Linking argumentativity and information structure in adversatives

Abstract

This paper deals with the semantics of the adversative connective but. It argues for a unified description of the semantic opposition and denial of expectation uses of but. Our analysis is an attempt at reconciling approaches based on the focussensitivity of but and an argumentative description of its meaning. To show that both approaches are necessary, we rely on examples involving quantifiers. Throughout this work, we connect our account to works dealing with the derivation of scalar implicatures. We argue that our data are neutral towards the issue of the locality of these inferences, and that the semantics of but is not sensitive to the presence of scalar implicatures.