Open AccessFactors licensing embedded present tense in speech reports
Author(s) -
Corien Bary,
Daniel Altshuler,
Kristen Syrett,
P.J.F. de Swart
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
zas papers in linguistics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 1435-9588
DOI - 10.21248/zaspil.60.2018.458
Subject(s) - falsity , relevance (law) , present tense , future tense , linguistics , past tense , psychology , relevance theory , cognitive psychology , computer science , philosophy , verb , law , cognition , neuroscience , political science
According to Ogihara (1995), the usage of the embedded present in a speech reportsuch as John said that Mary is in the room is restricted by the cause of John’s belief (the statethat made John think that Mary is in the room): the present tense can be used only if thiscause still holds at the time that John said that Mary is in the room is uttered. This paperpresents experimental evidence demonstrating that this is only one of the factors that licensesa felicitous usage of the embedded present tense. In particular, we show that the cause ofbelief still holding is not a necessary condition, and identify two additional, sufficient (but notnecessary) factors: in cases of false belief, who is aware of the falsity of the belief and durationof the reported state. While these factors are independent, they collectively support the ideathat the present tense encodes ‘current relevance’, even in embedded contexts (e.g. Costa 1972;McGilvray 1974). This gives rise to the question of how we can derive ‘current relevance’ and,in particular, whether previous analyses of the embedded present tense are adequately equippedto do so.Keywords: tense, speech reports, double access, experiments.