On the information status of appositive relative clauses

Existing semantic theories of appositive relative clauses (ARCs) assume that ARCs contribute asserted but not at-issue content (Boer & Lycan [4], Bach [3], Chierchia & McConnell-Ginet [5], Potts [13], AnderBois et al. [2], Murray [12]). In this paper I demonstrate that the information status of ARCs depends on their linear position in the clause: clause-medial ARCs are not at-issue whereas clause-final ARCs can behave like regular at-issue content. I propose a uniform one-dimensional semantics under which ARCs are conjuncts that can acquire at-issue status if the issue raised by the main clause has been terminated. The idea is formally implemented in Dynamic Predicate Logic (Groenendijk & Stokhof [9]) enriched with propositional variables (AnderBois et al. [2]).