LFG architecture, semantic definiteness structures and nonverbal syntactic constructions

Nonverbal sentences have posed a challenge for modern linguistic theories. A recent analysis of nonverbal sentences in LFG, Rosén (1996), applied to both topic comment and nominal sentences using situation semantics (Fenstad et al, 1987). This analysis is restricted to nominal sentences, allowing a finer grained distinction between information structure and nominal sentences. The proper analysis of definiteness/specificity helps account for certain nonverbal sentences. This paper is a preliminary study of a semantic definiteness function in LFG theory which expresses three semantic definiteness relations found in natural language: Existential, Identity, and Characterizational. The three relations derive their features for definiteness/specificity from the discourse, similar to the feature systems of Heim (1982, 1983) and Enç (1991).