Verum focus is verum, not focus: Cross-linguistic evidence

Abstract

The accent pattern known as verum focus is commonly understood as an ordinary alternative focus on the truth of a proposition. This standard view, which we call the focus accent thesis (Fat), can be contrasted with the lexical operator thesis (Lot), according to which the accent pattern that looks like focus in languages like German or English is actually not an instance of focus marking, but realizes a lexical verum predicate, whose function is to relate the current proposition to a question under discussion. Although it is hard to distinguish between the Fat and the Lot on the basis of German or English, a broader cross-linguistic perspective seems to favor the Lot. Drawing from fieldwork on Tsimshianic (Gitksan) and Chadic (Bura, South Marghi), we first show that in none of these languages is verum realized in the same way that ordinary alternative focus is marked. This sheds initial doubt on the unity of verum and focus. Secondly, the Fat predicts that a language cannot have co-occuring verum and focus, if it does not allow multiple foci, and that a language should allow them to co-occur if it allows for multiple foci. Again, while it is hard to find counterexamples in German or English, some of the data from our cross-linguistic investigation favor the Lot.

Verum in Gitksan

“…13 I further assume a standard view that the denotation of polar questions is the set of possible answers: { p , ¬ p }. I then adopt ideas by Davis and McCready (2016) about expressives (use-conditional elements) in questions, following Gutzmann et al (2020) for their application to verum. Davis and McCready argue that expressives in questions can operate on whatever is the true answer to the question.…”

Contrast, Verum Focus and Anaphora: The Case ofet pourtant si/nonin French

“…Several approaches are taken in order to account for vf . In a review of the literature, Gutzmann, Hartmann & Matthewson (submitted) consider two of these approaches, vf as an instance of focus (this is the focus accent thesis ( fat )) (Wilder 2013, Samko 2016, McCloskey 2017, Goodhue 2018) and vf as a lexical operator introduced at LF (this is the lexical operator thesis ( lot )) (Romero & Han 2004, Gutzmann & Castroviejo 2011, Gutzmann et al. submitted).…”

“…In order to restrict the semantics of verum , Gutzmann et al. (submitted: p. 42) increase the attitudinal role of the speaker in the form of a wish to downdate the qud [31] (following Gutzmann & Castroviejo (2011)), yielding the semantics expressed in (36).…”

“…In the same line of thought, Gutzmann et al. (submitted: p. 42) argue that: ‘If a speaker uses verum to explicitly mark that she wants to prevent that the qud is settled toward , then should already have been proposed (by an utterance of , for instance) or, at least, this possibility should have been raised in the discourse context (by a biased question, for instance)’. This makes a correct prediction in a dialogue like that in (57) but does not account for (58):…”

“…23Adapted from Büring (1997: p. 43), where qud ‘is the most recent issue that the interlocutors are trying to address […] by contributing its propositional context to the common ground’ (Gutzmann et al. submitted: p. 7).…”