earticle

영어

A distinction is made between common nouns and proper nouns in traditional grammar. These. are names for persons, geographical units and many other concrete and abstract entities, while those are nouns that refer to a Kind of persons and things. In this paper we depend the idea that the difference between common nouns and proper nouns is basically a difference in logical type. The distinction between common nouns and proper nouns is related to the presence of a referential arguments. The referential argument R is only present in common nouns, not in proper nouns. The absence of R in proper nouns explains the very restricted range of determiners and modifiers they allow. The presence of a referential argument corresponds with a semantic, type-theoretical difference. Nouns with R are interpreted as predicates, expressions of type , but nouns without R are interpreted as individual constants, expressions of type c. In section 2 this explains the limited range of determiners and modifiers of proper nouns. In section 3, the analysis of proper nouns will be extended to definite generics, which can be seen as proper names for Kinds. In this way we can distinguish between proper nouns for entities on two Kinds of levels. Lexical rules map between these different sorts of nouns by manipulating the referential argument. Proper nouns can be turned into common nouns by adding R in the argument-structure. There is a concomitant shift of types from e to . By deleting of the R of common nouns, proper nouns for kinds can be made, which are used in definite generics. These show the same restricted possibilities of determination and modification as ordinary proper nouns. Here the type-shift goes from to e.