Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T17:06:22.622Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Time, perspective and semantic representation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 May 2017

K. M. JASZCZOLT
K. M. JASZCZOLT*
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

I discuss the perspectival nature of temporality in discourse and argue that the human concept of time can no more be dissociated from the perspectival thought than the concept of the self can. The corollary of this observation is that perspectival temporality can no more be excluded from the semantic representation than the notion of the self can: neither can be reduced to the bare referent for the purpose of semantic representation if the latter is to retain cognitive plausibility. I present such a semantic qua conceptual approach to temporal reference developed within my theory of Default Semantics. I build upon my theory of time as epistemic modality according to which, on the level of conceptual qua semantic building blocks, temporality reduces to degrees of detachment from the certainty of the here and the now. I also address the questions of temporal asymmetry between the past and the future, and the relation between metaphysical time (timeM), psychological time (timeE, where ‘E’ marks the domain of epistemological enquiry), and time in natural language (timeL), concluding that the perspective-infused timeE and timeL are compatible with timeM of mathematical models of spacetime: all are definable through possibility and perspectivity.

Keywords

timeMtimeEtimeLepistemic modalityDefault SemanticsA-theory of timeB-theory of timePerspectiveIndexicalsDirect-Quantitative ViewModal-Contextualist View
Type
Research Article
Information
Language and Cognition , Volume 10 , Issue 1 , March 2018 , pp. 26 - 55
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © UK Cognitive Linguistics Association 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

references

Aikhenvald, A. Y. (2012). The languages of the Amazon. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Amis, M. (1984). Money. London: Vintage Books.Google Scholar
van der Auwera, J., & Plungian, V. A. (1998). Modality’s semantic map. Linguistic Typology, 2, 79–124.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barlassina, L., & Del Prete, F. (2015). The puzzle of the changing past. Analysis, 75, 59–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baron, S. (2015). Tensed truthmaker theory. Erkenntnis, 80, 923–944.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bittner, M. (2005). Future discourse in a tenseless language. Journal of Semantics, 22, 339–387.Google Scholar
Bohnemeyer, J. (2002). The grammar of time reference in Yucatec Maya. Munich: Lincom Europa.Google Scholar
Davidson, D. (1970). Events as particulars. Noûs, 4, 25–32. [Reprinted in D. Davidson (1980), Essays on actions and events (pp. 181–187). Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Dummett, M. (2004). Truth and the past. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Dummett, M. (2006). Thought and reality. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Einstein, A. (1920/2010). Relativity: the special and the general theory, trans. Lawson, R. W.. London: Methuen. [Reprinted in 2010 by Mansfield Centre, CT: Martino Publishing.]Google Scholar
Fleck, D. W. (2007). Evidentiality and double tense in Matses. Language, 83, 589–614.Google Scholar
Givón, T. (2005). Context as other minds: the pragmatics of sociality, cognition and communication. Amsterdam: J. Benjamins.Google Scholar
Grice, P. (2001). Aspects of reason, ed. Warner, R.. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
de Haan, F. (2006). Typological approaches to modality. In Frawley, W. (Ed.), The expression of modality (pp. 27–69). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Hawking, S. W. (1988). A brief history of time: from the Big Bang to black holes. London: Bantam Press.Google Scholar
Heidegger, M. (1953). Sein und Zeit. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer. Trans. by Stambaugh, J. (1996) as Being and time. Albany: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Higginbotham, J. (1985). On semantics. Linguistic Inquiry, 16, 547–593.Google Scholar
Husserl, E. (1928). Vorlesungen zur Phänomenologie des inneren Zeitbewusstseins. Jahrbuch für Philosophie und phänomenologische Forschung IX. Halle: Max Niemeyer. Trans. by Brough, J. B. as Lectures on the phenomenology of the consciousness of internal time in: On the phenomenology of the consciousness of internal time (1893–1917). Part A. 1991. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M. (2005). Default Semantics: foundations of a compositional theory of acts of communication. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M. (2009a). Representing time: an essay on temporality as modality. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M. (2009b). Cancellability and the primary/secondary meaning distinction. Intercultural Pragmatics, 6, 259–289.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M. (2010). Default Semantics. In Heine, B. & Narrog, H. (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of linguistic analysis (pp. 193–221). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M. (2012). Cross-linguistic differences in expressing time and universal principles of utterance interpretation. In Filipović, L. & Jaszczolt, K. M. (Eds.), Space and time in languages and cultures: linguistic diversity (pp. 95–121). Amsterdam: J. Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M. (2013). Temporality and epistemic commitment: an unresolved question. In Jaszczolt, K. M. & de Saussure, L. (Eds.), Time: language, cognition, and reality (pp. 193–209). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M. (2016a). Meaning in linguistic interaction: semantics, metasemantics, philosophy of language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M. (2016b). Temporal reference without the concept of time? In Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, B. (Ed.), Conceptualizations of time (pp. 3–24). Amsterdam: J. Benjamins.Google Scholar
Jaszczolt, K. M., & Huang, M. (in press). Monsters and I: the case of mixed quotation. In Saka, P. & Johnson, M. (Eds.), Semantic and pragmatic aspects of quotation. Dordrecht: Springer.Google Scholar
Kamp, H., & Reyle, U. (1993). From discourse to logic: introduction to modeltheoretic semantics of natural language, formal logic and Discourse Representation Theory. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Kaplan, D. (1989). Demonstratives: an essay on the semantics, logic, metaphysics, and epistemology of demonstratives and other indexicals. In Almog, J., Perry, J., & Wettstein, H. (Eds.), Themes from Kaplan (pp. 481–563). New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kelly, S. D. (2005). Temporal awareness. In Smith, D. W. & Thomasson, A. L. (Eds.), Phenomenology and philosophy of mind (pp. 222–234). Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Le Poidevin, R. (2007). The images of time: an essay on temporal representation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Leslau, W. (1995). Reference grammar of Amharic. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.Google Scholar
Levinson, S. C. (2003). Space in language and cognition: explorations in cognitive diversity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Levinson, S. C., & Burenhult, N. (2009). Semplates: A new concept in lexical semantics? Language, 85, 153–174.Google Scholar
Levinson, S. C., Meira, S., & The Language and Cognition Group (2003). Natural concepts in the spatial topological domain – adpositional meanings in crosslinguistic perspective: an exercise in semantic typology. Language, 79, 485–516.Google Scholar
Lewis, D. (1979). Attitudes de dicto and de se . Philosophical Review, 88, 513–543.Google Scholar
Ludlow, P. (1999). Semantics, tense, and time: an essay in the metaphysics of natural language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Ludlow, P. (2013). Tensism. In Jaszczolt, K. M. & de Saussure, L. (Eds.), Time: language, cognition, and reality (pp. 175–192). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Matthewson, L. (2006). Temporal semantics in a superficially tenseless language. Linguistics and Philosophy, 29, 673–713.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McLaughlin, B., & Bennett, K. (2005). Supervenience. In Zalta, E. (Ed.), Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. Online: <http://plato.stanford.edu/contents.html>.Google Scholar
McTaggart, J. E. (1908). The unreality of time. Mind, 17, 457–474. [Reprinted in J. E. McTaggart (1934). Philosophical studies (pp. 110–131). London: E. Arnold.] Google Scholar
Mellor, D. H. (1998). Real time II. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Montague, R. (1960). On the nature of certain philosophical entities. The Monist, 53, 159–194. [Reprinted in Thomason, R. (Ed.) (1974), Formal philosophy: selected papers of Richard Montague (pp. 148–187). New Haven: Yale University Press.]Google Scholar
Mount, A. (2015). Character, impropriety, and success: a unified account of indexicals. Mind and Language, 30, 1–21.Google Scholar
Mozersky, J. M. (2001). Smith on times and tokens. Synthese, 129, 405–411.Google Scholar
Mozersky, M. J. (2015). Time, language, and ontology: the world from the B-theoretic perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Noonan, H. W. (2013). Presentism and eternalism. Erkenntnis, 78, 219–227.Google Scholar
Parsons, T. (1990). Events in the semantics of English: a study in subatomic semantics. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Partee, B. H. (1973). Some structural analogies between tenses and pronouns in English. Journal of Philosophy, 70, 601–609. [Reprinted in B. Partee (2004), Compositionality in formal semantics (pp. 50–58). Oxford: Blackwell.]Google Scholar
Pederson, E., Danziger, E., Wilkins, D., Levinson, S., Kita, S., & Senft, G. (1998). Semantic typology and spatial conceptualization. Language, 74, 557–589.Google Scholar
Predelli, S. (2014). Kaplan’s three monsters. Analysis, 74, 389–393.Google Scholar
Prior, A. N. (1967). Past, present and future. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Prior, A. N. (1968). Papers on time and tense. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Prior, A. N. (2003). Papers on time and tense: new edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Reichenbach, H. (1948). Elements of symbolic logic. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Roberts, C. (2014). Indexicality: de se semantics and pragmatics. Unpublished ms., Ohio State University.Google Scholar
de Saussure, L. (2013). Perspectival interpretations of tenses. In Jaszczolt, K. M. & de Saussure, L. (Eds.), Time: language, cognition, and reality (pp. 46–69). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Schlenker, P. (2003). A plea for monsters. Linguistics and Philosophy, 26, 29–120.Google Scholar
Sklar, L. (1981). Up and down, left and right, past and future. Noûs, 15, 111–129.Google Scholar
Smith, Q. (1993). Language and time. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Srioutai, J. (2006). Time conceptualization in Thai with special reference to d 1 ay 1 II , kh 3 oe:y, k 1 aml 3 ang, y 3 u: I and c 1 a. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Cambridge.Google Scholar
Stalnaker, R. C. (1981). Indexical belief. Synthese, 49, 129–151.Google Scholar
Steedman, M. (1997). Temporality. In van Benthem, J. & ter Meulen, A. (Eds.), Handbook of logic and language (pp. 895–938). Amsterdam: Elsevier Science.Google Scholar
Strawson, P. F. (1959). Individuals: an essay in descriptive metaphysics. London: Methuen.Google Scholar
Thornton, A. (1987). Maori oral literature as seen by a classicist. Dunedin: University of Otago Press.Google Scholar
Tolstoy, L. (1869/2007). War and peace, trans. Pevear, R. & Volokhonsky, L.. London: Vintage Books.Google Scholar
Tonhauser, J. (2011). Temporal reference in Paraguayan Guaraní, a tenseless language. Linguistics and Philosophy, 34, 257–303.Google Scholar
White, V. A. (2015). Presentism and Einstein’s train of thought: reply to Brogaard and Marlow. Erkenntnis, 80, 1023–1029.Google Scholar
Wierzbicka, A. (1996). Semantics: primes and universals. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar