The expression of speaker's bias in Czech polar questions

Anna Staňková

Abstract:

This MA thesis focuses on Czech polar questions, especially on the description of their syntactic-
semantic interface. Besides that, I discuss an additional layer of pragmatic meaning (i.e.,
bias), which expresses the speaker’s expectations about the possible answers based on their
beliefs or on their immediate context. The question’s bias is signaled by a number of formal
means: word order (interrogative vs. declarative), polarity (positive vs. negative question)
and particles (e.g. copak). The interpretation of negation in polar questions is by no means
trivial, as it gives rise to two types of reading: inner and outer. I propose explicit syntactic
and semantic analyses of negative polar questions in Czech using the generative and formal
semantic approach. To capture the difference between inner and outer negation, I use Repp’s
(2013) theory and the verum/falsum operators. I also propose a syntactic analysis of verbal
movement to the initial position in Czech interrogative sentences. The thesis, therefore,
aims to characterize how the formal means interact with the question’s meaning (including
bias). I ran a naturalness judgment task to empirically test the hypotheses based on previous
accounts of polar questions and my own analyses. The experimental set-up consisted of multiple
parts investigating negative polar questions as well as the behavior of certain particles
(copak, náhodou, snad, přece). The results showed that the immediate context interacts with
the question’s interpretation as well as its word order. To some extent, it also determined the
usage of some of the particles.