La résolution de pronoms en contexte : Le rôle de la syntaxe, de la sémantique et de la pragmatique dans l'interprétation de pronoms
Israël de la Fuente · HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe) · 2015
This thesis investigates the mechanisms involved in pronoun resolution in ambiguous contexts. Beyond the typical psycholinguistic approach that puts forward the factors that play a role in pronoun interpretation, we propose an in-depth analysis of the discourse structure of the context where the pronominal dependency is established in order to explain why the role of these factors varies as a function of the contextual circumstances. We argue that the discourse unit (DU) is the optimal domain for the study of pronoun resolution. We propose a “relational” definition of DU, whereby the DU configuration of a complex sentence depends on the syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic content of the subordinate clause and its relation with the matrix clause. We analyze two types of adverbial adjuncts: non-relational (temporal) and relational adjuncts (causal). We argue that, while the former are processed as part of the same DU as the matrix clause, the latter are processed as separate DUs from the matrix clause. We claim that the DU configuration of the sentence has an effect on pronoun interpretation and that factors affecting resolution have a different weight according to whether they occur within a DU or across two DU. We propose that pronoun resolution searches a maximum of discourse coherence and that interpretation preferences come about in the process of maintaining coherence (intra-unit) or establishing coherence (inter-unit). We test these claims with a series of experiments that investigate the role of the syntactic function of the antecedent, its information status, and the coherence relations between propositions in the context of 1 or 2 DU, in English, French and Spanish.