are willing to consider as candidates for the actual world in the conversation, resulting in the inclusion of worlds that interlocutors have previously ruled out due to perceived outlandishness. We therefore suggest that the two uses are best treated as sharing a common semantic kernel, deriving hedging and mirativity as effects of the particular type of object to which like applies.

Keywords

common grounddiscourse particlesevidentialityhedgingmirativitypolysemy
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Linguistics , Volume 55 , Issue 1 , 01 February 2019 , pp. 1 - 34
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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Footnotes

We would like to thank Ryan Bochnak, V. Chaudhry, Eva Csipak, Regine Eckardt, Anastasia Giannakidou, E. Jamieson, Kelsey Kraus, Sven Lauer, Alda Mari, Muffy Siegel, Stepanie Solt, Jon Stevens, George Walkden, three anonymous reviewers for the Journal of Linguistics, as well as the audiences at LSA 90, CSSP 2017 and the University of Konstanz for their comments and feedback. All errors are our own.

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