Zero or null anaphora is another name for what phenomenon?

• A. Pronoun-dropping
• B. Ellipsis
• C. Coreference
• D. Cataphora

Answer: (A)

Zero or null anaphora describes omitting a pronoun when the meaning is recoverable from the verb form or prior discourse. In languages that drop pronouns (pro-drop languages), the verb's ending already marks person and number, so saying the pronoun would be redundant. For example, in Spanish you can say hablo to mean “I speak,” with the first-person subject implied by the verb ending. This omission of an overt pronoun is exactly pronoun-dropping, the phenomenon referred to by zero/null anaphora.

This isn’t about ellipsis in general (omission of part of a clause), nor about cataphora (a forward reference to something later in the text), nor about coreference (the relationship between two mentions of the same entity). The focus here is on the ordinary omission of a pronoun because the reference can be recovered from the verb and context.