ABSTRACT
“Pragmatics without syntax is empty; syntax without pragmatics is blind” (Huang 2014, p. 352). This generalization applies to a wide range of language phenomena, including reference and the function and structure of referring expressions, such as pronouns. Pronouns are an intriguing component of natural language and have posed a long-standing puzzle for linguistics. On the one hand, they are context dependent; for example, the semantic values of I and he in (1) may be fixed only by determining their reference in context. This makes pronouns – or at least some instances of pronoun use – extra-grammatical, and places them in the domain of pragmatics (Lyons 1977; Huang 2014). On the other hand, pronouns are encoded elements; this property places them in the realm of semantics and syntax (Ariel 2010). For example, we know that he in (1) refers to an individual that is [+human]; it also refers to the agent of the calling event. In addition, we know that the pronoun must be he rather than himself, at least in English.
