汉语疑问词岛效应的语用预设新解

原因疑问词“为什么”与其它疑问词不同，它遵守岛效应，不能在复合名词组、主语、附加语等岛外解释。这种差异与原因问句的预设有关。“谁”“什么”“哪里”“什么时候”“怎么样”这五个疑问词都是具有疑问性质的存在量词，其答句用来确定存在量词的值。原因问句的预设中不包含任何存在量词，其预设是陈述句，而且该陈述句的命题值为真。原因问句的提问对象随句子焦点的变化而变化，其答句解释焦点优于选项命题集合中其它成员的原因。原因疑问词“为什么”的辖域位置与句法位置相同，因此在逻辑式不移位，无法在岛外解释。

A presuppositional account for island effects of Chinese wh-phrases

Differing from other wh-phrases, weishenme （why） exhibits island effects and can not be interpreted out of such islands as a complex NP, a subject island and an adjunct. The difference can be attributed to their different presuppositions. Shei （who）, shenme （what）, nali （where）, shenmeshihou （when） and zenmeyang （how） are existential quantifiers with interrogative features. Their answers set the values of these existential quantifiers. With no existential quantifiers in its presupposition, a WHY-question presupposes the truth of a non-WHY-proposition. A WHY-question aims at a focus of a sentence and an answer to a why-question explains the advantages of a focus over other members in its alternative set. Weishenme （why） does not move at logical form and can not be interpreted out of an island since its scope position coincides with its syntactic position.