'Der und der hat mir neulich das und das erzählt': On the Interpretation of DPs with Article Conjunction

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate DPs with article-conjunction heads in German (AC-DPs). We argue that they are non-referential expressions, which impose certain constraints on the discourse model in which they can felicitously be used. We suggest that AC-DPs presuppose the existence of a previous conversation between the speaker and someone other than the hearer, and that a definite or a name was used in this conversation to refer to the referent of the AC-DP. We also illustrate how the use of AC-DPs can be explained by way of general pragmatic principles like 'Maximise Presupposition'.