Givennesswhat

Givennesswhat is a term used in linguistics and philosophy of language to describe a framework for analyzing what counts as given information in discourse, focusing specifically on the content or "what" that is presumed accessible to interlocutors rather than merely whether a referent is mentioned repeatedly. It aims to supplement traditional notions of givenness by emphasizing not just referents but the shared content that speakers treat as part of common ground.

Origin and usage: The term is a neologism in theoretical discussions and has no single canonical origin. It appears in cross-disciplinary debates on information structure, pragmatics, and discourse analysis in the 2010s and after, often as a label for analyses that foreground the givenness of content or propositions rather than solely lexical references.

Conceptual framework: Givennesswhat seeks to identify which elements of discourse are treated as given in terms of the content itself, not just in terms of continuity or remention. It complements notions of given/new, topic-comment, and background knowledge by asking what content is assumed to be shared or recoverable from context, including implicit assumptions, routine knowledge, and pragmatic cues. The approach stresses dynamic, context-sensitive assessment and acknowledges variation across speakers and situations.

Applications: In discourse analysis, givennesswhat can inform coherence assessment and reference resolution by tracing how participants align on "what" is already known. In natural language processing, it can guide modeling of shared knowledge and generate references that are contextually appropriate given the inferred givenness of content.

Critiques: The concept faces challenges in clear operationalization, cross-linguistic applicability, and potential overlap with established ideas of common ground without precise criteria.

See also: givenness, information structure, topic and focus, common ground, pragmatics, discourse analysis.