Accessibility:A Cognitive Approach to English Referring Expressions
Xie Ya-jun · Journal of Guangdong Radio & Television University · 2009
This paper proposes a cognitive interpretation with an analysis of the English referring expressions,based on Ariel's Linguistic Cognitive Accessibility Theory.It introduces the encoding principles of the referring expressions and the scale of accessibility of the Accessibility Theory suggested by Ariel,which becomes more and more popular with the researchers because of its popularity and the detailedness in the accessibility scale of the referring expressions.In English,the function of high accessibility markers is generally performed by pronouns,while the function of intermediate accessibility markers is fulfilled by demonstrative expressions and that of low accessibility markers are fulfilled by proper nouns and definite expressions.