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This book contains a case-based proposal as to how it could be accounted for the discourse structuring potential of different types of indefinite noun phrases. Besides English indefinite this, the two types of indefinite noun phrases central to the present investigation are indefinites headed by so’n in German and pe-marked indefinites in Romanian. In the following, I introduce the relevant contrasts in the two languages in turn.

German developed two determiners that are similar in function to English indefinite this, namely the indefinite demonstrative diese(r) (Wald 1983, Lyons 1999) and the complex determiner so’n (Wespel 2007, Chiriacescu 2010, von Heusinger 2011). In this book, I focus solely on the latter determiner form, as it comes closer to its English cognate in terms of distribution in colloquial language. Similar to English indefinite this, indefinite noun phrases headed by so’n show a tendency for referential readings, as illustrated in (4).

(4)	(a)	Anna	will	so’n Buch	von	Mircea Eliade	lesen.
		Anna	wants	so-a book	by	Mircea Eliade	read
		‘Anna wants to read so-a book by Mircea Eliade.’
	(b)	Anna	will	ein Buch	von	Mircea Eliade	lesen.
		Anna	wants	a book	by	Mircea Eliade	read
		‘Anna wants to read a book by Mircea Eliade.’

While the indefinite noun phrase ein Buch (‘a book’) in (4b) is ambiguous between a referentially specific and a non-specific reading, the indefinite noun phrase headed by so’n in (4a) bears only a specific interpretation as it refers to a particular book Anna wants to read.

A similar contrast is found in Romanian, a language in which direct objects are realized distinctively, as only some indefinite noun phrases are preceded by the morpheme pe, whereas the other class of indefinites remains unmarked (Niculescu 1965, Pană-Dindelegan 1997, Cornilescu 2001, Chiriacescu 2007, von Heusinger and Onea 2008, Lindemann 2018). Although the variation between a pe-marked direct object and a non-pe-marked direct object applies to definite unmodified noun phrases in equal manner (Chiriacescu 2007, von Heusinger and Chiriacescu 2009, 2011), here I focus only on cases that involve postverbal indefinite noun phrases, as illustrated in (5). Note that direct object arguments in Romanian are often accompanied by pronominal clitic doubling.

(5)	(a)	Petru	l-	a	vizitat	pe	un	actor.
		Petru	CL	Aux.	visited	pe	an	actor
		‘Peter visited an actor.’
	(b)	Petru	a	vizitat	un	actor.
		Petru	Aux.	visited	an	actor
		‘Peter visited an actor.’

Only in (5a) is the indefinite noun phrase un actor (‘an actor’) accompanied by the free morpheme pe, in (5b), the indefinite noun is neither preceded by pe, nor doubled by the pronominal clitic. The distribution of pe-marking with indefinite noun phrases has been either left unaccounted for in the literature so far, or has been explained in terms of different types of specificity (Farkas 1978, Dobrovie-Sorin 1994, von Heusinger and Onea 2008). According to the latter proposal, the referent associated with the direct object in (5a) is interpreted as referring to a particular actor, the identity of which is “known” to the speaker, whereas the referent in (5b) is analysed as being neutral with respect to this issue and thus allowing for both, a specific and a non-specific reading of the referent.

Despite their preference for particular referential readings, the distinction between a specific and a non-specific reading of the two types of indefinite noun phrases in German and Romanian is not that straightforward as it might seem at first sight, though. Consider example (6), in which both the indefinite headed by so’n as well as the indefinite headed by einen (‘a/an’) are compatible with a continuation sentence in which the identity of the referents they are associated with is denied. In other words, both indefinite noun phrases get a non-specific reading.

(6)	Maria will so’nen/ einen Prinz auf einen weißen Ross heiraten. Aber sie hat noch keinen kennengelernt.
	Mary wants to marry so-a/ a prince on a white horse. But she has not met one yet.’

In this book I argue that the tendency for particular referential readings (i.e. wide scope, fixed reference, epistemic specificity, etc.) stems from the speaker’s referential intention to introduce a referent that will give structure to the discourse in terms of referential persistence or continuation and potential topic shift.

To investigate the discourse structuring potential of indefinite noun phrases in English, German and Romanian, I analyse production and comprehension biases while referring. To this end, I restrict the experimental studies by (i) using a constrained form of discourse, i.e. multi-sentence discourses and by (ii) focussing on the establishment of referential chains. The dependent variable is the way writers refer subsequently to the referents introduced in the initial stories. For a brief illustration, consider the two mini-discourses given in Table 1.1, which are taken from the story continuation experiment reported in Chapter 5.

	pe -marked direct object	non- pe -marked direct object
S0	Anul trecut când am fost la mare am cunoscut un salvamar1. (Pro)1 era tot timpul activ. La sfârşitul sejurului meu, (pro)1 a salvat-o pe o fată2 de la înec. ‘Last year when I was at the seaside I met a lifeguard1. He1 was very active all day long. At the end of my stay there, he1 saved PE-a girl2 from drowning.’	Anul trecut când am fost la mare am cunoscut un salvamar1. (Pro)1 era tot timpul activ. La sfârşitul sejurului meu, (pro)1 a salvat o fată2 de la înec. ‘Last year when I was at the seaside I met a lifeguard1. He1 was very active all day long. At the end of my stay there, he1 saved a girl2 from drowning.’
S1	M-a mirat că (pro)1 a reușit să o2 salveze, pentru că (pro)1 era un burtos. ‘I was surprised that he1 could save her2, because he1 was a big-bellied man.’	(pro)1 Era un tip solid, mustăcios și încrezut. ‘He1 was a strong man, moustachioed and conceited.’
S2	Dar cum (pro)1 a văzut-o pe fată2 că (pro)2 striga după ajutor, (pro)1 nu a stat pe gânduri și (pro)1 s-a dus după ea2. ‘But as soon as he1 saw PE-girl2 that she2 was screaming for help, he1 did not hesitate and went after her2.’	Deși (pro)1 era enervant, multe fete îl1 plăceau. ‘Despite the fact that he1 was annoying, many girls liked him1.’
S3	Fata2 era inconștientă când (pro)2 a fost adusă la ţărm. ‘The girl2 was unconscious as she2 was brought to shore.’	După ce (pro)1 a salvat-o pe fată2 de la înec, (pro)1 a devenit atracția plăjii. ‘After (pro)1 saved PE girl2 from drowning, (pro)1 became the attraction of the beach.’
S4	(pro)2 nu avea mai mult de 10 ani. ‘She2 was not older than 10.’	Toată lumea vroia să se fotografieze cu acest bărbat curajos1. ‘Everyone wanted to be photographed with this brave man1.’

Table 1.1:

Sample experimental item from the experiment on pe-marking (Chapter 5)

Note that the indefinite noun phrases realized in direct object position in the initial context (i.e. S0) constitute minimal pairs, in the sense that the descriptive material of the noun phrases and the verbs selecting these objects are almost the same. I only manipulated the type of indefinite noun phrases used in direct object position in the two contexts (i.e. a pe-marked direct object in the left column vs. a non-pe-marked direct object in the right column of Table 1.1). The two direct objects in Table 1.1 differ with respect to their discourse structuring potential, which becomes evident in the continuation sentences. The referent of the direct object preceded by pe is introduced in sequence S0 by means of the indefinite noun phrase pe o fată (‘PE a girl’). Within the next sentences – (S1) through (S4) – the referent of the indefinite noun phrase is mentioned again six times. On the contrary, the referent of the non-pe-marked direct object o fată (‘a girl’) is mentioned in the discourse following its first mention in S0 only once, in continuation sentence three (i.e. S3). Based on larger discourse contexts like the ones illustrated in Table 1.1, I show that the functions of the three indefinite markers (this, so’n and pe) discussed in the beginning of this Section are best accounted for in terms of their discourse structuring potential. The basic claims I wish to make are outlined in the following Section.