Logical Form and communicative structure [Логическая форма и коммуникативная структура]

I discuss the relation of Logical Form and grammatical structure with focus on two fragments of Russian grammar ― the taxonomy of negation modes according to Elena V. Paducheva’s theory and root dative-infinitive clauses without external syntactic heads ― as well as the role of the compositionality principle. Paducheva’s classification of four negation modes explicitly works out the no-homomorphism approach to the semantics-to-syntax interface but tacitly takes into account communicative and prosodic factors, notably, the realization of verum and contrast meanings, which are always marked overtly across the world’s languages. The added verum, contrast, or eventive meanings clarify the contribution of negation to LF. Root dative-infinitive clauses contain non-verificational general negation, which predicts the word order AUX NEG INF, cf. Х-u bylo ne dostat’. Negative and non-negative root dative-infinitive clauses correspond to three alethic modes ― external necessity, external impossibility, and contingency. Each of these modes is licensed by a specific combination of grammatical features responsible for the interaction of Mood, Aspect, Tense, and Polarity and reflects the ordering of these functional categories in the clausal structure. The Logical Form of root dative-infinitive clauses contains a silent operator of strong modal force and blocks the expression of weak modality (possibility). In the middle section, I discuss the perspective of identifying grammar-oriented approaches with logical atomism, and lexicon-oriented approaches with logical holism.