Essays on Anaphora

162). I would hope that the two (!) allusions to Kant’s ‘Anchaaung’ on p. 16, and the acknowledgement to the ‘Deutsche Forschung Gemeinschaft’ (p. xviii), are not symptomatic of the accuracy of the more exotic language data.

References Fauconnier, G., 1985. Mental spaces. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Given, T., 1979. On understanding grammar. New York: Academic Press. Giv6n,

T., 1984. Syntax:

Krashen.

A functional-typological

S.. 1981. Second language

Langacker, Press.

R., 1987. Foundations

Taylor,

1989. Linguistic

J.,

University

acquisition of cognitive

categorization:

introduction,

I. Amsterdam:

and second language grammar. Prototypes

learning.

I. Stanford, in linguistic

Benjamins. Oxford:

Pergamon.

CA: Stanford theory.

University

Oxford:

Oxford

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Howard Lasnik, Essays on Anaphora. Dordrecht: Kluwer 1989. 179~~. US $64.00 (hardb.); US $ 19.95 (paperb.). Reviewed by Thomas Wasow, Department of Linguistics, Stanford, CA 94305, USA.

Academic

Publishers,

Stanford

University,

I. Introduction Essays on Anaphora (henceforth EA) contains nine papers by Howard Lasnik (some with co-authors) on ‘the treatment of anaphora within generative grammar. specifically, within Chomsky’s ‘Extended Standard Theory’ (EST)’ (p. vii). The first and the last papers appear in EA for the first time, though chapter 9 is listed as ‘in press’ in another anthology. Chapter 1 is a historical overview, and the other eight chapters present, in chronological order, Lasnik’s published contributions to the anaphora literature over a sixteen-year period. They vary considerably in terms of scope, depth, and how well they have withstood the test of time, but there is much in EA that is well worth reading. Because it is the only new piece in the book, chapter 1 is the focus of a major portion of this review. Newmeyer (1980: 207) asserts that Chomsky’s students ‘adopt his then-current views and continue to develop them even after his direct influence on them ceases ~ and even after he himself has gone on to some new position, often contradicting the one he taught them’. Whether or not this claim is generally true, Lasnik is a clear counterexample. For nearly two decades, he has contributed to the evolution of Chomsky’ Government Binding Theory out of the Extended Standard Theory (via the Revised Extended Standard Theory). As Chomsky’s positions have developed, so have Lasnik’s. This is not to say that Lasnik has slavishly followed Chomsky. Quite the

contrary, as many of the papers in EA show, Lasnik has often disagreed with Chomsky (and sometimes persuaded him); but the disagreements have been over the formulation of particular principles or parameters. not over the general architecture of the theory of grammar. Lasnik’s long-term participation in the development of GB and his close association with Chomsky put him in a nearly unique position to understand both the conceptual foundations and the mechanics of the theory. Fortunately for the rest of us. he is also a brilliantly clear expositor: he manages to steer the reader through even difficult technical material without losing sight of the fundamental questions he is seeking to answer. Though he has written only one major work whose primary purpose is pedagogical (Lasnik and Uriagereka 1988) his research papers provide lucid presentations of the theoretical issues he is concerned with, their significance. and relevant previous work. Chapter 1 of EA, entitled ‘A selective history of modern binding theory’, is an outstanding exemplar of Lasnik’s expository abilities. It starts with some problems that were raised in ‘Conditions on transformations’ (Chomsky 1973) a paper whose primary focus was not on anaphora, but on island constraints. It then traces (no pun intended) how the Specified Subject Condition and the Tensed Sentence Condition went through various revisions and renamings, which ~ in combination with a number of other developments (notably the insights of Lasnik 1976 and Reinhart 1976) ~ led to the Binding Theory (henceforth BT) of Chomsky (1981). 2. Types of referential

dependence

Several very interesting points emerge from this historical overview. First and foremost is a central insight embedded in BT: there are 3 types of referential1 dependence that can obtain between nominal elements, namely, obligatory coreference, obligatorily disjoint reference, or free reference. That is, some elements (e.g., reflexives ) must have a coreferential antecedent nearby; some pairs of elements (e.g.. two names in certain configurations) cannot have any overlap in reference; and some elements (e.g., third person non-reflexive pronouns) can select their referents quite freely (modulo certain constraints). Other logically possible relations do not occur. For example, there are no constructions in which overlap (but not necessarily identity) of reference is required, nor constructions in which overlap is permitted but coreference is impossible. More importantly, as Lasnik (1976) observed (building on insights of Dougherty 1969), there is no need for a rule pairing pronouns with possible antecedents, for optional coreference is subsumed under free choice of reference. Different types of NPs are subject to different constraints on the sorts of referential dependencies they can or must enter into. The principles of BT distinguish among 1 The notion of reference as employed will be discussed

below.

in this discussion

is not without

its problems.

This issue

Reviews

anaphors, pronominals, and names in this regard. Lasnik (in press) epithets like the idiot in (I) may constitute a fourth distinct class.

97

suggests

that

(1) After John walked in, the idiot sat down. This fascinating paper demonstrates that there is cross-language variation in the phenomena usually subsumed under Principle C of BT, and suggests a means of parameterization to capture what is universal while permitting the observed variation. A number of Lasnik’s arguments in EA boil down to the observation that certain proposed simplifications of BT would render it incapable of capturing all the necessary distinctions among types of referential dependence. In particular, he devotes considerable attention (especially in Lasnik 1981 and Lasnik in press) to the adequacy or inadequacy of various methods of designating the binding relationships among NPs (e.g., the indexing algorithms of Chomsky 1980, 1981 and Higginbotham’s 1983 notion of ‘linking’). He concludes that several (including that of Chomsky 1981) are inherently incapable of representing all three kinds of referential dependence. 3. Criticisms Another theme of chapter 1 that recurs in a number of other chapters is the interdependence between BT and the GB theory of movement rules. This began with Chomsky’s (1973) suggestion that some conditions on movement rules might also apply to certain rules of anaphora. With the development of trace theory (especially in Fiengo 1974) it became evident that some constraints on movement might be reducible to conditions on anaphoric binding. Further, modifications in BT would have consequences for the theory of transformations, and vice versa. It is this connection that permits Lasnik to reprint ‘Complement object deletion’ (Lasnik and Fiengo 1974) and ‘A note on illicit NP movement’ (Lasnik 1985) in a volume on anaphora. The latter paper also seems to focus on theory-internal issues that are now somewhat dated, as does Freidin and Lasnik’s (1981) ‘Disjoint reference and wh-trace’. Going over these articles, the reader is led to wonder whether EA has sufficient thematic coherence and historical importance to warrant assembling and reprinting material that is already quite accessible. Chapter 1 is, to be sure, an extremely valuable addition to the literature, full of important historical, theoretical, methodological, and empirical substance, but it is not clear that it provides sufficient justification for the existence of the collection. A more substantive criticism has to do with the methodology of GB. There appears to be an aesthetic, brought out clearly in chapter 1, that seeks to avoid any overlap in coverage between distinct grammatical mechanisms. That is, if there are two rules or principles, either one of which would suffice to predict the ungrammaticality of some particular non-sentence, then there is deemed to be something wrong with the rules or principles. No motivation is given for this heuristic, though it would seem to require

one. Some facts might just be explainable in more than one way. Surely, it would not bother a biologist that the absence of life on Venus could be accounted for indepcndently either by the composition of the atmosphere or by the surface temperature on that planet. Then why should it bother linguists that certain ungrammatical strings would violate both the Specified Subject Condition and the Propositional Island Condition?z Another potential objection to GB, which Lasnik covers very nicely in chapter I. concerns the ‘PRO Theorem’, perhaps the most celebrated result of GB research. This result is usually derived roughly as follows: Principle A of BT requires anaphors to be bound in their governing categories; Principle B of BT requires pronominals to be free in their governing categories; nothing can be both bound and free; therefore a pronominal anaphor cannot have a governing category. Hence, PRO only appears as the subject of nonfinite clauses. As stated, it is the fact that Principles A and B have the same domain that permits this derivation. But this fact has a further consequence: it predicts that overt pronominals and anaphors will be in complementary distribution, for any governed position in which both pronominals and anaphors could appear would be one that could be both bound and free. As Lasnik (p. 31) points out, pronominals and anaphors are not in complementary distribution : (2) The children (3) The children

like their/each other’s friends. thought that pictures of them/each

other would be on sale

These are contexts in which the elements in question do have governing categories, as the ungrammaticality of PRO in their place indicates. Lasnik (p. 32) goes on to explain how Chomsky (1986) proposes to avoid this problem, with the understated caveat that, ‘The answer is, in some respects, a rather unsatisfyingly technical one’. reconciling the proof of the PRO theorem with the non-complementarity of the distribution of pronominals and anaphors remains a challenge that goes to the very heart of BT. 4. Anaphora

and reference

One of the most fundamental questions that EA raises, though never fully answers, is how BT relates to semantics. Evidently, much of the data on which theories of anaphora are based consists of semantic judgements - namely, judgements regarding the possible referents of particular expressions. One might therefore think that the study of anaphora is a branch of semantics. z Of course,

the limiting case in which

all examples

accounted

for by one principle

also fall

under the other would be undesirable by Occam’s Razor. But so long as each principle can be independently motivated, cases where their consequences overlap are not grounds for abandoning or modifying them.

99

Reviews

Indeed, this appears to have been Lasnik’s view in his earliest writings on the topic, as indicated by the title of his classic ‘Remarks on coreference’ (1976). A lengthy footnote in that paper rebuts the assertion of Wasow (1972) that ‘the failure of two NPs to be related anaphorically does not entail that they have distinct referents’, taking the rather unconventional view ‘that the morning star and the evening star differ . . . in reference’ (p. 108). Later (Lasnik 1981), he states: ‘I will be concerned with intended reference, intended coreference, etc. In the analyses I will consider, grammaticality will depend not on actual reference but rather on intended reference’ (p. 132). No explanation is given of whose intentions are at issue, but this does provide a way around the problem of accidentally shared reference, as in the following: (4) Oedipus became the stepfather of Jocasta’s children. (5) Kareem Abdul Jabbar criticized Lew Alcindor. There are actually reasons for having distinct theories of anaphora and reference, in addition to cases of coreference without anaphora. There are, for example, cases like the following (due originally to Postal and Karttunen, respectively): (6) The lizard’s tail broke off, but it grew back again. (7) The man who gave his paycheck to his wife was wiser than the man who gave it to his mistress. In these examples, the reference of it is dependent on but not identical to that of an earlier NP in the sentence. Under BT, it would be free in both examples; though this is consistent with the semantics, it doesn’t say anything about the referential dependence. Moreover, it is possible to construct similar sentences in which BT could bind the pronoun to the earlier NP:

(8) The lizard’s tail grew back after it had broken

~ff.~

Here we seem to have anaphoric binding without coreference. This shows that none of the sorts of indexing mechanisms that have been proposed as formalizations of BT will suffice to differentiate among the kinds of referential relations that hold between NPs that are bound to each other. Lasnik (in press) makes the same point with even simpler examples: (9) They like themselves. (10) They like each other. 3 The impossibility of an anaphoric relation between it and the lizard’s tail in the following indicates that the main clause subject c-commands grew back after the lizard’s tail had broken off.

the adverbial

clause

in this construction:

II

100

Reviews

All versions of BT will say exactly the same things about (9) and (lo), namely, that the anaphors are bound to they. The clear meaning difference between these sentences is not part of BT. (It is, of course, addressed in some other literature, including one paper in this volume, namely, Lasnik and Fiengo 1973.) Lasnik (in press) finally recognizes the need for BT to be paired with an account of reference: ‘As is customary in studies of anaphora. 1 will ignore the problems inherent in such terms as “coreference”, “disjoint reference”, and the like. For a clear presentation of a number of these problems, see Higginbotham (1980). and for a promising approach towards a solution, see Heim (1982). For present purposes. I will adopt the pretense that the terms need no explication’ (p. 163). BT (at least in some versions) makes clear predictions about which pairs of NPs can be coindexed and contraindexed. In a wide range of cases, these predictions correlate closely with speakers’ intuitions about which NPs can be coreferential and which must have disjoint reference. But BT cannot be construed as a theory of refcrencc, coreference, or disjoint reference, for the reasons given above. Until a semantics is given for BT’s indexing, it will remain unclear just what it is a theory of. In the meantime, it will continue to be refined, and Howard Lasnik can be expected to continue to make major contributions to its development, as well as to other areas of gramatical theory.

References Chomsky,

Noam,

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for Morris

on transformations.

Halle. New York,

Holt,

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Chomsky, Chomsky,

Noam, Noam,

1980. On binding. Linguistic Inquiry 11, 146. 1981. Lectures on government and binding. Dordrecht:

Chomsky,

Noam,

1986. Knowledge

Dougherty,

of language.

Ray, 1969. An interpretive

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(eds.), A

and Winston.

New York:

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reference.

Foundations

of Language

5, 4888508. Fiengo,

Robert,

Cambridge,

1974. Semantic

conditions

on surface

1973. The logical Fiengo, Robert and Howard Lasnik, English. Foundations of Language 9, 447468. [Chapter Freidin,

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12, 39-53.

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MIT

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Linguistic

Inquiry

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Heim, Irene, 1982. The semantics of definite and indefinite noun phrases. University of Massachusetts doctoral dissertation, Amherst, Massachusetts. Higginbotham, James, 1980. Anaphora and GB: Some preliminary remarks. In: J. Jensen (ed.). Cahiers Linguistiques d’ottawa. Proceedings of the Tenth Annual Meeting of NELS, Department of Linguistics, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada. Higginbotham, James, 1983. Logical form, binding, and nominals. Lingutstic lnquiry 14, 395420. Lasnik, EA.]

Howard,

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Howard,

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Fiengo.

5355571. [Chapter 3 of EA.] Lasnik. Howard and Juan Uriagereka, empty categories. Newmeyer, Reinhart,

Cambridge,

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1974. Complement 1988. A course

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MA: MIT Press.

Frederick, 1980. Linguistic theory in America. New York: Academic Press. Tanya, 1976. The syntactic domain of anaphora. MIT doctoral dissertation,

Cambridge, MA. Wasow, Thomas, 1972. Anaphoric MA.

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relations

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