Types of Presupposition Theories on Presupposition

Example: Mary’s car is red. The sentence presupposes that Mary has a car. 2 Factive presupposition Such presupposition is information following verbs like know, realize, regret, surprised, stramge, and a fairly large number of other verbs, predicate adjectives, and predicate nouns which take a clause as subject or object. The information is considered as fact. In other words, this kind of presupposition presupposes truth of what is stated. Examples: • She didn’t realize John was ill. It presupposes that John was ill. • I regretted telling him. It presupposes that the speaker told another person. • I’m glad it’s over. It presupposes that the situation it is over. 3 Lexical presupposition A lexical presupposition is a presupposition, that another, non-asserted meaning is understood. Unlike factive presupposition, lexical presupposition presupposes an unstated concept. Examples: • Sarah managed to win in the contest. The sentence presupposes that Sarah succeeded in the contest. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI • Sarah didn’t manage to win the contest. The sentence presupposes that Sarah failed in the contest. But if the two sentences above are combined, they presuppose that Sarah tried to win the contest. • She stopped smoking. The sentence presupposes that the person mentioned used to smoke. • She started smoking. The sentence presupposes that the person mentioned didn’t smoke before. 4 Structural presupposition It presupposes that part of structure is already assumed to be true. Examples: • When did he leave? The question presupposes that someone mentioned has left. • Where did you buy the cake? The question presupposes that the listener you bought cake. • How fast was the car when it ran the red light? The question presupposes that the car ran the red light. 5 Non-factive presupposition This type of presupposition is opposite to factive presupposition. The information carried is considered not true or unreal. Examples: • I dreamed I was rich. The example above presupposes the speaker was not rich. • He pretends to be ill. The example above presupposes the person mentioned is not ill. 6 Counterfactual presupposition The last type is in the distinct area, which is what is presupposed is not only not true but contra to what is true. Example: If you were my friend, I would go with you. This presupposes the listener you are not the speaker’s my friend.

c. Presupposition and the Negation Test

As stated before, presupposition has different territory with assertion. Assertion is the claims that are made, based on the context. On the other hand, presupposition is the requirements that the context must satisfy so the utterance can be interpreted at all. The obvious distinction lays on the fact that assertion can be negated, while presupposition cannot. In order to get better understanding, let us see the examples below: The present king of France is bald. ASSERTION The present king of France is not bald. From the above examples, we can see that assertion is vulnerable with negation. However, presupposition is not. The both sentences carry the same presupposition, which is there is at present a king of France. Thus, such a survival of negation is the standard test for presupposition. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI

d. Presupposition Triggers

Where do presuppositions come from? Presuppositions are somewhat special among pragmatic categories in that they often have syntactic or lexical signals, also called presupposition triggers Levinson, 1983: 181. These triggers are responsible for the occurrences of certain presuppositions. Linguists singled out the presuppositional component of utterances and classified presuppositional signals presupposition triggers in an utterance. Lauri Karttunen Levinson, 1983: 181-182 has collected 13 kinds of such triggers, and the following list is a selection from these the examples provide positive and negative versions separated by ‘’ to allow the reader to check the inferences; the presupposition- triggers themselves are underlined; the symbol stands for ‘presupposes’: 1 Definite descriptions John saw didn’t see the man with two heads. There is a man with two heads. 2 Factive verbs Martha regretsdoesn’t regret drinking John’s home brew. Martha drank John’s home brew. Frankenstein waswasn’t aware that Dracula was there. Dracula was there. John realizeddidn’t realize that he was in debt. John was in debt. It was odd it wasn’t odd how proud he was. He was proud.