Documentation

Linglib.Phenomena.Focus.Studies.Rooth1992

@cite{rooth-1992} Bridge — Focus Interpretation @cite{rooth-1992} #

Bridges the empirical data in Focus/Basic.lean to the formal theory in Focus/Interpretation.lean (FIP, Q-A congruence), with a full compositional derivational chain through Montague semantics and connection to English fragment entries.

Pipeline #

Fragments/English/Nouns ──▷ Montague Lexicon ──▷ Tree
                                                        │
                                                    interp
                                                        │
                                                        ▼
                              propositions (QAWorld → Bool)
                                                        │
                                                   fromAlternatives
                                                        │
                                                        ▼
                                              QuestionDen / PropFocusValue
                                                        │
                                                   FIP / qaCongruent
                                                        │
                                                        ▼
                                              Bridge theorems ↔ Data

Model #

What's exercised #

Worlds crossing subject (Fred/Mary) × object (beans/rice). Sufficient to distinguish subject-focus from object-focus alternative sets.

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        Focused "FRED" in "FRED ate the beans" (Rooth §2.4, ex. 23a): O-value = "Fred"; A-value = {"Fred", "Mary"}.

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          Non-focused "ate the beans": singleton A-value (no alternatives). Exercises AltMeaning.unfeatured.

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            Unfeatured O-value equals the input.

            Unfeatured A-value is a singleton containing the O-value. Non-focused expressions evoke no alternatives (@cite{rooth-1992} §1).

            Focus partition of "FRED ate the beans": Fred is focused, evoking {Fred, Mary} as alternatives (Rooth §2.4, ex. 25a).

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              Background of "FRED ate the beans": the non-focused material.

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                Theme: the QUD presupposition "_ ate the beans" (λ-abstract). Rooth §2.4: in a Q-A pair, the theme corresponds to the question's content.

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                  Full information structure of "FRED ate the beans" in response to "Who ate the beans?"

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                    Theme carries the presupposed content.

                    Rheme carries the asserted answer.

                    Focus list matches the focused element.

                    Minimal derivation type for exercising HasInfoStructure. Pairs a focused constituent with background material.

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                        Exercises the HasInfoStructure typeclass: a FocusedSentence determines an InfoStructure.

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                          @cite{rooth-1992} §2.4, constraint (26d): In a Q-A pair ⟨ψ, α⟩, ⟦ψ⟧° ⊆ ⟦α⟧f. The ordinary semantic value of the question is a subset of the focus semantic value of the answer.

                          "Who ate the beans?" — Hamblin question with subject alternatives. ⟦Q⟧° = {fredAteBeans, maryAteBeans} (Rooth §2.4, ex. 24).

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                            Focus value of "[FRED]_F ate the beans" — same subject alternatives. ⟦A⟧f = {fredAteBeans, maryAteBeans} (Rooth §2.4, ex. 25a).

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                              Focus value of "Fred ate the [BEANS]_F" — object alternatives. ⟦A⟧f = {fredAteBeans, fredAteRice} (varies object, not subject).

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                                Q-A congruence: subject focus value = question denotation. ⟦[FRED]_F ate the beans⟧f = ⟦Who ate the beans?⟧ (Rooth §2.4).

                                FIP (27) holds: question alternatives ⊆ focus value. Trivially satisfied when the sets are equal.

                                FIP fails for object focus: "maryAteBeans" is in the question alternatives but not in the object-focus alternatives. This is why "#Fred ate the BEANS" is not a congruent answer to "Who ate the beans?"

                                Rooth §2.1, constraint (26a): the domain of quantification C of a focusing adverb is a subset of the focus semantic value ⟦α⟧f.

                                Rooth's formalization (30b): only(C) introduces
                                  ∀P[P ∈ C ∧ P(m) → P = VP']
                                where C is constrained by the FIP to be a set of properties
                                matching the focus semantic value. 
                                

                                Worlds for the "only" model: who Mary introduced to Sue.

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                                      Focus on BILL (Rooth §2.1, ex. 3a): O-value = introBill; A-value = {introBill, introJohn}. Focus determines the domain of "only".

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                                        "Only" with focus on BILL: O-value holds and all non-actual alternatives are excluded (Rooth §2.1, (30b)).

                                        "Only" with focus on JOHN: symmetric case.

                                        Different focus → different "only" meaning. Focus on BILL excludes John; focus on JOHN excludes Bill (Rooth §2.1, exs. 3a vs 3b).

                                        Focus in the congruent answer matches the data.

                                        Focus in the incongruent answer matches the data.

                                        The data (Basic.lean) says "FRED ate the beans" is congruent and "#Fred ate the BEANS" is incongruent with "Who ate the beans?". The theory (FIP, §6) explains:

                                        - Subject focus produces a focus value equal to the question
                                          denotation (§6a), so FIP is satisfied.
                                        - Object focus produces a focus value that differs (§6b):
                                          maryAteBeans ∈ ⟦Q⟧° but maryAteBeans ∉ ⟦A⟧f, so FIP fails.
                                        
                                        For "only" (§7), the data says focus determines what "only"
                                        excludes. The theory confirms: the FIP constrains the domain C
                                        of "only" to be a subset of the focus value, so different focus
                                        positions yield different exclusion domains. 
                                        

                                        The propositions in §2 were hand-defined. Here we derive them compositionally: entity denotations + a world-indexed verb meaning are combined via direct function application and Heim & Kratzer's interp to produce the same truth conditions.

                                        The derivational chain is:
                                          Fragment entry → Montague LexEntry → Tree → interp → Bool
                                        run once per world to yield a world-indexed proposition. 
                                        

                                        Entity domain for the focus model.

                                        • fred : E
                                        • mary : E
                                        • beans : E
                                        • rice : E
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                                            Extract the Bool truth value from a tree interpretation. Returns none if the tree is uninterpretable or has non-t type.

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                                              The propositions from §2 were stipulated directly. Here we show they are derivable: running interp at each world produces the same truth values.

                                              Compositionally derived "Fred ate beans" proposition.

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                                                Compositionally derived "Mary ate beans" proposition.

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                                                  Compositionally derived "Fred ate rice" proposition.

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                                                    Grounding: compositional "Fred ate beans" = hand-defined proposition.

                                                    Grounding: compositional "Mary ate beans" = hand-defined proposition.

                                                    Grounding: compositional "Fred ate rice" = hand-defined proposition.

                                                    Direct function application matches tree interpretation.

                                                    Connect the model's lexicon to English fragment entries. Fragment entries provide morphological and syntactic properties; the bridge verifies that these properties are consistent with the model and that fragment surface forms feed the compositional lexicon.

                                                    Fragment surface forms feed the Montague lexicon. The form field of each fragment entry matches a lexicon key.

                                                    "eat" has past tense "ate" matching the lexicon entry.

                                                    The complete derivational chain from fragments to FIP:

                                                    1. Fragment entries (§14) provide surface forms and properties
                                                    2. Surface forms feed the Montague lexicon (§10)
                                                    3. Tree derivations compose meanings via interp (§11)
                                                    4. Running at each world yields propositions grounding §2 (§12)
                                                    5. Propositions build Hamblin questions and focus values (§6)
                                                    6. FIP/qaCongruent proves congruence (§6a) or incongruence (§6b)
                                                    7. Theoretical predictions match empirical judgments (§9) 
                                                    

                                                    End-to-end: the compositionally derived question matches the hand-built question, so the FIP results in §6 apply to the compositional derivation.