Overt and covert modality in generic sentences

The paper intends to explain the ability of singular indefinite generic sentences (ISs - A lion has a mane, An Italian restaurant is closed on Monday) to express both definitional and accidental generalizations, without resorting to rules as primitive entities nor to normality conditions. Our modal analysis exploits the Lewisian notion of aboutness and introduces a parameter for respects, relativizing truth to sets of propositions, varying according to contexts and speakers. From here, we derive the preferred correlation between ISs and definitional statements, appealing to the ban of facts as a resource for respects. The modal semantics designed here explains how the observed restrictions of uses cope with singularity (vs plural definite generic sentences) and allows us to advance the hypothesis that IS are permeable to accidentality as a method of attribution of the property to the target entity rather than as a characterization of property itself.