Relevance, Assertion and Possible Worlds: A Cognitive Approach to the Spanish Subjunctive

This paper puts forward an analysis of the indicative/subjunctive contrast in Spanish, according to which the difference between the two moods is explained in terms of the former, but not the latter, being apt for the presentation of propositions as premises to be used in the derivation of implicatures. In terms of the theoretical framework employed - Sperber and Wilson's Relevance Theory this amounts to the claim that the indicative is characterised by the ability to present a proposition as relevant in its own right. This proposal is shown to account for the presence of the subjunctive in a wide range of linguistic environments and to explain its sensitivity to information-structure concerns, thereby shedding light on both its truth-conditional and non-truth-conditional contribution to utterance interpretation.