An Experimental Study on the Definiteness of Two Types of Korean Nominals in Bridging References

초록

This study delves into the semantic and syntactic factors that influence Korean speakers’ choice between two forms of anaphoric nominals: demonstrative NPs with ku ‘that/the’ and bare NPs without ku ‘that/the’. Drawing upon the division model of definites in such article languages as German, which distinguishes between strong definites (for anaphoric familiarity) and weak definites (for situational familiarity), this study carries out two tasks, rating and cloze, to see whether Korean mirrors the distribution observed in German, specifically, whether the division model of definites can be applied beyond German to more varied contexts in Korean. For this objective, an experiment is conducted within the context of two linguistic conditions: two types of bridging references, [whole-part] and [product-producer], and two types of subject markers, topic and nominative. The empirical findings derived from this study extend our comprehension of Korean speakers’ utilization of the two forms of Korean anaphoric nominals within bridging contexts, moving beyond the confines of experts’ intuitions. Furthermore, through a comparative analysis with the German language, this study not only sheds light on the nature of two forms of anaphoric nominals in Korean but also enriches the broader theoretical discussions on definiteness and familiarity across different languages.

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