THE GRAMMAR OF FRENCH QUANTIFICATION
Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory VOLUME 83
Managing Editors Marcel den Dikken, City University of New York Liliane Haegeman, University of Ghent, Belgium Joan Maling, Brandeis University Editorial Board Guglielmo Cinque, University of Venice Carol Georgopoulos, University of Utah Jane Grimshaw, Rutgers University Michael Kenstowicz, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Hilda Koopman, University of California, Los Angeles Howard Lasnik, University of Maryland Alec Marantz, Massachusetts Institute of Technology John J. McCarthy, University of Massachusetts, Amherst Ian Roberts, University of Cambridge
For further volumes: http://www.springer.com/series/6559
THE GRAMMAR OF FRENCH QUANTIFICATION
by
Lena Baunaz University of Geneva, Switzerland
13
Lena Baunaz University of Geneva Department of Linguistics 5, rue de Candolle 1211 Geneva Switzerland
[email protected]
ISSN 0924-4670 ISBN 978-94-007-0620-0 e-ISBN 978-94-007-0621-7 DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0621-7 Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York Library of Congress Control Number: 2011921709 # Springer ScienceþBusiness Media B.V. 2011 No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher, with the exception of any material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer ScienceþBusiness Media (www.springer.com)
Acknowledgments
‘One of the first things people read when they have between their hands a new book, is the acknowledgements’, one of my colleagues said. I craved to be at this stage of the book where the form and contents would be finally over and the time to write the famous acknowledgements has finally arrived. Yet, I didn’t think of the difficulty of the task. I owe an immense debt of gratitude to many colleagues and friends, for direct or indirect help in preparing this book. I hope I won’t forget anyone. I owe an immense debt of gratitude to Genoveva Puska´s with whom I had the chance to work. Her support and constant encouragements are very important to me. She deserves to be thanked for her patience and collaboration. Thanks also for the very insightful remarks. Many syntacticians have contributed to make this book as it is, by providing helpful discussions and feedback at various stages of the writing: particular thanks go to Ur Shlonsky for helpful and detailed remarks, as well as for his encouragements. I am very much indebt to Marcel den Dikken for very sharp live discussions, as well as for various on-line exchanges. His enthusiasm has been fruitful for my work, as well as very insightful. I would also like to thank Eric Mathieu: I came across his Ph.D dissertation one day of surfing the net and it was highly inspiring as well as decisive for the topic of the present book. Many thanks to Luigi Rizzi: his teaching, as well as his work on locality have a major influence on the present study. Special thanks also to two anonymous reviewers. The shape of the book owes them a lot and I am very grateful for their productive comments. I would so like to thank my fellow linguists at the University of Geneva. More particularly, I would like to thank Christopher Laenzlinger, with whom I was lucky enough to share an office for 6 years. This work has also benefited from stimulating discussions with other linguists of the department, notably Antoine Auchlin, Anamaria Bentea, Bruno Cartoni, Greg Ellison, JP Gold´ man, Eric Haeberli, Tabea Ihsane, Goljihan Kashaeva, Antonio Leoni de Leon, Sebastien L’Haire, Paola Merlo, Paola Minen, Jacques Moeschler, Lorenza Russo, Sandra Schwab, Gabi Soare, Alain The´riault, Eszter Varga and Eric Wehrli. Special thanks to Claire Forel, Eric Haeberli, Genoveva Puska´s and Stephanie Tame-Du¨rlemann for proof-reading the manuscript. As for the
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Acknowledgments
atmosphere on the 7th floor, I am very grateful to Eva Capitao for her unconditional help and kindness. This research was partly supported by three FNS (Fonds National Suisse) grants: n8 1114-064985, n8 PBGE1-111239, n8 PBGEP1-123702. I had the opportunity to spend 10 months at NYU, where I benefited from a very motivating and stimulating intellectual environment. I would like to warmly thank Anna Szabolcsi for spending long hours talking about semantics and some of my work in her office, as well as Richard Kayne. My greatest thanks go to Aria Adli, with whom I had the chance to talk a lot about wh-phrases in-situ in French. Many thanks to some of the former Ph.D students there in 2006: Rahul Balusu, Jonathan Brennan, Andrea Cattaneo, Tom Leu, Lisa Levinson, Marcos Rohena-Madrazo, Kevin Roon, Oana Sa˘vescu Ciucivara, Jason Shaw, Wing Mei (Amy) Wong and Eytan Zweig. I would like to thank Marcel den Dikken, as well as the CUNY Ph.D students of that time: David Haase, Alexia Ioannidou, Rachel Szekely, Erika Troseth and Chris Warnasch. When preparing the final version of this manuscript, I benefited greatly from spending a year in Paris 7/ CNRS UMR 7110, where I could extend and improve most of the ideas first developed in my dissertation. There, I was lucky enough to meet and work with Ce´dric Patin, who helped me verify the main hypothesis of my dissertation through an experiment. His insight was very important as he challenged me with lots of tricky comments on the semantics of questions. Special thanks to Elisabeth Delais-Roussarie, Jean-Marie Marandin and Claire Beyssade for very insightful discussions on the semantic and prosodic sides of French quantifiers. I would like to thank also Me´lanie Jouitteaux, Frederic Laurens and Hiyon Yoo for very subtle comments and discussions. This book would be very different without all their help. I would like to add to this list various linguists with whom I also had the opportunity to talk about quantification at various stages of this work, during conferences or colloquia: Maya Arad, Boban Arsenijevic´, Noureddin Elouazizi, Donka Farkas, Liliane Haegeman, Johan Rooryck, Martin Salzmann, Hubert Truckenbrodt. I want to specially thank Michal Starke, for the time passed in Geneva doing linguistics and taking time off chez Gaston with the Trio Infernal, which I belonged to, with Gabriel Lobos and Tom Leu, back in 2000. This thesis has benefited from the input data and grammaticality judgements of many people, linguists as well as non-linguists, mostly French speakers, but also English, German, Italian and Spanish speakers. I would like to thank them all. I wish to thank all my friends for their unconditional support over the years. More particularly I am eternally thankful to Frederic ‘Frikki’ Anna (Jæjæ, ´ ur stra´kur og otrulega ´ ´ ur vinur! takk takk!), Tom Frikki minn, þu´ ert goð goð Leu and Oscar Diaz. I also warmly thank Viviane Cattin, Sophie Ga¨llno, ¨ Christophe Lecomte, Claire Duchesne, Pascal Noirot, Laetitia Phialon, Aure´lien Pignaud, Michael Ro¨ osli, Anne Schiffmann, Selja Seppa¨la¨, Hafru´n ¨ ´ Stefa´nsdottir and Sylvain Debreyne.
Acknowledgments
vii
Lastly, I would like to thank my family, for their eternal support. I am very grateful to Michel and Matthieu for trusting me. Thanks to Squweaky who gives me love and encouragements. My dearest and warmest thanks are for this fabulous woman who always managed to support and encourage me, in all the domains of my life, that is, my mother.
Contents
1
Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1.1 Proposal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1.2 Outline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1 1 1 13 14
2
Split-DPs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.1 Wh-Questions in French . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.2 Wh In-situ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.3 Split-DPs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.4 Existential Qs in French . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.5 The Internal Structures of wh and Existential un Ns. . . . 2.1.6 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
17 17 20 33 56 75 89 97 98
3
Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1 Introduction: Floating Quantification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.1 Universal Quantifiers: Basic Facts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.2 Two Types of Universal Quantifiers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.3 Floating Quantifiers (FQs): Doetjes 1997, Fitzpatrick 2006. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.4 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
103 103 104 112 131 140 141
N-Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1 Introduction: N-Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.1 French Negation: An Overview. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.2 Monotonicity: pas un N vs. pas tous les N . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.3 The Negative Status of N-Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.4 French N-Words and Universal Quantifiers . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.5 A Typology of N-Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
145 145 147 152 170 176 186
4
ix
x
Contents
4.1.6 The Structure of N-Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.7 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
187 198 198
5
Intervention Effects Revisited. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.1 Locality Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.2 Redefining the Feature-Class of Qs: Strength . . . . . . . . . 5.1.3 Strong Islands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.4 Remaining Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.5 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
203 203 205 211 228 232 234 234
6
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1.1 Chapter 2: Split-DPs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1.2 Chapters 3 and 4: Floating Quantifiers (FQs). . . . . . . . . 6.1.3 Strength . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2 Perspectives. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
237 237 238 240 242 243 247
Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Appendix 1 (to Chapter 4) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Appendix 2 (to Chapter 4) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
251 251 252
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
255
Abbreviations
AP B&S CI cl. ClLD CS C&R D, DR, S Det(s) D-linking DN D-S&B 2004 E-E 2002 eWI FI F0 FQ GQ LF LI NC NSC Op PF PI PL P&P Q(s) QL QM QR R, D and R 2002 RM
articulatory-perceptual Beghelli and Stowell 1997 Conceptual-intentional Clitic Clitic-left-dislocation Computational system Cheng and Rooryck 2000 Doetjes, Delais-Roussarie and Sleeman 2002 Determiner(s) Discourse-linking Double negation Dobrovie-Sorin and Beyssade 2004 Etxepare-Etxebarria 2002 extraction out of weak island Full interpretation Fundamental frequency Floating quantifier Generalized quantifiers Logical form Lexical items Negative concord Non-standard colloquial French Operator Phonological form Polarity item Pair-list Principles and parameters Quantifiers Quantifier lowering Quantifier movement Quantifier raising Rialland, Doetjes, and Rebuschi 2002 Relativized minimality xi
xii
SC SCO SI SP WCO WI UG y/n 8Q 9Q : \ [
Abbreviations
Standard colloquial French Strong-cross-over Strong island Single-pair Weak-cross-over Weak island Universal grammar Yes-no Universal quantifier Existential quantifier Negative operator Intersection Union
Chapter 1
Overview
1.1 Introduction 1.1.1 Proposal Set within the Chomskyan tradition, this book provides a typology of French Quantifiers (Qs, i.e. scope-bearing elements), based on their syntactic, semantic and prosodic behaviors.1 More specifically, the main issues are to investigate their nature(s), their meaning(s), as well as the dependency(ies) they enter into. Following the observation made by Beghelli 1995 and Szabolcsi 1997 (a.o) that the scope of Qs is not uniform, I argue that they fall into two classes: Qs involving Split-DP behaviors and Qs involving FQ behaviors. I show that part of the non-uniformity of Qs is due to structural causes: Qs with a split-DP behavior give rise to different scope patterns than Qs behaving like FQs. A Split-DP structure is characterized by movement of an operator (Op), which strands its restriction in-situ, (1). The FQ structure involves movement of the noun restriction past the lexical Op, as in (2): (1) Split-DP structure: Opi. . . [ti restriction]
(Obenauer 1994)
(2) Floating Quantifier structure: [restrictioni . . .[ Op ti. . .]] (Sportiche 1988) Qs such as combien de chaises ‘how many chairs’ and tous les garc¸ons ‘all the boys’ can overtly reflect (1) and (2), respectively. In (3b), the Op is moved away from its restriction (see Obenauer 1994, Mathieu 2002 a.o), while in (4b) it is left in-situ. (3) a.
Combien de chaises as-tu peint(e)s ? How many chairs have you painted.masc.pl/fem.pl ‘How many chairs did you paint?’
1 For the time being, I use the term ‘quantifier’ (Q) to refer to items that contribute to some quantity or amount meaning. It does not say anything about its syntactic structure (or category), which is developed in Chapters 2, 3 and 4.
L. Baunaz, The Grammar of French Quantification, Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 83, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0621-7_1, Ó Springer ScienceþBusiness Media B.V. 2011
1
2
1 Overview
b.
(4) a. b.
Combien as-tu peint(*es) de chaises? How many have you paint. masc. pl/*fem.pl of. chairs ‘How many chairs did you paint?’ Tous les garc¸ons ont lu un livre All the boys have read a book Les garc¸ons ont tous lu un livre the boys have all read a book
Split-DP and FQ constructions must be distinguished from other apparent similar constructions, such as a lot in English (5) and beaucoup in French (6): (5) a. b.
A lot of students like to relax on the weekends John goes to the movies a lot (Fitzpatrick 2006:142, (3))
(6) a.
Beaucoup de linguistes ont danse´ la salsa a-lot of linguists have danced the salsa ‘Many linguists danced the salsa’ Les linguistes ont beaucoup danse´ la salsa the linguists have a-lot danced the salsa ‘The linguists danced the salsa a lot’
b.
(Doetjes 1997)
The positions of beaucoup and a lot correspond to variations in meaning. When adjacent to the DP, it quantifies over individuals only, as in (6a). When not adjacent to the DP, it tells us something about the amount of salsa dancing and it quantifies over the VP (event), as in (6b) (see Doetjes 1997). This is totally compositional. In Split-DP and FQ structures, Qs quantify over their noun restrictions, i.e. over entities. This structural variation is puzzling, since at first sight, this is not semantically compositional. I limit my discussion to existential quantifiers (9Qs), wh-phrases, universal quantifiers (8Qs) and N(egative)-words. With the help of syntactic and semantics tests, I also show that wh-phrases have a feature composition similar to that of 9Qs, and that N-words resemble 8Qs. I only concentrate my analysis on a very limited set of Qs that select DPs as complements (i.e. excluding Q time adverbs, like beaucoup ‘a lot’, see Doetjes 1997 for an analysis), i.e. Qs that show Split-DPs and FQs. The point is that FQs and the Q in Split DPs range over individuals, and quantify over DPs, and never over VPs, as will be developed in Chapters 2, 3 and 4. I argue that while this splitting of the DP yields sentences that are truth-conditionally equivalent with respect to their canonical (unsplit) structure, they involve different presuppositions (Obenauer 1994); this is however not the case for the distinction between FQs and non-FQs. 1.1.1.1 Non-canonical Quantification The term canonical quantification describes the configuration of canonical quantificational sentences (7).
1.1 Introduction
(7) a. b.
3
Every cowboy is riding a cow. quantifier restrictive clause nuclear scope 8x [x is a cowboy][(9y) y is a cow ^ x is riding y]
Quantificational expressions are complex DPs, composed of a Det, its restriction and a nuclear scope (also called the tripartite structure).2 The restriction is the domain of quantification of that Q and it takes scope over the clause it belongs to. At LF, any quantified noun phrase like all men in (8) will have the canonical structure in (9), where Det is the Quantifier all, the restriction is the NP men (formally men (x)) and the scope is the predicate. (8) All men walk (9) Det (Q)– restriction – (nuclear) scope The traditional canonical quantificational structure of the tripartite framework is schematized in (10a). (10b) and (10c) schematize two instances of non-canonical quantification in which I am interested in this book, that is Split-DP and FQ. Typically non-canonical quantification occurs with quantificational sentences where Q and the restriction are not adjacent anymore. (10) a. b. c.
Canonical Quantification: Q– restriction – scope Non-Canonical Quantification (Split-DP): Q-scope-restriction Non-Canonical Quantification (FQ): restriction–Q – scope
Split-DPs Because Q and its restriction are split, Split-DP structures are typical instances of non-canonical quantification: the Q part quantifies over its non-adjacent restriction (DP), (11b). (11) a. b.
Combien de chaises as-tu peint(es) How many chairs have you painted.masc.pl/fem.pl Combien as-tu peint(*es) de chaises? How many have you paint. masc. pl/*fem.pl of. chairs ‘How many chairs did you paint?’
Semantically, the sentences in (11) have the same truth-conditions: Obenauer 1994 notes that there is a close link between the position of the restriction and the interpretation of the wh-phrase as a whole, and that the interpretation of the wh-phrase correlates with the presuppositional interpretation of how many chairs. The only difference between (11a) and (11b) is that the former presupposes that there is a set of chairs that you painted, whereas the latter does not carry such a presupposition. Obenauer 1992 also notes that unsplit 2
Originally Lewis 1975 bases the tripartite structure on adverbs of quantification.
4
1 Overview
constructions with past participle agreement are ‘specific’ (vs. split-constructions). He concludes that specificity arises with agreement. In (11a), the Q combien ends up in front of the clause together with its restriction DP de chaises: past participle agreement in gender/number arises and a set of specific chaises is presupposed. In (11b), de chaises stays in situ, while combien overtly moves. Neither past participle agreement, nor presupposition show up. Other languages display overt Split-DPs: Japanese (Watanabe 1992, Hagstrom 1998 and subsq.), Chinese (Cheng 1991), Sinahla (Hagstrom 2001), German (Beck 1996) and Hungarian (Lipta´k 2001). In Japanese, quantificational structures are built with overt particles binding a variable (Hagstrom 1998). These overt particles are operators, taking as their restriction an overt indefinite, dare. In (12a), ka quantifies non-canonically over dare and marks the clause interrogative; in (12b), mo non-canonically binds dare, and the Q is interpreted as a 8Q; in (12c), ka and dare are adjacent yielding an existential interpretation: (12) a.
b.
c.
Dare-ga ki-masu-ka who N come-Q ‘Who’s coming?’ Dare-ga ki-te mo, boku-wa aw-a-nai Who-N come Q I-T meet not ‘For all x, if x comes, I would not meet (x)’ Dare-ka-kara henna tagami-ga todoi-ta who Q from strange letter-N arrived ‘A strange letter came from somebody’
(Japanese)
(Cheng 1991:83, (65))
Dare ‘who’, then, is neither intrinsically interrogative, nor existential: rather it acts as a variable available for 9 (13b) and 8 (13c) to bind it (13)3: (13) a. b. c.
dare dare-ka dare-mo
‘who’ ‘someone’ ‘everyone’
(14) dare ¼ one (x)
(Watanabe 1992) (Japanese)
There are two options to account for the relation between ka/mo and dare in (12a,b). The variable and the particle are either generated together, as in (15) (Q-movement occurs, stranding the variable in-situ); or the Q-particle is merged 3 In that respect, Hungarian resembles Japanese (see Lipta´k 2001): the ki-item is the basis of the quantificational paradigm, (i):
(i) a. b.
ki vala-ki
‘who’ ‘someone’
c. d.
minden-ki aki
‘everyone’ ‘whorel’
1.1 Introduction
5
in C8, as in (16) (no movement is involved and Q binds an overt indefinite below in the structure). In Chapter 2, I will show that the two options are available in French. (15) [variable+Qwh]
C°
(Japanese)
(16) [variable]…
Qwh C°
(Japanese)
FQs FQ structures also involve non-canonical quantification, as in (17), with universal quantification (Kayne 1975, Sportiche 1988), and (18) with negation: (17) a. b. (18) a. b.
Juliette a chante´ toutes les chansons J. has sung all the songs Juliette les a toutes chante´es J. them has all sang Juliette a chante´ aucune chanson / des chansons J. has sang none song / of.the songs Juliette en a chante´ aucune J. cl. has sang none ‘Juliette sang none of them’
Here again, the DP restriction has been split from its quantificational part. 4 Note that with object related FQs, as in (17b) and in (18b), the direct object is obligatorily cliticized onto the finite verb, showing up as les or en, creating the schema in (2), repeated here as (19): (19)
[restrictioni
...
[ Op ti. . .]]
The literature on French Q-Floats can be divided up into two main approaches, which fall under either a syntactic (20a) or a semantic (20b) analysis. (20a) illustrates the adnominal approach (Sportiche 1988, Shlonsky
4
Kayne 1975 identifies a second type of FQ constructions, with Q preceding the restriction, (i):
(i)
Elle a tous voulu les lire She has all wanted them to-read ‘She wanted to read them all’
(Kayne 1975:4)
This type is discussed in Section 3.1.3, when referring to Doetjes’ analysis of FQ constructions, and can then be analysed as a pure case of FQ structure, (19).
6
1 Overview
1991, a.o), while (20b) is often referred to as the adverbial approach (see Bobaljik 2003, Doetjes 1997, Fitzpatrick 2006 a.o)5: (20) a. b.
[Les e´tudiants]i ont [ VP[tous ti] lu un livre] Les e´tudiants ont [VPtous [ VP lu un livre]]
In this book, I adopt Doetjes 1997, which unifies these two approaches. FQs are adnominal Qs adjoined to XPs, generally VPs. This analysis accounts for both adverbial and determiner-like properties of FQs. (21a) illustrates their internal structure; (21b) exemplifies the adjunction analysis (Doetjes 1997): (21) a. b.
FQ: [Q tous [DP pro]] [XP FQi [XP . . . eci. . .]]
(Doetjes 1997:202, (5))
The great advantage of this analysis is that both object and subject-related FQs are treated uniformly. This claim is motivated in Chapter 3. In the following sections I outline the major claims I make for the different Qs discussed in Chapters 2, 3 and 4. I propose that wh in-situ phrases and 9Qs have instances of Split-DPs, while 8Qs and N-words of FQs (see Baunaz 2008 for the premises of this latter idea). 1.1.1.2 Existential Presupposition Existential presupposition is the crucial notion developed throughout Chapter 2 and used in Chapters 3 and 4. This notion has been widely discussed in the literature to refer to various phenomena occurring with special types of noun phrases: among other things, wh-extraction out of weak islands (Pesetsky 1987, Obenauer 1994), French wh in-situ (Boeckx 1999, Mathieu 2002), wide scope indefinites (Milsark 1974, Fodor and Sag 1982, Enc¸ 1991, Diesing 1992, Farkas 2002, Ihsane 2008, . . .). Various names are supposed to cover this notion: wh-phrases are d-linked (Pesetsky 1987) or ‘presupposed’ (Boeckx 1999, Cheng and Rooryck 2000 a.o); dependant noun phrases like a(n)/some woman and a certain (i.e. indefinites as in Heim 1982, Abush 1994, Farkas 1994, Reinhart 1997, a.o) have the property of being ‘strong’, ‘referential’, ‘partitive’, ‘presuppositional’ or ‘speaker referential’ when they take wide scope (Milsark 1974, Fodor and Sag 1982, Enc¸ 1991, Diesing 1992, Farkas 2002, Ihsane 2008, respectively).6 Chapter 2 aims at understanding what these terms mean, and if they can be coalesced into one general concept, i.e. that of existential presupposition. I follow Starke 2001 and claim that there are two types of presupposed noun phrases (i.e. already introduced in the discourse): partitive and specific. 5 See Fitzpatrick 2006 for a non-uniform approach to the phenomenon: he argues that FQs are not all of the same type cross- (and inter-) linguistically. See also Chapter 3. 6 Cardinals, null Dets with bare nouns in English, partitives are also referred to as indefinites in the literature. In this section, I am only concerned with those mentioned in the main text.
1.1 Introduction
7
On the one hand, partitivity involves a subset of a previously mentioned group (it involves a finite set of alternatives; see also Enc¸ 1991). A partitive item is one of the objects in the world that the discourse makes reference to. In other words, the presupposition is that there is a predefined set. On the other hand, specificity-based noun phrases refers to familiar individuals only (i.e. they are identified via a known property). Based on this redefined concept of existential presupposition, I provide a finer typology of Qs, which can be each distinguished from type to type (wh-phrase vs. N-words, for instance) as well as inside one given type (partitive wh-phrases vs. specific wh-phrases, for instance). 1.1.1.3 Chapter 2 (Part 1): Wh-Phrases In-situ Four different kinds of languages are traditionally listed with respect to question formation in Natural languages: (i) languages like Chinese/Japanese which never show overt wh-movement (Huang 1982, Cheng 1991); (ii) languages like Hungarian whose wh-phrases must front (Lipta´k 2001); (iii) languages like English with compulsory movement of the wh-phrase. In case of multiple wh-phrases, only one must front, while the other(s) stay(s) in-situ; (iv) languages like French with mixed properties. Instead of obligatorily moving a wh-constituent (English), French has the option of leaving it in-situ (Chinese/Japanese), (22)7, 8: (22)
a. b.
Qui as-tu rencontre´? Who have you met Tu as rencontre´ qui? you have met whom
ex-situ in-situ
The distribution of wh in-situ as not been described in the literature in a homogenous way. The discussion is confusing, because the judgments given differ from one author to the next. For instance, a difference in the use of wh insitu is the possibility to embed them: (23)
7
tu penses qu’il a fait quoi? You think that he has done what ‘what do you think that he did?’
Echo-questions must be distinguished from information-seeking questions in (22a). Echoquestions are confirmation, or repetition-seeking questions ‘or ‘‘any question said in immediate response to an utterance which is surprising, deserving repetition, or which was in part not heard, or thought not to have been heard correctly,’’ ‘‘[. . .] or a showing of politeness, or concern, or an expression of surprise or disbelief, or the like,’’’ (Boeckx 1999:76). As such, echo-questions have a specific interpretation par excellence (Starke 2001). They have a particular prosody: they involve heavy stress of the wh in-situ (Mathieu 2002) or a ‘high þ rising echo intonation’ (Boeckx 1999: 76, see also Mathieu 2002), which is, as I will develop below, crucially different from what information-seeking questions trigger. 8 In standard normative ‘written’ French, wh-fronting is never an option: it is compulsory and wh in-situ is rejected. In spoken French however, both are used.
8
1 Overview
(23) is judged ungrammatical in Chang 1997, Boeckx 1999, Cheng and Rooryck 2000, Bosˇ kovic´ 2000, but perfectly grammatical in Starke 2001, Adli 2006 and Baunaz 2005. In this book, I describe judgments given by informants from the Geneva area (Switzerland), which correspond to those described by Starke 2001, Baunaz 2005 and Adli 2006. For expository purpose, I adopt the term Non-standard colloquial French (NSC henceforth) to refer to the dialect where non-root wh insitu constructions are fully grammatical (as opposed to standard colloquial French (SC French).9 I identify three different wh-phrases in-situ, each coming with its own syntax, semantics and prosody. A fall-rise intonation on a wh-phrase in-situ corresponds to a specific interpretation; a downfall (falling) intonation gives rise to a partitive reading and a rising/neutral to a non-presuppositional reading. I show that only specific wh phrases can extract out of weak islands, a fact noted in Starke 2001. I propose that (some) wh-phrases in-situ are instances of Split-DP structures (see also Mathieu 2002, to some respects). I argue that French wh-phrases are not intrinsically interrogative and that the qu-morpheme is not the morphological mark of the [þwh] operator (vs. Mathieu 2002). The data discussed in Chapter 2 suggest that French wh-phrases resemble Chinese/Japanese in various respects. Adopting Huang 1982’s view on Chinese, I propose that wh in-situ LF-move. I conclude that French wh-phrases are variables and get their interrogative strength via a phonologically null Opwh, just like the Japanese ka . . . dare relation in (12a) above (Hagstrom 1998). (24) is the internal structure of French wh-phrases: (24) [Opwh þ indefinite] Finally Intervention effects and other locality restrictions lead us to conclude that (24) is not the derived internal structure of wh-phrases in-situ. Based on overt cases of Split-DP constructions discussed in Obenauer 1994, I show that nonpresuppositional wh-phrases in-situ are covert Split-DPs (vs. Mathieu 2002), (25): (25)
C°…
[indefinite - Qwh]
9 This statement suggests a dichotomy between two ‘dialects’ of French, i.e. between that of Chang 1997 (a.o) on the one hand and that of Starke 2001, Adli 2006, on the other hand. That there are indeed ‘two dialects’ is not that clear: even if colloquial NSC French speakers can vary with respect to syntactic judgments (with both negative and scope islands), the variations are subtle and as such can be considered as one and a single dialect. As for SC French, the syntactic variations are less subtle and are clearly not homogenous (availability (or not) of wh in-situ with root infinitives, of modals etc), i.e. it should not be taken as a whole. My decision to split French into two dialects is not arbitrary, but relies on the stable observation that the in-situ strategy is or is not a root phenomenon for the authors discussed above. In Chapter 6, I suggest that the variations observed among speakers of different dialects is due to the way researchers tackle the phenomenon: in taking semantics and prosody into account or not.
1.1 Introduction
9
In the other two configurations, only covert movement of the whole complexDP applies. What seems to decide between wh in-situ, wh-movement and split-DP structures is related to (a) register (which I won’t discuss) and (b) interpretation.
1.1.1.4 Chapter 2 (Part 2): Existential Quantifiers The aim of Chapter 2 is also to provide an analysis of the French noun phrase un N, traditionally referred to as indefinite. Taking into account syntax, semantics, and prosody, I provide a new and more detailed characterization of this item, arguing for a three way occurrence. I use the term ‘existential’ to refer to DPs like un N ‘a/some N’, under its non-numeral use. I show that un N is interpreted as an indefinite coupled with an Op9, and that at LF some show canonical quantification at Spell-out, while others do not, i.e. resembling the internal structures of wh-phrases (see also Baunaz 2005 for a preliminary comparison).10 In both cases, the lexical Q and its semantic restriction may be split. An indefinite is generated with an Op that happens to be [þwh] in questions and [þ9] with 9Qs. I identify three classes of un Ns, each characterized by its own prosody, semantics, and syntax. (i) fall-rise 9Qs involve specificity; (ii) downfall 9Qs trigger partitivity and exhaustivity and (iii) neutral 9Qs non-presupposition. I show that only fall-rise 9Qs can be extracted out of weak (neg and scope) islands, and as such are not clause-bound, whereas downfall are and neutral 9Qs are stuck in this configuration. Interestingly, each 9Q has a correspondent wh in-situ, sharing its prosody, semantic, and syntax. I show that only nonpresuppositional 9Qs have Split-DP constructions, while specific and partitive 9Qs do not. Intervention facts, as well as a locality theory like RM also lead us to refine the internal structure of wh-phrases and 9Qs in the following way: (26) a. b. c.
[indefinite specific-Op9] [indefinite partitive-Op9] [indefinite] . . . Op9
(27) a.
[indefinite specific - Opwh]
b.
[indefinite partitive - Opwh]
c.
C°…
[indefinite - Qwh]
In Chapter 5, I arrive at a surprising conclusion: each type of noun phrases has a different structure, and the richer a Q is, the stronger it is and the more likely it moves. What we need to define is what ‘strong’ means and establish what moves. I propose that ‘strong’ means presupposition (specificity and 10
I characterize indefinites as variables bound by an Existential Operator (9) (Heim 1982).
10
1 Overview
partitivity) and I show that the two types have a strenghth distinction with respect to each other: specificity is ‘stronger’ than partitivity. Only non-presuppositional Qs show Split-DP structures, while presuppositional Qs move all along to check their semantic-syntactic features. Scope relationships between the different Qs can then be subsumed under Rizzi’s 2002 Relativized Minimality, modulo a slight modification of our definition of intervention. Something heavier blocks movement. In other words, specific noun phrases are less constrained than partitive noun phrases. 1.1.1.5 Chapter 3: Universal Quantifiers I focus on two 8Qs in French: chacun of-DPs ‘each of DP’ and tous DPs ‘all DP’, i.e. Qs that show overt FQ structures, (28).11 (28) a. b.
Les e´tudiants ont chacun re´ussi The students have each passed Les e´tudiants ont tous re´ussi the students have all passed
Chacun and tous must be distinguished from the distribution of two other genuine 8Qs: chaque ‘every’ and tout ‘all.sg’, whose distribution is that of D8, rather than spec, selecting NPs as complements, (29). Both quantify over their following NPs (vs. DPs), resembling every. Syntactically, both tout and chaque are singular. Tout agrees in gender with the following NP (30a); chaque does not (30b); they cannot follow demonstratives and articles, nor can they precede them either (31): (29) a. b. c. * (30) a. b. (31) a. b.
Chacun de [DP les e´tudiants] Each of the students tous [DP les e´tudiants] all the students Chaque/tout (de) [DP les e´tudiants] every /all (of) the students Toute femme est complique´e all. FEM.SG woman.FEM.SG is complicated Chaque femme est complique´e Each.SG woman.FEM.SG is complicated (*le/ce) tout (*le/ce) garc¸on (*the/this) all.MAS.SG (*the/this) boy (*le/ce) chaque (*le/ce) garc¸on (*the/this) each (*the/this) boy
11 Most of the influential works on French FQs focus on subject orientied tous ‘all’ (Kayne 1975, Sportiche 1988, Doetjes 1997 and Bobaljik 2003). Recently, Junker 1995, Kobuchi-Philip 2003 (and subsq.) and Fitzpatrick 2006 extend their analyses on FQ tous to FQ chacun ‘each’.
1.1 Introduction
11
Moreover Floating quantification is not found with chaque and tout, suggesting, that they behave differently from chacun and tous (note that under the completive reading (31b,c) with tout is ok): (32) a. b. * c. *
Chaque/ tout e´tudiant a re´ussi Each / tout student has passed L’e´tudiant a chaque / tout re´ussi the student has each / tout passed Les e´tudiants ont chaque/tout re´ussi the students have each / all.sg passed
Since only tous and chacun can float, I will mainly focus on the distinction between these two, leaving chaque aside.12 I claim that these 8Qs do not distinguish existential presupposition through prosody: the difference is lexical. Using the distinction established above between partitivity and specificity, I show that chacun is intrinsically specific, while tous is partitivity-based. And indeed, turning to the intonation of 8Qs, it becomes obvious that prosody does not produce the same interpretive effects that it does on 9Qs/wh-phrases in-situ. 12
A reviewer points out that the arguments to leave chaque out of the discussion vanishes once English each is taken into account. Her remark lies on the fact that each floats, yet it does not take DP complements, each the student being ungrammatical. At first sight, this remark is relevant. Once we look in more details at the distribution of English each, things look more complex, yet. Puska´s 2002 shows that each appears to have a mixed behavior, with a distribution varying from chaque to chacun: when each floats, its associate is a plural DP ((ib) vs (iib)). More importantly, when it does not float, of is inserted if the nominal is a DP plural ((ia) vs. (iia)): (i) (ii)
a. b. a. b. *
Each of the architects should receive a prize. The architects should each receive a prize. Each architect should receive a prize. The architect should each receive a prize.
(Puska´s 2002: 124 (66)) (Puska´s 2002: 124 (64))
(i) and (ii) are is reminiscent of the distinction between chacun of-DP and chaque N: chacun takes a plural DP as its restriction (iii), while chaque a singular noun phrase (iv). only chacun can float: (iii)
a. b.
(iv)
a. b. *
Chacun des architectes a rec¸u un prix. each of-the architects has received a prize Les architectes ont chacun rec¸u un prix. the architects have each received a prize Chaque architecte a rec¸u un prix each architect has received a prize L’architecte a chaque rec¸u un prix. the architect has each received a prize
(Puska´s 2002: 124 (65))
(Puska´s 2002: 123 (63))
These data suggest that each comes in two flavors: as a potential FQ (and as such takes the ofDP complement and corresponds to chacun), or as a determiner of the chaque-type (and as such, cannot float). Since English each is no more a counterexample to the arguments put forward above, leaving out chaque from the discussion is justified. For more details, see Puska´s 2002.
12
1 Overview
1.1.1.6 Chapter 4: Negation and N-Words The last type of argument Qs I am interested in is N-words. Two main issues arise as to their nature: (i) their negative status; (ii) their quantificational status (9 or 8). The first issue is related to the negative status of French N-words. In the syntactic literature, N-words are taken to express sentential negation, involving movement to the specifier of NegP (i.e. satisfying the Neg Criterion, see Zanuttini 1991, Haegeman and Zanuttini 1991, Haegeman 1995, a.o). On the one hand, there are reasons to claim that French N-words are semantically negative (de Swart and Sag 2002). Yet, this claim raises the issue of the compositionality of meaning: French has both Negative Concord (NC) and Double Negation (DN) readings (see De´prez 1997, 2000, 2003, Corblin and Tovena 2003, and more particularly de Swart and Sag 2002 who treat this issue within the polyadic quantifier framework). One can relate to this the problem the status of the bare negative operator, pas ‘not’, within the negative system (see de Swart and Sag 2002 in particular). On the other hand, nothing indicates that these words are morphologically negative in French. The French paradigm does not show any morphological coherence. A fact not shared by strict NC languages, such as Italian (see De´prez 2003). Personne, aucun and rien are morphologically distinct from one another and from the bare negative operator pas ‘not’. Hence being morphologically negative is not a necessary condition to be semantically (or inherently) negative (De´prez 2003).13 The second issue addressed is that of the quantificational status of N-words. Negative sentences containing them can logically be translated by two (truth conditionally) equivalent formulae: (33a), in which : scopes over 9; (33b), in which 8 scopes over :. (33) a. b.
:9x [P(x) ^ Q(x)] 8x [P(x) !:Q(x)]
(Existential negation) (Universal negation)
According to (33), N-words are composed of a negative operator plus either 9Q to its right or 8Q to its left. Based on (i) various tests elaborated by Zanuttini 1991 for Italian and Giannakidou 1999 for Greek, (ii) the typology of 9Qs and 13
This statement can be shown with other languages: in (i), the negative meaning is not morphologically marked (from Marcel den Dikken (p.c)): the negative semantics of the sentences in (i) are not due to morphological ‘negative’ marks: in (ia), n’t is not necessary to convey the negative meaning of the sentence; (ib) means ‘I do not care at all’ and in the Dutch example in (ic) de ballen ‘the balls’ turns the positive sentence negative when inserted. (i) a. b.
I could(n’t) care less what do I care?! Ik snap er de ballen van I understand there the balls of ‘I do not understand it at all’
(Dutch)
1.1 Introduction
13
8Qs elaborated in Chapters 2 and 3, and on (iii) Aristotle’s square of opposition (more particularly on the constructions involving the overt negative operator pas þ an adjacent Q (unemphasized un N ‘a N’ and unemphasized tous les N ‘all the N’)), I argue that personne ‘nobody’, rien ‘nothing’, aucun DP ‘no DP’ are each construed with a 8 of some sort scoping over negation with either overt, or covert instances of FQs. My analysis takes into account syntax, semantics, and prosody and brings up a new view on French N-words, as well as a new typology of 8Qs. The distinctions we are drawing show that Qs that prosodically distinguish between presupposition and non-presupposition involve Split-DP structures, which cannot be said for those who do not: with 8Qs and N-words, specificity/ partitivity are lexically encoded. Only specific and, partitive [þ/ neg] 8Qs can float.
1.1.2 Outline The focus of this study is the relationship between structure and interpretation. The aim is to determine how much syntax interacts with semantic systems. The answer is in line with recent works on that topic (Ihsane 2008 in particular). There is a lot of interaction, suggesting a close syntax-semantics mapping. The perspective in which this project sits is global, in that it meets a phenomenon (French quantification) from three different points of view: syntax, semantics and prosody. It gathers form, meaning and sound at the same time. I develop the semantic and syntactic aspects of Quantificational items in French and focus on wh-phrases, 9Q, 8Q, N-words, on the logical operator pas ‘not’. Formal aspects of Qs are kept to the minimum, though. This study yields a new typology of these elements. The (internal and external) syntax, semantics and prosody of Quantifiers (Qs) permit to distinguish and identify them with two well-defined non-canonical structures: Split-DPs and Floating Quantifiers (FQs).14 The Minimalist hypothesis being that optionality has to be motivated, the issue of the possible interpretations of Qs arises. Two points are raised in this book with respect to this issue: scope ambiguities and the optionality between wh-fronting and wh in-situ. Languages display various strategies to resolve ambiguities. Hungarian exhibits overt word order variations for each interpretation (Szabolcsi 1997, Puska´s 2000, a.o), while French is a strict language which does not permit overt multiple orders. The availability of wh in-situ and of scope ambiguities must be explained. I show that both are context-dependant and can (partially) be resolved through prosody in French. Hence ambiguities do not formally exist in French. 14
The term ‘external’ syntax is used to refer to syntactic operations at the level of the clause. ‘Internal’ syntax refers to operations occurring within a DP.
14
1 Overview
Qs are introduced in Chapters 2, 3 and 4. In Chapter 2 I focus on wh-phrases and 9Qs. I show the different syntactic, semantic and prosodic behaviors they display. On the basis of a redefined concept of existential presupposition, I provide finer distinctions among wh-phrases on the one hand, and among 9Qs on the other. I argue that each type of Qs (wh and 9) involves three distinct instances of the same segmental representation: qui ‘who’ has three different instances, just like un N. Each instance of qui corresponds to an instance of un N: a fall-rise (specific) Q, a downfall (partitive) Q and a neutral/rising (nonpresuppositional) Q. Based on this empirical parallelism, I argue that each type of Qs is composed of an indefinite and an Operator and might display a SplitDP structure. In Chapter 3, I focus on 8Qs and FQs and show that they are best analyzed as adnominal Qs adjoined to a maximal projection (Doetjes 1997). In Chapter 4, I discuss N-words and NPIs. I claim that N-words are universal negative Qs and that NPIs are indefinites. Because N-words successfully pass the tests for negativity discussed in Zanuttini 1991 (a.o) for Italian, I claim that they are negative (see also Mathieu 2002); because they successfully pass the tests for Universality discussed in Zanuttini 1991 for Italian and Giannakidou 2000 for Greek (see also Corblin et al 2004), I claim that they are universal (8).They involve : that takes phrasal scope over an (overt or null) argument DP, and 8, adjoined to XP. N-words are complex DPs. I argue that N-words do not involve splitting (contra Mathieu 2002), rather their internal structures and syntactic behaviors are similar to FQs. Further support for treating N-words as 8Qs is that they display overt FQ structures, where the restriction is cliticized onto the finite verb, leaving the Q in-situ. Under this view, N-words involve FQ structures, a` la Doetjes. The illusion of being covert only depends on what is lexicalized. This leads to the conclusion that the similar behavior of 8Qs and Nwords sets them apart from Split-DP constructions, as a result of their internal structure. Based on the results obtained, I discuss Q interactions and show that RM constrains their behavior (Chapter 5).
References Abush, Dorit. 1994. The scope of indefinites. Natural Language Semantics 2:83–135. Adli, Aria. 2006. French wh-in-situ questions and syntactic optionality: Evidence from tree data types. Zeitschrift fu¨r Sprachwissenschaft 25:163–203. Baunaz, Lena. 2005. The syntax and semantics of wh in-situ and existentials: The case of French. Leiden Working Papers in Linguistics 2.2. 1–27. Baunaz, Lena. 2008. Floating quantifiers: french universal quantifiers and N-words. In Selected Proceedings of the 34th Incontro di Grammatica Generativa, Special Issue of the Rivista di Grammatica Generativa, vol. 33. P. Beninca˛, F. Damonte and N. Penello (eds.). Padova: Unipress. Beck, Sigrid. 1996. Quantified structures as barriers for LF-movement. Natural Language Semantics 4:1–56. Beghelli, Fillipo. 1997. The syntax of distributivity and pair-list reading. In Ways of Scope Taking, Anna Szabolcsi (ed.), 349–408. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
References
15
Bobaljik, Jonathan. 2003. Floating quantifiers: Handle with care. In The Second Glot International State-of-The-Article Book, Lisa Cheng and Rint Sybesma (eds.), 107–148. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Boeckx, Ce´dric. 1999. Decomposing French questions. In University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics 6.1, Proceedings of the 23rd Annual Penn Linguistics Colloquium, J. Alexander, N.R. Han and M. Minnick Fox (eds.), 69–80. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania. Bosˇ kovic´, Zeljiko. 2000. Sometimes in SpecCP, sometimes in-situ. In Step by Step: Essays on Minimalism in Honor of Howard Lasnik, Roger Martin, David Michaels and Juan Uriagereka (eds.), 53–87. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Chang, Lisa. 1997. Wh-in situ in French. MA thesis, University of British Colombia. Cheng, Lisa. 1991. On the Typology of Wh-questions. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT. Distributed by MIT Working Papers in Linguistics. Cheng, Lisa and Johann Rooryck 2000. Licensing wh-in-situ. In Syntax 3 (1):1–19. Corblin, Francis and Lucia Tovena 2003. L’expression de la ne´gation dans les langues romanes. In Les langues romanes: proble`mes de la phrase simple, Danie`le Godard (ed.), 279–341. Paris: CNRS Editions. Corblin, Francis, Vivian De´prez, Henriette de Swart and Luci Tovena. 2004. Negative concord. In Handbook of French Semantics, Francis Corblin and Henriette de Swart (eds.), 427–461. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications. De´prez, Viviane. 1997. Two Types of Negative Concord. Probus 9:103–143. De´prez, Viviane. 2000. Parallels (A)symmetries and internal structure of negative expressions. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 18:253–342. De´prez, Viviane. 2003. Concordance ne´gative, syntaxe des mots-N et variation dialectale. Cahier de Linguistique Franc¸aise 25:97–118. Diesing, Molly. 1992. Indefinites. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Doetjes, Jenny. 1997. Quantifiers and Selection. On the Distribution of Quantifying Expressions in French, Dutch and English. Doctoral dissertation, HIL, Leiden University. The Hague: HAG. Enc¸, Mu¨rvet. 1991. The semantics of specificity. Linguistic Inquiry 22:1–25. Farkas, Donka. 1994. Specificity and scope. In Langues et Grammaires 1, Lea Nash and George Tsoulas (eds.), 119–137. Paris: Universite Paris. Farkas, Donka. 2002. Specificity distinctions. Journal of Semantics 19:1–31. Fitzpatrick, Justin Michael. 2006. Syntactic and Semantic Routes to Floating Quantification. Doctoral dissertation, MIT, Cambridge, MA. Fodor, Jerry and Ivan Sag. 1982. Referential and quantificational indefinites. Linguistics and Philosophy 5:355–398. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 1999. Affective dependencies. Linguistics and Philosophy 22:367–421. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 2000. Negative concord and the scope of universals. Transactions of the Philological Society 98:87–120. Haegeman, Liliane. 1995. The Syntax of Negation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Haegeman, Liliane and Raffaela Zanuttini. 1991. Negative heads and the Neg criterion. The Linguistic Review 8:233–251. Hagstrom, Paul. 1998. Decomposing Questions. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT. Distributed by MIT Working Papers in Linguistics. Hagstrom, Paul. 2001. Particle movement in Sinhala and Japanese. In Clause Structure in South Asian Languages, Veneeta Dayal and Anoop Mahjan (eds.). Dordrecht: Kluwer. Heim, Irene. 1982. The Semantics of Definite and Indefinite Noun Phrases. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts. Huang, James. 1982. Move WH in a language without WH movement. The Linguistic Review 1:369–410.
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1 Overview
Ihsane, Tabea. 2008. The Layered DP. Form and Meaning of French Indefinites. Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 124. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Junker, Marie-Odile. 1995. Syntax et se´mantique des quantifieurs flottants tous et chacun. Distributivite´ en se´mantique conceptuelle. Gene`ve: Librairie Droz. Kayne, Richard. 1975. French Syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Kobuchi-Philip, Mana. 2003. Distributivity and the Japanese Floating Numeral Quantifier. Ph.D. dissertation. City University of New York. Lewis, David. 1975. Adverbs of quantification. In Formal Semantics of Natural Language, Edward Keenan (ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lipta´k, Aniko. 2001. On the Syntax of Wh-items in Hungarian. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Leiden. Mathieu, Eric. 2002. The Syntax of Non-Canonical Quantification: A Comparative Study. Doctoral dissertation, University College London. Milsark, Gary. 1974. Existential Sentences in English. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT, published in 1979. New York-London: Garland. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1992. L’interpre´tation des structures-wh et l’accord du partiticipe passe´. In Structure de la Phrase et The´orie du Liage, Hans-Georg Obenauer and Anne Zribi-Hertz (eds.), 169–195. Saint-Denis: Presses Universitaires de Vincennes. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1994. Aspects de la Syntaxe A-Barre. The`se de Doctorat d’Etat, Universite´ de Paris VIII. Pesetsky, David. 1987. Wh-in-situ: Movement and unselective binding. In The Representation of (In)definites, Eric Reuland and Alice ter Meulen (eds.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Puska´s, Genoveva. 2000. Quantification in the left periphery: A syntactic argument for ‘split’ domains. In CLS 36, Volume 1: The Main Session, John Boyle, Jung-Huyck Lee and Arika Okrent (eds.). Chicago Linguistic Society: Chicago. Puska´s, Genoveva. 2002. Floating quantifiers: What they can tell us about the syntax and semantics of quantifiers. GG@G 3:105–128. Reinhart, Tanya. 1997. Quantifier scope. How labour is divided between QR and choice functions. Linguistics and Philosophy 20:335–397. Rizzi, Luigi. 2002. The Structure of CP and IP. The Cartography of Syntactic Structures. Oxford-New York: Oxford University Press. Shlonsky, Ur. 1991. Quantifiers as functional heads: A study of quantifier float in Hebrew. Lingua 84:159–180. Sportiche, Dominique. 1988. A Theory of floating quantifiers and its corrolaries for constituent structure. Linguistic Inquiry 19(3):425–449. Starke, Michal. 2001. Move Dissolves into Merge: A Theory of Locality. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Geneva. de Swart, Henriette and Ivan Sag 2002. Negation and negative concord in romance. Linguistics and Philosophy 25:373–417. Szabolcsi, Anna. 1997. Strategies for scope taking. In Ways of Scope Taking, Anna Szabolcsi (ed.). Dordrecht: Foris. Watanabe, Akira. 1992. Subjacency and S-structure movement of wh-in-situ. Journal of East Asian Linguistics 1:255–291. Zanuttini, Raffaela. 1991. Syntactic Properties of Sentential Negation: A Comparative Study of Romance Languages. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania.
Chapter 2
Split-DPs
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs The main topic of Sections 2.1.2 and 2.1.3, is wh in-situ constructions in French. Instead of obligatorily fronting a wh-phrase, French has the option of leaving it in-situ: (1)
a. b.
Qu’est-ce que tu as mange´ ? What is it that you have eaten T’as mange´ quoi? you have eaten what
ex-situ in-situ
Based on Starke’s 2001 description of wh in-situ, I discuss this construction and show that it empirically varies considerably from those usually described in the literature (Chang 1997, Cheng and Rooryck 2000 (C&R, henceforth), Boeckx 1999 (and subsq.) and Mathieu 2002, Bosˇ kovic´ 1998/ 2000). I identify three different wh in-situ, involving different syntax, semantics and prosody: (i) a fall-rise intonation on a wh in-situ corresponds to the specific interpretation (ii) a downfall (or falling) intonation gives rise to the partitive reading, and (iii) a rising intonation to the non-presuppositional reading. I show that only specific wh in-situ can extract from negative and strong Islands (SI) (Starke 2001, Baunaz 2005, Baunaz and Puska´s 2008). In Section 2.1.4, I discuss 9Qs. I show that un N can be declined into three different – yet morphologically identical, syntactic, semantic and prosodic objects. Each corresponding to the three wh-phrases discussed in Section 2.1.2.2 (see also Baunaz 2005 for a short preliminary comparison).
L. Baunaz, The Grammar of French Quantification, Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 83, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0621-7_2, Springer ScienceþBusiness Media B.V. 2011
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18
2 Split-DPs
In Section 2.1.5, I investigate the internal structures of each of these items. Since Abney 1987, it is admitted that DP is the extended projection of N. Minimally it has the following architecture, (2):
(2)
DP D’
Spec
NP
D° Spec
N’ N°
I assume that wh-phrases (qui ‘who’, quoi ‘what’, quel ‘which’) and 9Qs (un N ‘a N’) are full DPs of the type in (2), i.e. prenominal quel and un, behave like Dets, i.e. heads (D8): they cannot co-occur with other Dets (demonstratives, definite articles) and they agree in number and gender with their complement NP1: (3)
a. b. * c. *
(4)
a. b. * c. *
(5)
a. b. * c. *
Les/ces filles the. PL/these PL girls Les ces filles Ces les filles quelles filles which.FEM.PL girls.PL quelles ces filles which.FEM.PL these.PL girls. PL Ces quelles filles these. PL which.FEM.PL.girls. PL une fille a.FEM.SG girl. SG une cette fille a. FEM.SG this. FEM.SG girl. SG cette une fille this. FEM.SG a. FEM.SG girl. SG
Qs do not behave uniformly and the internal structures of wh-words and un Ns must be distinguished from that of 8Qs like tous ‘all’. Compare (3)–(5) to (6): (6)
(*ces/les) tous ces /les garc¸ons these/the all these/the boys Tous precedes demonstratives and definite articles, and cannot follow them. Another notable difference between wh-words, 9Qs on the one hand and 8Qs 1
I take wh-words like lequel ‘which one.MASC.SG’, laquelle ‘which one.FEM.SG’, lesquelle ‘which one.PL’ to be parallel in structure to standard wh-words, i.e. they are lexical heads in D.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
19
on the other is that only the latter can appear clause medially, resembling sentence medial adverbs, while still quantifying over DP-arguments only (the DP-subject les islandais), (7b) vs. (8b), (9b): (7)
a. b.
(8)
a. b. *
(9)
a. b. *
Tous les islandais ont lu la saga de Nja´ll-le-bruˆle´ all the Icelanders have read BRENNU-NJA´LS SAGA Les islandais ont tous lu la saga de Nja´ll-le-bruˆle´ the Icelanders have all read BRENNU-NJA´LS SAGA Quels islandais ont lu la saga de Nja´ll-le-bruˆle´? which Icelanders have read BRENNU-NJA´LS SAGA Islandais ont quels lu la saga de Nja´ll-le-bruˆle´? Icelanders have which read BRENNU-NJA´LS SAGA Un islandais a lu la saga de Nja´ll-le-bruˆle´ an Icelander has read BRENNU-NJA´LS SAGA Islandais a un lu la saga de Nja´ll-le-bruˆle´ Icelander has a read BRENNU-NJA´LS SAGA
In (7b), the restriction of the 8Q undergoes A-movement to the subject position, stranding the Q in situ (recall that FQ stands for floating quantifier): (10)
[YP restrictioni
...
[XP FQi [XP . . . eci. . .]]]
The Q ‘floats’ in a sentence medial position (see also Chapter 3, Section 3.1.3). Some Wh-phrases also display DP-splitting, yet not of the form shown in (7b): (11)
a. b.
(12)
Combien de livres Selja a lu? How many of.books S. has read Combien Selja a lu de livres? How many S. has read of.books
[YP Qi . . . [XP[DP eci restriction]]
In (11b), the Q is overtly moved to the specifier projection of a functional category, the restriction is left in-situ, as schematized in (12) (see Obenauer 1994, a.o). It is a Split-DP structure. Another notable difference between whphrases and 8Qs has to do with case theory. When a part of the DP is cliticized, split-DP structures involve partitive case (or genitive) (13b-c); FQs involve structural cases, (14)2: (13)
a.
Selja a lu un des articles Selja has read one of the articles
2 The term partitive is not used as a semantic term here, but as a morphological mark on a DP (i.e. case (en-cliticisation). I have nothing to say about case marking. See below for a different usage of that notion.
20
2 Split-DPs
b. c. (14)
a. b.
Selja en/* les a lu un Selja PART./ACC has read one Combien Selja en/*les a-t-elle lu? How many Selja PART./ACC has.cl.t.she read Selja a lu tous les articles Selja has read all the articles Selja les/*en a tous lu Selja ACC/PART has all read
The facts illustrated above show that 8Qs, wh-phrases and un Ns) display different internal and external syntax. Based on Giusti 1991, 1997 I propose that 8Qs are lexical heads external to the DP (see Chapter 3 for developments). From the wh and 9 data above, I conclude that wh-words and 9Qs are DPs, minimally consisting of a head Noun, having a DP representing its extended projection. Yet, because the DPs I am interested in display various meaning (specificity, partitivity, or something else) and because they are clearly quantificational (yielding a Q-variable relationship), I claim that the internal structures of theses phrases are more extended than (2) suggests (see Ihsane 2008 for un Ns).
2.1.1 Wh-Questions in French French has at least four strategies to form matrix questions with a wh-phrase (terminology from Boeckx 1999, see also C&R 2000): fronting, reinforced fronting (both are ex-situ), clefting and in-situ, as presented in (15): (15)
a. b. c. d.
Qu’ est-ce que tu as mange´? what EST-CE QUE you have eaten Qu’ as-tu mange´ ? What have you eaten C’est quoi que t’as mange´ ? It is what that you have eaten T’as mange´ quoi? you have eaten what
Reinforced fronting Fronting ¼ English Cleft in-situ ¼ Chinese, Japanese
In standard ‘written’ French, wh-fronting is compulsory (15a,b). As such, it resembles English. Spoken French has both fronting as well as the additional possibility of wh in-situ, (15d), resembling Chinese and Japanese. In spoken French, both ‘options’ are therefore available. Clefting is used in both registers. In what follows, a brief description of the introduced ‘options’ is presented.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
21
2.1.1.1 Wh-Fronting and Wh-Reinforced Fronting A productive way to form a wh-question in French is to front the wh-word to the left periphery of the clause3: (16)
a. b.
Qu’est ce que tu as achete´? What is it that you have bought Qu’as-tu achete´ ? what have you bought
(Reinforced fronting) (Fronting)
The wh-phrase in (16) involves informational (weak) focus. Weak focus is typically syntactically realized in wh-questions, where the non-(existential) presuppositional wh-phrase is fronted. It fills ‘a gap in the addressee’s knowledge without the exhaustive, contrastive or counter-assertive connotations of strong focus’ (Mathieu 2002:120, (119a)). Prosodically, C&R 2000 observe that wh-words in fronted constructions involve a non-raising intonation. This intonation must be distinguished from the rising intonation characterizing (i) wh in-situ and (ii) yes/no (y/n) questions (without est-ce que, C&R 2000: 4) (see Section 2.1.2, see also Baunaz and Patin 2009 for a different view). Semantically (16) are constituent questions that seek new information; the context is defined as a plausible range. Wh-fronting is mainly used in nonpresupposional contexts. A presupposed answer set is not expected to the question (see also Chang 1997, C&R 2000), (17): (17) Question : Answer :
Qu’est-ce que Marie a achete´? What est-ce que Marie has bought Nothing
(C&R 2000 : 4, (7))
It is standard to argue that wh-phrases are moved to the highest SpecCP in root questions. This book is not concerned with the difference between Qu’estce que and qu’. Following Rooryck 1994, I assume that est-ce que essentially realizes C8 in (16a), i.e. it is a complex Q-complementizer, while C8 is lexicalized by the auxiliary in (16b).
3 For space reasons, I will not be concerned with the option of inverting the finite verb with a subject clitic (vs. full DP subject) in wh-constructions in French, (ia) vs. (iia) :
(i)
a. b.
Qui as-tu vu? Who have you seen Qui t’as vu? Who you.cl. have seen
(ii)
a. * Who has M. seen b.
Qui a Mika vu? Qui Mika a-t-il vu ? Who M has–t-he seen
22
2 Split-DPs
Overt wh-movement shows Cross-over Effects: Strong Cross-Over (SCO) effects (18) and Weak Cross-Over (WCO) effects (19).4,5,6 (18)
*
Quii / Quel garc¸oni a-t-ili invite´ ti? Whom/ which boy has he invited
(19)
*
Quii / quelle fillei est-ce que sai me`re aime ti le plus? Who / which girl is it that her mother likes the most
They are also sensitive to superiority (20), as well as to weak islands (WIs), exhibiting the classical argument/adjunct asymmetry for wh-extraction out of weak islands (eWIs) (21) and (22).7,8 Note that fronted wh-arguments are easily 4 In the analysis of wh-question formation, the term Cross-over defines the constraint(s) on possible binding or coreference existing between particular phrases and pronouns (Postal 1971). Waswo 1972 distinguishes between SCO and WCO effects, based on the fact that speakers feel the restriction on binding stronger in the case of SCO structures, than in WCO. This divide is also supported by different types of A’-movements (see Rizzi 1990). Overt whmovement involves A’-movement. A’-movements (Wh-, focus-movements and topicalization) are sensitive to Strong Cross Over (SCO). Yet only wh- and focus-movements are sensitive to Weak Cross-Over, topics aren’t (i).
(i)
Jeani, sai me`re l’ invite J. her mother clresum invites
Under the idea that wh/focus are Operators, Lasnik and Stowell 1991 conclude that only [þQ]-movements are sensitive to WCO, and that topicalization is not [þQ]-movement. 5 In a crossover violation, the wh-phrase ‘crosses over’ a coreferential pronoun when it is fronted. If cross-over violations are reformulated relative to the position of the trace, they arise when a coreferential pronoun precedes the trace. The ungrammaticality of (19) is due to illegal overt wh-movement across a coindexed pronoun to its left. Under the assumption that wh-traces are [-pronominal, -anaphoric], they are subject to Principle C of Binding Theory, just like R-expressions. In (19), the trace is bound by the pronoun in subject position of the matrix clause, and as such, violates Principle C. 6 WCO violations arise when the pronoun precedes but does not c-command the trace. In (18), the object wh-phrase qui has ’crossed over’ sa, which is embedded in the subject position, creating a WCO violation. 7 Syntax restricts the order of appearance of wh-phrases in multiple root questions. The structurally upper wh-phrase is fronted while the structurally lower wh-phrase stays in-situ. Languages like English do not allow wh in-situ when only one wh is involved. In simple questions, the wh-word obligatorily moves to the highest SpecCP whose C8 contains a [þwh]. In (20b), movement of the object wh phrase is ungrammatical. Overt wh-movement is subject to Superiority effects. Superiority Violations can be circumvented, when the fronted whphrase is D(iscourse)-linked (Pesetsky 1987) (see section ‘‘Interpretations’’). 8 Islands are domains from which extraction is banned (Ross 1967). Weak Islands (WIs) block extraction of some (but not all) phrases (see Obenauer 1994, Mathieu 2002 and Starke 2001 for French); Strong Islands (SIs) are absolute blockers to extractions (see Cinque 1990, Szabolcsi and den Dikken 2003 a.o, see Starke 2001 for French). Prototypical WIs are wh and neg(ative) islands from which wh-extraction is not possible. A wh-island is created by an embedded sentence introduced by a wh-word; a neg island is created in a negative sentence from which a wh cannot be extracted. The impossibility of extraction out of SI has
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
23
extracted if existentially presuppoed (or d(iscourse)-linked as in Pesetsky 1987), (23). Both argument and adjunct fronted-wh-phrases are sensitive to SIs, (24): (20)
a.
b. * (21)
a. b.
c. *
d. * (22)
a.
b. (23)
a. * b.
(24)
a. * b. *
Qui a achete´ quoi? Who has bought what ‘Who bought what?’ Qu’est-ce que qui a achete´? what who has bought A quii est-ce que Casimir se demande s’il a donne´ son gaˆteau ti? to whom EST-CE that C. cl. wonders if he has given his cake A quii est-ce que Casimir croit que Hippolythe n’a pas donne´ son gaˆteau ti? to whom EST-CE that C.thinks that H. NE has not given his cake Quandi est-ce que tu te demandes quel proble`mej Andrea re´soudra tj ti? when EST-CE that you cl. wonder which problem A. will solve Quand est-ce que tu crois qu’elle est pas partie? When EST-CE that you think that she is not gone Qui’est-ce que seulement Jean fait ti? What EST-CE that only J. does ‘What does only Jean do?’ (Mathieu (2002: 49), (24b)) * Comment est-ce que seulement Jean lit un livre ? how EST-CE that only Jean reads a book Qui’est-ce qu’il se demande qui a achete´ ti? what EST-CE that he cl. wonders who has bought Quel livrei Rachel se demande qui a lu ti ? which book R. cl. wonders who has read Qui’est-ce que tu crois qu’ils vont inviter ceux qui ont fait ti? what that you think that they will invite those that have done Commenti tu crois qu’ils vont rembourser ceux qui ont voyage´ ti? how you think that they will reimburse those that have traveled
2.1.1.2 Wh-Clefts One of the French ways to form questions, called ‘clefting’, is illustrated in (25): (25)
C’est quoi que tu veux manger ? It is what that you want to.eat
(Clefting)
The cleft sentence is traditionally analyzed as the French focus construction par excellence. It involves two parts: (i), the demonstrative pronoun ce plus a contrastively focalized XP, (optionally) followed by (ii) a clause que [. . .]. traditionally been analyzed as (i) barrier violations and (ii) ECP violations (the trace is not antecedent governed) (Huang 1982). For instance, adjunct clauses are barriers for extraction. See Section 2.1.2.2, and Chapter 5.
24
2 Split-DPs
Rialland, Doetjes and Rebuschi 2002:1 (R,D,R 2002, henceforth, see also Doetjes, Rialland and Rebuschi 2004) distinguish between at least three types of clefts, in French, based on (i) the different ways information is organized, (ii) different prosody on the XP (the XP is not necessarily prosodically more prominent). Types 1–3 are shown in the figures below. Thanks to Annie Rialland for lending to me the relevant recordings for Figs. 2.1, 2.2, 2.3 and 2.4. Figure 2.2 is from the corpus ESTER (Gravier, Bonastre, Geoffrois, Galliano, McTait and Choukri 2004). All the curves are mine: (1) Type 1: Cleft sentences with a focus/post-focus organization (Fig. 2.1) altourFE 0.711783393
400
1.60217687
Pitch(Hz)
300
200
75 c’est
pour Tournier
0
qu’elle va voter 1.602
Time (s)
Fig. 2.1 F0 curve of ‘it is for Jospin that Mathilde voted’? (adapted from D, R, R 2004, fig. 2)
(2) Type 2: Explicative all-focus cleft sentences (Fig. 2.2)
FI1cE_ideesrepeteesFL 300
7.94729246
Pitch (Hz)
250 200 150 100 75 c’est
3.576
par le travail (répéti)répété
que les idées de ce que l’on doit faire après naissent Time (s)
9.812
Fig. 2.2 F0 curve of ‘it is because of repeated work that ideas of what you have to do arise’, (example from the corpus ESTER)
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
25
(3) Type 3: Broad-focus cleft sentences, with an XP ending with a major continuation rise (Fig. 2.3) alplaisir 0.838980477
400
1.64861678
Pitch (Hz)
300
200
75 c’est
avec plaisir
que je vous reçois
0
1.649
Time (s)
Fig. 2.3. F0 curve of ‘it/that is with pleasure that I invite you to this seminar’ (adapted from D, R, R 2004, fig. 6)
In this work I have only looked at wh-clefts that fit under Type 1, in their classification, namely the focus/post-focus organization, and the prosody associated to the XP/post-focal part.
Prosody Just like assertive and interrogative focus cleft sentences, (26) and (27), respectively, wh-clefts may prosodically involve intonational agreement, (28). ‘[intonational agreement] concerns the post focus part exclusively. It consists in the repetition of the terminal boundary tone occurring at the end of the focus part at the end of the utterance (. . .) [the first boundary tone is] responsible for the falling contour of the focus part and can also be posited at the end of the postfocus’ (R,D,R 2002:14). L% indicates the assertive boundary tone (Low) and H% the interrogative boundary tone (High). (26)
[C’est pour Tournier] [qu’elle va voter] L% L% It is for Tournier that she will vote ‘it’s for Tournier that she will vote’
(R, D and R 2002:2)
(27)
[C’est pour Jospin] [que Mathilde a vote´]? H% H% is it for Jospin that Mathilde voted?
(D, R and R 2002:2)
26
2 Split-DPs
In (26), L% ends each intonation phrase. The first one signals the falling contour of the focused XP Tournier. The post-focus part, going from the end of Tournier (first L%) to the end of qu’elle va voter, has been described by R, D and R 2002 as a low plateau. The second boundary tone is also a low tone L%, which is a ‘copy’ or which agrees with the first one. Clefts may prosodically involve intonational agreement. With interrogative clefts, H% ends each intonation phrase. Intonational agreement is observed again. PH21 0.79969742
1.91301587
300
Pitch (Hz)
250 200 150 100 75 c’est 0
pour Jospin
que Mathilde a voté? Time (s)
1.913
Fig. 2.4: F0 curve of (27) (adapted from D, R, R 2004, fig. 1)
(28) has a similar intonation pattern. The utterance is interrogative, and the boundary tones involved are interrogative H% boundary tones: (28)
[C’est QUOI] [que tu veux manger] ? H% H% It is what that you want to eat ‘What is it that you want to eat?’
Both wh-clefts and non-wh-clefts show intonational agreement. In the next section, I present the semantics of French wh-clefts and show that they differ from non wh-clefts in being non-contrastive, i.e. wh-clefts do not involve strong focus. Semantics Before turning to the semantics of wh-clefts, let us come back to genuine clefts. Such utterances are focus-related. The XP in the matrix is a focalized constituent, while the post-focus clause is the background (which can be discursively or contextually given). The focalized XP in a cleft carries Identificational focus (E´. Kiss 1998), i.e. contrastive focus involving exhaustivity. In (29), pour Tournier can be contrasted (ex. adapted from Doetjes, Rebuschi and Rialland 2004: fig. 2:543):
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
(29)
27
[C’est pour TOURNIER] [qu’elle a vote´], pas pour Dupont L% L% It is for Tournier that she voted, not for Dupont
Prosodically, pour TOURNIER is defined as a narrow focus bearing focal stress and its domain is delimited by a terminal boundary tone, identified as L%, denoting the assertive boundary tone. Note that a falling intonation occurs at the end of TOURNier (see Fig. 2.1). I claim that wh-clefts must be distinguished from assertive clefts in that they involve no contrast. Boeckx 1999, 2003 shows that wh-clefts strongly involve existential presupposition. He illustrates this by the test of Negation. Compare wh-fronting to wh-cleft: (30)
a. b.
(31)
a. b.
Qu’a achete´ Jean ? WH.cl has bought Jean Un livre /une voiture/ rien. . . Un livre / a car / nothing
(Boeckx 1999 : 69, (2))
C’est quoi que Jean a achete´ ? it is what that J. has bought Un livre /une voiture/ *!rien. . . A book / a car / nothing
The semantic difference between (31a) and (30a) is that the former is strongly presupposed – hence cannot be answered by rien ‘nothing’– while the latter is not and answering the question in (30) by ‘nothing’ is felicitous. Wh-clefts are used in contexts where possible referents for the answer are presupposed. A set of alternatives is considered. As said above, wh-clefts are considered to be the focus construction par excellence. For Boeckx 1999, wh-XPs involve strong focus and as such must be distinguished from fronted-wh, which involve weak focus (and are non-presuppositional). The speaker attracts the hearer’s attention in order to ask a question on a particular item. He assimilates wh-phrases in clefts to focalized XPs in assertive clefts. Boeckx 1999:75 claims that cleft constructions are cases of contrastive focus, entailing exhaustivity and uniqueness, as in (32)9: (32) 8x P(x) à x ¼ a: a presupposition that only a has property P. At least two problems with this kind of analysis have been (indirectly) pointed out in the literature. It is indeed unclear if wh-clefts should have the same 9 Presupposition of existence is encoded in an empty D head in clefts. Wh-phrases in clefs are structurally heavier than those in fronted-wh phrases (where no empty head is present). Boeckx 1999 concludes that fronted wh-phrases are not presupposed and involve Information Focus, while clefts involve contrastive focus. The distinction between the two wh-types is extended to their syntax. Wh-phrases in clefts do not move, they are too heavy.
28
2 Split-DPs
semantics as assertive clefts. And if they do, what kind of clefts do they resemble to? Boeckx proposes that they involve strong focus, like assertive clefts. Mathieu 2002 shows that wh-clefts are not contrastive, however. Recall that clefts in French are at least of three types. R, D, R 2002 conclude that ‘Clefts are not a focusing construction: the XP position is not a special syntactic focus position, and the coda can be included in the focus domain.’ Clefts are then not the Focus-construction by excellence, as traditionally claimed. Independently, Mathieu concludes that there exist at least two cleftstructures in French. Non-presentational clefts involve identificational Focus (contrastive) (33), while presentational do not, as (34) illustrates (Mathieu 2002:125, (132) and (133)): (33)
C’ est le LIVRE que j’ ai achete´. It is the book that I have bought ‘It’s the BOOK that I bought.’ (implied : not the magazine).
(34)
C’est le livre que j’ ai achete´. It is the book that I have bought ‘It’s the book that I bought.’/‘Here’s the book that I bought.’
Mathieu claims that presentational clefts ‘involve presupposition of the DP in situ, but of the whole VP as well [. . .] crucially the DP does not involve strong focus’ (Mathieu 2002:126). If wh-XPs in clefts are similar to XPs in assertive clefts in involving contrastive focus (Boeckx 1999), similar locality restrictions should show up in both constructions (Mathieu 2002). Yet, le livre is not sensitive to the island induced by negation in (35a), whereas quoi is blocked in (35b), suggesting that contrastive (strong) focus is not at stake with wh-clefts. (35)
a.
b. *
Ce n’ est pas le livre que j’ ai achete´ . it Neg is not the book that I have bought ‘It is not the book that I bought (it’s the magazine).’ Ce n’ est pas quoi que tu as achete´? it Neg is not what that you have bought ‘What is it not that you have bought?’ (Mathieu 2002: 61, (45))
Supporting the non-contrastiveness of wh-XPs in clefts is the fact that they cannot be contrasted with another DP, as in (36): (36)
??
C’est quel menu que tu as choisi, (et pas quel alcool) ? It is which plate that you have chosen, (and not which alcohol)
I conclude that wh-phrases in wh-clefts are not necessarily focalized, in the sense that the DP does not necessarily involve strong focus. It never receives a contrastive interpretation, namely it does not involve Identificational Focus. Whclefts involve presupposition and as such semantically resemble presentational clefts (Mathieu 2002). Prosodically they resemble non-presentational clefts.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
29
Syntax: Movement or Non-movement? In this section, I give five arguments in favor of overt movement of wh-phrases in clefts: (i) wh-c¸a constructions; (ii) assertive cleft constructions; (iii) Weak Island (WI) facts; (iv) Strong Islands (SI); (v) past participle agreement. Impossibility of wh-c¸a in cleft constructions
(i)
Wh-c¸a is the d-linked wh-phrase par excellence (C&R 2000) and shows up with quand ‘when, ou` ‘where’, qui ‘who’, quoi ‘what’, comment ‘how’, (42). For C&R, this construction proves the existence of true wh in-situ (37) vs. (38): (37)
a. b. c.
(38)
a. * b. * c. * d. ?? d. ?? e. ??
T’as vu qui c¸a (cet apre`s-midi) ? You have met who-that (this afternoon) (C& R 2000:19, (28)) T’es parti quand c¸a? You left when-that T’es parti ou` c¸a ? you have left where-that ? Qui c¸a as-tu vu? Who-that have you met Qui c¸a est-ce que tu as vu? Who that C8 that you have seen Qui ca t’as vu? Who that you have seen Quand c¸a t’as dormi? when-that you have slept Comment c¸a t’as crie´ ? how-that you have screamed Ou` c¸a t’as dormi ? where that you have slept
(C& R 2000:19, (29a and b))
(37) and (38) suggest that in French, wh-c¸a cannot move overtly. If whphrases in clefts are moved from the lowest IP, wh-c¸a is expected to be ungrammatical. If, on the contrary, they are based-generated in the matrix clause, i.e. literally in-situ, they must be grammatical. The facts indicate that overt movement occurred (all these examples are grammatical under an echoreading): (39)
a. * b. *
C’est qui c¸a que tu as vu? It is who that that you have seen C’est quand c¸a / ou` c¸a / comment c¸a que t’as dormi? It is when that / where that / / how that that you have slept
Incidentally, the examples with quoi-c¸a behave differently from other whphrases with c¸a. Neither the in-situ strategy in (40) nor the ex-situ configuration in (41) and (42) is able to license quoi-c¸a in French:
30
2 Split-DPs
(40)
a. * b. *
(41)
a. * b. *
(42)
a. * b. *
T’as fait quoi c¸a? You have done what-that T’as bu quoi c¸a? You have drunk what-that
(NSC French)
Quoi c¸a as-tu fait? What that have you done ? Quoi c¸a as-tu bu ? what that have you drunk
(NSC French)
C’est quoi c¸a que tu as fait ? It is what-that that you have done C’est quoi c¸a que t’as bu? It is what that that you have drunk
The only configuration where quoi-c¸a is acceptable is the C’est XP configuration without CP following it, with a prosodic break (#) between quoi and c¸a: (43)
a. b.
C’est quoi#c¸a ? it is what-that C’est du fromage It is cheese
A piece of evidence in favor of a different analysis for a structure like (43) is the fact that in this construction, only c¸a can be left dislocated (vs. wh in-situ): (44)
a. b. *
Et c¸a, c’est quoi/qui/ou`/quand/comment? And that, it is what/who/where/when/how Et c¸a, tu as vu quoi/qui/ou`/quand/comment and that you have seen what/who/where/when/how
Let me remain agnostic as to its internal structure. I claim that in (43), the whc¸a is base generated in its spell-out position, i.e. it is in-situ.10 Why wh-c¸a does not appear in (40) and (42) is left unanswered. (ii)
Assertive cleft constructions
A second piece of evidence in favor of a movement analysis arises by comparing wh-clefts to non-wh-clefts. Consider the following cleft versions – with a d-linked definite DP (45a), and a non-d-linked indefinite DP (45b): (45)
a.
C’est LA FILLE que tu crois qu’elle a pas vu It is the girl that you think that she has not seen
10 A further difference is worth noting: c¸a in (43) and (43a) gets a demonstrative (really deictic) interpretation, whereas it does not in (43) (Genoveva Puska´s, p.c). I have nothing interesting to add and leave the correct analysis of these facts open for future research.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
b. *
31
C’est UN GARC¸ON que tu crois qu’elle a pas vu (NSC French) it is a boy that you think that she has not seen
In (45a), LA FILLE is fine, yet nothing tells us if movement occurred or not. Recall that extraction out of WIs is only possible with d-linked wh. If LA FILLE is replaced by a non-d-linked XP such as UN GARC¸ON, the sentence gets ungrammatical. This is expected if UN GARCON moves from the lowest clause to the highest one: pas creates a negative island for extraction. These facts resemble frontedwh-phrases constructions (Section 2.1.1.1). Yet, one might argue that ungrammaticality could also be due to semantic factors. Indefinites are not easily presupposed and require strong contexts to be so, indeed (45b) improves if the indefinite is presupposed. In (46), however, the XP is trapped in a SI. Remember that the XP in clefts is strongly presupposed, hence the WI should not do any harm. The sentence is ungrammatical, due to the fact that the XP has been moved out of the SI: (46)* C’est LA FILLE que tu crois qu’elle a pas dit c¸a pour punir it is the girl that you thinks that she has not said that to punish These data give us hints to analyse the syntactic structure of clefts. Cleft constructions and relative clauses (RC) are traditionally analyzed as patterning alike (apart from the fact that RC only modify NPs, whereas the CP in clefts can be of any category, although they may be difficult with APs). Chomsky 1977 (a.o) proposes that RCs are CPs, adjoined to N8, an (overt or non-overt) operator moves to the specifier of that CP, (47b): (47)
a. b.
RC: [CP whi Ø [IP ...ti ...]] RC: [CP Op (that) [IP ...ti ...]]
The fact that indefinite NPs cannot escape WIs is evidence that clefts do not behave like RC, i.e. that the indefinite XP is actually moved from a lower position in the that-clause and fronted somewhere in the matrix. It follows that no covert wh-operator is involved.11 (iii)
Weak Island facts: interrogative cleft constructions
Starke 2001 notes that argument wh-clefts aren’t trapped in WIs and involve specificity (i.e. is strongly presupposed; to be defined shortly), (48). (48)
a. b. ??
11
C’est QUOI que t’as pas fait? (French) It is what that you have not done C’est COMMENT que t’es pas parti? (Starke 2001 : 24, (57)) It is HOW that you are not left
See Svenonius 1998 for a more developed idea, see also Kayne 1994 on RCs and movement.
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2 Split-DPs
In (48), the two that-clauses involve a negative island each, the wh-XP being interpreted either as the object of faire (48a) or as modifying partir (48b). In (48), the contrast in the distribution of quoi and comment is similar to the classical argument/adjunct asymmetry discussed in Rizzi 1990 (a.o) for overt wh-movement. When the adjunct comment is in a cleft, the sentence is degraded. That the picture is a little more complex than what is traditionally described here is witnessed by the fact that non-adverbial quand ‘when’ and ou` ‘where’ can be successfully extracted in this configuration (see Starke 2001:91 for details): (49)
a. b.
(iv)
C’est QUAND que t’es pas parti? It is when that you are not left C’est OU` que t’es pas parti ? It is where that you are not left
Strong Islands
A fourth argument in favor of a movement analysis of wh-XPs in clefts is the fact that they are trapped in SI configurations, (50): (50)
a* b. *
C’est QUOI qu’elle a fait le gaˆteau pour causer? It is WHAT that she has made the cake to provoke C’est COMMENT qu’elle a fait le gaˆteau pour causer une dispute It is HOW that she has made the cake to provoke a fight
Presuppositional-based wh-XPs are ungrammatical with SIs. Comparing wh-cleft configurations with wh-fronted constructions, I note that in the latter, wh-phrases can hardly be extracted, suggesting that fronted wh-phrases and wh-phrases in clefts should be analyzed as involving overt movement. (51) (v)
* Qui’est-ce que tu crois qu’elle a dit c¸a [pour obliger Eric a` e´pouser ti]? who that you think that she has said that to oblige E. to marry Past participle agreement
French has past participle agreement with direct objects. When the direct object overtly moves past the past participle, agreement can arise (52a). If no overt movement occurs, agreement is unavailable (i.e. default marking/ 3rd.p.sg.masc.), (52b)12: (52)
a.
b.
Il l’a e´crit/e he cl. has written.DFLT/.p.sg.fem ‘he has written it’ Il a e´crit/*e une lettre he has written.DFLT/*.p.sg.fem. a letter ‘He has written a letter’
(NSC French)
12 The indefinite in object position can either be moved and adjoined to VP (May 1985), or existentially bound and left in-situ. In both cases, the processes are covert. See Section 2.1.4 on un Ns.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
33
(53) resembles (52a) rather than (52b), suggesting that overt movement triggers past participle agreement in number and gender with the overtly moved direct object, i.e. the wh-element in a wh-cleft moves from within the coda to its final landing site in the C’est XP-clause. (53)
C’est quelle lettre qu’il a e´crite? (NSC French) It is which letter that he has written.DEFT/.p.sg.fem.
I come back to wh-clefts in Chapter 5, Section 5.1.3.2.
2.1.2 Wh In-situ A fourth strategy to form wh-questions in French is to leave the wh-phrase in situ. The Minimalist hypothesis being that optionality has to be motivated, the ex-situ vs. in-situ option is questionable. Recent minimalist studies show that wh in-situ in French are semantically and syntactically different from (i) their fronted counterparts, and from (ii) Chinese/Japanese wh-phrases. C&R 2000, Mathieu 1999, 2002, 2004a, Boeckx 1999, 2003, Starke 2001 and Adli 2006 claim that there are (i) syntactic, (ii) semantic and (iii) prosodic differences between wh-frontings and wh in-situ constructions. There is no consensus as to the properties displayed by wh in-situ, and it seems that (at least) two French dialects must be acknowledged: standard colloquial (SC) French and non-standard colloquial (NSC) French.13 Mathieu 2004a, Starke 2001, Tellier 1991, Aoun and Li 1991 have examples of grammatical non-root non-echo wh-in-situ constructions (NSC French), that are crucially given as ungrammatical by Chang 1997, Boeckx 1999, C&R 2000 and Mathieu 200214: (54)
Tu penses qu’elle a rencontre´ qui? You think that she met who
(Tellier 1991:169, (fn1))
This section aims at drawing a clear distinction between the two dialects at stake in terms of (i) prosody, (ii) semantics and (iii) syntax. As it will become clear below, SC French does not refer to a uniform phenomenon of wh in-situ constructions; rather it should be understood as ‘not SC French’. Indeed despite the fact that the two dialects differ in the ability of wh-phrases in-situ to occur in embedded clauses, SC French does not display a uniform behavior, 13
See Chapter 1, Section 1.1.1.3. A fact also noted by Starke 2001: 52: ‘my best guess is that the more restrictive judgments correspond to ‘‘classical’’ written French, as to the spoken French described here. I have however been unable to find a single speaker of that dialect’. 14 Bosˇ kovic´ 1998/2000 is an important work on wh-phrases in-situ, too, yet it does not take into account semantics and prosody, which will be proven to be essential aspects of wh-phrase in-situ. For that reason, I do not include it in the main discussion, although the data discussed in that text strongly resemble those of SC French.
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2 Split-DPs
whereas NSC French does. In Section 2.1.2.2 I present how wh-phrases in-situ behave in NSC French, which is the dialect I am interested in. NSC French has partially been presented in Starke 2001, in Baunaz 2005 and Adli 2006.
2.1.2.1 Standard Colloquial French General Properties The properties of wh in-situ questions that are traditionally given in the literature are the following: (i) wh in-situ is a root phenomenon; (ii) wh-phrases insitu are trapped in negative islands; (iii) wh-phrases in-situ do not tolerate interactions with Qs; (iv) they are associated with strong presuppositional contexts: Wh-phrases in-situ cannot be CP-embedded (finite / non-finite)15
(i) (55)*
Jean a dit que Marie a vu qui? Jean has said that Marie has seen who
(56)
a. * b. *
(ii) (57)
Il a de´cide´ de faire quoi? He has thought C to do what Il peut rencontrer qui? He can meet who
(SC French) (Boeckx 1999 :77, (22)) (SC French) (Mathieu 2002:43, (18a)) (SC French) (C&R 2000 :11,(18b))
Wh phrases in-situ are trapped in neg Islands *
Tu ne fait pas quoi ce soir ? you NE do not what tonight
(SC French) (Mathieu 2002 : 35, (2a))
In (57), quoi is blocked and seems to be subject to stricter locality constraints than wh-fronting.16 Note however that if the matrix verb selects a C8 [þwh] not filled by si ‘if’, a wh left in-situ is ungrammatical. This observation is valid crossdialectically17: 15
(56b) is grammatical for both Boeckx 1999 and Bosˇ kovic´ 1998/2000. Bosˇ kovic´ 1998/2000 argues for a C8/I8 dichotomy, and claims that a sentence like il veut acheter quoi? is a restructuring (modal) contexts. Against this view, Mathieu 2002 claims that it is not true that C-heads always block wh-movement, i.e. the contrast lies on tense (and selection), rather than on C8: (i)
16
Il veut [CP C qu’ elle fasse quoi]? he wants that she does-SUBJ what
(SC French) (Mathieu 2002: 51, (29))
As will become clear below (iv), SC French wh in-situ are associated with strong presuppositional contexts. According to the locality constraints discussed in Section 2.1.1.1 for whfronting, d-linked (i.e. presuppositional) wh-phrases are easily extracted out of WIs (Pesetsky 1987). Then (57) is expected to be grammatical, if a strict parallelism is maintained. 17 Suggesting that in embedded indirect questions wh-movement is obligatory to check the strong [þwh] feature of the selected C8
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
(58)
a.
Jean se demande ce que Marie mange J. wonders what is it that M. eats Jean se demande que Marie mange quoi J. wonders that Marie eats what Jean se demande Marie mange quoi ? John wonders Marie eats what
b. * c. *
(iii) (59)
35
(SC French)
Wh in-situ do not tolerate interactions with Qs (full DPs, and adverbs)18: a. *
Il fait toujours quoi le dimanche? (SC French) He does always what the Sunday (Mathieu 1999:448 (14a)) Il fait souvent quoi le dimanche? He does often what the Sunday (Mathieu 1999:448 (15a)) Aucun e´tudiant a lu quoi? No student has read what (Mathieu 2002:48, (23a)) Exactement cinq e´tudiants ont fait quoi? Exactly five students have done what (Mathieu 2002:82, (76a)) Plus de cinq e´tudiants ont fait quoi? More of five students have done what (Mathieu 2002:82, (77a)) Seulement Jean arrive a` faire quoi? Only Jean arrives to do what (Mathieu 1999:447: (12a)) Meˆme Jean arrive a` faire quoi? Even Jean arrives to do what (Mathieu 1999:448: (13a))
b* c. * d. * e. * f. * g. *
Qs of different types block covert-fronting of wh-phrases in-situ, yielding different grammaticality judgments. Mathieu 1999, 2002 observes that the questions in (60) are grammatical only under a pair-list (PL) reading, i.e. wh in-situ are not able to scope over 8Qs, (60). In (60), only one reading is blocked, contrasting with (59). (60)
a. * ?
b. * ?
18
Tout le monde aime quoi? (SC French) All the people likes what ‘for which thing (x), everybody likes thing (x)’ ‘for which pair <x, y>, every (x) likes (y)’ (Mathieu 1999:447 (10a)) Jean donne tous les restes a` qui? Jean gives all the leftovers to whom ‘for which person (x), J. gives all the leftovers to that person (x)’ ‘for which pair <x, y>, J. gives (x) to (y)’ (Mathieu 1999:447 (11a))
The data in (59) and (60) suggest that covert movement is blocked. The ungrammaticality of (59)c and d recalls typical Intervention effects a` la Beck 1996 where quantificational adverbs intervene and block LF-movement of the wh in-situ.
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2 Split-DPs
Yet, not every linguist agrees on the judgments given in (60). Zubizaretta 2003 makes a distinction between ungrammatical sentences and sentences that are acceptable under a particular reading, but blocked under another. She shows that data involving full 8Qs are perfectly fine when interacting with wh-phrases in-situ, (61) and (62) (Zubizarreta 2003:4, (12) and (13)). (61)
Q:
A: (62)
Q:
A: (63)
Q: A:
Les enfants se sont mis a` table. Chacun (d’entre eux) a` droit a` combien de pizzas ? The children have sat at the table. Each (of them) is entitled to how many pizzas? Chacun (d’entre eux) a droit a` trois pizzas Each (of them) is entitled to three pizzas Pierre a achete´ plusieurs livres. Il a envoye´ chacun des livres a` qui ? Pierre bought several books. He sent each of the books to whom? Il a envoye´ chacun des livres a` l’un de ses amis He sent each of the books to one of his friends Ils ont donne´ tous les bonbons a` qui ? (SC French) They gave all the candies to whom ? Ils ont donne´ tous les bonbons a` leur meilleur ami They gave all the candies to their best friend (Zubizarreta 2003:4, (14))
None of these questions can have a PL reading: the 8Q can never take wide scope and either a specific or a functional reading is possible.19 The availability of wide scope of the wh-phrase suggests movement of the wh-phrase in-situ.20 19
She claims that Contrastive Focus induces blocking, which creates ungrammaticality, i.e. they are real interveners. This is exemplified in (i) with floated tous and (ii) with a focalized DP: (i)
a.
b. * (ii)
*
Ils ont tous mange´ quoi? They have all eaten what ‘They have all eaten what?’ Ils ont TOUS mange´ quoi ? ‘They have ALL eaten what’
(SC French)
(Zubizaretta 2003:5, (21))
LES GARCONS ont mange´ quoi? The boys have eaten what
(SC French)
20 Boeckx 2003 calls this effect the ‘limitation effect’. He draws a distinction between intervention and limitation effects (a distinction not made in his previous works. These data were ungrammatical under a non-echoic reading). Relativized Minimality accounts for Intervention effects: (i) is ungrammatical, because an intrinsically focused item intervenes, blocking movement of the (contrastively focused) wh in-situ.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
37
Similar data have been marked # by Boeckx 1999, Boeckx 2003, Chang 1997, C&R 2000, i.e. good under an echoic reading only. For them, interactions of wh-phrases in-situ with any Q are ungrammatical, unless echoic, (64): (64)
(iv)
# Tous les e´tudiants ont rencontre´ qui? All the students have met who ‘Who did all the students meet?’
(SC French) (Chang 1997 :17, (34))
They are strongly associated with presuppositional contexts
Wh-phrases in-situ and wh-fronted must be contrasted in that the former, but not the latter, is associated with ‘strongly presupposed context’ (Chang 1997, Boeckx 1999, 2003, C&R 2000, Mathieu 2002). For Chang 1997, the interpretation of wh in-situ questions elicits ‘details on an already established (or presupposed) situation’ (Chang 1997:45). To be felicitous, a wh in-situ question must refer to a presupposed event. Marie a achete´ quoi? is felicitous ‘if the speaker assumes the event of Marie buying something’ (C&R 2000:5). Answering ‘nothing’ is infelicitous, because the speaker is assuming that Marie bought something (see also below). No such presupposition is triggered with wh-fronting. Similarly, Mathieu 2002 says that a wh in-situ question asks details on an established situation. In other words, wh in-situ are used in special situations. A familiar situation or individual that the speaker/hearer has in mind or that is accessible to their immediate environment is involved, i.e. there is a familiar referent and this referent corresponds to the element in-situ. The wh in-situ refers to a situation and an individual that is inferred. Importantly for Chang, C&R 2000 and Mathieu 2002, wh in-situ questions are not associated to a presupposed answer set, i.e. the notion of ‘presupposed event’ is distinguished from that of d-linking (Pesetsky 1987). This idea is not unanimous, even among the linguists analyzing SC French. For Boeckx 1999 and Obenauer 1994, for instance, wh in-situ questions ranging over restricted sets. To sum up, the big lines of wh in-situ properties fall on the following (sometimes divergent) data: (i) wh in-situ cannot be found in embedded contexts (finite or non-finite) (note that depending on the author, they can co-occur with modals); (ii) wh-in-situ do not escape neg islands; (iii) judgments on Q/wh interactions diverge. Semantically (iv) wh in-situ are only found in strongly presuppositional contexts, eventhough linguists disagree on the definition of existential presupposition (i.e. whether it is a synonym for d-linked, as in Pesetsky 1987 or not). (i)
* Tu as beaucoup vu quoi? You have a lot seen what
(SC French) (Boeckx 2003:12 (66))
As for the limitation effects, Boeckx 2003 refers to Grohmann’s 1998 idea that ‘quantified NPs forcing a single pair reading are poor topics, semantically speaking.’ (Boeckx 2003:12), i.e. they move to SpecTopP. Because for him wh in-situ are ‘hidden’ clefts, they do not move (see section ‘‘Prosody and Semantics’’). Boeckx appeals to IP-remnant movement.
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2 Split-DPs
Prosody and Semantics The prosody and semantics of SC French wh in-situ constructions have been discussed in the syntactic literature since the late 1990s. Boeckx 1999, 2003, C&R 2000 and Mathieu 2002 have all assigned a different intonation pattern to the data they described, corresponding to one particular interpretation: (ia) a rising intonation corresponds to contrastive focus (Boeckx 1999, 2003) or (ib) to a yes/no question interpretation (C&R 2000); (ii) a downfall intonation corresponds to some kind of topic (Mathieu 2002). (i)
a. wh-phrases in-situ receive a rising intonation and are focalized
Based on prosodic, syntactic and semantic facts, Boeckx 1999 argues that wh phrases in-situ are covert wh-clefts in French. Prosodically, wh phrases in-situ are focused, and receive a ‘Focus Intonation’ (Boeckx 1999:71) (a ‘raising’ intonation in Boeckx 2003), just like wh-clefts. Morphologically, wh-clefts and wh in-situ constructions involve the strong pronoun quoi in (65c,d), which contrasts with the weak pronoun qu’ in fronting/ reinforced frontings, (65a,b): (65)
a. b. c. d.
Qu’/*quoi est-ce que tu as mange´? WH-cl./what is-it that you have eaten Qu’/*quoi as-tu mange´ ? WH-cl./*what have you eaten C’est quoi /*qu’ que t’as mange´ ? It is what/WH-cl. that you.-cl. have eaten T’as mange´ quoi/*qu’ ? You have eaten what/wh-cl
Reinforced fronting Fronting Wh-cleft in-situ
Semantically, both types of interrogatives involve strong presupposition (Chang 1997, C&R 2000). Unlike wh-fronting, they cannot be answered by rien ‘nothing’: (66)
A: B:
C’est quoi que Jean a achete´ ? it is what that J. has bought Un livre /une voiture/ *rien. . . A book / a car / nothing
(SC French)
On the basis of that test, Boeckx 1999 (and subseq.) shows that wh-phrases in-situ and wh-clefts cannot be used out-of-the blue and a strong context where possible referents for the answer must be presupposed. Boeckx proposes that wh-phrases in-situ are like wh-XPs in clefts: exhaustively focalized. Wh-XPs in clefts and wh-phrases in-situ are similar with respect to prosody and interpretation, involving existential presupposition plus exhaustivity and uniqueness. Boeckx 1999 proposes that existential presupposition is encoded in an empty D head in both constructions. These phrases are heavier in terms of structure (this empty head is not present with non-presuppositional wh-phrases). This is reflected in their morphology (quoi vs. qu’) and in their
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
39
syntax (in-situ vs. fronting). The non-movement analysis is supported by the assumption that heavier phrases do not overtly move (Cardinaletti and Starke 1999). Fronted wh-phrases are not presupposed and involve Information Focus. Boeckx’s analysis raises at least three problems (at the prosodic and semantic interface, as well as syntactic). First, focalized XPs in clefts receive a downfall intonation (see section ‘‘Prosody’’). If in-situ wh-phrases are focused and assimilated to wh-XPs in clefts, then they must receive a downfall intonation too. As far as my judgments go, raising intonation of a focalized wh in-situ is clearly echoic. Second, Boeckx 1999 proposes that wh-phrases in-situ involve restrictions that do not range over a restricted set. If these elements are contrastively focused, a set of alternatives has to be considered: ‘this means that a restricted set of some kind is involved.’ (Mathieu 2002:60). There is then a contradiction. If wh-XPs are contrastively focalized, like the XP in clefts, both constructions must be impossible with a negative intervener. Mathieu 2002 shows that this is not the case, i.e. (67b) must be ungrammatical for reasons other than strong focus. (67)
a.
b. *
(i)
Ce n’ est PAS le livre que j’ ai achete´ . (SC French) it Neg is not the book that I have bought ‘It is not the book that I bought (it’s the magazine).’ Ce n’ est PAS quoi que tu as achete´? (SC French) it Neg is not what that you have bought ‘What is it not that you have bought?’
b. wh-phrases in-situ receive a rising intonation and are yes/no questions (y/n, henceforth)
For C&R 2000, wh in-situ constructions involve some sort of final rising intonation (‘/’), comparable to the yes/no intonation of yes/no questions, (68b): (68)
a. b. c.
T’ as mange´ quoi /? You have eaten what T’as vu Marie / ? You have seen Marie T’as vu Marie \ You have seen Marie
(SC French)
Just like the rising intonation in (68b) distinguishes y/n questions from simple declarative sentences (68c), wh-phrases in-situ contrast with wh-phrases ex-situ, which display typical non-rising intonation. The y/n intonation is accounted for thanks to an intonation ‘root’ Q-particle (morpheme) appearing in C8. This non-overt Q-particle is a [y/n] operator. The parallelism with y/n questions is pushed further thanks to the claim that wh in-situ and y/n questions only appear in strongly presupposed contexts (as in Chang 1997). C&R claim that the same presupposition is triggered in y/n questions.
40
2 Split-DPs
Obviously, wh in-situ questions are not y/n questions, but genuine constituent questions. C&R propose that wh in-situ are not specified for [y/n] questions. The y/n intonation displayed by these interrogatives is a reflex of the presence of a covert y/n-particle (or Q-morpheme). As such, these constructions have an underspecified Q, marked as [Q: ], merged in C8, (69a). [Q: ] is valued at LF, by a [y/n] feature, and becomes [Q: y/n ] as a default operation. The [þwh] feature of the wh-word is moved at LF in order for the (underspecified) Q-morpheme to get specified for the value [þwh] (69b): (69) a. b.
Q Jean a achete´ quoi ? [Q: ] Q Jean a achete´ quoi? [Q : wh ]
(SC French)
(C&R 2000:9)
C&R 2000 extends Cheng’s 1991 analysis of Chinese wh in-situ constructions (see Section 2.1.3.1). French has a Q-morpheme merged in C8, i.e. it is an in-situ language. Under this approach, LF-feature movement is more restricted than overt movement, since wh-feature movement shows (i) Intervention effects, (ii) only root properties. Wh in-situ constructions and fronting constructions involve different syntactic structures. Under the minimalist framework, it follows that French does not display optionality. There are yet two problems with C&R observations, which are both related to prosody. One is also related to presupposition. First, if it is true that a rising intonation may fall on a wh-phrase in-situ, Adli 2006:18 shows in an experimental study that it is not systematic. So it is not true that wh-phrases in-situ are always rising and as such, this contour does not (necessarily) contrast with a non-rising intonational contour typical of declarative structures. Moreover, wh in-situ questions may also instantiate a falling contour, i.e. the contour exhibited by wh-phrases in-situ is not the y/n intonation. In this respect, Mathieu 2002:58 claims that the observation that wh in-situ questions involve a rising intonation similar to y/n questions, is empirically incorrect. ‘If there were, it would in fact be very difficult to distinguish information-seeking WH-in-situ interrogatives from echo questions, since echo questions typically receive heavy stress of the WH phrase in situ and/or rising intonation.’ Second, the intonational contour of y/n question ‘does usually not fall at the end of yes/no questions [. . .], whereas this is possible at the end of wh in-situ questions’ (Adli 2006:18). Adli’s study also shows an interesting fact, namely that bi-syllabic wh-phrases, like quel vase ‘which vase’ alternate with either the rising or the falling contour. Third, they claim that the y/n intonation is associated with strong presupposition, yet it is not true that a rising intonation corresponds to a strong presuppositional context. For my informants, the y/n intonation they discuss is clearly non-presuppositional. Hence they all reject the y/n rising intonation which is claimed to be grammatical with a strong presuppositional reading (the corresponding French examples are in (71)):
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
41
(70)
a. b.
Are you cooking tonight? You’re cooking tonight?
(non-presuppositional) (presuppositional) (Mathieu 2002:56, (39))
(71)
a. b.
Tu cuisines ce soir/? *(je pense) Tu cuisines ce soir\? (je pense)
(non-presuppositional) (presuppositional)
The rising intonation in (71a) triggers a non-presuppositional reading. The speaker does not assume that the hearer is going to prepare something for dinner. Under the downfall intonation, the speaker presupposes that the hearer is going to prepare the dinner (or is preparing the dinner), hence the availability of the tag je pense in (71b). (ii)
wh-in situ receive a natural downfall intonation and are Split-DPs
Mathieu observes that overt Split-DPs (combien. . . de N constructions) and wh in-situ have a similar prosody. The intonation falling on the restriction at the end of the structure is defocalized (default stress), (72). This intonation is similar to the one that falls on the right dislocated structure in (73):
(72)
(73)
Combien as-tu lu de livres? how many have read of books ‘How many books have you read?’
(SC French) (Mathieu 2002:58 (41))
Il n’ est pas content, le voisin. (SC French) he Neg is not happy the neighbour Literally: ‘He is not happy, the neighbour.’ ‘Our neighbour is not happy.’ (Mathieu 2002:58 (42))
Right dislocated objects are typically analyzed as topics in French. They resemble wh-phrases in-situ and overt Split-DPs in that they involve presupposition of the dislocated DP. In (73), the right dislocated DP le voisin is topicalized, and just like de livres in (73), it is defocalized. Mathieu 2002 concludes that the restriction in the split version (72) is also a topic. Whereas combien in (73) is focalized, in the unsplit version, the whole fronted wh-phrase is focalized.21,22 21
The sentences in (72) and (73) have a distinct prosody, since (73) involves an overt right dislocated element and a pause between content ‘happy’ and le voisin ‘the neighbor’, signaled by the comma, must be hearable. Such pause is neither found with overt split constructions, nor with wh in-situ constructions. 22 Mathieu 2002: 126 argues that wh in-situ constructions are akin to presentational clefts, a construction very similar to topic structures (vs. focalized clefts, see Boeckx 1999 and this section). Crucially, the wh in presentational cleft does not involve contrastive focus, but weak focus.
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2 Split-DPs
By analogy, the wh-phrase in-situ involves a phonologically null operator that overtly moves to SpecCP. Mathieu 2002 claims that wh in-situ constructions receive default sentence stress and involve defocalization on the restriction (i.e. the wh in-situ receive a natural downfall intonation (in capitals)). The defocalized wh-phrase in-situ does not move, and just like de livres in (72), it is considered as a topic. Movement is then related to discourse considerations.
(74)
Tu as mange´ QUOI ?
(NSC French)
The two intonations described in the literature on wh in-situ constructions and their corresponding semantics diverge. Boeckx’s rising intonation corresponds to contrastive focus, while Mathieu’s downfall intonation to topic. As for C&R’s rising intonation, it does not correspond to Boeckx’s, but to y/n questions. Linguists working on wh in-situ constructions in SC French focus on the ideal that there is only one kind of wh phrase in-situ, with one sort of intonation, one sort of semantics, and one sort of syntax. Yet, they do not agree on the data they analyze. Prosody, semantics and syntax are three areas where the data diverge, and each linguist has a distinct description from the other. Crucially, none of these studies gives any indications about the way the judgements have been collected (experimental study? Corpus study?), about how many informants have been tested, about the provenance of the informants. Recent descriptions widely challenge these observations, and tend to give a uniform description of the phenomenon. NSC French wh in-situ share similar prosody, semantics and syntax in Starke 2001, Baunaz 2005 and Adli 2006. Crucially these authors explore the possibility of various kinds of wh-phrases in-situ. The aim of the next section is to provide a comprehensive description of the facts. 2.1.2.2 Non-standard Colloquial French The term Non-Standard Colloquial (NSC) French refers to the type of French that displays non-root wh in-situ constructions (see Chapter 1, Section 1.1.1.3). As such, it must be distinguished from Standard Colloquial (SC) French for which the wh in-situ phenomenon has unanimously been described as a root phenomenon, but whose properties are yet non-uniform (see previous section).23 Most of my informants are Swiss speakers (from Geneva (7), and from Neuchaˆtel (2) areas). There is also a Parisian, and a speaker from Montpellier 23
I do not think that there are different dialects of French with respect to wh in-situ constructions. The distinction made in this work is subtler. It could well be the case that everything depends on the utterance context and that intonation plays a major role in accessing existential presupposition. What we are going to discover is that there are not two different versions of colloquial French, but different ways to approach one single phenomenon.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
43
(South of France).24 In my description, I will mainly use examples discussed in Starke 2001 – which are Geneva-based, in Adli 2006 and in Baunaz and Patin 2009.25,26,27 General Properties In Section 2.1.2.1, prosodic, semantic and syntactic properties of SC French wh in-situ constructions were sorted out: (i) wh in-situ cannot be found in embedded contexts; (ii) they cannot be moved out of infinitival CP-complements; (iii) they can (or cannot) occur with modals; (iv) they do not escape neg islands; (iv) judgments on Q/wh interactions diverge; (v) they are only found in presuppositional contexts. Starke 2001, Baunaz 2005 and Adli 2006 challenge these properties, claiming that argument and adjunct wh in-situ do appear (i) in embedded clauses; (ii) in neg-islands; (iii) with modals, (iv) with Qs (and A’-adverbs (81))28)29: (i)
24
Wh-phrases in-situ can be CP-embedded (finite / non-finite) (75) a. Tu crois que Jean a achete´ quel livre ? (NSC French) You believe that J. has bought which book (Starke 2001) b. Tu penses que Jean va e´pouser qui finalement? You think that Jean will marry who in the end (Starke 2001)
Most of the informants were either given a full questionnaire, or asked orally whether a given sentence was ok or not in a particular context (i.e. with a particular semantics). Intonation at that time was mainly used as diagnostics, and checked later with Parisian speakers on an experimental study conducted by Baunaz and Patin 2009 (see fn. 27). Most of the F0 figures in this book come from recordings from that study. The three intonations first described in Baunaz 2005 have been checked and acknowledged by Adli’s 2006 experimental study. 25 Starke gives no other description about the type/number of speakers he consulted. 26 Adli 2006 carried out an experiment (a guided interview technique called qualitative interview) with 20 French native speakers at the University of Paris Jussieu. 27 Baunaz and Patin 2009 conducted an experiment in December 2008, Paris (ILPGA, Universite´ Paris 3). 6 subjects were required to read interrogative sentences in dialogues. They were recorded in an anechoic chamber, with a Marantz PMD670. Thirty-two target sentences were created using 8 base sentences, which differ in their polarity (positive, negative), in the place of the wh word (in-situ, ex-situ) and the form of the wh-word (qui, quel N). Each base sentence was associated with three contexts (partitive, specific and non-presuppositional), to the extent the combination is available in the Grammar of French. Distractors were also included in the experiment: Non-restrictive relatives, Verum Focus, etc. The experiment lasted 30 min by subject. 28 Adli 2006:16, fn. 5 notes that One of the examples in C&R (2000:11) based on Chang 1997, namely ‘il admire toujours qui?’, is not a good example for a quantifier. Toujours is, firstly, a quantificational adverb (‘always’) and secondly, often used in the sense of ‘still’, which is also the preferred reading for this sentence. It is interpreted as ‘whom does he still admire?’ and not ‘whom does he always admire?’. My interviewees, by the way, had accepted this sentence. 29 Q interactions are not discussed in Starke 2001.
44
2 Split-DPs
c. d. (76) (ii)
Tu crois qu’il arrive comment? You believe that he arrives how Tu crois qu’il va ou` ? You believe that he goes where
(NSC French) (Adli 2006:13, (6)
Il a de´cide´ de faire quoi? He has thought C to do what
(SC French)
Wh phrases in-situ are not trapped in neg Islands Il n’a pas rencontre´ qui ? He NE has not met who
(77)
(NSC French)
Modals (78), as well as Neg-Islands plus modals (79)
(iii)
(78) a.
Il peut rencontrer qui? (NSC French) He can meet who (Adli 2006: 16, (13)) b. Il peut/doit aller ou` ? he can/must go where (Adli 2006 : 16, (14)) (79) a. Il (ne) doit pas toucher qui/quoi? (NSC French Fr) He (NE) must not touch who/what b. Il (ne) peut/doit pas aller ou`? He (NE) can/must not go where (Adli 2006:14, (9)) (iv) wh in-situ tolerate interactions with Qs (Full DP (80)) and adverbs (81)30 (80) a.
Plusieurs personnes ont reconnu qui? (NSC French) Several persons have recognized who (Adli 2006:16, (15)) Plusieurs cheˆnes ont e´te´ coupe´s ou`/quand ? several oaks have been cut where/when (Adli 2006:16, (16))
b. (81) a. b. ?
Tu fais toujours quoi les week-ends? You do always what the week-ends ‘What do you always do on week-ends?’ Tu fais souvent quoi les week-ends? You do often what the week-ends ‘What do you often do on week-ends?’
(NSC French)
(NSC French)
The acceptability of (75)–(81) varies depending on the contexts. Note that these examples are judged degraded with respect to their moved counterparts. I claim 30
As for (81b), judgments vary from ‘?’ to ‘??’. A. Cattaneo (p.c) notes that the argument/ adjunct asymmetry may arise again here, i.e. giving more weight to the parallelism we are drawing between overt and covert wh-movement. (i)
a. * b. ?? c. *
Tu manges souvent du pain quand? You eat often bread when Tu bois souvent de la bie`re ou` ? you drink often beer where Tu bois souvent ton cafe´ comment ? you drink often your coffee how
(NSC French)
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
45
that the grammatical status of (75)–(81) depends on the discursive contexts they appear in as well as on the type of existential presupposition they carry. In other words, a lexical form like qui ‘who’ is potentially ambiguous between (at least) three interpretations: specific, partitive (both are presuppositional) and non-presuppositional. I will also show that prosody plays an important role. Prosody When it comes to the prosody of SC French wh in-situ, linguists do not agree (see section ‘‘Prosody and Semantics’’). I claim that the different intonations described in the literature are exhibited in NSC French. Wh-phrases in situ can be perceived to come with (i) a rising intonation and (ii) a slight falling intonation. In addition to these two, a fall-rise intonation (characterised by a high (H) accent (see Baunaz and Patin 2009) is also very productive. In the next section, I discuss the semantics associated with these three intonations. I claim that these three different prosodiess parallel three different interpretations of the wh-phrase in situ. Interpretations When it comes to the semantics of French wh in-situ, linguists highly disagree. (see section ‘‘General Properties’’ above). I claim that what linguists have to say about the semantics of wh in-situ in French is valid, but needs to be refined. It is often claimed that French wh-phrases in-situ and French fronted-wh differ in terms of presupposition, wh in-situ being necessarily associated with ‘strongly presupposed context’ (Chang 1997, Boeckx 1999, C&R 2000 a.o). No such presupposition is (necessarily) triggered with wh-fronting. Boeckx 1999 illustrates these facts by the test of Negation. The test shows that in presuppositional contexts, rien ‘nothing’ is not a possible answer. He argues that wh-phrases insitu are covert-clefts. Both wh-XPs in clefts and wh-phrases in-situ cannot be used out-of-the blue and a strong context where possible referents for the answer must be presupposed (‘#’ indicates that the answer goes against A’s presupposition): (82)
A:
B: (83)
A:
B: (84)
A:
Qu’ a achete´ Jean ? WH.cl has bought Jean ‘What has Jean bought?’ Un livre /une voiture/ rien. . . A book / a car / nothing (Boeckx 1999 : 69, (2)) Jean a achete´ quoi ? John has bought what ‘What has Jean bought?’ Un livre / une voiture / # rien A book / a car / nothing (Boeckx 1999 : 69, (3)) C’est quoi que Jean a achete´ ? it is what that J. has bought ‘What has Jean bought?’
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2 Split-DPs
B:
Un livre /une voiture/ # rien. . . A book / a car / nothing
In the literature, the term D(iscourse)-linking (Pesetsky 1987) is used to cover the notion of strong context (or strongly presupposed). This term was first defined syntactically and refers to the (exceptional) cases in which some whphrases tend to escape weak islands (and take wide scope). It is well known that in certain wh-constructions, complex wh-words (which N) are more free in their potential movements than bare wh-phrases like who (see Cinque 1990, Rizzi 1990 (a.o) for theories accounting for these phenomena). Which N must be distinguished from who in being able to be linked to referential sets pre-established/familiar in the discourse or part of the common ground shared by both the speaker and the interlocutor. In other words, the felicitous answers are restricted to a presupposed set. The interpretation of which N asks for an answer about a specific set, determined by the nominal head of the wh-word (i.e. girl, in (85)), present in the context of discourse. No such requirement is present with who in (86). D-linking is then not a syntactic notion. (85)
Which girl has eaten the apple ?
(86)
Who has eaten the apple ?
On the basis of the availability of French wh-phrases in-situ under negation and on the variation observed in the discourse contexts in which these constructions occur, Starke 2001 distinguishes between two types of noun phrases that drag presupposition along by already being introduced in the discourse. Presupposed nouns phrases (i.e, and not presupposed events, as in Chang 1997) can be interpreted depending on two discursive contexts: partitivity and specificity.31,32 Partitivity involves a finite set of alternatives (the presupposition is that there is a predefined set). A partitive DP is an object that has been previously mentioned together with other objects, each of which is a possible referent of the answer to the wh-phrase. In other words, a partitive item is a subset that is extracted from a previously mentioned group.33 There is no presupposition that there is a particular antecedent available in the discourse (such that the interlocutor believes that this referent is the right one), despite the existence of a set of available alternatives (a range). A further property is that the answer associated with a partitive wh-phrase can be a disjunctive statement (or smaller phrase) of the kind ‘X or Y’. The term specificity refers to familiar individuals, i.e. identified via a (known) intrinsic property. More precisely, there must be an available entity (part of the 31
Partitivity is called range in Starke 2001. It refers to Enc¸’s 1991 specific partitivity. Starke 2001 is not explicit when it comes to defining these notions. They are presented here as I understand them. 33 Or a list-setting, i.e. a set domain or a range (in Starke’s terms). 32
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
47
common ground shared by both the speaker and the interlocutor) as potential antecedent for that wh-phrase. The question requires the identity of that entity. ‘X or Y’ is not a possible answer to a specific wh-phrase. In other words, specific whphrases trigger the presupposition that the interlocutor knows the complete (nondisjunctive) answer, as such, a specific wh-phrase does not entail subsets or set relations.34 Specific wh-phrases are context dependant, since their referent depends on the utterance context. Specificity and Cinque’s d-linking are equivalent. Consider (87) and (88) below, which cannot be uttered out-of-the-blue, but require contextually specified domains. Partitivity picks out a domain whose set contains more than one item, as the following list-context indicates, (87). Figure 2.5 shows that QUOI in (87) is pronounced with a falling intonation (in Capitals in the text). QUOI has a Fundamental Frequency (F0) clearly falling (as a continuation fall). Because this prosody is perceived as falling, I call it the downfall intonation (I also use the term falling, interchangeably). (87)
A conversation between Vanessa and He´le`ne about Aure´lien’s birthday gift: V: Fred hesitated a lot between a bottle of champagne, a CD, a jacket. . .
34
In Heim 1982, definites and indefinites must be distinguished: (i) definites must be familiar in the context and (ii) the restriction on a definite NP must be presupposed. She captures the meaning of both definites and indefinites, using the notion of file cards. Roughly, the notion of familiarity on NPs is characterized as displaying a co-indexed discourse referent in the Domain (i.e. the Common Ground; formally, a function from discourse contexts to sets of indices. Each set of indices is the discourse referent constituting the Domain of the relevant context). Definites presuppose that such discourse referents are in the Domain, i.e. they refer back. Indefinites must be novel and introduce new referents by restricted free variables x in the universe of discourse. A new card with index x is added to a file cardset F, and is augmented as the discourse progresses. The difference between the two is formulated in terms of file card indices, as in (i): (i)
Novelty-Familiarity-Condition: For to be felicitous w.r.t. a file F it is required for every NPx in that: i. if NPx is [ definite], then 62 62Dom(F); ii. if NPx is [þdefinite], then a. x 2 Dom(F), and (Heim, 1982: 370) b. if NPx is a formula, F entails NPx.
(i-i) illustrates novelty; (i-iia) familiarity, that is ‘the discourse referents of definite NPs must be already familiar at the time when these NPs are uttered’ (Zucchi 1995:45). In (i-iib), the Descriptive Content Condition states that definite NPs presuppose their descriptive content. Enc¸ 1991 extends the claim that specificity is closely related to familiarity, and extends (i) to indefinites.
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2 Split-DPs
Fig. 2.5 (Smoothed) F0 of (87)
LN:
V:
OH! Et il a fini par acheter QUOI? Oh! And he has finally bought what ‘Oh! and what did he finally buy?’ A bottle of champagne / # nothing
In (87), there is no presupposition that there is an available antecedant in the discourse; yet there is a set of available alternatives: LN tries to identify a member of the known list of possible gifts. She has no clue about what Fred chose, activating a partitive reading of the wh-phrase, the answer can only be within the presupposed set available to both speaker and interlocutor, and is necessarily disjunctive: the answer can potentially be a bottle of champagne, a jacket, or a cd. To sum up, what is partitive is a discourse, certain linguistic expressions and their referents. Figures 2.6 and 2.7 are the F0 curves of two different speakers for a single sentence in a partitive context. In both cases, quoi is uttered with a slight falling intonation. Note that the wh-word is not the highest tone in the sentence. Everybody is queueing at the caferteria. Several main courses are proposed: beefsteak, chicken and stew. The waiter asks Le´a, who is hesitating for too long: (88)
Bon, vous prenez QUOI finalement? Ok, you take what finally ‘ok, what do you want, finally ?’
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
49
Fig. 2.6 F0 curve of (88)
Fig. 2.7 F0 curve of (88)
Qui and quoi are bare pronouns. The prosody of partitive wh-words involving more syllables show a similar pattern (Fig. 2.8). The wh-word quel ‘which’ is uttered without proeminent accent or stress: it is slightly falling (or at best flat). Note that if the noun is more likely proeminent, this fact is not systematic (Baunaz and Patin, p.c): (89)
Vous choisissez QUEL plat finalement? You chose which dish finalement ‘Finally which dish do you want ?’
(Baunaz and Patin 2009)
50
2
Split-DPs
Fig. 2.8 F0 curve of (89)
Specificity picks out an individual. Consider the following context35: there has been a murder. Three guys have been arrested; there are 4 witnesses. A journalist and one of the witnesses have a conversation about the trial that is about to end. Suspects and witnesses have been confronted. One of the suspects is recognized by all the witnesses. The burden of proof lies on suspect number 3. The journalist asks: (90)
J : et les te´moins ont reconnu qui dans le box des accuse´s ? and the witnesses have recognised whom in the box of the defendants ‘and whom did the witnesses recognise in the defendants’ box ?’
In (90) the journalist tries to identify an individual whose reference is inferred to be familiar to the interlocutor, that is, the guy that all the witnesses recognized. In that discursive context, the specific antecedent (and so the felicitous answer) is defendant number 3, as such, personne ‘nobody’ cannot be a felicitous answer, since it would go against the presupposition that there is a specific antecedent for qui ‘who’. Specificity is then also defined relative to the type of answer possible. The answer is non-disjunctive. In (90) the F0 is falling on the last syllable of the past participle and clearly rising on the whphrase, which is lengthened (Fig. 2.9). Because it is perceived as fall-rise, I call this intonation the fall-rise intonation (indicated below by ‘’), from now on. The same pattern arises with complex wh-phrases (quel accuse´ ‘which witness’ in (Fig. 2.10)): the F0 is slightly falling on the past-participle and clearly rising on the wh-word quel, which bears the H accent. That the specific noun is falling (there is no prominence on accuse´), is not a systematic, though, even if it is the preferred option:
35
Context adapted from Adli 2006, and tested in Baunaz and Patin 2009.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
51
Fig. 2.9 F0 curve of (90)
Fig. 2.10 F0 curve of (90)
Note that the same pattern arises with quoi /kwa/ ‘what’ in-situ. In the following specific context, the past participle (achete´) tends to be slightly falling (or flat) and the wh-phrase in-situ gets an H accent (Fig. 2.11). He´le`ne is a big fan of Bjork, who just released a new album. He´le`ne must meet her good friend ¨ Fred near that big Mall called La Fnac. She is 20 min late: (91)
H : I am so sorry, i am late ! But I popped at the Fnac to bye something. F: ah ouais! Et t’as achete´ quoi a` la Fnac? Oh yeah ! and you have bought what at the Fnac ‘oh yeah! And what did you buy at the Fnac’
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2 Split-DPs
Fig. 2.11 F0 curve of (91)
(91) means: what is the thing that I believe you bought at the mall. The fall-rise intonation at the end of the sentence indicates that the speaker has a very good idea that the interlocutor has a specific referent in mind. Note that Figs. 2.9, 2.10 and 2.11 are clearly contrasting with Figs. 2.5, 2.6, 2.7 and 2.8, where partitive bare wh-words are uttered with a slight falling (or at best flat) intonation and where prosodic prominence may be found on the noun with complex wh-phrases, but crucially not on the wh-word quel itself. In addition to partitive and specific wh-phrases in-situ, there is a third type of wh-phrase that has been claimed to be impossible in-situ (Boeckx 1999, a.o): that type of wh in-situ is neither specific, nor partitive; it is non-presuppositional. According to the test of Negation (Boeckx 1999), rien ‘nothing’ is not a possible answer in presuppositional contexts. On the basis of that test, linguists have shown that wh in-situ – just like wh-clefts, cannot be used out-of-the blue and a strong context where possible referents for the answer must be presupposed. Yet, while this fact is valid for wh-clefts (they cannot be answered by rien (66), above), the same is not true for wh-phrases in-situ (see Starke 2001, Mathieu 2004a, Baunaz 2005). Concretely, the test of negation reveals that wh-clefts are necessarily presuppositional, whereas wh in-situ phrases do not necessary involve presupposition, (91). In addition, neither partitive, nor specific wh in-situ can be answered by rien ‘nothing’, suggesting – again, that both trigger presupposition (92) and (93): (91)
A.
B:
T’as mange´ quoi ? you have eaten what ? ‘what did you eat ?’ Nothing / an apple
(Out-of-the-blue)
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
(92)
A:
B: (93)
A:
B:
53
Jean a achete´ quoi (de la liste)? John has bought what (from the list) ‘What has Jean bought?’ A book / a car / *nothing
(partitive)
Jean a achete´ quoi ? John has bought what ‘What has Jean bought?’ A book / a car / *nothing
(specific)
On the basis of Boeckx’s argument about the relation Negation-presupposition, I claim that wh in-situ questions that can be answered by rien do not involve commitment of existence. They can be uttered in situations where the interlocutor has no clue about the referent for the wh-phrase. Note moreover that a question with a non-presuppositional wh-phrase can also be answered by ‘quelque chose’ something (Andreas Haida (p.c)), a typical positive polarity item in French. No commitment of existence is involved in that sentence, since it appears out-of-the-blue (The speaker does not even know whether Jean bought anything in (92)). To sum up, the non-presupposition of wh interrogatives is defined negatively: non-presuppositional wh-phrases are neither specific, nor partitive. When no commitment of existence is involved with wh-phrases in-situ, a ‘rising’ intonation is perceived, from the last syllable of the past participle up to the end of the utterance (as in (91)). The F0 curve of that sentence (Fig. 2.12)
Fig. 2.12 F0 curve of (91)
54
2 Split-DPs
contrasts with Figs. 2.9, 2.10 and 2.11, whose F0 is falling from the last syllable of reconnu and then raised on the wh phrase. In that case, rien is a possible answer.36 This intonation is written without special diacritics/fonts. A single wh-phrase in-situ can (potentially) exhibit three distinct interpretations: two are presuppositional and one is not. Specificity differs from partitivity in that it requires a richer context. Specificity-based discursive contexts narrow down to familiar individuals (the context offers no choice), while partitive contexts allow various possibilities/alternatives (a choice). Under a partitive presupposition, one extracts an individual from a subset of a presupposed set, while under specificity, a familiar individual is identified. A lexical form like qui, is then (potentially) ambiguous between (at least) three interpretations. As the reader will have noticed, the differences between (i) specific, (ii) partitive and (iii) non-presuppositional wh phrases in-situ can be reformulated as differences in the presupposition on the nature of the answer that the whphrase triggers. With specific wh-phrases in-situ, the presupposition lies in the fact that there is a set of objects that were previously mentioned in the discursive context out of which the interlocutor picks up the object (or objects) she wants to refer to in her fully informative non disjunctive answer. With partitive whphrases in-situ, the presupposition is that there is a set of objects that were previously mentioned in the discursive context out of which the interlocutor picks up one or more objects she wants to mention in her (possibly disjunctive) answer (A disjunctive answer is chosen if her knowledge is not sufficient to give a complete non-disjunctive one). No presupposition on the answer is involved with non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ. Table 2.1 summarizes the different properties discussed so far. The domain of non-presuppositional wh-phrases is not constrained, and opens on an infinite set of alternatives. No familiar individual is involved. Partitive wh-phrases are distinguished from non-presuppositional ones in involving a closed, presupposed set of alternatives. As for specific Qs, there is no set of alternatives, but a
Table 2.1 Semantic properties of wh-phrases in-situ Domaine Non-presuppositional Qs Partitive Qs Specific Qs
36
Open Closed Closed
Familiar individual
Alternatives p p Speaker: underspecified
Interlocutor: *
* * p
Complex wh-words tend to get a presuppositional interpretation (see Pesetsky 1987, a.o). When they are in-situ, they tend to get either a partitive, or a specific intonation (see Baunaz and Patin 2009). For this reason, I do not have figures of complex wh-phrases in-situ with a rising intonation.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
55
familiar individual as referent for the wh-word (that the hearer is inferred to have in mind)37: In this section, I argued for a differential treatment of existential presupposition with respect to wh-in-situ constructions. Wh-phrases may carry existential presupposition. When they carry it, they can be either specific, or partitive. I focussed on the relationships between the intonations of wh phrases in-situ and their interpretations. I have shown that (i) interrogative clauses with whphrases in situ exhibit three distinct prosodic contours, (ii) each prosodic contour is associated with distinct interpretative (semantic/pragmatic) properties. Based on the hypothesis that existential presupposition carried by whphrases in-situ has prosodic correlates, Baunaz and Patin 2009 conducted a pilot ‘production’ study to (i) check whether a particular prosody was associated with different presuppositional and non-presuppositional contexts; (ii) check if the prosodic parameters varied depending on the ‘in-situ’/‘ex-situ’ status of a wh-word (that have both the same context restrictions). They argue that prosody can mark different discursive status in spoken NSC French. More precisely, wh-words starting with /k/, like qui, quoi, quel, can get an accent when they carry a specific presupposition, no matter the position they occupy (in-situ/ex-situ).38 This accent is neither found on non-presuppositional, nor on partitive wh-phrases. This study supports the idea proposed in this book, namely that the nonpresupposition vs. presupposition distinction is not sufficient and must be refined in terms of specific vs non-specific. Besides discourse contexts and prosody, I claim that specificity and partitivity can be distinguished in terms of syntax. First, specific and partitive wh phrases in-situ are not senstitive to the same interveners (see Chapter 5 37 Note that the notion of alternatives available for speaker or interlocutor is not necessary to define specificity. The crucial point distinguishing specificity from partitivity is tied to the notion of familiarity (cf. Heim 1982). See fn. 34. 38 In that study, the term accent is used interchangeably with prosodic salience (Ce´dric Patin, p.c). A note about the prosodic descriptions is in order, here. Their study is based on a production experiment, and the results obtained slightly vary from our description here (beside the fact that a neat distinction between specific and partitive wh-phrases is observed). Our findings are based on introspective judgements (i.e. can you say et les te´moins ont reconnus qui dans le box des accuse´s? in various contexts) where intonation is only used as diagnostics discriminating specificity from partitivity and non-presupposition, i.e. the methodology used is different. The ‘apparent’ diverging descriptions are yet not contradictory (as opposed to what was said about SC French in the preceeding section): for Baunaz and Patin (p.c), if it is true that a fall-rise intonation on a wh in-situ gives rise to a specific interpretation, it is not true that a specific context always corresponds to a fall-rise intonation (the same one way correspondance is valid for partitives/falling and non-presuppositional / rising). In other words, it is not true that interpretation gives rise to a particular prosody, things might be a little bit more complex than presented. Yet I claim that when a speaker perceives a particular intonation on a wh-phrase in-situ, he can easily reconstruct the context as specific, partitive or non-presuppositional. This case has not been invalidated by Baunaz and Patin (p.c). Further research is needed in this area.
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2 Split-DPs
in particular). Second, I claim that the mechanism linking the referent of the specific wh-phrase in-situ with the existing discourse referent can get grammaticalized in natural languages. I argue that specificity is overtly marked in the prosody of specific wh in-situ phrases in French, while syntactically grounded (see Baunaz and Patin 2009). Typically, specific items like wh-words (and un N ‘a N’, see Section 2.1.4) take wide scope (see also Chapter 5, Section 5.1.2).
2.1.3 Split-DPs Recall from Chapter 1, Section 1.1.1.1 that the term canonical quantification describes the configuration of canonical quantificational sentences. Quantificational expressions are complex DPs, composed of a Det, its restriction and a nuclear scope, (94a). The restriction is the domain of quantification of that Q and it takes scope over the clause it belongs to. When Q and its restriction are not adjacent anymore, the term adopted to describe it is non-canonical quantification. The Split-DP configuration is a prototypical instance of non-canonical constructions, (94b), (see Obenauer 1994, Mathieu 2002 in particular). (94)
a. b.
Canonical Quantification: Q– restriction – scope Non-Canonical Quantification (Split-DP): Q-scope-restriction
In Japanese, non-canonical quantificational structures are built with particles and overt in-situ restrictions. These overt Q-particles take dare, an indefinite, as its restriction. In (95a), ka marks the clause interrogative, ka and dare are not adjacent; in (95b), mo and dare are again not adjacent, and the Q is interpreted as a 8Q; in (95c), ka and dare are adjacent, yet the complex is interpreted existentially: (95)
a.
b.
c.
Dare-ga ki-masu-ka (Japanese) who N some-Q ‘Who’s coming?’ Dare-ga ki-te mo, boku-wa aw-a-nai Who-N come Q I-T meet not ‘For all x, if x comes, I would not meet (x)’ Dare-ka-kara henna tagami-ga todoi-ta who Q from strange letter-N arrived ‘A strange letter came from somebody’ (Cheng 1992:83, (65))
The indefinite dare, glossed ‘who’, is neither intrinsically interrogative, nor existential (Hagstrom 1998, 2001). In (95a) to (95c), the same particle is used (ka), but two different readings arise, depending on their positions relative to dare. When ka occurs at the end of the clause (i.e. C8, in Japanese), it bears interrogative strength, i.e. it is a Qwh-particle. Dare then, is an overt variable available for binding (96). It can be associated to an overt Q-particle that can be spelled-out as ka or mo (97b and c).
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
(96)
dare ¼ one (x)
(97)
a. b. c.
57
(Japanese)
dare dare-ka dare-mo
‘who’ ‘someone’ ‘everyone’
(Watanabe 1992)
Two syntactic derivations can express the relation between ka [þwh] and dare in (95a) (and the same point can be raised for dare-mo): either (i) the restriction and the particle are generated together (and then Q-movement occurs, stranding the restriction in-situ), as in (98); or (ii) the Q-particle is merged in C8, and no movement is involved. Q binds the overt indefinite that stayed in-situ (99).39 (98)
[restiction+Qwh]
(99)
[restriction] . . . C8
C°
(Japanese) Qwh
(Japanese)
40
Japanese and Chinese wh in-situ arguably involves indefinites as wh-words (see Cheng 1991, C&R 2000, Tsai 1994 a.o), and as such they potentially also display Split-DP constructions.41
39
But may move at LF (for scope, absorption and/or selection purposes). Chinese wh-words are not intrinsically interrogative and acquire their interrogative force when bound by an overt (or non-overt) wh-operator. They can also be bound by other Operators, such as 9, 8 or Negative:
40
(i)
a.
b.
Ta yiwei wo xihuan shenme? he think I like what ‘What does he think I like?’ Ta yiwei wo xihuan shenme He think I like what ‘He thinks that I like something’ (Aoun and Li 1993:212, (45))
(Chinese)
(i) shows that the default reading is not interrogative. Shenme ‘what’ can be interpreted existentially, (ib). Chinese differs from Japanese in that the Q-particle is non-overt (Cheng 1991). 41 Chinese wh-phrases in-situ are pure variables (i.e. indefinites), and as such they do not need to move, witnessed by the fact that wh phrases (a) are not trapped in SIs ((i), ex. from Aoun and Li 1993a:203) and (b) do not trigger subjacency violation (ii) (see fn.43, this chapter). As they need to be bound by an Op in C8 to be interpreted as interrogative, Chinese wh abstract structure is that in (iii) (see also Mathieu 2002): (i)
(ii)
(iii)
Ta [yinwei ni shuo shenme hua] hen shengqi? (Chinese) he because you say what word very angry * ‘Whati was he angry because you said ti words?’ (adjunct island) Ta xiang-zhidao SHEI maile shenme? (Chinese) he wonder who bought what What x, x a thing, he wonders who bought x? (Mathieu 2002:65, (12)) [variable]. . . C8Qwh
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2 Split-DPs
Hagstrom 1998 (and subsq.), Watanabe 1992, Hagstrom 1998, 1999, 2001 argue that Japanese wh-phrases are composed of a Q-particle and an in-situ indefinite, dare. Based on the observation that the wh-phrase dare are fine within islands, Watanabe 1992 argues that wh-phrases in Japanese do not undergo movement, and that wh-Q-particles do (see also Hagstrom 1999). In non-d-linked contexts, ittai ‘in the world’ can show up with wh-phrases. If ittai is inserted inside an island and the wh-particle is at the end of the sentence (i.e. outside the island, occupying a position in the CP), the sentence is ungrammatical (100a). Yet, if ittai is outside the island and ka occupies a sentence final position, judgments improve (101b). In (100) and (101), brackets indicate island barriers (examples are from Hagstrom 1999:4, (9) and (10)): (100)
a. * Hiro-ga [Sue-ni ittai nani-o ageta hito-ni] aimasita ka ? H-NOM S-DAT ittai what-ACC gave man-Dat met.POL Q ‘What in the world did Hiro meet the man that gave t to Sue?’ b. * Hiro-ga [Sue-ni ittai tka nani-o ageta hito-ni] aimasita ka ?
(101)
a.
b.
Hiro-ga ittai [Sue-ni nani-o ageta hito-ni] aimasita ka ? H-NOM ittai S-DAT what-ACC gave man-DAT met.POL Q ‘What in the world did Hiro meet the man that gave t to Sue ?’ Hiro-ga ittai tka [Sue-ni nani-o ageta hito-ni] aimasita ka ?
If ka first originates next to ittai and then moves to CP, then (100) is ruled out because it cannot escape the island (Hagstrom 1999). Since ittai is outside the island in (101), ka-movement is fine: no island boundary is crossed. Hagstrom claims that ittai marks the base position of the particle, i.e. ka moves overtly42,43:
42
The same argument accounts for Intervention Effects (i): ka cannot move past another ka (ia); Intervention Effects are detected with the wh-particle no when it moves past negation (ib), 8Qs (ic) and 9Qs particles (id): (i) a. ?*
b. * c. *
d. ??
[John-ka Bill]-ga nani-o nominmasita ka? (Japanese) John-or Bill-NOM what-ACC drank Q (‘What did John or bill drink?) (Hagstrom 1999:2, (2)) Hanako-sika nani-o yoma-nai no? Hanako-only what-Acc read-Neg Q (adapted from Tanaka 1999) Hotondo dono hito-mo nani-o yonda no? almost every person what-Acc read Q (from Pesetsky 1998/2000, citing Miyagawa 1998) Dare-ka-ga nani-o katta no? someone-NOM what-ACC bought Q ‘Someone bought what?’ (Hoji 1985)
Under the hypothesis that Q-movement is witnessed in languages with Q-particles, island violations can be accounted for by resorting to locality violations. In (i) and (ii), in its way to C8 no crosses Q-particles, yielding sharp degradations. (see also Pesetsky 2000, a.o). It follows that if the wh in-situ is in a higher position when Q-movement occurs, no Intervention Effects is predicted to show up. Japanese scrambling is an example (Pesetsky 2000).
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
59
Japanese wh-movement is subject to Island effects. Wh-phrases in these languages stay in-situ, and there is movement of a wh-particle in overt syntax. This movement is subject to locality restrictions. In the next sections, I come back to NSC French and propose that wh-phrases in-situ are complex DPs of the Japanese type, yet minimally involving a phonologically null operator and an indefinite. I will argue that wh in-situ sentences (potentially) involve Split-DP configurations. This, of course, can be argued once a movement analysis is adopted. In the next section, I evaluate whether or not these phrases move at some point. 2.1.3.1 Evidence for a Movement Analysis of Wh-Phrases In-situ Phrases in NSC French According to Cheng 1991, interrogatives must be syntactically typed, either by a wh-particle (that can be phonologically null, generally in [y/n]-question) or via wh-movement. If languages with wh-particles do not syntactically move their wh-phrases (Japanese, Sinhala, Chinese), languages without wh-particles have to, to type the Clause interrogative.44 French does not fit within this typology: (i) it allows fronted and in-situ wh-phrases; (ii) while displaying the in-situ strategy, French does not have overt Q-particles. The status of movement with respects to the in-situ (vs. ex-situ) property of wh-phrases shows up once we want to give a syntactic analysis of this phenomenon. If LF-pied-piping movement operates over these phrases, a certain syntactic parallelism with their overt counterpart is expected, unless they involve different types of movement. This section is devoted to establish that wh in-situ phrases are subject to Q (A’)-movement, just like fronted wh-phrases. I also show that the wh-phrases in-situ identified above do not behave alike: not all are trapped in WIs. If movement of the wh-phrase in these constructions is attested, it must be covert. I show that wh in-situ constructions in NSC French parallel their overt 43
Aoun and Li 1993, Tsai 1994 (a.o) argue that Chinese wh-words are unselectively bound (Tsai 1994) (i.e. as using strategy (98)). Chinese wh in-situ are subject neither to wh-island (i) (Huang 1982), nor to intervention effects (ii): (i)
(ii)
ni xiang-zhidao [wh weishenme mai shenme]? You wonder I why buy what ‘what do you wonder why I bought?’ meigen dou mai-le shenme? Everyone all buy-perf. what ‘What did everyone buy ?’
(Chinese) (Huang 1982) (Chinese)
These facts suggest that Chinese wh in-situ phrases are not subject to the same restriction as Japanese wh in-situ constructions and that they must be analyzed differently (Watanabe 2001). 44 Things are obviously more complex. It has been shown that there are languages with Qparticles which display wh-movement, Vata (Koopman 1984) and Tlingit (Cable 2008) are cases in point. I thank Gabriela Soare for pointing this out to me.
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2 Split-DPs
counterparts in showing sensitivity to the classical tests for movement (see Section 2.1.1.1): SCO (102), WCO (103) and Superiority effects (104) and (105), WIs (neg) (106)–(111) and SIs (112) and (113). Just like fronted wh, wh in-situ constructions in French show SCO effects, independently of their intonation/semantics. French wh in-situ violate Principle C covertly. (102)
a. * b. * c. *
Ili pense que Tara a invite´ quii? Ili pense que Tara a invite´ _ quii? Ili pense que Tara a invite´ QUIi? He thinks that T. has invited WHOM
(NSC French)
Second, the three wh in-situ show WCO effects, just like fronted wh, i.e. they undergo quantificational movement: (103)
a.* b. * c. *
Sai me`re Her mother Sai me`re Her mother Sai me`re Her mother
aime likes aime _ likes aime likes
quii le plus? (NSC French) who the most quelle chanteusei le plus? which.fem.sg singer.fem.sg the most QUIi le plus? who the most
Another argument is based on multiple wh-constructions and superiority effects. Syntax restricts the order of appearance of wh-phrases in multiple questions. French multiple wh-questions involve superiority effects, (104): (104)
a.
b. *
Qui a achete´ quoi? Who has bought what ‘Who bought what?’ Qu’est-ce que qui a achete´ ? what who has bought
(NSC French)
Interestingly the same pattern has been pointed out by Bosˇ kovic´ 1998 for French multiple wh in-situ. He bases his evidence on multiple wh in-situ questions and shows that they can involve Single Pair (SP) answers (vs. the obligatory PL answer of overt wh-movement (105b)) i.e. they involve superiority effects. (105)
a.
b.
Il a donne´ quoi a` qui? he has given what to whom ‘What did he give to whom?’ Qu’a-t-il donne´ a` qui?
(Bosˇ kovic´ 1998:18, (43))
This, again, suggests that wh phrases in-situ LF-move. Fourth, some wh phrases in-situ are sensitive to WIs. Starke 2001 shows that specific wh in-situ in French can appear in neg islands (eWI).45 If [þneg] 45
See also Pesetsky 1987 and d-linking. Pesetsky’s contribution is to highlight the distinction between the availability of LF-movement vs. non-movement.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
61
intervenes, the much discussed argument/adjunct asymmetry witnessed with wh-fronting re-appears. (106)
a. b. ??
Tu crois qu’elle a pas fait _ quoi ? (NSC French) You think that she has not done what (Starke 2001: 23, (52a)) T’es pas parti _ comment? You are not left how (Starke 2001: 23, (54b))
If the wh in-situ receives a partitive reading and a downfall intonation, it can also move out of a WI, again iff it is an argument. (107)
a. b. *
T’as pas utilise´ QUELLE MACHINE ? You think that she has not done what T’es pas parti COMMENT? You are not left how
(NSC French)
(107) is perfect in the following context. Claire is a regular at Rainbow gym. She goes there three times a week. As it is usually the case in these gyms, she has a coach. Her coach usually prepares a plan for the day, i.e. she needs to use all the machines listed. That day Claire is a bit tired and she works out more slowly than usual. At the end of the session, she tells the coach that she could not use all the machines. The conscientious coach, who wants to prepare the next session is a bit frustrated, so he asks (107). Partitive wh in-situ need a list-context to be interpretable. As for non-presuppositional wh phrases in-situ, they cannot escape WIs: (108)
a. * b. *
Tu crois qu’elle a pas fait quoi? (NSC French) You think that she has not done what? Tu crois qu’elle a pas mange´ sa pomme comment? You think that she has not eaten her apple how
Therefore non-presuppositional wh in-situ are blocked in neg Islands. On the contrary, specific and partitive wh in-situ take scope over the whole clause, i.e. they can escape WIs, although wh-adjuncts in-situ cannot, suggesting again, that movement takes place also with these types of in-situ. Scope islands are another type of WIs (see Beck 1996, Pesetsky 1998/2000 and Chapter 5), where a Q intervenes between the in-situ position of the wh and Spec CP. Neither the presuppositional, nor the non-presuppositional wh phrase in-situ is available in this configuration. (109)
a. * b. ?? c*
Tous les e´tudiants ont lu QUOI? all the students have read what Tous les garc¸ons ont lu quoi? All the boys have read what Chacun des garc¸ons connaıˆ t _ qui ? each of the boys knows whom
(ok if echoic) (ok if echoic) (ok if echoic)
Consider the following context, adapted from Adli 2006. A conversation between two friends. A is telling B about a hearing where six persons are accused
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2 Split-DPs
of a kidnapping. Since all of them deny it, the burden of proofs relies also on the number of witnesses. During the process, only one witness recognized five of the accused, but all the witnesses recognized one of the accused. At this point B asks: (110)
a.
et tous les te´moins ont reconnu _ qui? (wh >8 only) And all the witnesses have recognized whom
(NSC)
With a specific wh in-situ (110a), the question is perfectly fine in this context, yielding a SP reading. Now imagine that A is telling B that the trial is over and that all the persons have been thrown in jail, but for different motives. In that context, which provides a clear range, partitive wh in-situ are not licensed (110b and c): b. * c. *
Chacun des te´moins a e´te´ accuse´ de QUOI ? (ok if echoic) and each of the witnesses has been accused of what Tous les te´moins ont e´te´ accuse´ de QUOI ? (ok if echoic) all the witnesses have been accused of what
With respect to scope islands, then, only specific wh in-situ can outscope 8Qs. Partitive and non-presuppositional wh phrases in-situ are blocked. (111a) shows that aggressively non-d-linked wh-phrases (i.e. ‘who the hell’) are not licensed in Strong Islands, i.e. the wide scope reading is only accessible to a presuppositional wh-phrase. Under the hypothesis that wh-phrases in-situ are licensed by covert movement, (111a) is accounted for in the same way as overt whmovement is in SI environments: it violates subjacency and antecedent government. Wh-phrases in-situ are not always banned from NSC French SI, (111b). Starke 2001 observes that wh-phrases in-situ can appear in SIs (Starke 2001, (51)). The interpretation of (111b) must presupposes the existence of an individual, i.e. it is specific (Baunaz and Puska´s 2008:48, (12)). As expected in the context of a SI, there is no argument/adjunct asymmetry, (112).46 (111)
a.* b.
Elle a ri [parce que Jean s’est moque´ de qui diable?] she has laughed because Jean has made fun of who devil Elle a ri [parce que Jean s’est moque´ de qui ?] she has laughed because Jean has made fun of who (¼who did she laugh because Jean made fun of?)
(112) Elle a ri parce que Jean a dormi ou` / comment / quand? She has laughed because J. has slept where/how/when (¼where/how/when did she laugh because Jean slept?) 46
Unexpectedly however, (112) involve wh-phrases trapped in SIs. This state of affairs is problematic since it is traditionally observed that extraction out of SI is impossible. In that sense, (112) resemble Chinese in adjunct islands (i): (i)
Ta [yinwei ni shuo shenme hua] hen shengqi? he because you say what word very angry * ‘Whati was he angry because you said ti words?’
(Chinese) (Aoun and Li 1993a:203)
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
63
Baunaz and Puska´s 2008 claim that the wide scope interpretation obtains via covert movement, even with SIs. Indeed, the presence of WIs reveals that the wide scope reading of a presuppositional wh-phrase is blocked by negation in matrix negative contexts (113) (Baunaz and Puska´s 2008:49, (13b), see Chapter 5, Section 5.1.3.2): (113) *elle a pas ri [parce que Jean a aime´ quel film]? she has not laughed because Jean has liked which actor Another argument in favor of a movement analysis comes along when French is compared to a language that only uses the in-situ strategy. One of Huang’s 1982 arguments in favor of LF-movement is based on selection. Chinese verbs display the same properties as English when it comes to selection. This is illustrated in (114)–(116) for Chinese, and (117)–(119) for English: (114) Zhangsan xiang-zidao Mary kanijian shei Z wonder Mary saw who ‘Z wonders who Mary saw’ *Who does John wonder (that) Mary saw?’
(Chinese)
(Mathieu 2002: 38, (9))
(114) can only be an indirect question. A verb like believe must be interpreted as a direct question (115), while a verb like know permits both readings (116): (115) Zhangsan xiangxin Mary janjian shei Z. believe Mary saw who ‘Who did Z. believe Mary saw?’ *‘John believes who Mary saw’ (116) Zhangsan zhidao Mary kanjian shei Z. know Mary saw who ‘Z. knows who Mary saw’ ‘Who does Z. know Mary saw’
(Chinese)
(Mathieu 2002: 38, (10)) (Chinese)
(Mathieu 2002: 38, (11))
In English too, know, believe and wonder each display different selective properties, (117)–(119). Know selects either a [þwh] C8 or a [wh] C8; believe selects a [wh] C8 and wonder a [þwh] C8. French behaves like English, in that respect, (120)–(122), i.e. wh-phrases in-situ move: (117) a. b.
Jim knows which book Mary reads Which book does Jim know Mary read?
(118) a. * b.
Jim believes which book Mary reads Which book does Jim believe Mary reads?
(119) a. b. *
Jim wonders which book Mary reads Which book does Jim wonder (that) Mary reads
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2 Split-DPs
(120) a. b. c. * (121) a. b. c. (122) a. b. * c. *
Olivier croit que Marie a vu qui / qui / QUI? O. thinks that M. has seen who(m) Qui est ce que Olivier croit que Marie a vu who is it that O. thinks that M. has seen Olivier croit qui Marie a vu O. thinks who M. has seen
(NSC French)
Olivier sait qui Marie a vu O. knows who M. has seen Qui est-ce que Olivier sait que Marie a vu Who is it that O. knows that M. has seen Jean sait que Marie a vu qui / qui / QUI ? J. knows that M. has seen who
(NSC French)
Olivier se demande qui/*que Marie a vu (NSC French) O. wonders who /*that Marie has seen Qui est-ce que Olivier se demande (que) Marie a vu ? who is it that O. wonders (that) M. has seen Olivier se demande que Mary a vu qui / qui / QUI? O. wonder that M. has seen who
In French, wh-phrases are never in-situ in embedded indirect questions (123): (123) a. b. * c. *
Je me demande qui tu as vu? I cl. wonder that you has seen Je me demande tu as vu qui ? I cl. wonder you have seen who Je me demande que tu as vu qui ? I cl. wonder that you have seen who
(NSC French)
A final argument comes from indirect y/n questions, introduced by si ‘if’. When si is selected, Adli 2006 notes that no wh phrase can show up in situ: (124) * Je me demande si Jean a achete´ quoi? I myself ask if Jean has bought what
(NSC French) (Adli 2006:23, (28))
The ungrammaticality of (124) is accounted for if NSC quoi is moved to the highest SpecCP at LF, for clause typing reason, yielding wh-island effects. Now that we have established that wh-phrases in-situ move at some point, the next issue is what kind of movement is involved. At least two possiblities arise: (i) covert phrasal movement, or (ii) overt movement of the wh-phrase, followed by remnant movement of the IP. The latter solution has been proposed for French and Spanish wh in-situ constructions. The idea in a nutshell is that in Split combien constructions, the wh-phrase insitu is overtly moved to SpecCP, subsequently followed by movement of the remnant IP (Poletto and Pollock 2004, Butler and Mathieu 2005):
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
65
(125) Combien [IP as-tu lu ei]j de livresi ej ei? (Butler and Mathieu 2005, (12)) The remnant analysis rests on the idea that Split-DPs and their unsplit counterparts are identical. Yet these two must be differentiated on the basis of (i) scope and (ii) agreement (Butler and Mathieu 2005): (i) shows that Split-DP structures have fixed scope, unlike unsplit structures, (126) (de Swart 1992): (126) a. b.
Combieni ont-ils tous lu ti de livres? (8 > wh) ; *(wh > 8) How-many have they all read of books Combien de livresi ont-ils tous lu ti? (8 > wh) ; (wh > 8) How-many of books have they all read.MASC.PL ‘How many books have they read’ (de Swart 1992:391)
(ii) If Split-DP structures never show object past participle agreement, their unsplit counterparts do. Object agreement corresponds to a presuppositional reading of the wh-phrase (Obenauer 1992, see Section 2.1.3.3): (127) a. b.
Combien de boitesi as-tu ouvertes ti ? how-many of cans have you open-PL.FEM Combieni as-tu ouvert/*es ti de boites? ‘How many cans have you opened?’ (Mathieu 2004a:7, (8))
The distinct meanings suggest that the stranded nominal in (127b) front to a distinct position than in (127a). Under a remnant analysis, the restriction would have to move to SpecAgrOP, i.e. triggering agreement, contrary to facts. More generally a movement analysis of the restriction in these contstructions is problematic since it introduces a novel nominal (i.e. cannot be topics). In other words, it should be interpreted in-situ, i.e. as not being part of a remnant IP movement. A second analysis of wh in-situ phrases as remnant movement in non-strict wh in-situ languages has been proposed for Spanish. Spanish is also a language allowing apparent ‘optional’ wh phrases in-situ. In (128), the wh-word can either occupy the topmost position (128a), or the lowest (128b): (128) a. b.
¿A quie´n invitaste a la fiesta? (Sp) Whom you-invited for the party ¿Invitaste a la fiesta a quie´n? You-invited for the party whom (Etxepare and Uribe-Etxebarria 2002, (1))
Etxepare-Etxebarria 2002 (E and UE, henceforth), and Jime´nez 1997, note the following syntactic and semantic properties for Spanish wh-phrases in-situ. Properties (i) to (v) are similar to thoses of NSC French wh in-situ: (i) Spanish wh in-situ can be adjuncts, (129); (ii) Spanish wh in-situ can be embedded, (130); (iii) Spanish wh in-situ are not trapped in scope islands, (131); (iv) Spanish wh in-situ show argument/adjunct asymmetry under neg islands, (132); (v) finally,
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2 Split-DPs
Spanish wh in-situ can appear in SIs, (133). They show that in (134), the whphrase in-situ actually moves, but inside the island (135) as the argumentadjunct asymmetry suggests; (vi) A point on which E and UE 2002 insist is the fact that Spanish wh in-situ involve non-neutral ‘elaborate contexts’. More precisely, their contexts, involve a contrastive flavor. They are assimilated to contrastive topics (136), yet occupying a position similar to contrastive foci in Spanish (137): (129) ¿Llegasteis como´ /con quie´n/cua´ndo? You arrived how/with whom/when ‘How/with whom/when did you arrive?’
(Sp) (E and UE 2002, (2))
(130) ¿Dicen que llegaron cuantos / quienes/ como/ cuando? (Sp) They-say arrived how-many /who/how/when (E and UE 2002, (3)) (131) a. b. b. (132) a. * b.
´ ¿Todo el mundo compra donde? Everyone buys where ¿Nadie compro´ que´? No one bought what ¿Tu puedes comprar que? You can buy what ´ ¿Tu´ no sabes quie´n llego´ como? You do not know who arrived how ´ ¿Tu´ no sabes como llego´ quie´n? You do not know how arrived who
(Sp)
(E and UE 2002, (4)) (Sp)
(E and UE 2002, (8))
´ (133) ¿Tu´ viste [al tipo que vivı´ a con quie´n/como] ? (Sp) You saw the guy who lived with whom/how Con Juan/Robando (E and UE 2002, (12)) (134) ¿Un estudiante de sui clase se fue [cuando aparecio´ quie´ni] ? (Sp) A student from hisi class left when showed up whoi Who is the person x such that a student of his/her left when he/she showed up? (E and UE 2002, (14b)) (135) a.
b. *
(136) a. *
¿Tu´ viste [al tipo que te pregunto [si ibas a comprar que´]]? You saw the guy who asked you whether you-were going to buy what? Un reloj A clock ¿Tu´ viste al tipo que te pregunto´ [si ibas a ir con quie´n] ? you saw the guy who asked you whether you.were going with whom (E and UE 2002, (15)) ¿Compraste que´? You.bought what
(Sp)
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
¿Tu hermana compro´ que´? Your sister bought what ¿En Safeway comprasteis que´ ? in Safeway you.bought what
b. c.
67
(E and UE 2002, (10))
(137) [Tu hermano ha comprado ei] creemos que UN TOYOTA NUEVOi Your brother has bought we.think that a NEW TOYOTA ‘We think that your brother has bought A NEW TOYOTA’ (E and UE 2002, (11)) E and UE 2002 claim that Spanish wh in-situ move. The trigger for movement is focus feature checking. They propose overt movement of the wh-phrase, subsequently followed by movement of the remnant. I have argued in Section 2.1.2.2, that wh-phrases in-situ in NSC French are neither focused nor contrastive, i.e. it seems doubtful that wh-phrases in these languages occupy identical positions. Another important difference is pointed out in point (vii). Spanish whphrases in-situ must occur to the rightmost position in the clause, unlike French: Se vistio´ de payaso para la fiesta (Sp) cl. dressed as-a-clown for the party ´ ´ ¿Se vistio´ (*como) para la fiesta como? cl. dressed how for the party how (E and UE 2002, (5))
(138) a. b. (139) a. b.
??
Elle s’est habille´e comment pour la feˆte ? She cl. Is dressed how for the party Elle s’est habille´e pour la feˆte comment ? She cl. Is dressed for the party how
(Fr)
This latter contrast suggests that Spanish wh in-situ, and not French, occupy ´ ‘special’ positions. In (138b), como does not occupy the canonical object position of internal arguments; in (138a) de payaso follows the lexical verb and precedes ´ the adjunct para la fiesta, while como follows the adjunct in (138b) (UribeEtxebarria 2001). This fact confirms the idea that Spanish wh in-situ do not occupy a neutral position. It also shows that French wh in-situ constructions, even if similar, are not identical.47 Spanish wh in-situ move, like French, but I 47
Spanish wh in-situ can be interpreted Across-The-Board (ex. (ia) from E and UE 2002, (6)), and can license parasitic gaps (iia), unlike French (ib) vs.(iib): (i) a. y tu´ dices [que Maria (*lo) ha comprado t] y [que Pedro (*lo) ha vendido t] que´? (Sp) and you say that Maria cl. has bought and that Pedro cl. has sold what b.* et tu dis que Marie a achete´ t et que Pedro a vendu t quoi? (Fr) and you say that M. has bought and that P. has sold what (ii) a. y [tu´ leı´ ste e [ para archivar e cuanto antes]] que´ ? And you read to file as soon as possible what b. ?? et tu lis e1 pour archiver e2 quel article? (unless echoic) And you read to file which article
(Sp) (Fr)
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claim that French wh in-situ undergo phrasal covert movement, (139). This analysis allows a unified account for the in-situ strategy of both argument and adjunct wh-phrases, as well as their matrix scope, even when embedded. The availability of the co-occurrence of wide-scope object wh-phrases in situ with narrow scope 8Qs confirms the point that IP is not a remnant. This section established that the three wh-phrases in-situ under discussion undergo covert Q-movement. I claim that (i) wh in-situ in French are similar to wh in-situ in Japanese/Chinese in being composed of an Opwh plus an indefinite, and that (ii) they all show different types of movement. In the next sections, I provide empirical arguments for an analysis of whwords as non-canonical quantification. Based on Hagstrom 1998 (and subsq.) I develop an idea first proposed by Mathieu 2002 for SC French and argue that wh phrases in-situ are potentially Split-DPs. 2.1.3.2 French Wh-Phrases Are Not Necessarily Interrogative If French wh-phrases are similar to Chinese and Japanese, wh-phrases must be pure variables as well. In French, wh-phrases are not only used in constituent questions, but also in non-interrogative contexts, like, exclamative contexts, (140); Relative Clauses, (141) (as Relative pronouns); they can combine with n’importe ‘neg important’ and form the non-interrogative indeterminate expression n’importe wh-phrase (see Zabbal 2003, Jayez and Tovena 2003), (142); arguably, some indefinites are also constructed with a wh-morpheme, as in (143); (144) shows that wh-items can be NPIs (G.Puska´s, p.c); Lipta´k 2001:137, (13a), (13b) gives examples of wh-phrases appearing in non interrogative constructions (145): (140)
a. b. c.
(141)
a. b. c.
(142)
a.
a.
Quel homme ! what man Comment t’ e´tais habille´e l’ autre soir ! how that you were dressed the other night ! Ou` que tu te caches, je te trouverai ! Where that you cl. hide, I cl. will find L’homme a` qui Willow a demande´ si Tara e´tait une sorcie`re. the man to whom W. asked if T. was a witch La fille avec qui Spike a rendez-vous ce soir est arrive´e. the girl with whom S. has (a) date this evening is arrived La manie`re comment Tara a jete´ le sort. . . the way how T. has thrown the spell. . . Marie doit e´pouser n’ importe quel garc¸on. M has to marry NE important which boy ‘Mary has to marry whichever boy’ Ted est habille´ n’importe comment T. is dressed NE important how ‘Ted is dressed shabbily’
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
(143)
a. b. c. d.
(144)
a. b. *
(145) a.
b.
69
Quelque chose me dit que Michael n’a pas bien compris Something cl. tell that M. NE has not well understood Quelqu’un n’aime pas la musique de Brian Someone NE like not the music of B. Quelques amis sont venus manger chez Michael et Debbie Some friends are come to.eat at M. and D. Justin cache quelque chose Justin hides something Je n’ ai pas parle´ I NE have not talked to J’ai parle´ a` I have talked to
a` qui que ce soit. anybody qui que ce soit. anybody
Qui apportait un fromage, qui un sac de noix, qui un quartier de che`vre. who brought.3sg a cheese who a bag of nuts who a piece of goat ‘One brought a piece of cheese, one a bag of nuts, one a piece of goat meat.’ Les professeurs rentraient chez eux, qui a` Paris, qui a` Bruxelles. The professors returned to home who to Paris who to Brussels
I conclude that wh-phrases are not necessarily [þwh] and that they do not necessarily occupy the highest position of the clause, (143), (144). The qumorpheme is not the morphological mark of the interrogative Op (unlike Mathieu 2004a, yet see fn. 52). Wh-words are not intrinsically [þwh]. Like in Japanese/Chinese, they appear in existential, negative and interrogative constructions, provided that an appropriate particle binds them ([þwh], [þrel], [9], [þexlcamative], or [þneg]). I conclude from this parallelism that wh-words are indefinites in French as well. Hence, naming a word like quoi a wh-phrase does not mean that this word is interrogative. It is the lexicalization of an indefinite that acquires its quantificational force from a Q.48 Just like indefinites, they do not need to move. Since these indefinites can be licensed long-distance (in embedded contexts), across certain islands, though not all, I claim that the internal structure of wh-phrases in NSC French resembles that of wh in-situ languages. As in Japanese, an indefinite is generated with an operator that happens to be [þwh] in questions: (146)
[Opwh þ indefinite]
(NSC French)
At this point, a dilemma shows up: either (i) the indefinite and the Q-particle are base generated together and then overt Q-movement operates, stranding the 48
Why the universal Q does not bind any wh-phrases remains a mystery to me.
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indefinite below (Hagstrom 1998), or (ii) they are not generated together: the Qparticle is merged in C8, binding wh in-situ in an argument position (as in Cheng 1991). One way to tackle this dilemma is to evaluate whether the operator can overtly strand its ‘indefinite’ in situ or not. Such a case overtly exists in French: combien-extraction. I turn now to a property combien exhibits: the so-called Split-DP construction. The internal structure of combien de N is developed in more detail. 2.1.3.3 Combien . . . de NP : Obenauer 1983, 1984, 1994 and Mathieu 200249 The term Split-DP stems from the French construction discussed in Obenauer 1994, and illustrated in (147a), where combien is split from its in-situ restriction: (147) a. b.
Combieni as-tu peint/*es ti de chaises ? how-many have you painted /*FEM.PL of chairs Combien de chaisesi as-tu peint/es ti? how-many chairs have you painted- FEM.PL ‘How many chairs have you painted?’
In (147b), the whole DP complex [combien-restriction] is overtly moved. According to Obenauer 1992 non-split constructions may be ‘specific’, and split-constructions may not.50 This is attested by the fact that French (i) A’movement triggers past-participle agreement if the moved DP is specific (147b), suggesting a correlation between specificity (a pure semantic notion) and agreement (a pure syntactic notion); (ii) in French, extraction of a presupposed whobject across a neg-island is easier than of a non-presupposed wh-phrase (see Rizzi 1990, Obenauer 1994). The same appears to be correct for combienconstructions: (148) a.* b.
Combieni n’as-tu pas lu ti de livres? How-many NE have you not read of books pas lus ti? Combien de livresi n’as-tu How-many of books NE have you not read-MASC.PL ‘how many books have you not read?’ (Mathieu 2002:23, (25))
Non-presuppositional wh in-situ cannot be extracted out of neg-islands; presuppositional can. Thus according to Obenauer 1994, (i) overt Split-DPs correspond to non-presuppositional wh-phrases (147a)/(148a), and (ii) non-split are 49
This chapter is built on the idea, first put forward by Obenauer (but see also Rizzi 1990 (and subsq.) and Mathieu 2002, 2004a), that the split and unsplit versions of combien de N are semantically equivalent. Spector 2006 shows that is not necessarily true and provides complex examples which challenge this idea. Spector’s account of Intervention effects is a semantic one. 50 Where specificity means ‘presuppositional’.
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71
presuppositional (147b)/(148b). The distinction between the two types of questions lies on the information triggered by these elements. Combien must yet be distinguished from other wh-arguments (qui ‘who’, quoi ‘what’ etc.). Wh-words can be found in exclamative contexts, in Relative Clauses as Relative pronouns, and in n’importe wh-phrase constructions, as well as NPIs (see Section 2.1.3.2). Combien cannot appear is such constructions, (149) and (150)51: (149)
a. * b. *
(150)
a. * b. * c. * d. * e. *
Combien qu’il fasse (de centime`tres), ce gars est petit ! How much that he measures (of centimeters) this guy is small Combien de kilos ! how many of kilos Les kilos combien j’ai porte´ The kilos how.many i have carried Les chaises combien j’ai peintes the chairs how.many I have painted N’importe combien de chaises tu vends? NE important how.many of chairs you sell Tu vends n’importe combien de chaises ? you sell NE important how.many of chairs Je n’ ai pas peint combien que ce soit I NE have not painted ‘anyhow’
I claim that combien is not ‘strictly speaking’ a wh-item. It is an overt realization of the wh-operator, with a quantity meaning (see Chapter 5, Section 5.1.2.4) (151)
[combien þ indefinite], where combien¼ Opwh
Based on the assumption that wh-phrases occur only in interrogative contexts, Mathieu 2002 analyses SC French wh-phrases in-situ as [þQ] (unlike
51
It seems to me, that the exclamative contexts in (i) are fully grammatical, whereas arguably, comment ‘how’ functions alike. I note that to the extent that French speakers accept these sentences, they belong to a very specific register. I have nothing to say about this. (i) a. b. (ii) a. b.
Combien t’es grande! How much you are big! Combien t’as porte´ de kilos hier soir ! How much you have carried of kilos the other night Comment t’es grande! How you are big Comment t’as porte´ les bouteilles hier soir! How you have carried the bottles the other night
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Chinese, or Japanese, see preceding section).52 Because they prosodically and syntactically resemble overt Split-combien constructions (section ‘‘Prosody and Semantics’’), he proposes that they involve a phonologically null Op (of which the qu-morpheme is a morpho-phonological mark) and a restriction. Opwh is extracted from the complex DP (at Spell-Out) and moved to SpecCP to check the [þwh] feature of C8, stranding the indefinite in-situ. Mathieu 1999, 2002 conclude that wh in-situ are covert Split-DPs, (152). Just like in (153a), if a Q intervenes, the sentence is bad (153b)53: (152)
C° ……….. [Opwh indefinite]
(153) a. b. *
(SC French)
Tu as lu combien de livres? you have read how-many of books Tu n’as pas lu combien de livres? (SC French) You NE have not read how-many of books ‘How many books have you not read?’ (Mathieu 2004a: 8, (11) and (12))
In Mathieu’s analysis of SC French data, Focus, Neg, 8Qs and wh-phrases block movement of wh-phrases in-situ. Just like overt Split-DPs, wh-phrases in-situ cannot be extracted out of neg-islands. This analysis is problematic.54 (i) according to Mathieu 1999, 2002 vs. 2004a, wh in-situ in SC French are strongly presuppositional. He claims that wh phrases in-situ and unsplit-combien de N share similar semantics. Just like unsplit-combien de N, a wh in-situ question asks details on an established situation. In other words, wh in-situ are used in special situations. A familiar 52
Mathieu 2004a:78, fn. 5 revises this analysis: I assume that wh-phrases like qui and quoi are simple indefinites. I take the que morpheme to be an existential, rather than a question morpheme. Qu can be found in quelqu’un and quelque chose, words that are not interrogatives. I assume that the difference between quelqu’un and qui on the one hand, and quelque chose on the other is that qui and quoi are specified as [þwh] (but crucially they are not specified as [þQ].
53 Mathieu 1999 relates the Intervention Effects detected above to the more general RM of Rizzi 1990. He argues that the trace left by the moved Opwh is non-referential and must be antecedent-governed. In neg-islands antecedent-government of the Opwh-trace is blocked (suggesting that these interveners occupy A’-positions). In other words, overt null Op-movement is like non-referential adjunct extraction. It is blocked by intervening A’-specifiers. Wh in-situ-arguments cannot appear in neg-islands (ia), while wh-fronted arguments can:
(i)
a. * b.
54
Tu ne fais pas quoi ce soir? (SC French) you NE do not what this evening Qu’est-ce que tu ne fais pas ce soir ? what that you NE do not this evening (Mathieu 2002 :24, (28))
Despite the fact that this analysis is based on only one type of wh-phrases in-situ (section ‘‘Prosody and Semantics’’).
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73
situation or individual that the speaker/hearer has in mind or that is accessible to their immediate environment is involved, i.e. there is a familiar referent and this referent corresponds to the restriction in-situ. Following Chang 1997, Mathieu claims that these constructions are not ‘associated with a presupposed answer set’ (Mathieu 2002:50). Yet, the wh in-situ refers to a situation and an individual that is inferred. This information is encoded within the stranded indefinite. (ii) SC French wh phrases in-situ can never cross neg (or interveners of any Op type), just like Split-DP constructions. Following the parallelism established between the syntax and semantics of combien de N and SC wh in-situ in French, presuppositional wh phrases in-situ are expected to be fine in negative islands, along with (153b), contrary to facts. In other words, Mathieu’s wh phrases in-situ display unsplit semantics, but split syntax.55 For NSC French, I have argued for three types of wh-phrases in-situ, of which two types are presuppositional. Specific and partitive wh-phrases are extractable in neg islands. Therefore, following Obenauer, (i) presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ are expected to be non-split, like combien de N and (ii) non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ to be split, as in combien . . . de N-constructions. In Section 2.1.3.2, I have shown that NSC French wh-phrases in-situ are like Japanese dare. They are not intrinsically interrogative, i.e. the qu-morpheme is 55
Mathieu 2004a argues for a one-to-one mapping from form to interpretation, and claims that the optionality found with the alternation wh-ex-situ/in-situ does not exist, i.e. the distinction found is one of interpretation. He argues that ‘the EPP/D feature associated with [þwh] in C is always strong’ (Mathieu 2004a:2). The difference is the position of the noun. Mathieu 2004a is concerned with the difference between split and unsplit structures. Split structures involve non-presuppositional semantics, while unsplit involve existential presupposition. Recall that agreement is optional with unsplit constructions, and unavailable with split ones. Covert split-combien constructions are those cases where overt movement of combien de N does not yield syntactic agreement with the past participle and the de N reconstructs at LF, (i). Wh in-situ constructions involve a semantics similar to de N in combien de N constructions. Mathieu 2004a concludes that wh-phrases in-situ involve Split-DPs, and notes that they can be non-presuppositional, as in (ii): (i) (ii)
a. Q
b. A
Combien de boitesi as-tu ouvert ti ? How many of boxes have you open Tu fais quoi dans la vie? You do what in the life ‘what do you do for a living?’ ‘Nothing. I am unemployed’
(Mathieu 2004a:7, (9)) (NSC French)
(Mathieu 2004a: 18, (23))
He argues that the semantic/discourse properties of in-situ nominals are derived from an analysis in which the stranded nominal (in wh in-situ and (covert) Split-combien constructions) is a predicative indefinite, i.e. semantically incorporated (as in Van Geenhoven 1998). The stranded indefinite in a (c)overt Split takes narrow scope and is property denoting. In other words, they denote a property and are ‘interpreted as a predicate of a variable introduced by the verb’ (Mathieu 2004a:29). Their existential status comes from the verb. A verb may or may not be an incorporating verb. See Mathieu 2004a for details.
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not the morphological mark of Opwh (vs. Mathieu 2002). In Section 2.1.3.1, I have shown that Q-movement is attested in the three constructions at stake, since they are all sensitive to WCO. Because some of these DPs are subject to Interventions, I claim that the Q-part is intrinsic to the DP.56 I claim that NSC French wh-phrases in-situ are indefinites, acquiring their interrogative strength by a phonologically null Opwh, as such resembling Japanese (see Section 2.1.3). Because of their different syntactic, prosodic and semantic properties (Section 2.1.2.2), I propose three basic structures for wh-phrases in-situ in NSC French: (154) a. b. c.
[QP Qwh [NP indefinitepartitive]] [QP Qwh [NP indefinitespecific]] [QP Qwh [NP indefinite] ]
Based on the observation that overt split-DPs yield non-presuppositional readings in French, I propose the structure in (155) is only met with nonpresuppositional wh-phrases in-situ: (155) Qwhi C8 . . . [QP ti [ NP indefinite] ] In other words, only non-presuppositional wh in-situ (154c) yield Split-DP constructions. In other configurations, covert movement of the whole complexDP is witnessed. Splitting the DP is only possible with non-presuppositional wh-phrases, namely with less ‘heavy’ constituents.
2.1.3.4 The Optionality Problem Following Obenauer 1994, Mathieu 2002 claims that overt unsplit-combien de N movement may correspond to a non-presuppositional reading, i.e. when past particle agreement with de N is not triggered. In that case, de N is reconstructed in its base position, yielding a covert split construction. His analysis, then, shows that split and unsplit structures correspond to different interpretations. Yet, Mathieu does not discuss the different interpretations a wh-phrase in-situ may exhibit. In this chapter, I have argued that they may display at least three different readings: specific, partitive and non-presuppositional. This information is reflected by the prosody involved with each of the interpretations. I have also claimed that non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ have a split structure, while presuppositional phrases are unsplit. In that sense, again, there is no option between split and unsplit structures. The reason of the alternation between fronting and in-situ constructions remains an issue not yet discussed. This optionality has generally been attributed to the fact that the two (apparently similar) constructions involve different structures. Bosˇ kovic´ 1998, for instance, who argues for LF-movement of the wh in-situ, claims that C with a strong þwh-feature is inserted at LF, i.e. LF 56
In Chapter 5, the three wh-phrases in-situ are shown to be subject to Intervention effects.
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movement is obligatory. The strong þwh feature is inserted in C in overt syntax in overt fronting. For C&R 2000, a ‘root’ y/n intonation morpheme [Q: ] is present in the numeration. Underspecified [Q: ] is not found in a wh-fronted structure. Wh in-situ are licensed by checking off the þQ-feature in C8, by movement of the wh-feature to C. Thanks to this movement, feature valuation is achieved the Q-morpheme is valued wh. Hence, there is no optionality. Yet our analysis forces a real syntactic optionality: our result is that wh in-situ sentences and wh-fronting are similar. Wh-phrases in-situ involve both split-DP and full covert movement, yet favor the covert full fronting (since nonpresuppositional wh-phrases in-situ are more difficult to get). Wh-fronting favors full-movement rather than Split-DPs. In other words, the choice between one or the other movement process (Split-DP vs. unsplit) is related to interpretation, as witnessed by intonation i.e. the same reason which accounts for one or the other structure is in order for both kind of constructions (fronting or in-situ), i.e. a strong EPP/wh feature, for instance. Under the hypothesis that wh-phrases in-situ and wh-fronted are similar, their structures should be identical. External syntax, semantics and prosody seem to confirm this point. I account for their internal structure in Section 2.1.5. A possible explanation is that of Adli 2006. As he puts it, wh in-situ questions are limited to NSC spoken French. He shows that in terms of processing load, wh in-situ and wh-fronted are identical (see Adli 2006 for details). The choice between one or the other structure seems to be optional, even at the psycholinguistic level, i.e. one or the other structure involves the same cost. At this point, I see nothing besides register variation that can explain the optionality between the two structures. This, of course, needs more work.
2.1.4 Existential Qs in French It is traditionally acknowledged that there are three types of noun phrases: referential, quantificational, and indefinites. Dets like the and these are traditionally referred to as referential, every, all as quantificational and a(n), some and a certain to as indefinites (Heim 1982, Abush 1994, Farkas 1994, Reinhart 1997, a.o).57 Their semantics are different. Heim and Kratzer 1998 show that according to the law of contradiction and of the excluded Middle, only referential noun phrases (definites, demonstratives, proper names) denote individuals (of type <e>). Some/a Ns are classically considered quantificational (i.e. 9Qs). Yet, works on semantics have shown that they are better treated as variables (Kamp 1981, Heim 1982). a P and 8Qs differ from each other in terms of distribution. Indefinites appear in Existential constructions, while Qs do not 57
Cardinals, null Dets with bare nouns in English, partitives are also referred to as indefinites in the literature. In this section, I am only concerned with those mentioned in the main text.
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(156) (Milsark 1974, 1977); a P can appear as predicate nominals, (157); exception-phrases can modify 8Qs, but not a P (158); their respective scope properties are different. Crucially, 8Qs are clause-bound, while a Ps are not, (159) (Reinhart 1997). (156) a. b. *
There is an elf sleeping in the tree There is every elf sleeping in the tree
(157) a. b. *
Juliette is a singer Juliette, Patsy, Edina and Louise are every singer
(158) All students / every /No /each / *some student but John likes Mary. (159) a. b.
A professor thinks that every student sleeps (9 > 8); *(8 >8) Every professor thinks that a student sleeps (9 > 8); (8 >8)
Indefinites must be distinguished from both Qs and referential noun phrases. Heim 1982 argues that indefinites acquire their quantificational force from binding with other operators in their neighborhood. An indefinite is a free variable whose value is assigned via unselective binding within the set of individuals. Indefinites are interpreted in-situ. They must be novel and introduce new referents by restricted free variables in the universe of discourse, i.e. they have no discourse referent. They presuppose that their discourse referent is new. In Heim’s DRT (see also Kamp 1981), the referent of a ‘specific’ indefinite depends on the referent of another DP, i.e. they are not quantificational, but receive an existential interpretation ‘by default’ (and can also co-vary when in the scope of another operator). If no operator is involved in the clause, the variable introduced by the indefinite is bound by a silent 9 by a rule called Existential closure. Indefinites denote individuals. They are of type <e>, just like referential noun phrase. I use the term ‘existential’ to refer to the noun phrase un N ‘a N’. This section focuses on the syntax of un N (see Baunaz 2005, Ihsane 2008). I show that it is a complex DP, interpreted as an indefinite coupled with an Op9, and that at LF some show non-canonical quantification, while others do not. I identify three types of 9Qs, all endowed with different prosody, semantics, and syntax. When a un N is perceived with a particular intonation (fall-rise, falling, or neutral), a particular interpretation is triggered: specificity, partitivity, or non-presupposition, respectively. I argue that 9Qs and wh-phrases are complex DPs, each composed of an indefinite and a corresponding Operator. Strikingly, NSC French wh-phrases in-situ show corresponding properties. This analysis corroborates two recent analyses of French indefinites. A semantic one (Dobrovie-Sorin and Beyssade 2004 (D-S&B 2004)), and a syntactic one (Ihsane 2008). Both works show that French ‘indefinites’ are three-way ambiguous. D-S&B claims that French ‘indefinites’ must be classified according to their semantic types. They show that indefinites can be interpreted as Qs <<e, t>, t>, referential noun phrases <e> or properties <e, t>. They also claim that French
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77
existential constructions are much more complex than what has been described for English in the literature. They argue that only property denoting noun phrases can appear in French il y a (‘there be’) constructions, and that’s the reason why quantificational and referential noun phrases are banned in this configuration.58 This means that not only referential and quantificational noun phrases, but also properties can appear in argument positions (see also McNally 1995, Van Geenhoven 1996, Dobrovie-Sorin 1996). The authors claim that the difference between Qs on the one hand and indefinite noun phrases on the other rests on the fact that the latter can be classified as property denoting, while the former cannot. One consequence of their analysis is that narrow scope cardinals a` la Milsark, i.e. weak noun phrases, are assimilated to properties (see D-S&B 2004 for details). Ihsane 2008 is also in favor of a three-way distinction and she also proposes that the three-way classification of indefinites corresponds to three different semantic types. Quantificational indefinites are Qs involving partitivity a` la Enc¸ 1991, S-referential indefinites involve speaker’s reference (i.e. Fodor and Sag’s referential indefinites), while the last type denotes properties. Working within the cartographic approach, her analysis adopts D-S&B’s classification, while looking in detail at the internal structure of the three indefinites. She develops the idea that the more structure a noun phrase has, the higher the scope it takes.59 Hence quantificational (partitive) un Ns take wide scope, while property-denoting indefinites (bare or mass nouns) always take narrow scope. Referential indefinites (those denoting an individual, i.e. specific) can either be dependent (cf. intermediate reading, i.e. co-variation is expected with a higher Q) or not. As such, this approach raises the important fact that indefinites can have different interpretations. That is, cannot only be understood as being indefinite bound by existential closure (Heim 1982).
2.1.4.1 Prosody and Semantics This section is devoted to the prosodic and semantic properties of un N. Existential un Ns can be uttered (and perceived) in (at least) three different ways: fall-rise (), downfall (or falling intonation, in Capitals); and neutral. Each occurrence has a semantic correlate: specific, partitive, no commitment of existence, respectively. 58
Another argument for the existence of property-denoting indefinites is plural indefinite objects under negation. Mathieu 2004b proposes that in (i) the narrow scope taking indefinite object plural gaˆteaux cannot show up with the indefinite Det des, but only with the de Det. De gaˆteaux in (i) is property-denoting. Des Ns in object position are fine iff they takes wide scope over negation. (i)
59
Je n’ai pas mange´ *des/de gaˆteaux ¼ it is not the case that I ate some cookies (adapted from Mathieu 2004b:5, (5))
An idea adopted in this Chapter and developed in Chapter 5 (see also Baunaz 2005).
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Recall from section ‘‘Interpretations’’ that the term ‘specificity’ refers to familiar individuals, i.e. identified via a known property, i.e. it does not involve sub-set or set relation(s). Incidentally a specific item triggers the presupposition that the interlocutor knows the referent for that entity. In the discursive context in (160), the specific antecedant (the only possible one) for un homme, can only be Chandler (provided that both interlocutors knows the series, but they both know it, otherwise there would be no point of (i) asking that question, (ii) answering that answer). un homme refers to a familiar individual (i.e. ‘Chandler’) and no alternative is evaluated: (160) a. b.
Did you watch Friends yesterday? Is Monica still going out with that insecure guy? M’enfin! Depuis 3 saisons, tous les fans de la se´rie Friends savent que Monica sort avec _ un homme /# UN homme / # un homme (i.e. Chandler). ‘You should know that Monica has been dating a guy for 3 seasons.’
In (161), une femme is uttered with a specific intonation, and inverse scope results. (161) means that there is a woman, Marylin, and all the men love her. (161)
The name of the sexiest woman of all time just came out in GQ. There was no doubt, all the voters voted for her. Reading that news, Claire informs her husband: Claire: Tous les hommes aiment une femme, marylin!
Figure 2.13 is the F0 curve for (160b). The F0 is falling on the main verb and on avec and clearly rising on un. The first syllable of homme is lengthened, with a
Fig. 2.13 F0 curve of (160), with a fall-rise un N
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
79
Fig. 2.14 F0 curve of (161), with a fall-rise un N
H accent. In Fig. 2.14, the main verb is slightly falling, with a rising on un. H falls on the first syllable of femme. Figures 2.13 and 2.14 resemble Fig. 2.10, where the final syllable of the DP is falling. Recall that the notion of existential presupposition comes in two different flavors: partitivity and specificity. A partitive item is an object that has been previously mentioned together with other objects, each of which is a possible referent to that item. Crucially, there is no presupposition that there is a specific antecedent/referent available in the discourse (such that the interlocutor thinks that it is the right one), despite the existence of a set of available alternatives (or a range). The presupposition is that there is a predefinied set. Partitive based-presupposition involves a finite set of alternatives. In the context in (162), UN N is extracted from a presupposed list and is uttered with a falling (downfall) intonation on carte.60 As Fig. 2.15 illustrates, un is slightly rising, and the F0 falls on the noun. The prosody of une carte resembles that of quoi in Figs. 2.5, 2.6 and 2.7. No H accent falls on the DP:
60
In French downfall intonation is typical of contrastive focalization (i).
(i)
a. b.
C’est JEAN que j’ai vu, et pas MARIE it is JEAN that I have seen, and not MARIE J’ai vu JEAN, et pas MARIE I have seen JEAN, and not MARIE
Yet UN N does not involve explicit contrast, (vs. contrastive focus). It involves a weak contrast with respect to the set of cards in (162b). UN can also have a numeral reading, i.e. ONE and not TWO. I won’t discuss it here.
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Fig. 2.15 F0 curve of (162b), with a downfall un N
(162)
Context: a magician shuffles the cards, lays them fan-shaped and pre- sents them to his friends. Each player has to pick a different card, the magicien will try to guess which ones. He says: magician: Tout le monde prend UNE carte /# une carte / #une carte everybody picks some of the cards / any card / a card
The only rule is to pick a card out of a list. The card game provides a range and each player is left with the choice to pick out any card, i.e. it does not pick up an individual. The set of cards is introduced in the context (presupposed vs. attested) and as such is non-empty. The card is a subset of this set. These DPs can be paraphrased by un des NP ‘one of the NP’, involving a part-of relation (see Ihsane 2008). They are covert partitives (Enc¸ 1991). Things are different in (163), where the identity of the enemy is not known (and not presupposed). Rather, it introduces a novel individual, asserting the existence of the enemy. This type of un N is not familiar (a set of alternative is provided (see Table 2.1, section ‘‘Interpretations’’), and the reference of un ennemi in (163) is not in the speaker’s mind, nor is it taken out of a set. It is ‘indefinite’. In (163), un could be translated into English by any N or by a N (or another N).61 No particular prosody is involved (Fig. 2.16).
61
Ihsane 2008 provides contexts where un N can appear with the non-presuppositional reading: y/n questions (ia); wh-questions (ib); intensional contexts (ic), subjunctives (id); imperatives (ie) and disjunctions (if): (i)
a.
As-tu achete´ un livre? Have you bought a book
(Ihsane 2008:70, (38))
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81
Fig. 2.16 F0 curve of (163), with a neutral un N
(163) a. b.
you know what ? Ron a un ennemi. Ron has an enemy
That there is a non-presuppositional un N is upheld by the test of Negation, where negation negates the existence of the referent denoted by the DP. (164c) is a presupposition failure.62 For negation to take scope un N, the latter must be formed with de þ NP.63
b. c. d. e. f.
62
Qui as rencontre´ un Bernois ? Who has met a Bernese (id., (39)) Jean veut un chat John wants a cat (id., (40a)) Marie a insiste´ pour qu’un e´tudiant puisse entrer (id., (41a)) Mary has insisted for that a student could.SUBJ to.enter Va voir un me´decin! Go to.see a doctor (id., (41b)) Soit un voleur est entre´ dans la maison, soit on a oublie´ d’e´teindre Either a thief is entered in the house or we have forgotten of to.switch.off (id., (41c))
(164b) would be fine under a contrastive focus reading (similar intonation, /yn/ a bit more intense than the partitive version). Yet, this is not an interpretation we are looking for. 63 Note that de N as such is not an existential, but an NPI, and in (166b), it is licensed by a negation. See Chapter 4, Section 4.1.2.1.
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(164) a. * b. *
c.
Il n’y a pas une chanteuse qui va sortir un album (i.e. Bjork) ¨ There NE a singer who is going to release an album Il n’y a pas UNE chanteuse / une des chanteuses qui va sortir un album There NE is not a singer / one of the siger who is going to release an album Il n’y a pas de livre sur la table. There NE is a book on the table, but I do not know which one
The relevant distinction can thus be paraphrased in the following terms. With partitivity, one chooses (or extracts from) a subset from a presupposed set (i.e. a list); with specificity, a familiar individual is identified. Finally, un N may not necessarily trigger any commitment of existence. The three occurrences of un Ns can be interpreted existentially. They can occur in il y a constructions (165) and they interact with other Qs, (166).64 (165) a. b.
c. d.
L’e´tudiant sait qu’il y a un prof dans ce bureau (i.e. Eric) ‘the student knows that there is a (specific) prof in this office’ L’e´tudiant sait qu’il y a UN prof dans ce bureau (parmi d’autres) the student knows that there is a professor in this office (a.o) ‘the student knows that there is a prof dans ce bureau (a.o).’ L’e´tudiant sait qu’il y a un des professeurs dans ce bureau ‘The student knows that there is one of the profs in this office’ L’e´tudiant sait qu’il y a un prof dans ce bureau. ‘The student knows that there is any prof in this office.’
When they take wide scope over a quantificational element, un N is necessarily ‘specific’. Let us start with negation. Specific un N obligatorily takes wide scope, (166a); non-presuppositional un N takes narrow scope, (166b), and shows up in the de N form (see also Godard 2004). If 9Q is assigned a partitive reading, it cannot take wide scope, (167a): (166) a.
b.
c.
64
Fred n’a pas vu un chien F. NE has not seen a (specific) dog There is a dog, and Fred did not see it Fred n’a pas vu de chien F. NE has not seen of dog Fred didn’t see any dog Personne / aucune des filles a vu de chien Nobody / none of the girls has seen any dog ‘Nobody / none of the girls saw any dog’
(9 > :)
(: > 9)
(:>9) only
These sentences are yet not the best examples in order to test the quantificational status of un Ns. There may be different kinds of il y a constructions, all not necessarily existential (see Dobrovie-Sorin and Beyssade 2004, for an analysis).
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
(167) a. ??
83
Fred n’a pas vu UN chien, (parmi les chiens) Fred NE has not seen a dog, (from the set of dogs) ‘Fred didn’t see some of the dog’
in (167a) tends to be interpreted as specific, i.e. a familiar individual is identified (but see fn. 60, as well as Chapter 4), just like the overt partitive un des N. (167b) can be easily uttered in a situation in which there is a group of dogs playing in the garden and Fred is looking for his own dog. Then Vanessa utters (167b): UN CHIEN
b.
Fred n’a pas vu un des chiens Fred NE has not seen one of the dogs
(9 > :)
In (167b), there is a dog (say Milou, i.e. it is familiar) and among the set of dogs playing in the garden, Fred did not see that dog. In that sense, the existential within the partitive takes wide scope over negation, and is interpreted as specific65. The type of 8Qs with whom they interact has an influence on the scope taking availability of presuppositional un Ns.66,67 Specific un N must take wide scope over tous les N, (168a), but cannot co-occur with chacun des N, (169a); partitive un N is not felicitous with tous les N (168c), yet must take narrow scope over
65
I come back to these facts in Chapter 5, Section 5.1.2.3 As one of the reviewers pointed out, the examples in (168) unambiguously involve typereadings (vs. token-readings). In (168a), the token reading is infelicitous as all the professors are wearing one and the same tie together is impossible. That is, wide scope of specific un Ns seems to be tied to the type-reading. Yet, consider (i):
66
(i)
Tous les e´tudiants ont souleve´ _ un piano. token reading only *(8>9); (9>8) All the students have lifted a piano
(i) is fully felicitous with both wide scope of un piano (a piano) over the universal quantifier tous les e´tudiants and a token reading. As Puska´s 2002:117 puts it, ‘the [students] lifting pianos are visualized as a collective event, because apparently it is more difficult to access the individual lifting event’. The token reading shows up, but not the type-reading. Hence there are predicates that applies to types (porter ‘to wear’), other to tokens (soulever ‘to lift’). As such, the type/token distinction is irrelevant to the notion of specificity. Specificity equally arises with both readings. The reader is refered to Ihsane 2008 for arguments against the importance of the type-token problem with partitive un N (her Q-un NP). 67 This is due, I claim, to the fact that the two universal Qs at stake have different intrinsic features (see Chapter 3, and Chapter 5 in particular).
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chacun des N (169c).68,69,70 The same patterns are observed with un des N (168d, 169d). Since tous les N and chacun des N are Qs interacting with specific and partitive un Ns, I claim that presuppositional un Ns are Qs (Baunaz 2005, Ihsane 2008). Non-presuppositional un N can never take wide scope over Qs. They differ from specific and partitive un Ns in that they can appear in nonexistential contexts and be bound by any Op, like, for instance negation (166) and (167), or 8Qs. In (168b)/(169b), une cravate co-varies with the two 8Qs. (168) a. b. c. ?? d. ??
(169) a. * b. c.
Tous les profs ont porte´ _ une cravate * (8>9) ; (9> 8) All the professors wear a (specific) tie Tous les profs portent une cravate (diffe´rente) (8>9) ; *(9> 8) all the professors wear a (different) tie Tous les profs portent UNE cravate (diffe´rente, parmi d’autres) all the professors wear a tie (different, from the set of ties) ?? (8>9) ;*(9> 8) Tous les profs portent une des cravates (diffe´rente) all the professors wear one of the ties (different) ?? (8>9) ; *(9> 8) Chacun des profs porte _ une cravate Each of the professors wears a tie Chacun des profs porte une cravate (diffe´rente) (8>9) ; *(9> 8) each of the profs wears a tie Chacun des profs porte UNE cravate (diffe´rente, parmi d’autres)
68
Based on Davidson 1980, Kratzer 1995 shows that Stage level predicates have an external event argument, over which the Q subject can distribute, while Individual level predicates express permanent properties, and, as such lack an event argument, failing distribution. The status of (169a) could also be accounted for claiming that chacun, being intrinsically distributive, needs a distributive share (either an individual of type <e>, or an event of type
), and as such distributes over the event of wearing, i.e. there would be several events of wearing a specific tie. In (169a), yet, it is difficult to conceive that the wearing event of a specific tie be multiple, unless we construct the unlikely context such that the professors successively wear the tie and then take it out to give it to another professor. Hence, no access to a distribution over events is available. Why (169a) is out is yet left unexplained, unless a RM account is proposed (Chapter 5). 69 Ihsane 2008 shows that in (i), with partitive un N as subject, surface scope wins out again: (i)
a. b.
70
Un e´tudiant a achete´ tous les journaux a student has bought all the newspapers Un e´tudiant a achete´ chacun des journaux a student has bought each of.the newspapers
(9 > 8) ; *(8>9) (9 > 8) ; *(8>9)
English partitive a N is similar. Ihsane 2008 provides (i) (from Borer (p.c)): (i)
Every man danced with some women/woman. (Ihsane 2008: 108, (135))
In (i), identifiable women can co-vary with the men, i.e. some women takes narrow scope, and every man takes wide scope, while being part of a presupposed set, i.e.it is a partitive.
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d.
85
each of the professors wears a tie (different, from the set of ties) (8>9);*(9> 8) Chacun des profs porte une des cravates (8>9) ; *(9> 8) each of the professors wears one of.the ties
In Chapter 5, I claim that these facts can be treated in terms of Relativized Minimality (Rizzi 2002). Summing up so far, (i) a fall-rise-(fall) intonation on un N is associated to specificity, i.e. it is interpreted as relating with familiar individuals; (ii) a falling (downfall) intonation on un N indicates partitivity; (iii) a neutral intonation on un N maps onto a non-presuppositional interpretation. These facts are similar to the prosody and semantics of wh-phrases in-situ. Note also that (i)–(iii) are existentially construed, by default. The fact that (i) and (ii) interact with both 8Qs and negation suggests that they are quantificational. Non-presuppositional un Ns are like indefinites. They are intrinsically non-quantificational, and need binding by an Op. If not Op is overtly realized, they are bound by an 9Op by default (see also Beghelli 1995, Szabolcsi 1997, Junker 1995, Choe 1987 for discussions). In Section 2.1.4.2, I show that the syntax of the three un Ns is subject to the same restrictions as that of the three wh-phrases in-situ discussed above.
2.1.4.2 Syntax 9Qs and wh-phrases in-situ pattern alike with respect to islands constraints. Recall that overt and covert wh-movements are sensitive to various syntactic constraints: i) WIs; ii) SIs; iii) WCO and SCO (see Sections 2.1.1.1/2.1.1.2). Q-movement creates A’-dependencies. If 9Qs are also affected by movement, similar locality constraints are expected to show up. (i)
Weak Islands
I have already established that the three un Ns are Qs because they interact with negation and 8Qs (Section 2.1.4.1). Only specific un N can escape negative islands, (166a). The only possibility to get a non-presuppositional reading of 9Q is to modify the DP in such a way that it shows up as de N, (166b,c). Moreover, if 9Q is assigned a partitive reading, close to the reading un des N (one of the N), it cannot take wide scope either, and the sentence is marginal (167a).When it comes to scope islands, 9Qs show limitation effects of the type observed with wh-phrases in-situ. Only specific un N can scope over tous les N, (168a). Non-presuppositional are necessarily scoped over by the universal subject, (168b). Partitive un N takes narrow scope over tous les N (168c-d). As mentioned above, specific un N is not dependant on the distributive chacun, nor do they take scope over it (169a) ((169a) also suggests that it is blocked by chacun des N) (yet see (172)); non-presuppositionals take narrow scope and so
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2 Split-DPs
do partitive un Ns ((169b–d). Note that only specific 9Qs can take (wide) scope over a whole sentence, while partitive and non-presuppositional 9Qs cannot: (170) a.
b.
a.
Tous les professeurs pensent que Fred porte une cravate all the professeurs think that F. wears a (specific) tie *(8>9) ; (9> 8) Tous les professeurs pensent que Fred porte une cravate all the professors think that Fred wears a tie (or another) (8>9) ; *(9> 8) Tous les professeurs pensent que Fred porte une des cravates all the professors think that Fred wears one of the ties (8>9) ; *(9> 8)
I conclude that specific un N must take wide scope, but might be blocked; that partitive 9Qs cannot take wide scope, but may be trapped. More generally, the fact that these two types of un N are somehow blocked in WIs allows us to conclude that they move. As for the non-presuppositional versions, these are trapped in WIs. Because they never take wide scope, I conclude that they are interpreted in-situ via unselective binding. (ii)
Strong Islands
The absence of intermediate scope readings would support Fodor and Sag’s proposal whereby indefinites are ambiguous between two readings: quantificational, where the indefinite takes scope within a local domain only, or referential – where the wide scope reading of the indefinite is only apparent, i.e. they are scopeless: (171)
Each teacher overheard the rumor that a student of mine had been called before the dean
Under the quantificational reading, what the professors overheard is the rumor that a student (or another) of mine had been called before the dean. Each takes scope over a student of mine, i.e. the scope of the indefinite is confined to the domain of the lowest clause. Under the referential reading, (171) is about a particular student, say John, and each of the teachers overheard the rumor that John had been called before the dean. A student of mine, with that reading, is not quantificational at all and as such, is scopeless. The reading where a student of mine takes wide scope with respect to the that-clause but narrow scope with respect to each teacher would be the intermediate reading of a student of mine in (171). It is not possible in (171). The existence of intermediate scope readings with indefinites have yet been reported in various works (Ruys 1992, Abusch 1994, Kratzer 1998 a.o). Un Ns can take intermediate scope, when trapped in a SI, (172). Yet, under that reading, only the specific 9Q shows up. In (172), the specific un N can only scope over tous les e´tudiants, but not over chacun. The possibility of
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87
intermediate readings with specific un N is another argument in favour of their quantificational status (see Kratzer 1998 and references cited there, vs. Fodor and Sag 1982). This means that they can be dependant on chacun (i.e. they cannot escape the domain of the relativized quantified DP, i.e. they have scope properties).71 (173) shows that the partitive version cannot scope out the SI: Chacun des profs a fe´licite´ tous les e´tudiants qui ont lu un livre qu’il a recommande´. ‘Each of the professors has congratulated all the students that have read a book that he recommended.’ For every prof (x), there is a book such that x congratulated all the students that read that book. there is a book such that for every prof (x), x congratulated all the students that read that book
(172)
*
Chacun des profs a fe´licite´ tous les e´tudiants qui ont lu un des livres qu’il a recommande´. For every professor (x), there is a book such that x congratulated all the students that read that book. For every professor (x), x congratulated all the students that read a (different) book
(173) *
(172) and (173) support a (covert) movement analysis of both presuppositional un N. See Chapter 5 for a more complete and uniform analysis of the SI and WI facts. (iii)
Cross-over phenomena
A third property of 9Qs is that they are all sensitive to SCO effects, i.e. they all undergo A’-movement, including non-presuppositional un N, (174).72 Because 9Qs show WCO effects, I conclude that they undergo Q-movement, (175): 71
An important question asked by a reviewer concerns the prosodic realization of the specific indefinite in (172). As far as my judgments go, the fall-rise intonation is preferable (though not compulsory). I have yet not been able to conduct an experiment with that kind of sentence, nor have I found any work on that issue in the literature. 72 The SCO effect (created by a principle C violation) found in (174) can also be witnessed if 9Q stays in situ: (i)
a. * b. * c. * d. *
Ili a invite´ _ un enfanti he has invited a (specific) child Ili a invite´ un enfanti he has invited a child (or another) Ili a invite´ UN ENFANTi he has invited a child (from the set of children) Ili a invite´ un des enfantsi he has invited one of the children
Still, (i) does not reveal anything about movement.
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2 Split-DPs
(174) a. * b. * c. * d. * (175) a. * b. * c. * d. *
A une fillei, ellei a donne´ le livre to a specific girl, she has given a book A une fillei, ellei a donne´ le livre to a girl or another, she has given a book A UNE fillei, ellei a donne´ le livre to a girl (from the set of girls) she has given a book A une des fillesi, ellei a donne´ le livre to one of the girl, she has given a book Sai me`re aime un enfanti her mother loves a (specific) child Sai me`re aime un enfanti Her mother loves a child (or another) Sai me`re aime UN enfanti her mother loves a child (from the set of children) Sai me`re aime un des enfantsi her mother loves one of the children
If the XP in clefts moves from its base-generated position within the coda (see section ‘‘Syntax: Movement or Non-movement?’’), then, the same results can be observed with un N. (176) a. * b. * c. * d. *
C’est un enfanti que sai me`re aime it is a (specific) child that her mother loves C’est un enfanti que sai me`re aime it is a child (or another) that her mother loves C’est UN enfanti que sai me`re aime it is a child (from the set of children) that her mother loves C’est un des enfantsi que sai me`re aime It is one of the children that her mother loves
Note that no WCO effect is observed if the XP is a definite noun phrase (177): (177)
C’est Victori que sai me`re admire it’s Victor that her mother admires
To sum up, the data presented here show that un N is three ways ambiguous, that they come with three different intonations corresponding to three different readings. In addition to appearing in existential constructions and to interacting with other Qs, they show movement restrictions typical of Q-movements, suggesting that they are composed of a quantificational part. These properties are very similar to those of wh-phrases in-situ discussed in Section 2.1.2.2. Only specific 9Qs must take wide(st) scope, just like specific wh in-situ. Neither is clause-bound. Just like partitive wh-phrases in-situ, partitive un N is clausebound and blocked by 8Qs. Yet, partitive 9Qs cannot take wide scope, unlike partitive wh in-situ (see Chapter 5, Section 5.1.2). Non-presuppositional un Ns
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89
must be bound by another operator in their neighborhood, suggesting the noncanonical structure in (178): (178)
Opi
. . ... [indefinitei], where Op can be neg, 8 or 9
In this section, I have argued that there are (at least) three distinct versions of un N that parallel in prosody, semantics and syntax three different wh-phrases in-situ. I have observed that (i) a fall-rise intonation is associated with a specific interpretation; (ii) a falling intonation indicates a partitivity-based presupposition; (iii) a neutral intonation on an un N maps onto a non-presuppositional interpretation, and a rising intonation on a wh in-situ triggers a non-presuppositional reading. Un Ns and wh-phrases associated with (i), (ii) and (iii) interact with Qs of different types, suggesting that they are quantificational. In Section 2.1.3, NSC French wh-phrases in-situ are argued to be complex DPs with (potential) Split-DP configurations. I claim that the internal structure of French 9Qs is like that of wh-phrases in-situ. An indefinite is generated with an Op that happens to be [þwh] in questions and [þ9] in case of 9Qs: (179)
a. b.
[Opwh þ indefinite] [Op9 þ indefinite]
(NSC French) (NSC French)
Just like wh-phrases in-situ, 9Qs are complex DPs, involving Op, its restriction plus a feature (specific, partitive). Complex un Ns have the following structures: (180)
a. b. c.
[indefinite specific-Op9 ] [indefinite partitive-Op9] [indefinite] ... Op9
(in existential constructions)
(180c) is the interpretation by default (in existential constructions, or sentences without overt Op). Op9 can be replaced by Op8, resulting in co-variation. In the next section, I investigate the internal structures of these six phrases.
2.1.5 The Internal Structures of wh and Existential un Ns At the beginning of this chapter I claimed that wh-phrases are NPs whose extended projection is represented by DP. I have argued that wh-phrases come in three distinct flavors: specific, partitive or non-presuppositional, and that the three wh-phrases have distinct syntactic behaviors. Based on the fact that existential un N parallel wh-phrases in-situ in their (external) syntax, semantics and prosody, I reasonably concluded that they are internally similar. In this section, I would like to dig deeper within the architecture of these nominal phrases. Recall that traditional canonical quantificational structures involve the tripartite structure in (181). In non-canonical quantificational structures,
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2 Split-DPs
these elements are mixed up. The Q part quantifies over its non-adjacent restriction (183): (181)
Canonical quantification:
Q – restriction – scope
(182)
Non-Canonical quantification:
Q – scope– restriction
(183)
Split-DP structure:
Opi. . . [ti restriction]
Qs like combien de chaises ‘how many chairs’ optionally reflect (181) and (182) overtly. In (184a), the whole constituent is overtly moved to the front of the clause. In (184b), the operator is moved away from the restriction, which is left in-situ (Obenauer 1994, Mathieu 2002 a.o). (184)
a.
b.
Combien de chaises as-tu peint(e)s How many chairs have you painted.masc.pl/fem.pl ‘How many chairs did you paint?’ Combien as-tu peint(*e)s de chaises? How many have you paint. Masc. pl/*fem.pl of. chairs ‘How many chairs did you paint?’
In (184) the Q quantifies over the DP restriction, i.e. over entities. The conclusion reached at the end of Section 2.1.3.1 is that the morphological realization of wh-words is not intrinsically [þwh], i.e. wh-words are not quantificational, except for combien in combien de N-constructions (combien being the morphological mark of interrogatives). Yet I have argued that Q-movement is attested with all the wh-phrases in-situ discussed, meaning that Q is part of the structure of the wh-word, though not morphologically realized (i.e. combien de N being their overt counterpart). I arrived at the conclusion that French wh-phrases are composed of a phonologically null (covert) Q-particle (see also Mathieu 1999, 2002, 2004a). In other words, French is a mix between Chinese (having an indeterminate wh-phrase and no overt Q-particles) and Japanese (having overt movement of a Q-particle). At the end of Section 2.1.3, the issue of Q-movement shows up, and I concluded that Q is generated with its restriction and is subsequently moved to C8. I argued that only some wh phrases in-situ in French display this pattern. Presuppositional wh-phrases behave like full ones, and non-presuppositional wh are covertly split. The fact that both wh-phrases insitu and full wh-phrases ex-situ constructions are truth conditionally equivalent suggests a real optionality between the two alternatives. Yet splitting the DP or not is not a matter of optionality and really seems coined to presupposition or lack thereof (see Mathieu 2004a). A similar analysis is given in Section 2.1.4 for un Ns. The structure of nominal phrases can be divided into three domains (see Laenzlinger 2005, Ihsane 2008 a.o): the left-periphery (information domain), the inflectional domain, and the thematic domain. The domain of information structure is what interests us. I concentrate on Ihsane’s work on the leftperiphery of un Ns.
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91
Drawing a distinction between argumental and predicative noun phrases, Ihsane 2008 follows the traditional distinction between DP and NP.73 An NP denotes a property and needs a Det to turn into an argument. She shows that the left-periphery of an argumental un N must be analyzed within a cartographic approach (Aboh 2001, Zamparelli 2000, Giusti 2005, Laenzlinger 2005 a.o) and refines the DP/argument parallel (see Longobardi 1994). Postulating a strict syntax-semantics mapping, she proposes that the functional category ‘DP’ is split into discrete functional projections encoding different kinds of information. She argues that the structure of a (syntactic) argument (Longobardi 1994) must minimally involve the lowest layer of the left periphery, i.e. argumental noun phrases are structurally different from predicative ones. The former project DPs, the latter do not and ‘are truncated at the level of the highest inflectional level’ (i.e. they are NumP or NP-shells) (Ihsane 2008:91): (185)
A ‘nominal expression’ is an argument only if it is introduced by one of the categories of the DP domain (the left-periphery) (Ihsane 2008:91, (95))
Ihsane 2008 identifies three types of un Ns: (i) property denoting, (ii) quantificational and (iii) S-referential (encoding speaker’s reference). (i) may be existential, (ii) are never existential and (iii) is always existential. The three un Ns display three distinct semantic types (see D-S&B 2004). Their external syntax is influenced by their (internal) left-periphery: whether un N takes scope, undergoes QR, or stays in-situ seems to be dependent on the size (and composition) of its left-periphery. These three un Ns broadly correspond to the un Ns of our typology.74 (i) Property denoting un Ns correspond to our non-presuppositional un N Recall that this type of un N is not necessarily existential, in that it can be bound by other types of operators (modal, negation, 8Qs etc.). Crucially, they obligatorily take narrow scope (Section 2.1.4.1). In that sense they never move for the sake of interpretation (or movement is minimal). They are variables
73 That is, the distinction between (ia) and (ib), where un livre is an argument in (ia) and une linguiste a predicate in (ib).:
(i)
a. b.
74
J’ai lu un livre I have read a book Je suis une linguiste I am a linguist
At the end of Sections 2.1.3 and 2.1.4 , I arrived at the conclusion that French wh-in-situ and un Ns have a complex DP-structure, which seems to influence their respective internal syntax.
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(Baunaz 2005). For Ihsane 2008 too, they are non-quantificational, and as such lack the Q-layer. She gives the following structure to such noun phrases: (186)
[PropP uni [NumP ti ... [NP livre]]]
(Ihsane 2008 : 92, (97))
Ihsane extensively argues that property-denoting un Ns are syntactic arguments, and that PropP is the lowest layer of the Vorfeld. In other words, PropP is sufficient to make a DP argumental.75 Note that the article un ‘a’ is generated within the inflectional domain (CountP, Tabea Ihsane (p.c)).76
75 For Ihsane – despite the non-quantificational status of SRefP, both S-referential un Ns and quantificational un Ns are syntactic arguments occupying argument positions. Propertydenoting un Ns function like syntactic arguments too, as the coordinate structure in (i) illustrates (from Ihsane 2008:72, following Partee 1986, ex. (9)):
(i)
Mary considers John competent in semantics and an authority on unicorns
The conjuncts in a coordination structure must be identical, i.e. they must be of a similar type. Verbs like consider take property-denoting arguments, i.e. arguments of type <e, t>, that is APs or NPs, i.e. NPs can be property-denoting arguments. (ii) shows that a Ns can also enter such constructions, vs. universal quantifiers (a.o): (ii)
Mary considers that an island /two islands / many islands [is /are better than. . .] *every island/ * most islands/ *this island. . . . (Partee 2002:361, partial (10)).
Ihsane 2008 refers also to McNally 1995 for the semantics of predicates taking propertydenoting arguments. 76 Ihsane’s account of these elements looks incompatible with a semantic incorporation analysis (van Geenhoven 1998, Mathieu 2004a). Incorporated nominals are not arguments, since ‘the predicate is absorbed by the verb as the predicate of that verb’s internal argument’s variable.’ As a consequence ‘the valence of the verb is reduced by one. A transitive sentence becomes intransitive.’ (Mathieu 2004a:30). Incorporated nominals are then properties. The obligatory narrow scope that these elements take is due to the fact that the predicate (the verb) provides the existential quantification. Hence a crucial difference between this account and Ihsane’s is that PropPs are arguments (since the lowest projection of the left-periphery, PropP, is projected). Despite this (crucial) difference, Ihsane 2006 tries to unify a semantic incorporation approach with hers. The idea is to relate semantic incorporation to ‘truncation of the highest level of the nominal Vorfeld, namely S-reference Phrase and Quantifier Phrase’ (Ihsane 2006:254). Other typical instances of truncated structures within noun phrases with bare nouns show up, where the whole Vorfeld has been truncated, yielding a predicative structure (vs. argumental): (i)
En tant que fille As girl ‘As a girl’
(Ihsane 2006:253. (49a))
According to Ihsane, when truncation (at least) of all the Vorfeld is achieved, the noun is nonargumental and is semantically incorporated. If PropP is still present, the nominal is an argument. Under my approach to wh in-situ and existential un Ns, both approaches can account for non-presuppositional phrases, and I do not decide between one and the other. However, for explanatory purposes, I develop Ihsane’s.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
(ii)
93
Quantificational un Ns correspond to our partitive un N
They are arguments, hence project PropP. They do not pick up a referent, but ‘represent a proportion of a set which has been introduced in the discourse’ (Ihsane 2008:83), i.e. they are presuppositional (and partitive). The QP layer is responsible for its quantificational reading: (187)
[QP uni [PropP ti [NumP ti ... [NP livre]]]
(Ihsane 2008 : 96, (106))
Q-un Ns correspond to our partitive un Ns, which are crucially interpreted with a partitive reading. Ihsane 2008 claims that Q-un Ns are familiar, a property intrinsic to our specific un N (and not to partitive un N, see Section 2.1.4.1). (iii)
S-referential un Ns correspond to our specific un N
S-referential un Ns are context dependent, in that their referent may vary depending on the utterance situation. They are existential. SRefP is not quantificational (quantificational noun phrases do not pick out an entity). The QP layer is justified for syntactic purposes (scope, i.e. c-command). They take wide scope, can move past weak (scope) islands, can take intermediate scope, and somehow they need to take wide scope. Their referential interpretation is encoded within S-RefP, the topmost projection within the left-periphery. (188)
[SRefP uni [QP ti [PropP ti [NumP ti ... [NP livre]]] (Ihsane 2008: 102, (117))
Specific un N share similar properties with SRef-un Ns. Yet a crucial distinction between the two lies on their quantificational status. In Section 2.1.4, I have argued that this type of un N is quantificational (based on scope properties, island restrictions and WCO effects). Moreover, whether specificity is tied to the speaker’s mind or not is not crucial for its definition. The term ‘specificity’ refers to familiar individuals, i.e. identified via a known property, i.e. it does not involve sub-set or set relation(s) (see fn. 34/37). Every argument un N has the PropP layer, which makes it an ‘argument’. Property-denoting un Ns lack the Q-phrase, because they are not quantificational. Because they are not ‘referential’, they also lack S-RefP, the upper functional projection. Quantificational un Ns are arguments, so PropP is generated. Their quantificational status is upheld thanks to Q, above PropP. As for S-referential un Ns they project PropP. Because they show scope relationships, they also project Q. This analysis of French un N raises at least one major problem. A second problem arises when extending her analysis to other DPs with similar syntactic and semantic properties (i.e. wh-phrases in-situ). The first problem has already been addressed and concerns the presence of Q8 with SRefPs (see above). The presence of a Q in (188) is unexpected. Quantificational noun phrases do not pick out entities, but this is exactly what SRefP does, i.e. it is non-quantificational. Yet, Q must be present, she
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claims, for scope reasons. SRefP enters scope relationships. It is Q within the left-periphery of that DP that triggers QR, at the sentence level. Aware of the contradiction that the structure of SRefP brings along, Ihsane proposes that only Q8 remains syntactically active (whereas the referential feature gets inactive). Ihsane runs into circularity, though. If SRefP is interpreted referentially (vs. quantificationally), as she claims, then its scope properties are left unexplained. Ihsane answers that these properties arise because of the projection of Q. A theoretical issue arises at this point. Ihsane argues for a strict syntaxsemantics mapping. If SRefP is not quantificational, while having a Q in its internal structure, then there is no strict mapping. A second problem arises when we compare un Ns with other quantifiers. Recall that un Ns and wh-phrases in-situ share similar semantics, prosody and syntax. I have extensively claimed that existential un Ns are similar to whphrases, i.e. the two types of items have the same internal structure. Under Ihsane’s typology of un Ns, Q8 is associated with existential presupposition (see Q-un Ns, and S-Ref-un Ns). So non-presuppositional wh-phrases would be a PropP un N, as in (189): (189)
[PropP queli [ NumP ti . . . [NP livre]
If (189) is the correct structure for non-presuppositional wh-phrases, then they must be non-quantificational. Q8 must be absent from such structures, by definition. (189) causes two related problems: (i) I have shown that wh-phrases are quantificational, i.e. they must involve Q8; (ii) adding a Q above PropP would force the non-presuppositional wh-phrase to be interpreted as a partitive Q, since both non-presuppositional wh-phrases and Q-un Ns would have a similar structure, and interpretation (by strict syntax-semantic mapping), again an unwanted result. I adopt the idea that the DP must be split into discrete projections and adopt Ihsane’s hierarchies for the three-way ambiguous un Ns. However I make some substantial modifications. In the following, I assume comparable structures for both wh-phrases and 9Qs in French. First, I claim that because both partitive and specific noun phrases are quantificational, ‘QP’ is projected with both types. As a first consequence, ‘QP’ is not devoted to partitivity, but to quantification, and hosts a phonologically null operator (Op9, Opwh). As a second (related) consequence, partitivity must be encoded within a projection, just like specificity is (cf. SRefP in Ihsane 2008): PartP. Second I claim that the order SRefP > QP must be reversed. Two arguments in favor of the order QP > SRefP can be advocated: (i) nothing in Ihsane’s approach prevents switching these projections since nothing motivates her original order; (ii) if Q8 hosts the existential Operator, Op9 must block movement of un to the head of SRefP, as a result of the Head-movement-Constraint. I claim that PartP occupies the position lower than QP.77 77
Note that PartP is absent from Ihsane’s original proposal, since partitivity is encoded in QP.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
95
Non-presuppositional un Ns are non-quantificational arguments. Movement to PropP makes the DP argumental, (190): (190)
[PropP uni [ NumP ti . . . [NP livre]
Partitives are argumental, and involve presupposition, which is encoded in Part8. Movement of un is to Part8. As an indefinite, it gets bound by Q9, which ccommands it, (191): (191)
[QP Q9 [PartP un parti [PropP ti [ NumP ti . . . [NP livre]
Specific un Ns are also argumental, and trigger existential presupposition with wide scope, i.e. it must contain ‘something’ more than just Q above PropP: specificity. I rename Ihsane’s S-RefP Spec(ific)P (vs. referential), as in (192): (192)
[QP Q9 [SpecP un speci [PropP ti [ NumP ti . . . [NP livre]
Traditionally, it is admitted that overt partitives, which involve a part of relation, involve a non-overt N, as in (193) (see Fitzpatrick 2006 for references). Because overt partitives are interpreted like covert partitives and because they exhibit the same external syntax, I claim that in (194), the highest DP is split as in (191): (193)
[DP some [NP ˘N [PP ofpart [DP the [NP students]]]]]
(194)
[QP Q9 [PartP un parti [PropP ti [NumP ti . . . [NP ˘N [PP despart livres ]]]]]78
In (191), (193) and (194), the indefinite is bound by the operator in Q (9, for partitive and specific existential un Ns). Spec8 is what renders Q specific. Part8 turns Q partitive. Non-presuppositional un Ns involve neither SpecP, nor Q. Being indefinites, they must be bound by a relevant operator. I claim that this is achieved via either existential closure (at the VP-level, see Heim 1982), or via neg, 8. Wh-items are not interrogative per se, at least not in their morphological realization. Yet, their external syntactic behavior proved to react like quantificational items (or at least that they undergo Q-movement).79 As extensively argued above, the external syntax of wh-items must involve a phonologically null operator, i.e. non-presuppositional wh-items might be interpreted with an empty set. Just like the three variants of un Ns, I claim that they have three different internal structures. Since the three wh-phrases under discussion are 78
Where ˘N is the set of books, i.e. un des livres means ‘some book of the books’. I leave open the issue of de heading a PP or being within the Vorfeld of livres. See Ihsane 2008. 79 Qwh marks the interrogative force of the DP, even if not morphologically realized (see Section 2.1.3.2). Wh-phrases are ‘indefinite’, like Japanese wh-words, and must be bound by a quantificational element, i.e. a Q-particle ([þwh], [þ9], [þrel] or [þexclamative]). For this reason, wh-words never go to Q (or higher), just like un never goes to the left periphery of the clause. Un is never the quantificational operator. Recall that I distinguish between wh-items and combien (de N)): combien is the morphological realization of the wh-operator.
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quantificational arguments, they all project a PropP and a Q (195). Partitive wh items are ‘partitive’, so they project a PartP (196), below Q. SpecP is also projected below QP, (197). Qs in (196) and (197) c-command and bind indefinite quel, in Part8 and Spec8, respectively. The wh-item is moved to PropP to get its argument status.80 (195)
[QP Qwh [PropP qui [NumP ti ...[NP ˘]]]]
(196)
[QP Qwh [PartP queli [PropP ti [NumP ti ...[NP livre]]]]]
(197)
[QP Qwh [Spec queli [PropP ti [NumP ti ...[NP livre]]]]]
Overt combien de N means ‘how many Ns among the set of Ns’. It is a ‘quantity’ or ‘number’ reading, intrinsic to its restriction (see Obenauer 1994).81 I adapt Ihsane’s (p.c) structure of quantitative phrases to combien de N. When combien strands the restriction in situ, it drags the whole cluster QP > . . .> QuantityP along. The PP is left in-situ.82 (199) and (200) are a summary of this section: (198)
[QP combieni [Q’ Qwh . . . [QuantityP ti [deP de [countP livre-s [NP tj ]]]]]
(199)
a. b. c.
Non-presuppositional un N : PropP Partitive un N : Q Specific un N : Q
(200)
a. b. c.
Non-presuppositional wh-N : Q > PropP > NumP > . . .NP Partitive wh-N : Q > PartP > PropP > . . . NP Specific wh-N : Q > SpecP > PropP > . . . NP
> NumP > > PartP> > SpecP >
. . .NP . . . NP . . . NP
Compared to non-presuppositional Qs, partitive and specific Qs project an additional layer. SpecP and PartP allow the DP to get a presuppositional Q, i.e. partitive and specific Qs have something more than non-presuppositional Qs. This additional layer is what allows pied-piping of the whole complex DP, which undergoes covert movement.83 Despite the fact that they tend to take 80
Arguably, yet, -el in quel is complex and involves incorporation of –el to qu-, yielding quel. Ihsane 2008 claims that the Dets le/la/les involve grammatical numbers, i.e. they are generated within the inflectional domain, much like Q and S-referential des N. 81 Heycock 1995 and Fox 1999 (see also Spector 2006) suggest that de N in the unsplit version must be analysed as denoting NumP. Num8 holds a numeral variable, combien binding it. In the non-canonical version, these authors argue that de N is interpreted in situ, just like what is advocated in this book. 82 Such a structure differs from the one discussed above for wh-phrases like qui in that the operator is overtly realized. Partitivity, specificity or their absence must then be represented within the left-periphery of the DP within the PP. I leave open for discussion where exactly this information would be. 83 Why this should be so remains yet to be answered.
2.1 Introduction: Split-DPs
97
wide scope, that presuppositional (and in particular specific) Qs undergo piedpiping when undergoing movement (to CP for wh-phrases or to a devoted scope position for 9Qs) can again be witnessed by the analogy this structure exhibits with combien-constructions. Ihsane 2008:105 (Michal Starke (p.c)) notes that pied-piping (of additional material. i.e. the preposition pour ‘for’ in (201) (her examples (126)) is obligatory in those contexts: (201)
a. b. *
Pour combien de politiciens as-tu vote´ ? for how.many of politicians have you voted Combien de politiciens as-tu vote´ pour ? how.many of politicians have you voted for
Ihsane concludes that ‘[. . .] the quantificational element embedded in a bigger constituent is active in the sense that undergoes QR, in which case it carries along the material dominating it.’ She adds that ‘(. . .) to have scope properties, a nominal expression must involve a Q layer.’ (Ihsane 2008:105). As such, wh-items and un Ns are lexicalized. Their quantificational parts are yet left unpronounced (vs. combien), just like in Chinese. Their quantificational status is obtained through binding with a Q8 occupying a position within the Vorfeld of the split DP (for partitive and specific) or by a Q8 outside the DP (for non-presuppositional DPs), as in Japanese. In that sense, the French wh in-situ construction is a mix between Chinese and Japanese: it involves a null operator (Chinese) that covertly moves to CP (Japanese).
2.1.6 Conclusion I have presented wh in-situ constructions in NSC French and shown that they considerably vary from those usually described in the literature (Chang 1997, C&R 2000, Boeckx 1999 and Mathieu 2002). I identify three different whphrases in-situ and show that each kind has a corresponding 9Q, sharing with it its prosody, semantics, and syntax. Syntactically, they exhibit three distinct behaviors: (i) fall-rise wh-phrases in-situ are not trapped in WIs, but cannot escape SIs, suggesting that movement takes place. Specific wh-phrases in-situ can escape WIs (Starke 2001); (ii) falling (downfall) wh-phrases in-situ are blocked in scope islands, but not in neg-islands, yet they can be extracted from SIs; (iii) rising wh-phrases in-situ are non-presuppositional and can never be extracted covertly. As for overt wh-movement, I assume that whphrases ex-situ move to a specifier position in the left periphery. Wh-phrases ex-situ escape WIs, but cannot escape SIs. I have also discussed the status of 9Qs in NSC French and identified three distinct classes, all endowed with a different prosody, semantics, and syntax: (i) fall-rise 9Qs which involve specificity; (ii) downfall (or slightly falling) 9Qs which trigger partitivity and (iii) neutral 9Qs which are non-presuppositional. I have shown that only specific 9Qs can be extracted out of both weak and
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strong islands, and as such are not clause-bound, whereas partitive 9Qs are generally trapped (but not in neg-islands) and neutral 9Qs are always stuck in this configuration. Following Mathieu’s 2002 approach, originating in Obenauer 1984, I claim that quantificational DP structures may be non-canonical at Spell-out, i.e. a lexical operator and their semantic restriction may be separated, yielding SplitDP constructions. I reached the conclusion that (i) overt Split-DPs correspond to non-presuppositional wh-phrases, and (ii) non-split constructions are presuppositional. Based on Obenauer’s 1994 observation that overt split-DP constructions yield non-specific readings in French, and as such underlie only non-presuppositional wh in-situ and non-presuppositional 9Qs; in other configurations, covert movement of the whole complex-DP is observed. Then I have shown that only non-presuppositional 9Qs/wh in-situ yield Split-DP constructions, while presuppositional phrases do not. With the former case, only the Q-part is A’-moved. The latter case resembles overt full fronted wh-phrases, i.e. Qs move as a whole. In the case of wh-phrases, movement is to the left periphery. In the case of 9Q movement, I claim that it is to an A’position. That presuppositional features are related to the restriction associated with Q is supported by prosody. Recall that wh-phrases in-situ realize the restriction of an abstract Q; on them, stress prominence arises with specificity. In Chapters 3 and 4, I investigate the nature(s) and the meaning(s) of Universal Quantifiers (8Qs) and N(egative)-words in French. Taking into account syntax, semantics and prosody, I draw a new characterization of these elements. I finally reveal that specificity, partitivity and their absence are features playing a crucial role in their syntax. In Chapter 5, I show that scope relationships between 8Qs and 9Qs, as well as between 8Qs and whphrases in-situ display systematic constraints on movements. I argue that scope interactions can be treated in terms of Starke’s 2001 idea of RM, once specificity, partitivity and non-presupposition are taken into account. One consequence of the internal structures of DPs is that the heavier a quantificational DP is the more likely to move as a whole- where heaviness seems to be related to presupposition. In other words, the internal structures of quantificational DPs have an impact on external structures (Chapter 5).
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Aoun, Joseph and Yen-Hui Audrey Li. 1993. Wh-elements in situ: Syntax or LF? Linguistic Inquiry 24(2):199–238. Baunaz, Lena. 2005. The syntax and semantics of wh in-situ and existentials: The case of French. Leiden Working Papers in Linguistics 2.2. 1–27. Baunaz, Lena and Ce´dric Patin. 2009. Prosody refers to semantic factors: Evidence from French wh-words, talk given at the Interface Discourse-Prosody Conference in Paris 7, September 11th 2009. To be published in Proceedings of IDP, Elisabeth Delais-Roussarie, Hi-Yon Yoo, L. de Saussure and A. Rihs (eds.), Etudes de se´mantique et pragmatique franc¸aises. Berne: Lang. Baunaz, Lena and Genoveva Puska´s. 2008. Feature stripping and wh-movement in French and Hungarian. In Selected Proceedings of the 34th Incontro di Grammatica Generativa, Paola Beninca, Federico Damonte and Nicoletta Penello (eds.), Padova: Unipress Special Issue of the Rivista di Grammatica Generativa, vol. 33:43–60. Beck, Sigrid. 1996. Quantified structures as barriers for LF-movement. Natural Language Semantics 4:1–56. Beghelli, Fillipo. 1995. The Phrase Structure of Quantifier Scope. Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles. Boeckx, Ce´dric. 1999. Decomposing French Questions. In University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguisitics 6.1, Proceedings of the 23rd Annual Penn Linguistics Colloquium, J. Alexander, N.R. Han and M. Minnick Fox (eds.), 69–80. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania. Boeckx, Ce´dric. 2003. French Wh-in-situ Interrogatives as (C)overt Clefts, ms. Harvard University. Bosˇ kovic´, Zeljiko. 1998. LF Movement and the Minimalist Program. In NELS 28. GLSA, P.N. Tamanji and K. Kusomoto (eds.), 43–57. Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts. Bosˇ kovic´, Zeljiko. 2000. Sometimes in SpecCP, sometimes in-situ. In Step by Step: Essays on Minimalism in Honor of Howard Lasnik, Roger Martin, David Michaels and Juan Uriagereka (eds.), 53–87. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Butler, Alastair and Eric Mathieu. 2005. Split-DPs, generalized EPP and visibility. In MIT Working Papers in Linguistics, Martha McGinnis and Norvin Richards (eds.), 49–57. MA: MIT. Cable, Seth. 2008. Question particles and the nature of wh-fronting. In Quantification: A Cross-Linguistic Perspective. North Holland Linguistic Series: Linguistic Variations Volume 64. Matthewson, Lisa (ed.), Bingley, UK: Emerald. Cardinaletti, Anna and Michal Starke. 1999. The typology of structural deficiency. In Clitics in the Languages of Europe, Henk van Reimsdijk (ed.), 145–233. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Chang, Lisa. 1997. Wh-in situ in French. MA thesis, University of British Colombia. Cheng, Lisa. 1991. On the Typology of Wh-questions. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT. Distributed by MIT Working Papers in Linguistics. Cheng, Lisa and Johann Rooryck. 2000. Licensing wh-in-situ. Syntax 3(1):1–19. Choe, Jae-Woong. 1987. Anti-Quantifiers and a Theory of Distributivity. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts. Chomsky, Noam. 1977. On wh-movement. In Formal Syntax, Peter. W Culicover, Tom Wasow and Adrian Akmajian (eds.), San Francisco, London: Academic Press. Cinque, Guglielmo. 1990. Types of A Bar-dependencies. Cambridge, MA:: MIT Press, Linguistic Inquiry Monograph. Davidson, Donald. 1980. Essays on Actions and Events. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Dobrovie-Sorin, Carmen. 1996. Syntactic Configurations and References: SE/SI in Romance. In Grammatical Theory and Romance Languages, Karen Zagona (ed.). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Dobrovie-Sorin, Carmen and Claire Beyssade. 2004. De´finir les Inde´finis. Coll.Sciences du Langage. Paris: E´ditions CNRS.
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Doetjes, Jenny, Georges Rebuschi and Annie Rialland. 2004. Cleft sentences. In Handbook of French Semantics, Francis Corblin and Henriette de Swart (eds.). Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications. Enc¸, Mu¨rvet. 1991. The semantics of specificity. Linguistic Inquiry 22:1–25. Etxepare, Ricardo and Myriam Uribe-Etxebarria. 2002. Wh-movement in Spanish: The right side of it. Talk given in Leiden, December 12, 2002. Farkas, Donka. 1994. Specificity and scope. In Langues et Grammaires 1, Lea Nash and George Tsoulas (eds.), 119–137. Universite´ Paris 8. Fitzpatrick, Justin Michael. 2006. Syntactic and Semantic Routes to Floating Quantification. Doctoral dissertation, MIT, Cambridge, MA. Fodor, Jerry and Ivan Sag. 1982. Referential and quantificational indefinites. Linguistics and Philosophy 5:355–398. Fox, Danny. 1999. Reconstruction, binding theory, and the interpretation of chains. Linguistic Inquiry 30:157–196. Giusti, Giuliana. 1991. The categorial status of quantified nominals. Linguistische Berichte 136:438–452. Giusti, Giuliana. 1997. The categorial status of determiners. In The New Comparative Syntax, Liliane Haegeman (ed.), 95–123. London and New York: Longman. Giusti, Giuliana. 2005. At the left periphery of the Romanian noun phrase. In On space and Time in Language, Martine Coene and Liliane Tasmowski (eds.). Cluj: Clusium. Godard, Danie`le. 2004. French negative dependency. In Handbook of French Semantics, F. Corblin and H. de Swart (eds.), 351–389. Stanford, CA: CSLI. Gravier, G., J.-F. Bonastre, E. Geoffrois, S. Galliano, K. McTait and K. Choukri. 2004. ESTER, une campagne d’e´valuation des syste`mes d’indexation automatique d’e´missions radiophoniques en franc¸ais. In Actes de JEP-TALN 2004. Fe`s, Maroc Grohmann, Kleanthes. 1998. Syntactic inquiries into discourse restrictions on multiple interrogatives. Groninger Arbeiten zur germanistischen Linguistik 42:1–60. Hagstrom, Paul. 1998. Decomposing Questions. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT. Distributed by MIT Working Papers in Linguistics. Hagstrom, Paul. 1999. The movement of question particles. In Proceedings of NELS 30, M. Hirotani, A. Coetzee, N. Hall and Y. Kim (eds.), Amhest, MA: GLSA. Hagstrom, Paul. 2001. Particle movement in Sinhala and Japanese. In Clause Structure in South Asian Languages, Veneeta Dayal and Anoop Mahjan (eds.). Dordrecht: Kluwer. Heim, Irene. 1982. The Semantics of Definite and Indefinite Noun Phrases. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts. Heim, Irene and Angelika Kratzer. 1998. Semantics in Generative Grammar. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers. Heycock, Caroline. 1995. Asymmetries in reconstruction. Linguistic Inquiry 26:547–570. Hoji, Hajime. 1985. Logical form Constraints and Configurational Structures in Japanese. Doctoral dissertation, University of Washington. Huang, James. 1982. Move WH in a language without WH movement. The Linguistic Review 1:369–410. Ihsane, Tabea. 2006. The Construction of the DP Domain: From /un/-NPs and /du/des-/NPs in French to Bare Nouns in Romance and Germanic. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Geneva. Ihsane, Tabea. 2008. The Layered DP. Form and Meaning of French Indefinites. Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 124. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Jayez, Jacques and Lucia Tovena. 2005. Free choiceness and non-individuation. Linguistics and Philosophy 28:1–71. Jime´nez, Maria-Luisa. 1997. Semantic and Pragmatic Conditions on Word-Order in Spanish. Ph.D. dissertation, Georgetown University. Junker, Marie-Odile. 1995. Syntax et se´mantique des quantifieurs flottants tous et chacun. Distributivite´ en se´mantique conceptuelle. Gene`ve: Librairie Droz.
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Kamp, Hans. 1981. A theory of truth and discourse representation. In Formal Methods in the Study of Language, Jeroen Groenendijk, Theo Janssen and Martin Stokhof (eds.). Amsterdam: Mathematical Centre. Kayne, Richard. 1994. The Antsymmetry of Syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. E´. Kiss, Katalin. 1998. Informational focus vs. identificational focus. Language 74:245–273. Koopman, Hilda. 1984. The Syntax of Verbs: From Verb Movement Rules in the Kru Languages to Universal Grammar. Dordrecht: Foris Publication. Kratzer, Angelika. 1995. Stage-level and individual-level predicates. In The Generic Book, Gregory N. Carlson and Francis J. Pelletier (eds.), 125–175. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Kratzer, Angelica. 1998. Scope or Pseudoscope? Are there wide-scope indefinites? In Events and Grammar, S. Rothstein (ed.). Dordrecht: Kluwer. Laenzlinger, Christopher. 2005. Some notes on DP-internal movement. GG@G 4, 227–260. Lasnik, Howard and Tim Stowell. 1991. Weakest crossover. Linguistic Inquiry 22, 687–720. Lipta´k, Aniko. 2001. On the Syntax of Wh-items in Hungarian. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Leiden. Longobardi, Giuseppe. 1994. Reference and proper names: A theory of N-movement in syntax and logical form. Linguistic Inquiry 25:609–665. Mathieu, Eric. 1999. Wh in-situ and the intervention effect. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 11: 441–472 Mathieu, Eric. 2002. The Syntax of Non-Canonical Quantification: A Comparative Study. Doctoral dissertation, University College London. Mathieu, Eric. 2004a. The mapping of form and interpretation: The case of optional wh-movement in French. Lingua 114:1090–1132. Mathieu, Eric. 2004b. Review of Carmen Dobrovie-Sorin et Claire Beyssade, De´finir les inde´finis, in http://aix1.uottawa.ca/~emathieu/Dobrovie_Beyssade.pdf. May, Robert. 1985. Logical Form: Its Structure and Derivation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. McNally, Louise. 1995. Bare plurals in Spanish are interpreted as properties. In Proceedings of the 1995 ESSLLI Conference on Formal Grammar, G. Morrill and R. Oehrle (eds.), Republished in 2004, Catalan Journal of Linguistics 3:115–133. Milsark, Gary. 1974. Existential Sentences in English. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT, published in 1979. New York-London: Garland. Milsark, Gary. 1977. Toward an explanation of certain peculiarities of the existential construction in English. Linguistic Analysis 18:85–109. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1983. Une Quantification Non-Canonique: La Quantification a` Distance. Langue Franc¸aise 58:66–88. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1984. On the identification of empty categories. The Linguistic Review 4:153–202. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1994. Aspects de la Syntaxe A-Barre. The`se de Doctorat d’Etat, Universite´ de Paris VIII. Partee, Barbara H. 1986. Noun phrase interpretation and type-shifting principles. In Studies in Discourse Representation Theory and the Theory of Generalized Quantifiers, Jeroen Groenendijk, Dick de Jongh and Martin Stokhof (eds.), 115–143. Dordrecht: Foris. Pesetsky, David. 1987. Wh-in-situ: Movement and unselective binding. In The Representation of (In)definites, Eric Reuland and Alice ter Meulen (eds.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Pesetsky, David. 1998/2000. Phrasal Movement and Its Kin. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Poletto, Cecilia and Jean-Yves Pollock. 2004. On the left periphery of some Romance WHquestions. In The Structure of IP and CP. The Cartography of Syntactic Structures, Volume 2. Luigi Rizzi (ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Postal, Paul. 1971. Cross-Over Phenomena. New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. Reinhart, Tanya. 1997. Quantifier scope. How labour is divided between QR and choice functions. Linguistics and Philosophy 20:335–397.
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Rialland, Annie, Jenny Doetjes and Georges Rebuschi. 2002. What is Focused in C’est XP qui/que Cleft Sentences in French? Talk given in Aix-en-Provence, April 2002. Rizzi, Luigi. 1990. Relativized Minimality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Rizzi, L. 2002. Locality and left periphery. In Structures and Beyond. The Cartography of Syntactic Structures, Volume 3. Adriana Belletti (ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rooryck, Johan. 1994. On two types of underspecification: towards a feature theory shared by syntax and phonology. Probus 6:207–233. Ross, John R. 1967. Constraints on Variables in Syntax. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT. Ruys, Eddy. 1992. The Scope of Indefinites. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Utrecht. Starke, Michal. 2001. Move Dissolves into Merge: A Theory of Locality. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Geneva. Spector, Benjamin. 2006. Aspects de la pragmatique des ope´rateurs logiques. Doctorat de sciences du langage (Universite´ Paris 7). Svenonius, Peter. 1998, Clefts in Scandinavian. In ZAS Working Papers 10:163–190, Berlin, Zentrum fu¨r Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft. de Swart, Henriette. 1992. Intervention effects, monotonicity and scope. Proceedings of SALT vol. 2, 387–406. Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press. Szabolcsi, Anna. 1997. Strategies for scope taking. In Ways of Scope Taking, Anna Szabolcsi (ed.). Dordrecht: Foris. Szabolcsi, Anna and Marcel den Dikken. 2003. Islands. In The Second State-of-the-Article Book, Lisa Cheng and Rint Sybesma (eds.). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Tanaka, Hidekazu. 1999. LF wh-islands and the minimal scope principle. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 17:371–402. Tsai, Chih-Hao. 1994. Effects of Semantic Transparency on the Recognition of Chinese TwoCharacter Words: Evidence for a Dual-Process Model. Unpublished Master’s thesis, National Chung-Cheng University, Chia-Yi, Taiwan. Tellier, Christine. 1991. Licensing Theory and French Parasitic Gaps. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers. Uribe-Etxebarria, Myriam. 2001. A review of Jime´nez (1997). GLOT International 5:6. Van Geenhoven, Veerle. 1996. Semantic Incorporation and Indefinite Descriptions: Semantic and Syntactic Aspects of Noun Incorporation in West Greenlandic. Ph.D. dissertation, Tubingen. Wasow, Thomas. 1972. Anaphoric Relations in English. dissertation, MIT. Watanabe, Akira. 1992. Subjacency and S-structure movement of wh-in-situ. Journal of East Asian Linguistics 1:255–291. Watanabe, Akira. 2001. Wh-in-situ languages. In The Handbook of Contemporary Syntactic Theory, Mark Baltin and Chris Collins (eds.), 203–225. Oxford: Blackwell. Zabbal, Youri. 2003. The Semantics of the French Indeterminate Expression ‘N’Importe’. MIT/UConn/UMass/Brown Semantics Workshop. October 25, 2003. University of Massachusetts. Zamparelli, Roberto. 2000. Layers in the Determiner Phrase. New York, NY: Garland. Zubizarreta, Maria-Luisa. 2003. Intervention effects in the French wh-in-situ construction: Syntax or Interpretation? In A Romance Perspective in Language Knowledge and Use. Selected Papers from the 31st Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages, Rafael ´ and Richard Camero (eds.). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Nun˜ez-Ceden˜o, Luis Lopez Benjamins.
Chapter 3
Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
3.1 Introduction: Floating Quantification The term canonical quantification describes the configuration of canonical quantificational sentences. Non-canonical quantification typically occurs with quantificational sentences where the quantifier (Q) and the restriction are not adjacent. I adopt the traditional canonical quantificational structure of the tripartite framework in (1a); (1b) schematizes non-canonical quantification: (1)
a. b.
Canonical Quantification: Q – restriction – scope Non-Canonical Quantification: restriction – Q – scope
Floating Quantifiers construction involve movement of the noun restriction past the lexical Q, as in (3) (Koopman and Sportiche 1991). QPs such as tous les garc¸ons ‘all the boys’ can overtly reflect (1a) and (1b): in (3b) Q is left in-situ: (2)
Floating Quantifier structure:
(3)
a. b. c. d.
[ restrictioni
...
[ Q ti. . .]]
Tous les garc¸ons ont lu un livre All the boys have read a book Les garc¸ons ont tous lu un livre the boys have all read a book Juliette a chante´ toutes les chansons Juliette has sung all the songs Juliette les a toutes chante´es Juliette them has all sang
In (3), Q quantifies over entities. Because Q and its restriction are split in (3b), (3d), FQs are typical instances of non-canonical quantification (1b): the Q part quantifies over its non-adjacent restriction. The position of Q with respect to its restriction in (3a)-(3b) does not yield truth conditional differences and the two 8Qs quantify over the DP les garc¸ ons, i.e. they are scopally equivalent
L. Baunaz, The Grammar of French Quantification, Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 83, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0621-7_3, Springer ScienceþBusiness Media B.V. 2011
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(cf. Sportiche 1988, Bobaljik 2003).1 Note moreover that FQs, just like their non-FQ counterparts agree with the DP they modify. FQ structures have mainly been studied with tous ‘all’ in French, rather than with chacun ‘each’. Floating Quantification must be distinguished from Split-DP structures (Chapter 2): Split-DP structures are characterized by movement of an operator stranding the restriction in situ, as in (4b) (schematized in (5)): (4)
a.
b.
(5)
Combien de chaises as-tu peint(e)s How many chairs have you painted.masc.pl/fem.pl ‘How many chairs did you paint?’ Combien as-tu peint(*es) de chaises? How many have you paint. Masc. pl/*fem.pl of. chairs ‘How many chairs did you paint?’
Split-DP structure:
[Qi. . . [ti restriction]]
The main difference between FQs and Split-DPs is that FQs and their non-FQ counterparts do not yield different presuppositions. In this chapter, I show that Qs that prosodically distinguish presupposition from non-presupposition may involve Split-DP structures; those marking the distinction lexically may involve FQ constructions. I argue that this is due to their internal structure: whereas FQs involve adjunction, Split-DPs involve complementation. A consequence of these facts is that Qs overtly displaying FQ constructions have a different external syntax than those displaying SplitDP structures. FQs are clause-bound, while Split-DPs are not. In the following, I present the basic assumption my analysis relies on, as well as some properties of French 8Qs.
3.1.1 Universal Quantifiers: Basic Facts All and each in English are 8Qs taking DPs as their (adjacent) restrictions. The French equivalent of prenominal all is tout ‘all’ and comes from the low latin tottus. In its plural form, it indicates the idea of totality without exception, i.e. it involves exhaustivity (see also Fitzpatrick 2006). Chacun is arguably composed of two parts (Junker 1995): a quantificational part chac- and a nominal part –un. Etymologically chacun derives from cascu´num (lat. vulg) which takes quisque(unus) (literally chaque un ‘each one’) and catu´num ([unum] cata unum) (literally un a` un ‘one to one’; cata had a distributive value).2
1
FQs can also be clause final. However, in that position, they prosodically and semantically involve focus-like properties (Puska´s 2002). For this reason, they are not discussed here. 2 From http://www.lexilogos.com/francais_langue_dictionnaires.htm
3.1 Introduction: Floating Quantification
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Even if French 8Qs involve a totality meaning, they syntactically differ from every and all when scope interactions enter the game. (6) is ambiguous between two readings: either for every man (x), there is a woman (y) and (x) loves (y), or there is a woman (y), such that every man (x) loves that woman; the sentences in (7) aren’t ambiguous and only wide scope of 8Qs is available: (6) a. Every man loves a woman b. All the men love a woman
(8 > 9); (9 > 8) (8 > 9); (9 > 8)
(7) a. Tous les hommes aiment une femme (8 > 9); *(9 > 8) All men /every man love a woman b. Chacun des hommes aime une femme (8 > 9);* (9 > 8) each of the men loves a woman Consider the examples in (8), which apparently involve the same linear strings as (7). Even though both sets involve wide scope of 8Qs, 9Qs differ in meaning and prosody: un Ns in (8) involves partitivity (witnessed by a falling intonation, in Capitals); un Ns in (7) trigger neutral non-presupposition (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.4.1). (8) a. b.
Tous les hommes aiment UNE femme (8 > 9);* (9 > 8) all men/every man love A woman Chacun des hommes aime UNE femme (8 > 9);* (9 > 8) each of the men loves A woman all men/every man love(s) exactly one woman, and no more
Examples (7) and (8) suggest that only Surface Scope is available with these strings. However, this is incorrect. Indeed, when un N is uttered with a fall-rise prosody (‘_’), Inverse Scope is compulsory: (9a) means that there is a woman (y), such that for all men (x), it is the case that (x) loves her. (9b) is not felicitous – under the relevant reading, because the specific un N must take wide scope over chacun, a distributive Q. If 8Q distributes over the event of receiving (and not over un prix) the sentence is fine, (10): (9)
a. b. #
(10) a. b.
Tous les hommes aiment _ une femme all the men love a (certain) woman Chacun des hommes aime _ une femme each of the men loves a certain woman
*(8 > 9) ; (9 > 8)
Tous les garc¸ons ont rec¸u _ un prix all the boys have received a prize Chacun des garc¸ons a rec¸u _ un prix each of the boys has received a prize (Puska´s 2002 :106–7 (3))
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That (10b) is not felicitous under the relevant reading suggests that 9Q is blocked and cannot take wide scope.3 As (10) shows, _ une femme is not blocked by tous les hommes, but it is by chacun des hommes. This suggests that the two 8Qs do not behave alike, as will be developed in Section 3.1.2. Certain intrinsic properties of 8Qs set them apart from 9Qs (and wh-phrases, to some extent), suggesting that tous and chacun belong to the same type of Q (see also Baunaz 2008). 8Qs are (i) clause-bound, (ii) they cannot be predicate nominals, (iii) they are not true partitives, i.e. they are structurally different from un des N ‘one of the N’ and plusieurs des N ‘several of the N’) (Fitzpatrick 2006). In other words, tous les N behaves like chacun des N in terms of quantification, but not like un Ns. Indeed, 8QPs cannot move out of indicative (tense) embedded clauses (Reinhart 1997, a.o). This contrasts with wh-phrases in-situ and existential un Ns, which can escape clause boundaries, as developed in Chapter 2, Sections 2.1.2.2/2.1.4.2 (see also Ihsane 2008, Starke 2001). (11)
a.
b.
(12)
a.
b.
Une fille a dit que tous les garc¸ons e´taient sympas (9 > 8) ; *(8 > 9) a girl has said that all the boys were nice Tous les garc¸ons ont dit qu’une fille e´tait sympa (9 > 8) ; (8 > 9) All the boys have said that a girl was nice a girl has said that nobody NE was nice Une fille pense que chacun des garc¸ons e´tait sympa (9 > 8) ; *(8 > 9) A girl thinks that each of the boys was nice Chacun des garc¸ons pense qu’une fille e´tait sympa (9 > 8) ; (8 > 9) each of.the boys thinks that a girl was nice
Moreover, they cannot be construed as predicate nominal, while 9Qs can, (13): (13)
a. b. *
Juliette est une amie a` moi Juliette is a friend of mine Juliette, Patsy, Edina et Louise sont toutes les amies a` moi4 Juliette, Patsy, Edina and Louise are all the friends of mine
3
In Chapter 5, I claim that this is a case that is handled by Relativized Minimality (RM). Marcel den Dikken (pc) notes that in English, it is possible get all as a predicate nominal, modulo a right context. Assuming that I have no more friends than Juliette, Patsy, Edina and Louise, I can say: 4
(i)
Juliette, patsy, Edina and Louise are all (of) my friends
It means that each of them is my friend, but not exhaustively. Under the exhaustive reading, where all that I have as friends is P, E and L, the sentence in (13b) is out. Thanks to Genoveva Puska´s and Christopher Laenzlinger for helping me understand these data.
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107
Juliette, Patsy, Edina et Louise sont chacunes les amies a` moi Juliette, Patsy, Edina and Louise are each of the friends of mine
c. *
In addition to (i) and (ii), 8Qs are semantically and syntactically different from true partitives, suggesting a neat structural difference between ‘weak’ Qs (of which 9Qs belong) and ‘strong’ Qs like 8Qs. Although (14) and (15) look similar, Fitzpatrick 2006 argues that not all Qs appearing with of-DPs are true partitives. In the remaining, I will systematically compare French tous les N and chacun des N to true partitives, when applicable. Fitzpatrick 2006 gives various arguments in favor of a clear structural (and semantic) difference: (14)
a. All (of) [DP the students] b. Each of [DP the students]
(Fitzpatrick 2006:173, (2a)) (Fitzpatrick 2006:173, (2c))
(15)
a. b. c.
Three of [DP the students] Few of [DP the students] Some of [DP the students]
(Fitzpatrick 2006:177, (9a)) (Fitzpatrick 2006:177, (9b)) (Fitzpatrick 2006:177, (9c))
The structure of true partitives is that the one given in (16), ‘where ˘N is a null noun whose meaning is parasitic on the following NP’ (Fitzpatrick 2006:178; see also Chapter 2, Section 2.1.5), whereas all and each are adjoined to maximal projections (Doetjes 1997, Fitzpatrick 2006), like adverbs, but showing adnominal behaviors. This is illustrated in (16) (from Fitzpatrick 2006:181, (16)) (16)
[DP some [NP˘N [PP ofpart [DP the [NP students]]]]]
One of the arguments that calls for a necessary distinction between true partitives and all/each-of-DP is semantic: the former are semantically partitive, while the latter are exhaustive. As such, ‘[(17a)] shows a possible continuation which professes ignorance of the full set, after the use of a nonexhaustive quantifier, while [(17b)] shows that exhaustive quantifiers reject such a continuation.’ (Fitzpatrick 2006:179). Tous and chacun are like all/ each: they have a totality meaning, suggesting that they are (exhaustive) 8Qs, i.e. they are not partitive, as attested by the unacceptability of the pronominalization with en: (17)
a. b. #
Three of John’s students were there, but I have no idea whether he has others that will come later. All/each of John’s students were there, but I have no idea whether he has others that will come later (Fitzpatrick 2006:179, (12))
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3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
(18)
a. b. # c. #
Un des amis de Jean est venu, mais je n’ai aucune ide´e s’il en a d’autres qui viendront. Tous les amis de Jean sont venus, mais je n’ai aucune ide´e si il en a d’autres qui viendront. Chacun des amis de Jean est venus, mais je n’ai aucune ide´e si il en a d’autres qui viendront. ‘One/All/each of John’s students were there, but I have no idea whether he has others that will come later’
In addition to this semantic difference, Fitzpatrick 2006 gives two syntactic arguments in favor of a distinction between all/each-of-DP and true partitive some/three-of-DP. First, numerals (among other weak Qs) can co-occur with possessives in their Spec, (19a); all cannot, (19b). Fitzpatrick 2006:182 argues that if possessives occur in SpecDP (Abney 1987) and if three is a head, then numerals can co-occur with an element in their spec. If all is an adjunct or a spec, it competes with the possessive, and so the ungrammaticality of (19b) is derived: to be grammatical, the Q should precede the possessive, i.e. all cannot be part of the DP.5 (19)
a. b. *
Mary’s three sisters... John’s all wishes...
(Fitzpatrick 2006:182, (17b and c))
Since French possessives do not occupy spec positions, but are complements, this test is not applicable in that language.6 Second, of in true partitives is different from of in all (of) DP: of is optional with all, while obligatory with partitives, (20); partitive of can be separated from its Q, though not from all, (21). Partitive of can also be preceded by an overt noun phrases, but not with all, (22):
5
This only argues for all not being a head and not in favor of some being a head. As Fitzpatrick (id) points out ‘one would have to explain also the absence of non-exhaustive examples like Mary’s some sisters and John’s most wishes’. 6 The relevant distinction between English and French can be seen in (ia) vs. (ib). In both constructions, Mary is the possessor and three sisters/trois soeurs the possessed noun. The lexical possessors do not appear, at first glance, in the same position. Note that Mary in French is preceded by genitive de: (i)
a. b.
Mary’s three sisters les trois soeurs de Mary the three sisters ofgen Mary
See Szabolcsi 1994, Kayne 1993, 1994 for analyses of possessives in Hungarian, Romance languages and English. See Tremblay 1991, Zribi-Hertz 2003 for analyses of French possessives.
3.1 Introduction: Floating Quantification
109
(20)
a. b.
All (of) the students went home. Several *(of) the students went home. (Fitzpatrick 2006:183, (20))
(21)
a. b. c. ?*
Of the students in this office, several will graduate this year. Of the students in this office, two will graduate this year. Of the students in this office, all will graduate this year. (Fitzpatrick 2006:184, (21))
(22)
a.
Several books of those (books) on the table should go to the li brary book sale. All books of those (books) on the table should go to the library book sale. (Fitzpatrick 2006:185, (25))
b. ?*
The equivalent of English of in French is de. De appears with chacun in chacun des N as well as with true partitives (plusieurs des N ‘several of the Ns’). de can be separated from true partitives, though not from tous and chacun7,8:
7
The first diagnosis, namely the fact that of in English is optional with all, but obligatory with partitives, hardly applies to French, because French involves slightly different constructions. First, de is impossible with tous ‘all.pl’ plus a DP, (i); second, whenever de is present with a noun (being either spellt out as des (i.e. the contraction of de þ les), or as de), it is compulsory (ii). As such, de is compulsory with chacun ‘each’ (iii): (i)
tous (*des/ *de les) les garc¸ons
(ii)
a. b. c. d. e.
f.
d.
Un *(des) garc¸ons One of.the boys Plusieurs *(des) garc¸ons Several of.the boys Beaucoup *(des) livres Many of.the books Beaucoup *(de) livres Many of books Le fre`re *(de) Marie The brother of Mary ‘Mary’s brother’ Les fre`res (*des) enfants the brother of.the children The children’s brothers L’analyse des donne´es the analysis of.the data
(partitive) (partitive) (partitive) (quantitative) (possessive)
(possessive)
(iii) chacun *(des) garc¸ons Hence, the test does not tell us anything about the status of partitive de vs. de in chacun des N. I would like to thank Christopher Laenzlinger for checking these data with me.
8
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3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
(23) a. b.
Plusieurs des e´tudiants de cette classe vont grader cette anne´e Several of.the students in this class will graduate this year Des e´tudiants de cette classe, plusieurs vont grader cette anne´e Of.the student in this class, several will graduate this year
Tous les e´tudiants de cette classe vont grader cette anne´e All the students in this class will graduate this year b. * Des e´tudiants de cette classe, tous vont grader cette anne´e of.the student in this class, all will graduate this year
(24) a.
Chacun des e´tudiants de cette classe va grader cette anne´e Each of the students in this class will graduate this year b. * Des e´tudiants de cette classe, chacun va graduate cette anne´e of.the students in this class, each will graduate this year
(25) a.
De can be preceded by an overt noun phrase with true partitives, but not with tous and chacun. (26) a. Plusieurs livres de ceux sur la table devraient eˆtre range´s b. * Tous livres de ceux sur la table devraient eˆtre range´s c. * Chacun livres de ceux sur la table devraient eˆtre range´s several books/all books/each books of those on the table should be put away That (24b)/(25b) are ungrammatical is expected if unlike all (of) the N, tous les N does not involve de (see also fn. 7) (i.e. the tests are irrelevant for tous les N). That (26b)/(26c) are ungrammatical is unexpected if de is partitive (cf. English of in (20)). Hence de in chacun des N is not partitive, i.e. tous les N and chacun des N must be structurally different from true partitives. Although Qs are traditionally analysed as determiners (Det), all and tous often co-occur with other determiners (demonstratives, the definite article) suggesting a different behavior from classical Dets (Giusti 1997 (a.o)). Examples (27) and (28) show that Dets on a one hand, and all/each on the other hand, must be distinguished from each other: the former heads DP; the latter must be outside of DP. (27)
a. b. c.
(*these/the) all these/the boys (*these/the) each of these/the boys (*les/ces) tous les/ces garc¸ons (*the /these) all the/these boys
(Giusti 1997:100, (17b))
(28)
a. * b. * c.
the these boys these the boys (*ces /les) chacun des /de ces garc¸ons (*these/the) each of.the/ of these boys
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111
In addition to their position to the left of the Det, as in (27) and (28)), and to the structural differences with true partitives, there is at least one more argument against their Det status: the type of restriction they select. Indeed, these Qs do not take NP restrictions, as classical Dets do in (29), but DP restrictions, (3).9 (29)
a. * b. * c. *
every the boys chaque les garcons tout les garcons
vs. every boy vs. chaque garc¸on vs. tout garc¸on
The availability of demonstratives ((14)/(15), Giusti 1991), and of possessors ((19), Fitzpatrick 2006) with all, as well as the semantic and syntactic properties listed above distinguishing all (of) the N from true partitives, call for an analysis of all as a modifier (AP or DegP), rather than a head (Brisson 1998, Fitzpatrick 2006 and Baunaz 2008). It means that all is a Spec. The fact that they are modifiers also suggests that these Qs are adjuncts. An argument for the adjunction analysis resorts to selection: there is no predicate selecting for Q alone, yet there are verbs selecting for DPs. Hence all is an adjunct (see Fitzpatrick 2006 for discussion). Like Fitzpatrick 2006, I adopt the structure in (30) for both English and French: all, each and tous, chacun are adjoined to DP.10 (30) Adjoined structure: [DP tous [DP les [NP garc¸ons]]] ‘all the boys’ The position of non-partitive of is not discussed. Yet, as I show below, and in particular in Section 3.1.3 (and fn.27), it must be part of the Q adjoined to DP.11
9
That chaque ‘every’ and tout ‘all.sg.’ are Dets and as such behave differently from tous and chacun as been motivated in Chapter 1, Section 1.1.1.5. See also fn.12, Chapter 1. 10 The facts that tous (but not all) agrees in gender and number with the following DP and that chacun agrees in gender only, is puzzling: they have determiner-like properties (see Section 3.1.3): (i)
a. b.
(ii)
a.
b.
Tous les garc¸ons all. MASC.PL. the.PL boys.MASC.PL Toutes les filles all.FEM.PL the.PL girls.FEM.PL Chacun des garcons each.MASC.SG of the boys.MASC.PL Chacune des filles each.FEM.SG of the girls.FEM.PL
11
The idea put forward by Fitzpatrick 2006 is that of is part of the Q, and as such does not select the restriction (vs. partitive of), yielding (i): (i)
[Q all (of) [DP pro]]
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I have shown that tous les N and chacun des N are 8Qs, involving a totality meaning. As such they must be distinguished from 9Qs (and as such from true partitives). Despite these similarities, I will show that the two 8Qs must minimally be distinguished from each other in terms of semantics and syntax. These minimal distinctions will not alter their internal structures, which, I claim, are similar. Yet, I argue that they come with two interpretive flavors, which affect their syntactic (scope) behaviors: specificity and partitivity. In Section 3.1.2, I discuss the domain of French full canonical 8Qs and shed light on their interpretive, prosodic and syntactic properties. I show that prosody does not produce the same interpretive effects as it does on 9Qs and wh in-situ.
3.1.2 Two Types of Universal Quantifiers In Section 3.1.1, I argued that certain intrinsic properties of 8Qs set them apart from 9Qs, grouping tous and chacun as one type of Qs. (i) clause-boundness; (ii) they cannot be predicate nominals. Yet, if chacun and tous show similar properties that distinguish them from un Ns, they slightly differ syntactically and semantically from each other, namely with respect to the following criteria: (iii) presque ‘almost’ modification, (31) and (32); (iv) pas ‘not’ modification, (33); (v) distributivity, (34)–(36). Tous les N can be modified by the degree adverb presque ‘almost’, (31a) (unlike 9Qs, (31b,c)).12 Presque cannot modify chacun, (32).13 (31)
a. b. * c. *
(32)
??
Presque toutes les filles ont mange´ des sushis almost all the girls have eaten sushis Presqu’une fille a mange´ des sushis almost a girl has eaten sushis Presque quelqu’un a mange´ des sushis almost someone has eaten sushis
J’ai mange´ presque chacun des sushis I have eaten almost each of the sushis
12
The validity of this test has been empirically challenged (Partee 1986, a.o). Yet, it clearly sets tous les N apart from un Ns which is the point here, but does not say anything about the universal status of a Q. 13 Note that in English, almost can modify both every and all, but not each: (i)
a.
One boy ate almost all the apples
b. c. *
One boy ate almost every apple One boy ate almost each apple
(Beghelli and Stowell 1997:99, (34c–e))
These facts suggests that each resembles chacun and every/all seem closer to tous.
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Pas ‘not’ can modify tous but not chacun14: (33)
a.
Pas tous les garc¸ons n’ont bu de coca Not all the boys NE have drank of. coke b. * Pas chacun des garc¸ons n’a bu de coca not each of.the boys NE have drank coke
Tous les N is ambiguous between distributive/collective readings; chacun des N can occur as subject of both distributive and collective predicates (see section ‘‘Beghelli and Stowell 1997’’): (34)
a. b. *
Tous les enfants se sont rassemble´s dans le parc pour manifester all the children ref. are gathered in the park to demonstrate Chacune des filles s’est rassemble´e dans le parc pour manifester Each of the girls refl. are gathered in the park to demonstrate
In that respect, French tous les N can be left dislocated, unlike chacun des N (and 9Qs, (36), examples from Rizzi 2003:218, (35))15,16: (35)
a. b. *
14
Again, the same distinction holds of English (see Beghelli and Stowell 1997:99, (35d and e)):
(i)
15
Tous les e´tudiants, je les ai aide´s all the students, I them have helped Chacun des e´tudiants, je l’ai aide´ each of the students, I him have helped
a. b. c. *
Not all the boys ate an ice-cream cone Not every boy ate an ice-cream cone Not each boy ate an ice-cream cone
Rizzi notes that the relevant examples are all grammatical in Italian. About (36), he says [. . .] a closely related language, French, which also posseses a kind of Clitic Left Dislocation construction, seems to disallow indefinite topics, whatever their status with respect to specificity (native speakers’ judgments on [(36)] range from marginal to impossible; I have reported here the most restrictive set of judgments) (Rizzi 2005:18).
16 A reviewer pointed out to me that ClLD constructions with tout le monde ‘everybody’ is generally not accepted by a large group of speakers. Note that one finds examples like these in the literature on French, (i):
(i)
?
Tout le monde, il aime le chocolat (spoken Parisian French) every body, he likes chocolate (Zribi-Hertz 2003 :7 (16b))
Note though that (i) not a dislocated subject construction for her (see Zribi-Hertz 2003:7 for details). My guess is that acceptance of such sentences is register dependant. Whether (i) is a frozen expression or not doesn’t really matter for my purpose, since this chapter rather focalizes on tous les N, i.e. the plural counterpart of tout with a presupposed restriction. I don’t discuss the properties of tout le monde.
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(36)
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a. * b. * c. *
d. *
Un livre si inte´ressant, je ne l’avais jamais lu ‘such an interesting book, I had never read (it)’ Une solution, il faudra la trouver cette fois aussi ‘a solution, we must find (it) this time as well’ Une secre´taire qui sache tenir la comptabilite´ du de´partement, je n’arrive pas a` la trouver ‘A secretary who could keep the department budget, I really cannot find (her)’ Une bonne chose, Jean l’a faite: il a arreˆte´ de fumer ‘A good thing, Gianni did (it) : he quit smoking’
The reason why left dislocation is available with tous les N and not with chacun des N can be attributed to the obligatory collective reading of the former Q in left dislocated constructions. Chacun cannot be collective, hence cannot be left dislocated (see Section 3.1.2.2). The two tests illustrated in Section 3.1.1 ((i) clause-boundness, (ii) predicate nominals) show that chacun des N and tous N pattern alike, (vs. 9Qs). The third, fourth, and fifth tests ((iii) presque-modification; (iv) pas-modification; (v) distributivity) call for a distinction among 8Qs. A further distinction must be brought up at this point and concerns the notion of existential presupposition. Recall that existential presupposition can yield two distinct readings: specificity and partitivity. While the distinction is prosodically encoded with wh-phrases and un Ns, it is lexically marked with 8Qs. 3.1.2.1 Prosody and Semantics Following works within the Generalized Quantifier framework (Barwise and Cooper 1981), I assume that 8Qs quantify over restricted domains. Horn 1997 argues that 8Qs involve existential presupposition, because they are interpreted with non-empty restrictions: the sentence every student left containing a universal DP is true ‘only in a context where there are students; a continuation like but there are no student is highly disfavored’ (Giannakidou 2002:15), i.e. they quantify over a ‘contextually given set’ (Enc¸ 1991, Giannakidou 2002, 2004, a.o) and exhibit the familiarity-property (Heim 1982). In (37a), all denotes the universal set of students, i.e. it has a generic reading. In (37b), a subset of individuals is extracted from the universal set: the subset refers to contextually relevant individuals, i.e. previously established in the discourse. The source of the restriction has to be non-empty: to evaluate (37), there has to be students. (37)
a. b.
All students read at least two books. All the students read at least two books.
Two types of 8Qs have been pointed out in the literature: whereas each and both trigger ‘strong’ presupposition, all and every are somewhat ‘weaker’. Giannakidou 1997 (and subsq.) discusses the contrast in terms of (non)-veridicality:
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115
‘An operator is nonveridical iff it does not preserve the truth of the proposition it embeds: Op p: !p’ (Giannakidou 2000:93). 8Qs presuppose non-empty sets (they are interpreted as involving non-empty restrictions): they are veridical. Not all 8Qs are veridical, yet. Only each is veridical; all and every aren’t. Each cannot license NPIs of the any-type, (39) (Giannakidou 1999: 375 (21)). (38)
a. b.
(39)
Every student who knows anything about the case should speak now All the students who know anything about the case should speak now (Giannakidou 1999: 375 (20))
*Each student who knows anything about the case should speak now
The difference between each on the one hand, and all/every on the other hand, is that each comes with an argument that must be non-empty; all/every do not have such a requirement (hence their availability in generic contexts). The existence of students cannot be cancelled out with each. Qs of the each-type have a stronger presupposition requirement than Qs of the all-type. Recall that there are two types of noun phrases that involve existential presupposition (which means already introduced in the discourse (Starke 2001, Chapter 2)). The two readings associated with these noun phrases are contextdependent: partitivity involves a subset of a previously mentioned group (or a listsetting, or set membership); specificity refers to familiar individuals (see fn. 34/37, Chapter 2). The speaker credits the hearer with an entity that he (the interlocutor) has in mind as referent for the noun phrase. Specificity differs from partitivity in that it requires a richer context: specificity-based contexts narrow down to familiar individuals (the context offers no choice); while partitive contexts allow various possibilities/alternatives. These notions have already been evoked in Chapter 2, with respect to wh in-situ and existentials. Wh in-situ phrases and 9Qs exhibit three distinct interpretations: two are presuppositional (partitive and specific) and one is non-presuppositional (i.e. neither partitive, nor specific). A lexical form like qui, for instance, is then (potentially) ambiguous between (at least) three interpretations. In addition to semantic differences, specificity, partitivity and non-presupposition are distinguished prosodically: a fall-rise intonation on a Q is perceived as specificity, a falling intonation on a Q reflects a partitive interpretation, and no (or sentence neutral) intonation corresponds to non-presupposition. Focusing on the syntactic behavior of these Qs, I arrived at the conclusion that specificity is existential presupposition with wide scope (and not widest scope, cf. Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.2); partitivity can take wide scope, but not necessarily. In this section, I show that specificity and partitivity have a role to play in the distinction between tous les Ns and chacun des N. However, the distinction is not prosodic, but lexical (tous les N vs. chacun des N). Consider the following partitive context: Charlotte drew up the list of guests for her woman-day party. Samantha does not know what’s on the list she just received, but she can nevertheless ask Charlotte, her Public Relation officer:
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(40)
a.
b. #
Toutes les filles seront pre´sentes a` ta soire´e ? all the girls be.FUT.PL present at party ‘Will all the girls be present at you party?’ Chacune des filles sera pre´sente a` ta soire´e ? each of the girls be.FUT.PL present at your party ‘Will each of the girls be present at your party?’
(40a) is felicitous because Samantha extracts from the guest list a group (all the girls) that she does not know yet. It is not a specific context for Samantha: although the set of guests is non-empty (it carries existential presupposition), it is a list that is not familiar to her. It is a partitive context. Only tous les N can be used. chacun des N is infelicitous in this context, i.e. only tous les N is felicitous in partitive contexts: among possible presupposed referents, some are extracted from within the set of girls.17 Crucially chacun is not partitive, suggesting that specificity-based presupposition needs a narrower context to be licensed. Note that the context is specific for Charlotte: all the women on the list (and the list itself) are specific to her. Handing the list to Samantha, she can say both (41a) and (41b): (41)
a. b.
J’aimerais que toutes les filles soient pre´sentes ! I would like that all the girls be present J’aimerais que chacune des filles soit pre´sente! I would like that each of the girls be present
That both are possible is not surprising: specificity requires a stronger context than partitivity. In that sense, specificity narrows down the context to familiar individuals. Partitivity contains the notion of specificity (Chapter 5, Section 5.1.2). With scope interactions, only specific un N can scope over partitive tous les N, (42a). Non-presuppositional un N is necessarily out scoped by tous les N, (42b) and (42c). Specific un N cannot be dependant on the universal specific chacun (unless specific un N takes intermediate scope, see Chapter 2, (172)), nor can they scope over it, (43a); non-presuppositionals, as well as partitives, take narrow scope ((43c) vs. (42c)): (42)
17
a.
Tous les professeurs portent _ une cravate All the professors wear a (specific) tie
* (8>9) ; (9> 8)
If chacun comes with a demonstrative, then the sentence (i) is fine, Tabea Ihsane (p.c):
(i)
chacune de ces filles sera pre´sente a` ta soire´e? Each of these girls will be present at your party
This is due to the fact that specificity and partitivity are related to the Q as a whole, i.e. the Det modifying the NP is a deictic here, which might change the presupposition status of the whole Q.
3.1 Introduction: Floating Quantification
b. c.
(43)
a. * b. c.
Tous les professeurs portent une cravate all the professors wear a tie (or another) Tous les professeurs portent UNE cravate all the professors wear a tie Chacun des professeurs porte _ une cravate each of the professors wears a tie Chacun des professeurs porte une cravate each of the professors wears a tie Chacun des professeurs porte UNE cravate each of the professors wears a tie
117
(8>9); *(9>8) (8 > 9); *(9 >8)
(8>9) ; *(9> 8) (8>9) ; *(9> 8)
I conclude that specific un N must take wide scope, but might be blocked by specific chacun des N only, and that partitive 9Qs cannot take wide scope. The fact that no 9Q can scope over specific 8Qs (43a) suggests that being a specific Q means taking wider scope than a partitive Q can (see Chapter 5). Another piece of evidence in favor of a distinct semantic status of chacun des N and tous les N is related to particular Existential Constructions of the il y a type. There-sentences trigger the well-known definiteness effect (DE), i.e. the DP must be indefinite (Milsark 1974). French is no exception to this phenomenon: the associate DPs in (45) are bad in il y a-constructions: (44)* (45)*
There is the/every man/ you in the garden (Heim 1987) Il y a l’homme / tous les hommes / toi dans le jardin There y has the man / all the men / you in the garden
French il y a (‘there is’) does not necessarily relate to Existential Constructions and that a variety of constructions shows up with it: the associate DP can be definite when the list reading is involved.18 Note that these cannot be treated as locative, since existential locatives are constrained by the DE. List-existentials typically appear in enumerating contexts, as in (46) (Szekely 2006, fn. 3). As answers to the question in A, B and B’ are perfectly felicitous: (46)
A: B: C.
What is there in the fridge for dinner? Well, there’s the leftover beef stroganoff Ben, il y a les restes du bœuf stroganoff Well, there’s the leftover beef stroganoff
In (46C), the speaker must presuppose the list which provides the range from which les restes du bœuf stroganoff is extracted. The DP has a partitive reading: among all the things in the fridge (eggs, salad etc...), I choose the leftover beef stroganoff. Tous les N can also appear in this construction, chacun des N cannot:
18
See fn. 64, Chapter 2.
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3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
(47)
Il y a tous les le´gumes there y has all the vegetables ‘There is all the vegetables’
(48)*
Il y a chacun des CDs dans la bibliothe`que There is each of.the CD in the library
I conclude that tous les N involves intrinsic partitive (list) readings, and chacun des N specific (individual) readings.19,20,21
19
Arguably, presuppositional features are related to the (D)NP-argument over which the Q quantifies. If this is on the right track, tout e´tudiant ‘every student’ in (i) should not involve partitivity (vs. tous les e´tudiants ‘all the students’).
(i)
Tout e´tudiant a une carte de le´gitimation All.sg student.sg has a card of legitimization ‘Every student has an ID card’
In (i), tout e´tudiant must be generic: in general every student has an ID. Incidentally the 9Q object cannot take wide scope. From these facts one might infer that tout itself does not come with a partitive presupposition, but rather that presupposition is dependent on the (syntactic) nature of the restriction. Yet there are at least two issues related to generic tout which might influence the generic vs. partitive reading: (i) it comes with a bare NP only, rather that a full DP. (ii) generic tout comes with a singular DP. So tout might still be itself partitive, while ranging over different individuals in generic contexts. Genoveva Puska´s (p.c) suggests that the bare singular NP e´tudiant in (i) is a property, i.e. the range that is given in the restriction is that of having the property ‘e´tudiant’ among all properties that might belong to the set. So tout e´tudiant means that for all entities with the property students (in the possible range of possible properties, i.e. cat, dog. . .) rather than for all individuals that exhaustively satisfies the conditions of the restriction. That presuppositional features are related to the restriction associated with Q is supported by prosody: recall that wh-phrases in-situ realize the restriction of an abstract Q; on them, stress prominence arises with specificity (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.2 and Chapter 4, Section 4.1.4.1). 20 I claim in Section 3.1.3 that -un in chacun, is the restriction of Q (des N is not the restriction, but its DP-associate, i.e. an argument of the verb). It might well be the case the un is responsible for the specificity construal of chacun. Thanks to Marcel den Dikken for pointed this out to me. 21 Chacun des N is intrinsically specific; tous les N is ambiguous between a partitive and a generic reading. To understand the distinction, chaque N needs to be brought up. Diesing 1992:19 argues that Individual Level predicates induce genericity, and that ‘subjects of individual-level predicates can only be bound by the generic operator (or an adverb of quantification)’: (i)
Firemen are available
(ii) can be uttered in a context where a journalist is inquiring about a fire that killed two people beside the fire station. It seemed that the firemen were late. The captain says: (ii)
Habituellement, chaque pompier est preˆt a` partir Usually every fireman is ready to go
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119
With wh-phrases in-situ and 9Qs, specificity and partitivity are audible: depending on the context, one or the other interpretation shows up, generally with a special prosody: partitive noun phrases are perceived as downfall (falling), specific as fall-rise and non-presuppositional neutral (or rising, for whphrases). The prosody of chacun des N and tous les N is however less obvious to pinpoint: within the same context (specific for 8Qs, non-presuppositional for 9Qs), chacun des N and tous les N can show up with two different prosodies each22: either they involve some kind of (sometimes slightly) falling (Figs. 3.1, 3.2 and 3.3) intonation, or they are uttered with a (rather) flat intonation (Figs. 3.4, 3.5, 3.6 and 3.7). The sentences have been pronounced three times each by seven French speakers (see fn. 27 of Chapter 1). Since these prosodies do not depend on the type of Q used (specificity of partitivity), I conclude that prosody does not work hand in hand with them. The contexts are in (49) and (50): (49)
Eva’s birthday party. Her co-workers at the University decided to each bring her a gift. The dean is looking at the basket in which there are a lot of birthday cards, and points out: a. Tous les collaborateurs ont signe´ une carte diffe´rente ‘all the students have signed a different card’ b. chacun des collaborateurs a signe´ une carte diffe´rente ‘Each of the co-workers signed a different card’
(50)
End of year party, various prizes where awarded to the best students: maths, English, French, physics (etc.). This year, most of the students got a prize. After the party, the dean told his wife: a. Tous les e´tudiants ont rec¸u un prix diffe´rent ‘all the students received a different prize’ b. Chacun des e´tudiants a rec¸u un prix different ‘each of the students received a different prize’
chaque gets a full generic reading, but chacun is totally excluded here (see also Flaux and Van de Velde 1997); tous les N can appear in generic context (iiia) vs. (iiib) (iii)
a. b.
*
Habituellement chacun des pompiers est preˆt a` parti Usually each of the firemen is ready to go Habituellement, tous les pompiers sont preˆts a` partir Usually all the /every firemen are ready to go
Both tous les N and chaque N can have generic construals; chacun is intrinsically specific, chaque is not and seems to trigger genericity only. Tous les N is ambiguous between genericity and partitivity. I have nothing to say about the ambiguity. 22 Recall that the two 8Qs are felicitous in specific contexts, see (41).
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(i)
3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
Chacun and tous are falling, with a non-presuppositional un N:
Fig. 3.1 F0 curve of (50a), speaker 4
Fig. 3.2 F0 curve of (50a), speaker 2
3.1 Introduction: Floating Quantification
Fig. 3.3 F0 curve of (50b), speaker 3
(ii)
Tous and chacun are flat:
Fig. 3.4 F0 curve of (49a), speaker 3
121
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3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
Fig. 3.5 F0 curve of (50a), speaker 6
Fig. 3.6 F0 curve of (49b), speaker 2
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123
Fig. 3.7 F0 curve of (49b), speaker 6
Note that in Figs. 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 3.5, 3.6 and 3.7, un N is uttered with no special intonation, and the non-presuppositional reading (with narrow scope with repect to 8Qs) is obligatory. Recall Fig. 2.14, Chapter 2, repeated here as (51), (Fig. 3.8): in (51), une femme is uttered with a specific intonation, and inverse scope results, i.e. intonation does play a role with un Ns, but does not with 8Qs. (51)
The name of the sexiest woman of all times just came out in GQ. There was no doubt, all the voters voted for her. Reading that news, Claire informs her husband: Claire: Tous les hommes aiment une femme, marylin!
Fig. 3.8 F0 curve of (51)
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3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
Just like tous les N does not need a falling intonation to get a partitive reading, chacun des N does not need to be perceived with a fall-rise intonation to be interpreted specific. I conclude that prosody does not play a role in the ‘presuppositional’ interpretation of 8Qs, contrary to what happens with un Ns and wh in-situ. Hence, specificity and partitivity are encoded prosodically with wh-phrases and un Ns: at least three different prosodic forms are instantiated. Prosody does not play a role in the presuppositional status of 8Qs. Specificity and partitivity are lexically encoded with 8Qs. On the basis of the observations made thus far, I identify tous les N and chacun des N with the following properties: (52)
a. b.
chacun des N ‘each of the Ns’: [universal] ; [specific] tous les N ‘all the N’: [universal] ; [partitive]
If the decomposition of 8Qs and 9Qs into distinct syntactic features is on the right track, then (i) non-overt chains should also be subject to Relativized Minimality (RM) and (ii) a uniform constraint on overt and covert chain formations (or movement) should be given. So if locality on Q movement is sensitive to features, RM applies to covert movement, as suggested in Beck 1996. Intervention effects support the fact that two different kinds of 8Qs exist. (See Chapter 5). In this section, I have presented the ‘universal’ properties of chacun des N and tous les N. I have also shown that these two 8Qs have to be distinguished in terms of semantics: I have claimed that chacun des N triggers specificity semantics; tous des N triggers partitive semantics. 3.1.2.2 Syntax In this section, I claim that 8Qs are not devoted to a particular position, i.e. they do not check a [þdist]ributive feature in French (vs. Beghelli 1995, Beghelli and Stowell 1997 (B&S 1997) and Szabolcsi 1997). I supply empirical evidence in favor of this claim. I show that one crucial test of Beghelli 1995, B&S 1997 does not apply to French, and that the interpretation of FQs in terms of distributivity/collectivity does not parallel that of non-FQs (Puska´s 2002), i.e. all 8Qs can be non-distributive. Beghelli and Stowell 1997 Consider again (53), where 8Qs take wide scope over neutral non-presuppositional 9Qs: (53)
a. b.
Tous les hommes aiment une femme (8 > 9); *(9 > 8) All men /every man love(s) a woman Chacun des hommes aime une femme (8 > 9); *(9 > 8) each of the men loves a woman for every man (x), there is a woman (y) and (x) loves (y) *there is a woman (y), such that every man (x) loves that woman
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125
In (53), the two 8Qs distribute over women: men co-vary with women. Choe 1987 claims that distributivity involves a distributor (the sorting key) and a distributee (the distributed share). The distributee can be the event (see fn. 68 of Chapter 2). In standard theories of Quantification, 8Qs form a uniform class (May 1985 (a.o)). B&S 1997 argue that this is not true: for instance, each can often take wide scope; every cannot. They argue for a more fine-grained typology. The syntactic behavior of 8Qs with respect to distributivity is interesting in that respect: every and each behave alike, while all is different. B&S conclude that each is an inherently [þdistributive] Q. Every is unspecified for that feature and all is never distributive. Along with indefinites, bare numerals and definites, all is a Group-Denoting Q(GQ). every and each are 8Qs, and as such, they are distributive. Every and each are the only distributive Qs in English. The distributive construal in (54) arises from pseudo-distributivity: (54)
All men carried three suitcases
Pseudo-distributivity arises with syntactically plural GQs, because they are not intrinsically distributive, distributivity is optional. B&S propose that a covert distributive operator (i.e. distribution over event) c-commands the pseudodistributor at LF. all syntactically behaves more like definites and bare numerals. Different tests can show this. Only all can occur with predicates that need collective arguments: (55)
a. All the knights surrounded the castle b. ?? Every knight surrounded the castle c. * Each knight surrounded the castle
all permits inverse scope with a Group-Denoting Q in object position, while each and every are forced to take wide scope (ex. (56a and b) are Gil’s 1995:322, (2)): (56)
a. b. c.
All men carried three suitcases (all>three);(three>all) (distr./coll) Every man carried three suitcases (all>three); *(three>all) (distr./*coll) Each man carried three suitcases (all>three); *(three>all) (distr./*coll)
(57) shows that distribution provides a distributor and a distributee. If this condition is not fulfilled, the distributive reading fails: the Group-Denoting Q a different book forces the distributive construal: it is a distributive Share. In (57a,b), every and each distribute over a different book; all, the boys and five boys cannot do so, too, (57d, e) can only mean The/ Five boys read a book that was different from the one read by other students.23 The same contrast arises when 23
Greg Ellison (p.c) points out that (66c) can have a synonymous distributive interpretation.
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arguments are reversed, (58). Only (58a) can get a reading where every book x, there is a possibly different boy who read x: (57)
a. b. c. * d. * e. *
Every boy read a different book Each (of the) boy (s) read a different book All the boys read a different book The boys read a different book Five boys read a different book (B&S 1997:90, (20))
(58)
a. b. c. * d. * e. *
A (different) boy read every book A (different) boy read each book A (different) boy read all the books A (different) boy read Ulysses and Dubliners A (different) boy read two books (B&S 1997:90, (21))
B&S 1997 conclude that all belongs to a class different from every and each: Each and every illustrate strong distributivity, requiring a distributor and a distributee (Choe 1987). When a distributive Q enters the derivation, it moves to SpecDistP to check [þdist], where it is interpreted as distributor. Dist8 is activated and selects ShareP. SpecShareP hosts the distributee, which can be a Group-Denoting Q and/or an existential over event. Movement to SpecDistP is covert. For B&S, all is the pseudo-distributor par excellence, because it doesn’t distribute necessarily. Pseudo-distributivity and strong distributivity involve distinct syntactic mechanisms. Where strong distributivity necessarily involves DistP, pseudo-distributive does not involve it at all. They claim that pseudodistributivity involves a covert syntactic distributive operator, similar to ‘silent floated each’, i.e. all is a non-distributive Q. Let us turn to the French data. First, in French, collective predicates cannot take distributive subjects (59) and (60); distributive predicates can (61) and (62). Hence, chacun des N is inherently distributive; tous les N is ambiguous. (59)
a. b. *
(60)
a. b. *
(61)
a. b.
Tous les garc¸ons se rassemblent dans la cour all the boys gather in the courtyard Chacun des garc¸ons se rassemble dans la cour each of the boys gather in the courtyard Tous les chevaliers entourent le chaˆteau all the knights surround the castle Chacun des chevaliers entoure le chaˆteau each of the knights surround the castle Tous les garc¸ons se sont endormis all the boys fell asleep Chacun des garc¸ons s’est endormi each of the boys fell asleep
3.1 Introduction: Floating Quantification
(62)
a. b.
127
Tous les garc¸ons meurent all the boys die Chacun des garc¸ons meurt each of the boys dies
Second, tous les N permits inverse scope with a Group-Denoting Q in object position, while chacun des N is forced to take wide scope: (63)
a.
b.
Tous les hommes ont porte´ trois valises All the men have carried three suitcases (all>three);(three>all) (distr./coll) Chacun des hommes a porte´ trois valises Each of the men has carried three suitcases (all>three); *(three>all) (distr./*coll)
Thirdly, all does not license a different N ((57) and (58), see fn. 66–68 of Chapter 2). French differs from English. In (64), un livre is uttered with no special prosody: neither the fall-rise, nor the falling intonation is involved. un livre diffe´rent ‘a different book’ is perfectly acceptable under its distributee reading; in fact it is its only possible reading, the collective reading is unavailable. Hence, contrary to English all, (64a) suggests that French tous les N can also be construed as obligatory distributor. (64)
a. b.
Tous les e´tudiants ont lu un livre diffe´rent every student (pl) have read a book different Chacun des e´tudiants a lu un livre diffe´rent Each of the students has read a book different
8Qs cannot take wide scope over specific un diffe´rent N. If the 8Q distributes over the event, the sentences in (65) are rescued and means that all the students read a different book than the one suggested, and they crucially all read the same book. In that case, only the reading where un livre diffe´rent has an anaphoric reading is available, ‘an N which is not identical to the one mentioned before’ (B&S 1997:90, fn. 14). Under the relevant reading, the two sentences are not felicitous when un livre diffe´rent is uttered with the specific prosody. However (65) has a different reading from (64): un livre diffe´rent being specific, it is clearly not distributed over i.e, it is not a distributive share: (65)
a. # Tous les e´tudiants ont lu _ un livre diffe´rent b. # Chacun des e´tudiants a lu _ un livre diffe´rent
If diffe´rent occurs in subject position, the same point arises, again contrasting with the English examples in (61) and (62). In (66), the distributive reading is the only available interpretation. Again the non-distributive reading is not felicitous, (67):
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(66)
Un e´tudiant diffe´rent a lu tous les livres a student different has read every books Un e´tudiant diffe´rent a lu chacun des livres a student different has read each of the books
a. b.
a. # _ Un e´tudiant diffe´rent a lu tous les livres b. # _ Un e´tudiant diffe´rent a lu chacun des livres
(67)
Tous les N turns out to behave differently from English all: while a distributive reading is possible in French (68), it is not in English, (69)24: (68)
Tous les nains rentreront dans la grotte l’un apre`s l’autre every the dwarfs enter.fut.3.sg in the cave one after the other
(69)
??
All the people discovered the cave one after the other (Junker 1995: 83, (3.25))
In French, tous les N is semantically more similar to chacun des N than each of the and all are to each other. In the next section, I show that there is no position devoted to the distributive meaning. As such, [þDist] is not a syntactic feature in French. Puska´s 2002: Floating Quantifiers Chacun and tous can float (data adapted from Puska´s 2002; see also Section 3.1.3): (70)
a. b.
(71)
a. b.
Tous les enfants ont mange´ deux glaces all the children have eaten two ice-creams Les enfants ont tous mange´ deux glaces The children have all eaten two ice-creams Chacun des garc¸ons a mange´ deux glaces each of the boys has eaten two ice-creams Les garc¸ons ont chacun mange´ deux glaces the boys have each eaten two ice-creams
24
(68) is not a good sentence for Junker 1995, her judgments are given in (i), i.e. there seems to be speaker variations: (i) a.
??
b.
???
Tous les gens de´couvrirent la grotte l’un apre`s l’autre All the people discovered the cave one after the other Chacun des enfants prendra un ballon l’un apre`s l’autre
(Junker 1995:83, (3.25))
each
(Junker 1995:82, (3.23))
of the children took a ball one after the other
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129
Let us focus on tous les N, which is ambiguous between a collective and a distributive reading, (72a), (73a). Puska´s observes that this ambiguity vanishes when tous is floated. The crucial data are those in (72b), (73b). In (72b), tous has a collective reading only; in (73b), tous must be distributive. (72)
a. b.
(73)
a. b.
Tous les colle`gues ont signe´ une carte. All the colleagues have signed a card Les colle`gues ont tous signe´ une carte. The colleagues have all signed a card
(coll/dist)
Tous les garc¸ons ont lu deux livres. all the boys have read two books Les garc¸ons ont tous lu deux livres. the boys have all read two books
(coll/dist)
(coll/*dist)
(*coll/dist)
If floated tous must raise towards a devoted position (DistP, for Beghelli 1995) at LF, the reading in (72b) is unexpected. If floated tous never raises to DistP, (73b) is unexpected. Puska´s concludes that even though a Q is obligatorily construed as distributive, it does not necessarily occupy SpecDistP. This claim is supported by (74)-(75), where no 9Q is involved and the definite DP la carte ‘the card’ occupies the object position. In (74a), tous les N is not floated, and a collective reading is compulsory. Signing is a stage level predicate, i.e. it has an external (event) argument (Kratzer 1989). If tous is floated, the distributive reading is triggered and distribution over different events of signing results, (74b). Chacun being strictly distributive, no collective reading is triggered in (75) and distribution over events is compulsory. (74)
a. b.
(75)
a. b.
Tous les colle`gues ont signe´ la carte all the collegues have signed the card Les colle`gues ont tous signe´ la carte.
(coll/*dist) (dist. over event)
Chacun des colle`gues a signe´ la carte. (*coll/dist. over event) each of the collegues has signed the card Les colle`gues ont chacun signe´ la carte. (dist. over event)
Individual level predicates lack event arguments. As a consequence, no multiple events are triggered and the distributive reading over events is not available. If tous des N is compatible with Individual level predicates, (76), chacun is not, (77): (76)
a. b.
(77)
a. * b. *
Tous les colle`gues connaissent la secre´taire. all the collegues know the secretary Les colle`gues connaissent tous la secre´taire. Chacun des colle`gues connaıˆ t la secre´taire. Each of the collegues knows the secretary Les colle`gues connaissent chacun la secre´taire
(coll/*dist) (coll/*dist)
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3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
On the basis of FQs, Puska´s 2002 concludes that there is no position devoted to distributivity in French. It follows that if Q movement (of some sort) arises, it is not to license the [þdist] feature in DistP. The discussion on FQs as well as the comparison between full 8Qs in French and English above contributes to the claim that the syntactic feature [þdist] is not active with 8Qs.25 Distributivity is morphologically marked (and obligatory) only with chacun in French and is optional otherwise. How does distributivity arise? Both distributive and non-distributive 8Qs are semantically plural. They allude to sets ‘containing more than one member’ (Gil 1995: 327). English distributive 8Qs are syntactically singular, yet, (78a), whereas non-distributive are plural, (78b). Note that every can co-refer with plural pronouns, i.e. patterning like all, (79b).26 (78)
a. b.
All meni can achieve theiri goals if theyi try hard enough Every mani can achieve his goal if hei tries hard enough
(79)
a.
All winnersi will receive a gold medal. Theyi will also be awarded with a free trip to Pattaya Every winneri will receive a gold medal. Hei/Theyi will also be awarded with a free trip to P.
b.
For Choe 1987, the sorting key must be semantically plural and the distributee must be indefinite (including the existential over event argument). Syntactically if the sorting key is singular, distributivity arises. Puska´s 2002:171 concludes that ‘[. . .] the entity denoted by the semantically plural expression is thus divided into its atoms by its lexical properties. This accounts for the obligatory distributivity of each/chacun compared to all/tous.’ Another reason to consider distributivity as a semantically marked feature is that each, every and chacun normally do not occur with mass nouns: mass nouns do not denote individualized entities hence cannot be construed as distributors. Hence chacun generally appears with countable nouns for distribution to apply. Now that the syntactic and semantic properties of 8Qs have been laid out, I turn to their floating property in more details. 25 The idea that distributivity is not syntactic (at all) is upheld by Gil 1995 who claims that distributivity is a semantically marked notion. I refer to Gil 1995 for further discussion. 26 Greg Ellison (p.c) challenges this argument in pointing out that since they (them, their) is used so widely as a singular gender-neutral pronoun in English (especially with a universally quantified antecedent), they in (79b) may in fact not be construed as a plural pronoun. Examples like (i) are not unusual:
(i)
a. b.
Every woman has the right to have their own child and to raise them the way they want to. Every man can achieve their goal if they try hard enough.
If this were correct, then all and every would be semantically equivalent in terms of number. I leave this open for further investigation.
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131
3.1.3 Floating Quantifiers (FQs): Doetjes 1997, Fitzpatrick 2006 French is well-known for being able to float its 8Qs and the structures in (80b) and (81b) are known as (subject-related) Floating Quantifiers (FQ) (Kayne 1975, Sportiche 1988). The DP restriction has been split from its quantificational part yielding non-canonical quantification. Yet, even if discontinuous, Q still semantically quantifies over its restriction: the position of the Q with respect to its associate DP in (80) and (81) does not yield truth conditional differences (Sportiche 1988, Bobaljik 2003). In the examples in (80) and (81), toutes ‘all’ and chacune ‘each’ semantically modify the external argument of the predicate, i.e. the DP les filles. (80)
a. b.
(81)
a. b.
Toutes les filles ont lu le livre All.fem.pl the girls.fem.pl have read the book Les filles ont toutes lu le livre the girls.fem.pl have all.fem.pl read the book Chacune des filles a lu le livre Each.fem.sg of.the girls.fem.pl has read the book Les filles ont chacune lu le livre the girls.fem.pl have each.fem.sg read the book
Chacun and tous involve DP-associates: tous [DPles e´tudiants] and chacun [DPde les e´tudiants].27 The availability of FQ structures depends on this association. FQs, like non-FQs, agree in number and gender with the DP they are associated with: in (87), les filles ‘the girls’ instantiates a plural and feminine DP, just like the FQ that modifies it. In (81), only gender agreement is displayed. This led scholars to assume that the relationship between DP and FQ is syntactic in nature, since FQs are like French Det.
27
It is more appropriate to associate de with the DP-associate, rather than with Q. Recall that despite the fact that it is never optional, de in chacun des N is not the partitive de found with plusieurs ‘several’ (Section 3.1.1). In addition, de does not appear alone, but with the Det les, yielding des (by PF-incorporation, see Junker 1995): de cannot be separated from chacun (i) and does not appear in floating constructions, (ii): (i)
* Des e´tudiants, chacun re´ussira cette anne´e Of the students, each will.pass this year
(ii) * Des e´tudiants re´ussira chacun cette anne´e Of.the students will.succeed each this year In that sense it is closer to the DP-associate than to Q. An empirical argument going in that direction is the fact de DP pronominalizes as a whole, and not only the DP, in (iii): (iii)
a. b.
Oscar a enseigne´ chacune des matie`res Oscar has taught each of the subjects Oscar les a chacune (*de) enseigne´es Oscar them has each taught
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A strict locality restriction rules the dependency between the FQ and the DP it modifies: FQs are not licensed in finite embedded clauses, (82a) and the modified DP must c-command the FQ, (82b). These locality conditions are similar to the constraints ruling anaphors, i.e. DPs in A-positions (Kayne 1984): (82)
a. *
b. *
Les infirmie`res pensent que Carole a toutes soigne´ les patients the nurses think that Carole has all.fem.pl cured the.masc.pl patients.masc.pl Le manager des infirmie`res a toutes soigne´ les patients the manager of the nurses has all.fem.pl cured the. masc.pl patients.masc.pl
In (82a), Carole cannot be the DP-associate of the FQ, because it is singular. Only les infirmie`res is a suitable candidate. Because it stands too far, though, the result is ungrammatical. FQs induce the same scope variations as their non-floated counterparts: (83)
a.
b.
Les infirmie`res ont toutes soigne´ une femme *(9 > 8); (8 > 9) the nurses have all cured a woman ‘the nurses all cured a woman (or another)’ Les infirmie`res ont toutes soigne´ _ une femme (9 > 8) ; *( 8 > 9) the nurses have all cured a (certain) woman ‘the nurses all cured a certain woman’
French display object-related FQs (contrary to English FQs), Yet there is ‘a significant difference between subject and object’– related FQs (Kayne 1975). In (84b) the DP internal argument is obligatorily cliticized onto the finite verb and the FQ occupies a clause medial position. The past participle and the FQ agree in number and gender with the cliticized DP. (84)
a.
J’ai voulu voir tous les garc¸ons I have wanted to.see all the boys ‘I wanted to see all the boys’ b. J’ai tous voulu les voir I have all wanted them see ‘I wanted to see them all’ c. * J’ai tous voulu voir les garc¸ons I have all wanted to.see the boys ‘I wanted to see all the boys’ ‘A certain woman saw them all’
Two major approaches address the issue of FQs: a movement/syntactic approach considers FQs as pure adnominal Qs, just like their non-FQ counterparts (85a) (Kayne 1975, Sportiche 1988, Koopman and Sportiche 1991, Shlonsky 1991 a.o), i.e. the lack of a semantic difference in the two
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133
constructions reflects a lack of syntactic differences. In both derivations, their restrictions start out adjacent to Q. With FQs only, Q is stranded in-situ. Conversely an adjunction/semantic approach argues for an adverbial status of FQs (Dowty and Brodie 1984, a.o), (85b). (85)
a. b.
[Les infirmie`res]i ont [ VP [FQ ti] fait des points de suture] Les infirmie`res ont [VPFQ [ VP fait des points de suture]] The nurses have all/each made stitches
FQs are semantically equivalent to non-FQ structures, they agree in gender and number with the DP associate they modify, and they are restricted by locality (Amovement). Under the syntactic analysis, Q and the DP form a syntactic constituent: Q modifies the DP, yielding the structure [Q NP] (Kayne 1975, Sportiche 1988, Shlonsky 1991, a.o): FQs mark the positions of DP traces, which are basegenerated with their restriction. As such, FQs are considered adnominal. The fact that toutes appears above the non-finite verb in (85b) has led tenants of the syntactic view to assume that FQs indicate the base generated position of the subject (the VP-internal subject Hypothesis, Koopman and Sportiche 1991). Its restriction, the DP les infirmie`res ‘the nurses’ in (85a), is generated in SpecVP, and undergoes A-movement to the subject position, stranding the FQ in the argument position. The stranding approach has also been supported by the fact that VP-adverbs, such as souvent ‘often’ precede FQ: (86)
a.
b.
Toutes les infirmie`res ont souvent fait des points de suture All.fem.pl the nurses have often made stitches ‘All the nurses have often made stitches’ Les infirmie`res ont souvent toutes fait des points de suture the nurses have often all.fem.pl made stitches ‘The nurses often made stitches’
This approach suggests that FQs are generated with the argument they are associated with. Hence the impossibility of post-verbal FQs with intransitive verbs, unless some extra-material follows it (87b): (87)
a. b.
Les infirmie`res ont (toutes) dormi (*toutes) The nurses have (all) slept (all) Les infirmie`res dorment toutes sur le sofa the nurses sleep all.fem.pl on the sofa ‘The nurses sleep all on the sofa’
Many problems arise with the stranding approach: if FQs are based generated in A-positions, they are expected to occur to the right of unaccusative (88a) / passive verbs (88b), yet. they clearly do not. However they do not: (88)
a.
Les infirmie`res sont (toutes) arrive´es (*toutes) the nurses are (all) arrived (all) ‘The nurses all arrived’
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3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
b.
Les infirmie`res ont (toutes) souvent (toutes) e´te´ (toutes) soigne´es (*toutes) the nurses have (all) often (all) been (all) cured (all)
Another argument provided by Sportiche 1988 against FQs as occupying thetarelated positions comes from their co-occurrence with manner adverbs (soigneusement ‘carefully’): If tous occupies a theta-related position, namely Spec of VP, it should follow VP modifiers, like – for instance – the manner adverb soigneusement ‘carefully’; but it does not (ex. from Fitzpatrick 2006:59, (39)): (89)
Les enfants ont tous soigneusement formule´ leur demande the children have all carefully worded their request b. * Les enfants ont soigneusement tous formule´ leur demande the children have carefully all worded their request a.
Bosˇ kovic´ 2004 also argues against FQs in theta-positions. If it is true that French past participles can overtly move out of the VP (Pollock 1989), as suggested by (90) where vu precedes the sentence medial adverb, then the sentence in (91) is predicted to be grammatical only if FQ appears in SpecVP, contrary to facts: (90)
(91) *
Pierre a vu a peine Isabelle Pierre has seen hardly Isabelle ‘Pierre has hardly seen Isabelle’
(Sportiche 1988)
Les enfants ont vu tous ce film The children have seen all this movie
(Bosˇ kovic´ 2004:688, (15))
The contrast in (90) and (91) suggests that tous appears in a higher position than a` peine ‘hardly’ in (90), i.e. outside the VP and SpecVP. These data can be accounted for under an analysis where FQs are not stranded in theta-positions: the tenants of the semantic approach understand FQs as not forming a syntactic constituent with the DP, but rather as occupying (adjoined) positions typical of adverbs (Dowty and Brodie 1984). This approach does not consider (90a and b) to be derived one from the other: in (90a), Q is a Det-like element; in (90b), it is considered an adverb, adjoined to predicates of different sorts (86). Subject FQs occupy a position above vP, object FQs a position to the left of the participle. In that sense, FQs do not directly quantify over their overt restriction. However, the adverb-analysis does not account for the required agreement between the DP and Q (see Puska´s 2002, a.o). To sum up, both approaches have flaws: the syntactic approach does not account for the unavailability of postverbal FQs with passives/unaccusatives, and its availability with intransitives, nor does it treat object and subject related QPs equivalently (Kayne 1975, a.o). The semantic approach does not account for the Det-like behavior of FQs.
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135
I adopt an approach that accounts for both object and subject related FQs, the adverbial positioning of these elements as well as their agreement behavior: recently, researchers tried to conciliate the determiner-like properties of French FQs with the adverbial approach in elaborating a syntactic and semantic account of the phenomenon. Elaborating on Doetjes’s approach, Fitzpatrick 2006 shows that English and French FQs display a distribution similar to adverbs, while other languages display adnominal FQs (Japanese). Importantly, though, neither Fitzpatrick 2006, nor Doetjes 1997 claim that FQs are of category ‘adverbs’. Doetjes 1997 shows that D(egree) Qs (DQs) can appear either (I) pre-nominally (92a), quantifying over books as an adnominal Q, or (II) in sentence medial positions (92b), taking scope over the VP as in non-canonical structures (Obenauer 1983). Inserting en un jour ‘in one day’ shows that non-canonical (92b) and canonical quantification configurations (92a) have different interpretations (Doetjes 1997 attributes this observation to Haı¨ k 1982): (92)
a. b.
Juliette a lu beaucoup de livres en un jour Juliette has read a lot of books in one day Juliette a beaucoup lu de livres en un jour Juliette has a lot read of books in one day ‘Juliette has read a lot of books in one day’
In (92a), a distributive reading over en un jour arises, whereas in (92b), the collective reading is preferred: all books are read in one and the same day. Doetjes 1997 concludes that beaucoup in (92b) functions as an adverbial, and as such, occupies a VP-adjoined position. Whereas beaucoup can quantify either over events or individuals, tous only quantifies over the closest individual it is related to, even when floated. Doetjes treats beaucoup in (92b) and tous as occupying adverbial positions, but clearly states that they should be semantically distinguished: whereas beaucoup functions as an adverb in (92b), floated tous does not. Adnominal Qs do not theta-select their host, rather they select the category of their host, i.e. DPs. FQs must be also be distinguished from Q time adverbs, which range over times and take scope over an event argument in the VP: (93) a. b. *
Les linguistes ont souvent danse´ la salsa the linguists have often danced the salsa Souvent (de) linguistes ont danse´ la salsa often (of) linguists have danced the salsa (Doetjes 1997:2, (2))
Doetjes 1997:202 claims that FQs are genuine quantified noun phrase ‘containing a silent element representing the domain of quantification’ (94a): because their distribution is that of adverbials, FQ is ‘generated in an adverbial position, and binds an empty category in an argument position’ (id.). In (94b), the whole FQ occupies an adjoined position from where it c-commands a member of its chain, i.e. the A-moved DP it quantifies over. FQ is VP (XP)-adjoined, a solution accounting for the unavailability of FQs in unaccusative/passive constructions.
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3 Floating Quantification: French Universal Quantifiers
FQ is not generated under SpecVP and can appear in a lower position iff the verb is followed by some material: FQ adjoins to a postverbal XP. As such, the complex [FQ Q þ pro] serves as an adverbial to the VP. (94)
a. b.
FQ: [QP tous [DP pro]] [XP FQi [XP . . . eci. . .]]
(Doetjes 1997:202, (5))
An important property of FQ is that it is dependent on the presence of an associate-DP with whom it agrees: to account for its determiner-like properties, Doetjes argues that FQ is an adnominal Q, selecting pro as its restriction. As (94b) shows, FQ binds ec, the trace of the moved DP over which it (indirectly) quantifies. [FQ tous pro] is semantically related to the overt noun phrase in argument position: since FQ is adjoined to the VP, it takes syntactic scope over the VP. Yet the domain of quantification of tous is the DP they select in (94a) (pro of type e), which must semantically co-refer with the associate DP. FQ binds the trace and syntactic agreement arises. Fitzpatrick develops this idea and proposes that FQ is both semantically and syntactically equivalent to [all of them]. –un in chacun is the lexicalization of pro. The distributor (chac-) takes as its restriction –un (see also Kobuchi-Philip 2003 and subsq.).28 Pro is incorporated into the semantics of Dowty and Brodie 1984 for adverbial FQs: In [(95)] FQ all is a function that takes the predicate [[VP]] as an argument. By adding pro to the FQ structure, the FQ becomes the argument of [[VP]]. This makes it easy to achieve the binding of the argument of [the predicate] by the subject. (Fitzpatrick 2006:71)
(95)
all ‘‘maximizes’’ the external argument of the VP [[all]] ¼ lP <e, t>.lx.P(max(x)) (Fitzpatrick 2006:22, (9b))
28
Hebrew, Greek and Arabic are languages where pro can be overtly realized with FQs (Fitzpatrick 2006). When FQ shows up in Hebrew, a pronominal clitic kol is compulsory (i), yielding kulam. When kol does not float, no pronoun shows up (ii) (see Shlonsky 1991 for a different account): (i)
a.
b. *
(ii)
a.
b. *
Ha-yeladim yasˇ nu kul-am The-children slept all-3.MASC.PL ‘The children all slept’ Ha-yeladim yasˇ nu kol the-children slept all
(Fitzpatrick 2006:77, (82))
kil ha-praxim bi-zhirut Katafti et I-picked ACC all the-flowers with-care ‘I picked all of the flowers carefully’ Katafti et kul-am ha-praxim bi-zhirut i-picked ACC all-* MASC.PL the-flowers with-care intended: ‘I picked all of the flowers carefully’ (Fitzpatrick 2006:77, (83))
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137
Fitzpatrick derives the semantics of adverbial FQs in a similar way to that of their non-floated counterparts, claiming that they are fully-fledged Qs.29 Crucially pro semantically and syntactically mediates the relationship between FQ and its DP-associate. ‘This pronominal element contributes a coreference-like relationship to the nominal associate’ (Fitzpatrick 2006:76). Thanks to pro, both locality effects observed with FQ constructions and the agreement between FQ and its associate are explained. Agreement arises as a result of binding. The advantage of this analysis is that both object and subject-related FQs are treated uniformly: what counts is the direct relation between FQ and the DP-trace: In (88a), les infirmie`res is generated in the object position of arrive´es and subsequently A-moves to the subject position. ti indicates the base position of that argument. FQ is possible because pro can bind that trace. (96c) realizes the configuration in (94b). Finally, the construction with the full DP detached from FQ is not found (96d), since tous needs to bind the trace of the moved DP. In (96d), the DP is in-situ, violating (94). In (96e), FQ binds the trace of the DP it quantifies over: (96)
a.
b.
[les infirmie`res]i sont [VP [toutes pro]i [VP arrive´es ti]] The nurses are all arrived ‘the nurses have all arrived’ J’ai voulu voir tous les garc¸ons I have wanted to.see all the boys ‘I wanted to see all the boys’
29
See Kobuchi-Philip 2003 (and subsq.) for a semantic analysis of FQ structures (for her, pro denotes a set of atoms), along Doetjes’s (and Fitzpatrick’s) lines. Note that for KobuchiPhilip 2003, FQs and their prenominal counterpart do not share the same semantic value. She claims that the prenominal version of FQ chacun is chaque N. But I have shown above that this is not the case, and that chacun and chaque must be distinguished (Chapter 2, Section 1.1.1.5, see also fn. 12 of Chapter 1). Kobuchi-Philip 2006:2 claims that FQs and their prenominal counterparts ‘do differ in their truth conditions in that FQs (. . .) generally lack a collective reading, while [their non-FQ counterparts] can always be interpreted either distributively or collectively.’ If it is indeed often the case that FQs are more likely to be interpreted as distributive, Puska´s 2002:117 argues that this is not the case of French FQs, concluding that What the data reveal is that the collective or distributive reading depends much more on what is accessible, or pragmatically plausible: the clowns lifting pianos are visualized as a collective event, because apparently it is more difficult to access the individual lifting event. In (i) and (ii), tous is systematically interpreted as collective (see section ‘‘Puska´s 2002: Floating Quantifiers’’): (i)
a. b.
(ii)
a. b.
Tous les clowns ont souleve´s un piano All the clowns have lifted a piano Les clowns ont tous souleve´s un piano The clowns have all lifted a piano Tous les clowns ont souleve´s le piano All the clowns have lifted the piano Les clowns ont tous souleve´s le piano the clowns have all lifted the piano
(Puska´s 2002 :117, (39), (40))
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c.
d. *
e.
J’ai tous voulu les voir I have all wanted them see ‘I wanted to see them all’ J’ai tous voulu voir les garc¸ons I have all wanted to.see the boys ‘I wanted to see all the boys’ J’ai [VP tous [VP voulu lesi voir ti]]
(Doetjes 1997:207, (16b))
Adopting Doetjes’ analysis, I assume that tous is an adnominal Q, selecting pro as its restriction. The whole FQ occupies an adjoined position i.e. FQs are VP-adjoined (or adjoined to any position where they c-command a member of their chain, i.e. the A-moved DPs they quantify over). As such, the complex [FQ Q þ pro] serves as an adverbial to the VP. The same analysis holds of chac-un. FQ and non-FQ constructions have similar structures: the Q tous is adjoined to a DP. The adjoined structure was preferred over the specifier structure, on the basis of the availability of demonstratives in tous les N constructions, since there is no more room left for the Q (following Giusti’s 1997 analysis of demonstratives as specifier of DP). Qs in FQ constructions adjoin to the DP hosting pro; and non-FQs, to the DP restriction. By extension, agreement on full universal DPs can be claimed to come from binding with the overt restriction. Hence, adopting the adjoined structure for full universal DPs as well as for FQs, is theoretically advantageous, and the strict correlation between semantics and syntax is kept.30 A note on terminology: from now on, the term FQ must be understood in Doetjes’s terms, i.e. it means that the internal structure of a quantifier entering a FQ structure involves (94a): [QP tous [DP pro]]. The term FQ structure/configuration refers to the surface ordering of a structure involving movement of the noun restriction past the lexical Q (or operator). Again, this analysis holds of chacun des N. 3.1.3.1 An Alternative: Against an Adjunction Analysis for FQs Beghelli 1995 shows that Qs are best analyzed if they are distinguished into different types. He argues that each type of Q has different semantic properties and different designated scope positions. Based on Italian and Hungarian, Beghelli 1995, Beghelli and Stowell 1997, Szabolcsi 1997 and Puska´s 2000 30
A potential objection is the agreement facts in French. It also holds for the adjunction analysis given for full 8Qs, which is, at first sight, not suited to account for the agreement facts between the Q tous and the DP associate as in (i): (i)
les infirmie`res sont toutes/* tous arrive´es The nurses.FEM.PL are all.FEM.PL / all.MASC.PL arrived
Fitzpatrick 2006 shows that agreement between unrelated syntactic elements can be triggered, as in Spanish bound pronouns agreeing in number and gender with their antecedent. In Spanish and Russian case agreement arises in secondary predicate between depictives and the associate argument. See Fitzpatrick 2006 for details.
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139
propose that Qs move to check logico-semantic features, the landing site of a Q being selective. Q-movement resembles that of wh-movement. Scope relationships are still defined in terms of c-command. Scope ambiguities are resolved structurally: the various Qs occupy different positions at LF. Depending on the linear LF-ordering, different scope interpretations arise (see Chapter 1). Following this line of reasoning, Puska´s 2002 shows that FQs in French occupy positions higher than the VP-domain, postulating a ‘low’-Q area in the IP-domain. In (97), tous can appear either below toujours ‘always’ or above bien ‘well’: (97)
a.??/* b.
c. d.??/*
Les enfants ont tous toujours appris leurs lec¸ons. the children have all always learned their lessons Les enfants ont toujours tous appris leurs lec¸ons. the children have always all learned their lessons ‘The children have all always learned their lessons’ Les enfants ont tous bien appris leurs lec¸ons. the children have all well learned their lessons Les enfants ont bien tous appris leurs lec¸ons. the children have well all learned their lessons (Puska´s 2002: 125, (69))
The data in (97) clearly show that FQs are inserted above manner adverbs. Bien occupies a low position in Cinque’s hierarchy (Voice), hence cannot occupy the VP internal subject position (see Koopman and Sportiche 1991, a.o), but a higher position, within the IP-domain. In other words, it seems that FQs do not occupy A/Agr-positions at Spell-out. Yet (97) also tell us something else: tous cannot appear above frequency adverbs: suggesting a hierarchical order a` la Cinque 1999. Puska´s, citing De´prez 1994, notes that chacun blocks overt movement of combien in (98), suggesting that it is an intervener to overt wh extraction (I come back to this point in Chapter 5, Section 5.1.2.4): (98)
* Combien est-ce que tu crois que ces enfants enverront chacun de cartes postales a` ses parents? how many do you think that these children will-send each of postcards to his parents
Puska´s proposes that FQs are remnant moved to a ‘relevant’ position within the ‘low’ IP-area, while the DP-associate has A-moved to the subject position. Yet she does not decide on a position for these FQs, nor does she give any reason for movement. ‘The trigger for movement itself remains to be identified. I retain the assumption that quantifier movement is feature-driven movement.’ (Puska´s 2002 :126, see section ‘‘Puska´s 2002: Floating Quantifiers’’). On the basis of FQ interpretations, she argues that ‘(. . .) distributivity does not belong to the syntactic triggers for quantifiers.’ (Puska´s 2002: 126), since one and the
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same Q can occur in the same position with a different interpretation (i.e. collective vs. distributive). She shows that distributivity is not the key feature for tous movement. Even if this approach has the advantage of taking into account the fact that FQs do not occupy a position right above VP (or adjoined to VP in Doetjes’s terms), it does not really account for the multiple positions in which these Qs can appear, i.e. when floated and non-floated. Moreover it does not account for the fact that quantifiers move directly to their spell-out position, with truth-conditionally equivalent meanings. Nor does it rule out the adjunction analysis: it is logically possible that these adverbs are all adjoined to VP, but layered in such a way that frequency adverbs precede FQs which in turn precede manner adverbs.31 A point which would support this latter view is the fact that chacun behaves differently in this respect: (99)
a. ? b. * c. d. *
Les enfants ont chacun toujours appris leurs lec¸ons. the children have each always learned their lessons Les enfants ont toujours chacun appris leurs lec¸ons. the children have always each learned their lessons Les enfants ont chacun bien appris leurs lec¸ons. the children have each well learned their lessons Les enfants ont bien chacun appris leurs lec¸ons. the children have well each learned their lessons (Puska´s 2002: 125, (68))
If chacun and tous are adverbs of the same type, as argued above, we expect to show the same ordering with respect to adverbs. Again, the problem seems to be semantic and not syntactic. I adopt the adverbial approach of Doetjes 1997 and Fitzpatrick 2006, keeping in mind that this approach can be extended to a feature-checking approach.
3.1.4 Conclusion In Chapter 2, both French 9Qs and wh in-situ are argued to be complex DPs, composed of an Op and an indefinite. These two types of Qs are scopally similar: they can be licensed long-distance. On the basis of a redefined concept of existential presupposition, I provided a finer distinction and argued that wh and 9Qs involve similar semantic features: specificity, partitivity or non-presupposition. This information is prosodically encoded, but syntactically grounded. In this Chapter, I turned to tous les N and chacun des N. I argued in favour of their status as 8Qs (Section 3.1.1) and presented two tests setting
31
Thanks to Marcel den dikken for pointing this out to me.
References
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them apart from 9Qs: (i) clause-boundness; (ii) predicate nominals. I introduced three other tests calling for a distinction among them: (iii) presquemodification; (iv) pas-modification and (v) distributivity (Section 3.1.2). In Section 3.1.2.1, I looked at another property of 8Qs, namely existential presupposition. Thanks to the distinction made in Chapter 2 among noun phrases involving existential presupposition, I showed that chacun des N involves specificity, while tous les N triggers partitivity. I ended my discussion on chacun des N and tous les N in Section 3.1.3 by looking at a final property characterising these Qs: they can optionally display non-canonical quantification, i.e. FQ structures. I adopted Doetjes’ analysis of FQ structures, assuming that the FQ tous is an adnominal Q, selecting pro as its restriction. The whole FQ occupies an adjoined (adverbial) position i.e. FQs are VP-adjoined (or adjoined to any position where it c-commands a member of its chain, i.e. the A-moved DP it quantifies over). As such, the complex [FQ Q þ pro] serves as an adverbial to the VP. The same analysis holds of chac-un. Pro being non-overt, it cannot be stressed: recall that wh-phrases in-situ and 9Qs realize the restriction of an abstract Q; on them, stress prominence arises with specificity (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.2). If 8Qs where similar to wh-phrases / 9Qs, pro (or –un, in chacun) would be expected to be prominent, contrary to facts. Specificity and partitivity are then encoded differently with the two groups of Qs: prosodically with wh/9Qs, lexically with 8Qs. In Chapter 5, I will show that ‘prosodically encoded’ (with wh-phrases and un Ns) and ‘lexically encoded’ (with 8Qs) are information syntactically grounded. The internal structure of FQs is then crucially different from those of SplitDPs: the Q is adjoined to (outside) the DP-argument in the former case, whereas it is part of (inside) the DP-argument in the latter. At the clausal level, the two types are again distinguishable: FQs are clause-bound; Split-DPs are clausefree. After having discussed the status of 9Qs in Chapter 2 and 8Qs in this section, I now turn to N-words. This section is devoted to argument N-words (personne ‘nobody’, rien ‘nothing’, aucun des N ‘none of the N’), as well as French sentential and phrasal negations.
References Abney, Steven. 1987. The English Noun Phrase in Its Sentential Aspect, MIT dissertation. Barwise, Jon and Robin Cooper. 1981. Generalized quantifier and natural language. Linguistics and Philosophy 4:159–219. Baunaz, Lena. 2008. Floating quantifiers: french universal quantifiers and N-words. In Selected Proceedings of the 34th Incontro di Grammatica Generativa, Special Issue of the Rivista di Grammatica Generativa, vol. 33. P. Beninca˛, F. Damonte and N. Penello (eds.). Padova: Unipress. Beck, Sigrid. 1996. Quantified structures as barriers for LF-movement. Natural Language Semantics 4:1–56.
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Beghelli, Fillipo. 1995. The Phrase Structure of Quantifier Scope. Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles. Beghelli, Fillipo and Tim Stowell. 1997. Distributivity and negation: The syntax of each and every. In Ways of Scope Taking, Anna Szabolcsi (ed.), 71–108. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Bobaljik, Jonathan. 2003. Floating quantifiers: Handle with care. In The Second Glot International State-of-The-Article Book, Lisa Cheng and Rint Sybesma (eds.), 107–148. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Bosˇ kovic´, Zeljiko. 2004. Be careful where you float your quantifiers. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 22:681–742. Brisson, Christine. 1998. Distributivity, Maximality and Floating Quantifiers. Ph.D. dissertation, Rutgers University. Choe, Jae-Woong. 1987. Anti-Quantifiers and a Theory of Distributivity. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts. Cinque, Guglielmo. 1999. Adverbs and Functional Heads: A Cross-Linguistic Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press. De´prez, Viviane. 1994. The weak island effect of floating quantifiers. In Functional Projections: University of Massachusetts Occasional Papers 17, Elena Benedicto and Jeff Runner (eds.), 63–84. Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts. Diesing, Molly. 1992. Indefinites. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Doetjes, Jenny. 1997. Quantifiers and Selection. On the Distribution of Quantifying Expressions in French, Dutch and English. Doctoral dissertation, HIL, Leiden University. The Hague: HAG. Dowty, David and Bellinda Brodie. 1984. The semantics of floated quantifiers in a transformational grammar. Proceedings of the West Coast Conferences of Formal Linguistics 3:75–90. Enc¸, Mu¨rvet. 1991. ‘The semantics of specificity. Linguistic Inquiry 22:1–25. Fitzpatrick, Justin Michael. 2006. Syntactic and Semantic Routes to Floating Quantification. Doctoral dissertation, MIT, Cambridge, MA. Flaux, Nelly and Danie`le van de Velde. 1997. Tous ensemble, Chacun Se´parement. In Langue Franc¸aise 112:33–48. Fodor, Jerry and Ivan Sag. 1982. Referential and quantificational indefinites. In Linguistics and Philosophy 5:355–398. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 1997. The Landscape of Polarity Items. Groningen Dissertations in Linguistics 18. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 1999. Affective dependencies. Linguistics and Philosophy 22:367–421. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 2000. Negative Concord and the scope of universals. Transactions of the Philological Society 98:87–120. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 2002. N-words and negative concord. Final, pre-publication version, published in 2006. In The Linguistics Companion. Oxford: Blackwell. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 2004. Domain restriction and the arguments of quantificational determiners. Semantics and Linguistic Theory 14:110–128. Gil, David. 1995. Universal quantifiers and distributivity. In Quantification in Natural Languages, Emmon Bach, Eloise Jelinek, Angelika Kratzer and Barbara Partee (eds.), 321–362. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Giusti, Giuliana. 1997. The categorial status of determiners. In The New Comparative Syntax, Liliane Haegeman (ed.), 95–123. London and New York: Longman. Haı¨ k, Isabelle. 1982. On clitic en in French. Journal of Linguistic Research 2(1):63–87. Heim, Irene. 1982. The Semantics of Definite and Indefinite Noun Phrases. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts. Heim, Irene. 1987. Where does the definiteness restriction apply? Evidence from the definiteness of variables. In The Representation of (In)definiteness, Eric Reuland and Alice G.B. ter Meulen (eds.), 21–42. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
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Horn, Laurence. 1997. All John’s children are as bald as the king of France: Existential import and the geometry of opposition. Chicago Linguistics Society 33:155–179. Ihsane, Tabea. 2008. The Layered DP. Form and Meaning of French Indefinites Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 124. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Junker, Marie-Odile. 1995. Syntax et se´mantique des quantifieurs flottants tous et chacun. Distributivite´ en se´mantique conceptuelle. Gene`ve: Librairie Droz. Kayne, Richard. 1975. French Syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Kayne, Richard. 1984. Connectedness and Binary Branching. Dordrecht: Foris Kayne, Richard. 1993. Toward a modular theory of auxiliary selection. Studia Linguistica 47:3–31. Kayne, Richard. 1994. The Antisymmetry of Syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Kobuchi-Philip, Mana. 2003. Distributivity and the Japanese Floating Numeral Quantifier. Ph.D. dissertation. City University of New York. Kobuchi-Philips, Mana. 2006. The floating quantifier’s restrictor. In Proceedings of the Third International Workshop on Logic and Engineering of Natural Language Semantics, Eric McCready (ed.), 209–220. Tokyo: The Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence. Koopman, Hilda and Dominique Sportiche. 1991. The position of subjects. Lingua, 85. 1:211–258. Kratzer, Angelika. 1989. An investigations of the lumps of thought. Linguistics and Philosophy 12:607–653. May, Robert. 1985. Logical Form: Its Structure and Derivation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Milsark, Gary. 1974. Existential Sentences in English. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT, published in 1979. New York-London: Garland. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1983. Une Quantification Non-Canonique: La Quantification a` Distance. Langue Franc¸aise 58:66–88. Partee, Barbara H. 1986. Noun phrase interpretation and type-shifting principles. In Studies in Discourse Representation Theory and the Theory of Generalized Quantifiers, Jeroen Groenendijk, Dick de Jongh and Martin Stokhof (eds.), 115–143. Dordrecht: Foris. Pollock, Jean-Yves. 1989. Verb movement, universal grammar, and the structure of IP. Linguistic Inquiry 20:365–424. Puska´s, Genoveva. 2002. Floating quantifiers: What they can tell us about the syntax and semantics of quantifiers. GG@G 3:105–128. Puska´s, Genoveva. 2000. Quantification in the left periphery: A syntactic argument for ‘split’ domains. In CLS 36, Volume 1: The Main Session, John Boyle, Jung-Huyck Lee and Arika Okrent (eds.). Chicago Linguistic Society: Chicago. Reinhart, Tanya. 1997. Quantifier scope. How labour is divided between QR and choice functions. Linguistics and Philosophy 20:335–397. Rizzi, Luigi. 2003. On some properties of subjects and topics. In Proceedings of the XXX Incontro di Grammatica Generativa, L. Bruge´, G. Giusti, N. Munaro, W. Schweikert and G. Turano, (eds.). Venezia: Cafoscarina. Shlonsky, Ur. 1991. Quantifiers as functional heads: A study of quantifier float in Hebrew. Lingua 84:159–180. Sportiche, Dominique. 1988. A theory of floating quantifiers and its corrolaries for constituent structure. Linquistic Inquiry 19–23. Starke, Michal. 2001. Move Dissolves into Merge: A Theory of Locality. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Geneva. Szabolcsi, Anna. 1994. ‘The noun phrase’. In The syntactic structure of Hungarian. Syntax and Semantics 27:179–274. Szabolcsi, Anna. 1997. Strategies for scope taking. In Ways of Scope Taking, Anna Szabolcsi (ed.). Dordrecht: Foris. Szekely, Rachel. 2006. Feature-placing, localizability, and the semantics of existential sentences, 361–371. http://www.zas.gwz-berlin.de/papers/zaspil/articles/zp44/447.pdf Accessed 18 June 2009.
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Tremblay, Mireille. 1991. Alternances d’arguments internes en franc¸ais et en anglais. Revue que´be´coise de linguistique 20(1):39–53. Zribi-Hertz, Anne. 2003. On the asymmetrical but regular properties of French possessive DPs. In From NP to DP, volume 2: The Expression of Possession in Noun Phrases, M. Coene and Y. D’Hulst (eds.), Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 56, 141–163. Amsterdam-Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Chapter 4
N-Words
4.1 Introduction: N-Words Four major types of Qs are represented by the Aristotelian (classical) Square of Opposition, expressing logical laws (Fig. 4.1). all and no (8:) are universals and some (9) and not all (:8) are particular. Both all and some are positive Qs, while no and not all are negative. All and no cannot be true at the same time (they are contrary); some and not all cannot be false at the same time (they are subcontrary); no cannot be false if all is true. All and not all are negations of each other, just like no and some are of each other.1 After having discussed the status of 8Qs in Chapter 3, and that of 9Qs in Chapter 2, I now turn to the semantic and syntactic status of N-words, pas tous les N ‘not all’ and pas un N ‘not a’. The nature of N-words raises (at least) two issues: their negative status All
Some
No
Contrary
Contradictory
Subcontrary
Subalternate
Subalternate
Fig. 4.1 Classical square of opposition
Not all
(negative or non-negative) and their quantificational status (9 or 8). As an answer to the first point, I show that based on various tests discussed for Greek and Italian (Giannakidou 1997 (and subsq.), Zanuttini 1991), that French N-words are inherently negative (Mathieu 1999, contra Rowlett
1
Horn 1989 notes that natural languages do not systematically lexicalize the :8 ‘not all’. See Horn 1989 for a pragmatic analysis, Hoeksema 1999.
L. Baunaz, The Grammar of French Quantification, Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 83, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0621-7_4, Ó Springer ScienceþBusiness Media B.V. 2011
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4 N-Words
1998). With respect to the second point, Based on the semantic and syntactic properties of 8Qs elicited in Chapter 3, I show that French N-words are 8Qs (contra De´prez 1997 (subsq.), Rowlett 1998, Mathieu 1999, 2002. See de Swart and Sag 2002 and Corblin et al. 2004 for discussion). My analysis of French N-words as involving universal negation is based on the following argument: within the square of opposition, no is identified as a universal negative Q. Yet, logically, negative sentences containing N-words can be translated into two (truth conditionally) equivalent formulae: (1a) in which the negative operator scopes over 9 and (1b) in which 8 scopes over the negative operator: (1) a. b.
:9x [P(x) ^ Q(x)] 8x [P(x) !:Q(x)]
(Existential negation) (Universal negation)
According to (1), N-words are composed of a negative operator plus either 9 to its right or 8 to its left. I focus on constructions involving the overt negative operator pas ‘not’þ an overt adjacent Q (‘unemphasized un N ‘a N’ and unemphasized tous les N ‘all the N’). I show that pas þ un N lexicalize (1a) and that argument N-words lexicalize the inverse (scope) pattern of the sequence pas þ tous les N, (1b). I argue that scope interactions between pas and tous show that the negative operator can operate locally and be syntactically adjoined, strikingly resembling Doetjes’ analysis of FQs given in Chapter 3.2 The facts that Nwords may overtly display FQ structures, and that they are clause-bound argue in favor of this treatment. This Chapter is organized as follows: Section 4.1.1 is an overview of French sentential and constituent negation. Section 4.1.2 argues that constituent negation is parasitic on different types of Qs. The combination of parasitic negation and Qs builds monotone decreasing Qs. I analyse the nature of complex DPs like pas un N ‘not a N’ and pas tous les N ‘not all the N’ and show that although pas modifies un N, it takes sentential scope, and builds up a monotone decreasing operator in both its NP and VP arguments; pas in the construction pas tous les N takes phrasal scope only and builds a monotone decreasing operator in its VP argument only. I conclude that the sequence pas un N is the lexicalization of (1a) in French. (1b) does not lexicalize the two operators: the sequence tous... pas never gives rise to universal negation (Section 4.1.2.2), which is lexicalized by Nwords. In Section 4.1.4, I argue for the universal status of French N-words, using semantic and syntactic diagnostics. Comparing the sequence involving a 8Q and pas (yielding the meaning ‘not every’ [: > 8]) to the syntax and semantics of Nwords, I conclude that both involve parasitic negation (Section 4.1.6). Keeping the parallelism between 8Qs and N-words, I show that N-words can overtly realize derivations of the FQ type a` la Doetjes 1997 (see Baunaz 2008 for the premises of this latter idea). The consequence is that 8Qs and N-words have a similar syntactic behavior as a result of their similar internal structures. 2
I use the terms ‘local’, ‘phrasal’, ‘constituent’ and ‘parasitic’ negation interchangeably. They all must be distinguished from sentential negation, which operates over the whole sentence.
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
147
4.1.1 French Negation: An Overview It has been observed that expressions of negation cross-linguistically follow ‘Jespersen’s cycle’ (after Jespersen 1917), which describes a cyclic change of negative particles through history. A cycle can be described as follows for French (Hirschbu¨hler and Labelle 1994, Corblin and Tovena 2003, Corblin et al. 2004, Zeijlstra 2004 a.o): an item, that happens to be positive and independent from the negative sentential marker, progressively turns into some kind of reinforcer to it to the point where it changes into a negative polarity item (its occurence being dependent on the presence of the negative marker). At the end of the cycle, that item gets independent from sentential negation, acquiring a negative status by itself, while the former negative sentential marker gets weaker and weaker, is often omitted, and loses its negative force. The cycle is illustrated in (2). (2) a. b. c. d. e. f. g. h. i.
old Latin: Middle Latin: Classical Latin: Old French: Middle French: Classical French: Modern French: Future French: ?:
Ne þ V Ne þ oenum þ V non þ V nen þV neþVþ (pas) Ne þ V þ pas (ne) þ V þ pas V þ pas pas þ V
(Christensen 2003)
It is admitted in the literature that Old Latin ne was phonologically weak, (2a), and got strengthened by the emergence of Middle Latin oenum ‘one thing’, (2b). Ne þ oenum became non and bore negative strength (2c); later non shifted into nen (2d) and finally ne arised (2e). Middle French ne appeared to gradually lose its negative force and got reinforced by the emergence of pas (for sentential negation) (2e,f): in (3), ne starts out as the negative sentential marker, then pas comes to reinforce ne to finally appear all alone, bearing by itself the negative meaning: (3) a. b. c.
Jeo ne di I not say Je ne dis pas I NE say not Je dis pas I say not (Corblin and Tovena 2003:3, fn. 4, (i-ii))
Steps (2 h, i) are not reached yet by French negation: ‘presumably the language will continue to evolve to the point where the ne is no longer optional, but instead archaic. At this point, we would expect pas generally to carry the negativity in French (Ashby 1981).’ (Christensen 2003:5).
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4.1.1.1 Sentential Negation, Constituent Negation, ne and pas Traditionally contemporary sentential negation is claimed to consist of an optional clitic, ne, combined with a negative adverb like pas ‘not’ (3) (Pollock 1989): (4)
Carter (n’) aime pas Dr. Benton3 Carter NE likes not Dr. Benton ‘Carter does not like Dr. Benton’
The bare logical sentential negative operator pas occupies a fixed position in the middle field. In (4): it takes scope over the whole sentence, and is generated under SpecNegP. Clitic ne is base generated under Neg8, subsequently moved with the finite verb when the latter moves to Agr8. I assume that NegP is located above TP (Belletti 1990, a.o). Ne is not negative anymore (Rowlett 1998, see Godard 2004 for rare exceptions remaining from an older system). As such, it can be omitted, (4); it cannot mark negation alone, (5); it can occur in certain non-negative constructions with ‘rhetorical effect in some interrogative contexts’ (Rowlett 1998: 28), (6a) (from Pe´ters 2001:73, fn. 83), in non-negative subjunctive constructions (6b) and non-negative comparatives (6c); ne itself does not license NPIs or de N , (7), pas does (8): (5) (6)
* Je ne fais mon travail I NE do my work a.
b.
c.
(Rowlett 1998: 27 (52))
Des communaute´s, y en a-t-il d’avantage qu’il (n’) y en a eu? Some communities there of-them has –t-il more than-it NE there of-them has had ‘Communities, are there more of them than there used to be?’ Je veux partir avant qu’il (ne) fasse nuit I want to leave before that it NE be.subj. night ‘I want to leave before night falls out’ Buffy The Vampire Slayer (n’) est une se´rie que pour ados BTVS NE is a series only for teens ‘BTVS is only a series for teens’
(7)* Carole n’a lu quoi que ce soit / de livre C. NE has read anything / of.book (8)
3
Carole (n’) a pas lu quoi que ce soit/ de livre C. NE has not read anything / of.book
I am only interested in spoken French. It is however true that formal written French requires ne to appear in negative sentence. Thanks to Ur Shlonsky for pointing this out to me.
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When pas is embedded in a tensed clause of a lexical verb like dire ‘to say’, it cannot scope over it, as the interpretations in italics show: pas is clause bound (9a). Note that if pas is in the embedded clause (9b), ne cannot occur in the matrix. Yet, when pas is embedded in an infinitival complement of a modal verb, its domain extends to the matrix, i.e. it can scope over the modal in the matrix, (10): (9) a.
b. (10) a. b.
* *
Juliette dit qu’elle n’aime pas Rome´o Juliette says that she NE likes not Romeo ‘Juliette says that she does not like Romeo’ ‘Juliette does not say that she likes Romeo’ Juliette ne dit qu’elle aime pas Rome´o Juliette NE says not that she loves Romeo Juliette ne peut pas voir Marie Juliette NE can not see Marie Juliette peut ne pas voir Marie Juliette can NE not see Marie
(neg > can) (can > neg)
I assume that ne only marks the domain where the negative element is interpreted. Given its distribution it behaves like Polarity Items (PI) (Pe´ters 2001). If pas is the negative operator par excellence, its scope is not necessarily sentential. Sentential negation affects the whole proposition; constituent negation negates only a sub-part of the sentence, i.e. the difference must be understood in the size of their domain of operation (see also Zeijlstra 2004:47). Ne can appear in both configurations: just like English (11), the French medial negative marker pas ‘not’ can be interpreted either as sentential or as constituent negation (12). This ambiguity suggests that it can appear in two different (clause medial) positions: (11) Carter was not promoted because of his attitude. (i) Carter was not promoted and the reason is because of his attitude. (ii) Carter was promoted but not because of his attitude. (12) Carter (n’) est pas promu a` cause de son attitude. Carter was not promoted and the reason is because of his attitude’ a. Carter (n’) est PAS # promu a` cause de son attitude. ‘Carter was not promoted but because of his attitude’ b. Carter (n’) est pas prom[yy] a` cause de son attitude. ‘Carter was promoted but not because of his attitude’ (12) is ambiguous: in (12b) pas ‘not’ modifies the because-phrase, rather than the VP, (12a). The two readings are distinguished by different intonations on pas (and probably on the rest of the sentence): it is either heavily stressed (a slight break (#) can even be noticed after PAS (12a)) or not (but in that case, promu is lengthened (12b)). Note that the two readings are available with or
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without ne realized. This matter of fact has also been observed by Godard 2004, who gives the following example of pas negating a Det (13) (see Section 4.1.2.1 for an analysis): (13) Pas un candidat ne s’est pre´sente´ Not one candidate NE came
(Godard 2004: 355, (10a))
(12) and (13) show that ne is compatible with constituent negation (see also (20b), (21b) and (22) below). In (13), ne indicates only the clause where pas is interpreted, even if its domain of operation is limited. In certain circumstances ne is absolutely impossible (14): (14) a. b. c.
(*ne) pas (*ne) mal (NE) Not (NE) bad (*ne) pas (*ne) Romano ! (NE) not (NE) Romano (*ne) pas (*ne) dans dix minutes (NE) not (NE) in ten minutes
These data confirm that ne is in a position higher than TP. In (14), T8 is absent and ne is never present. I also conclude that the presence of ne is not a sufficient condition to license sentential negation (as in (5), (6)), since it may also appear with constituent negation (as in (4), (13)), vs. Rowlett 1998, (a.o). In conclusion, if ne is a PI, it needs to be licensed by a downward entailing operator, (13). 4 Cardinaletti and Guasti 1993 discuss Italian negation in small clauses (SC) and note that it should be distinguished from sentential negation, even if homonymous. When present, the sentential negative operator non occurs preverbally and can co-occur with a negative adverb, yielding a negative concord reading, (15). Crucially in small clause, non cannot co-occur with negative adverbs, (16): (15) Non ho mai visto Gianni not have never seen John ‘I have never seen John’ (16) a. * b. * c. *
Ritengo Gianni non mai contento (I) consider Gianni not never happy Ritengo Gianni mai non contento Ritengo Gianni non contento mai (Cardinaletti and Guasti 1993:42)
SCs do not involve TP. They conclude that non in SC is a negative adverb, which is ‘structurally adjoined to the lexical projection AP contained in the small 4
Because it is not the aim of this work to discuss this issue, I leave it for future research.
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clause’ (Cardinaletti and Guasti 1993:43). Another difference between non in SC and non in tensed clauses is that non can be stressed in the former case, (17), but cannot in the latter, (18). This is so because non is a clitic in (18), but an adverb in (17) (examples from Cardinaletti and Guasti 1993: 51, (34a and b)): (17)
Ritengo Gianni NON soddisfatto del suo lavoro (I) consider Gianni not satisfied with his work
(18) * Gianni NON e` soddisfatto del suo lavoro Gianni not is satisfied with his work As will be noted below, intonation on pas can also reveal interesting facts about the interpretation (scope) of the medial negative adverb in French. French differs from Italian in that pas is excluded from the negative concord system of French (see Section 4.1.3), and the co-occurrence of pas with other negative adverbials leads to ungrammaticality even in non-small clauses environments. Pas can appear prenominally, affecting the constituent in subject position, (19): (19) Pas tous les e´tudiants (n’) ont re´ussi l’examen Not all the students (NE) have succeeded the exam ‘Not all the students have passed the exam, i.e. some have’ Because the scope of pas in (19) is not sentential (the sentence does not turn negative), I claim that it involves phrasal negation. I will argue in Section 4.1.2.2, that the sequence pas tous (DP) builds a monotone decreasing operator only in its VP argument. It is increasing in its NP argument.5 Hence phrasal negation may be expressed with the negative marker pas, negating an AP/DP/PP (20)–(22) or an AdvP (23) and (see Godard 2004, Rowlett 1998, a.o). Phrasal negation can be expressed as an affix, on NP/ APs/AdvPs (24a–c) and can license NPIs (25) (like sentential negation (8)): (20) A. B.
How are you ? Are you awake? Encore endormie, pas encore re´veille´e ‘Still sleepy, not awake yet’
5 A potential problem raised by G.puska´s (p.c) is that the paraphrase of (19) suggests the following meaning: it is not the case that all the students have passed the exam. In Section 4.1.2.2 I show that pas in (19) takes scope over the 8Q obligatorily (NPI licensing is a case in point). (19) then must be distinguished from (i), where the sentence is scopally negative, i.e. in (19), there is an ‘event’ of succeeding the exam, while in (i), there is no event of roses being bought by students/it is not the case that students brought roses:
(i)
Pas un e´tudiant a amene´ de roses not a student has bought roses
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(21) a.
b. (22) a.
b.
Conny : I am telling you, I saw Lizzi kissing Romano ! Chunny: t’es folle ! pas Romano ! You are crazy not Romano ‘are you crazy ! not Romano’ Carol (n’) aime pas MARK, mais DOUG Carol NE loves not mark but Doug Jerry: ok, ok, I am coming Susan: de´peˆche toi, alors, pas dans dix minutes ! ‘hurry up, then, not in ten minutes’ Kerry (ne) marche pas AVEC UNE CANNE, mais AVEC UNE BE´QUILLE
Kerry NE walks not with a stick, but with a crutch ‘Kerry does not walk with a stick, but with a crutch’ (23) Jerry (n’) est venu non pas souvent, mais rarement6 Jerry ne is come NON not often, but rarely (24) a. b. c.
Possibilite´ / impossibilite´ De´pendant / inde´pendant Habituellement / inhabituellement
(25) a.
Pas un e´tudiant n’a dit quoi que ce soit Not a the students (NE) have said anything Il est impossible de faire quoi que ce soit pour elle it is impossible to do anything for her
b.
In Section 4.1.2, I discuss the status of pas un N as well as pas tous les N and show that although pas modifies un in (25a), it takes sentential scope, building a monotone decreasing operator in both its NP and VP arguments, while pas in pas tous les N only takes phrasal scope, building a monotone decreasing operator only in its VP argument. Pas un N is anti-additive; pas tous les N is not.
4.1.2 Monotonicity: pas un N vs. pas tous les N Under the functional view of Dets, noun phrases differ in that the denotation of a predicate is a function that takes the denotation of the subject referential noun phrase as an argument; the inverse operation applies with Qs. Monotonicity is a property of functions operating in ordered domains. If the function is applied to a bigger set and remains true if the set shrinks, it is a monotonic decreasing function, i.e. if the domain of the sentence shrinks, whatever is true in a larger universe is true of a shrunken universe. Formally, a function f is monotonically 6
Godard 2004 points out that the sequence non (pas) ‘no not’ signals constituent negation.
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decreasing iff it reverses the subset relation, i.e. f(B) µ f(A). This is exemplified in (26): No is downward monotonic in both its NP and VP argument. (26) a. b.
No student reads –/–> no human reads No human reads ! no student reads
Conversely, what used to be true remains true under a monotonic increasing operation. In other terms, we look at larger properties: F(A) µ f(B), as in (27): (27) a. b.
Some students are thieves ! some students are crooks Some students are thieves ! some people are thieves
All and every are functions that take two arguments. They are decreasing in their NP arguments (28) and (29), but decreasing in their VP argument, (30). The same is true of French tous les N: (28) a. b. b.
[[all the student]] is not included or equal to [[all the humans]] [[every student]] is not included or equal to [[every human]] [[tous les e´tudiants]] is not included or equal to [[tous les humains]]
(29) a. b. c. d. e. f.
All the students read –/–> all the humans read All the humans read ! all the students read Every student reads –/–> every human reads Every human reads ! every student reads Tous les e´tudiants lisent –/-> Tous les humains lisent Tous les humains lisent ! Tous les e´tudiants lisent
(30) a. b.
all guests arrived early ! all guests arrived Tous les enfants sont rentre´s tard ! tous les enfants sont rentre´s All the children came back late ! all the children came back (Beyssade 2006 :6, (28))
With non-monotonic functions, such inferences are not available. This is typical of Dets like most, exactly N, (31) (from Geurts and van der Slik 2005:99): (31) a. b.
Exactly five dots are scarlet –/–> Exactly five dots are red Exactly five dots are red –/–> Exactly five dots are scarlet
Monotonicity plays an important role in licensing NPIs of the any-type. NPIs are deficient elements that need licensing to be interpretable, i.e. they are dependant items. They are licensed in the scope of N-words, (32) (Klima 1964), but not only: NPI-licensers must be extended to at least fewer than N environments, (33). In fact, implication reversals are the right environments for NPI licensing (Fauconnier 1974). (34) illustrates the entailment reversing effect of negation: (32) a. * b.
Juliette sees anything Juliette does not see anything
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(33) Fewer than three men read any book (34) John walks ! John moves Not (John walks) <– Not (John moves) Hence, negation creates downward entailing environmements. Ladusaw 1980 shows that semantics can give the right result, (35). Monotone decreasing operators license NPIs, creating downward entailing environments (DE). Interrogatives (36) or conditionals (37) are not DE contexts: (35) a is a trigger for negative polarity items in its scope iff a is downward entailing (where trigger is the expression that licenses a) (Ladusaw 1980) (36) Did Juliette see anybody? (37) Tell me if Juliette sees anyone Licensing conditions of NPIs are then not necessarily negative contexts, i.e. the term ‘NPI’ is misleading, as such they are often referred to as Polarity Items instead (Giannakidou 1997 (a.o)). Zwarts 1995, Giannakidou 1998, Szabolsci 2004 show that many NPIs need weaker or stronger licensers: for instance, anytype NPIs are licensed in non-downward entailing contexts (38) (Giannakidou 2002b:6, (13)). Giannakidou 1997 (and subsq.), Zwarts 1995 show that NPIs are licensed by the class of nonveridical operators, from which downward entailing operators are a subset of, see Section 3.1.2.7 (38) a. % b. c. d.
Exactly three students saw anything Neither student saw anything Nobody but john saw anything Almost nobody saw anything
(Linebarger 1980)
Syntax also takes care of NPI licensing. NPIs have a transparent behavior with respect to their licensers: they must be c-commanded at spell-out by a monotone decreasing operator, and roofed at some point for interpretation (Ladusaw 1992), i.e. both syntax and semantics play a role in their licensing.8 NPIs are indefinites without quantificational force of their own (Heim 1982): they only contribute an unbound variable and a descriptive context. 7
Zwarts 1998 showed that negative Ops exhibit different degrees of negative strength (i).
(i)
Anti-morphic µ anti-additive µ decreasing µ non-veridical
8
The role of syntax has first been noticed by Linebarger 1980: in (i) any must be in the immediate scope of a decreasing operator and means that there are no earrings that she wore to every party, and not that It wasn’t to every party that she wore any earrings. (i)
She didn’t wear any earrings to every party
(Acquaviva 1997, (23b))
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Although c-command is a way to explain the dependency between a dependant item and its licenser, semanticists tackle the NPI licensing from a different point of view. An NPI can only be interpreted thanks to its licensers. As Giannakidou 2002b notes, NPIs of the any-type have a different distribution from positive polarity items – like some N – who typically receive certain interpretations in certain limited contexts. Because the type of licensing contexts for NPIs I am interested in is mostly anti-additive and anti-morphic contexts (i.e. negative contexts), I call them NPIs throughout.9 Monotonicity properties can be asserted separately for each argument of a Det. The pair in (39)/(40) show that all/tous, being monotone decreasing in its first argument and increasing in its second one, licenses only NPIs in its restrictor10: (39) a. All the students who had any luck will pass the exam b. * All the students who pass the exam must have any luck (40) a.
Tous les e´tudiants qui avaient quoi que ce soit d’inte´ressant a` dire ont participe´ All the students that had anything interesting to say have participated b. * Tous les e´tudiants qui ont participe´ avaient quoi que ce soit d’inte´ressant a` dire All the students that have participated had anything interesting to say
In Section 4.1.2.1, I focus on constructions involving the overt negative operator pas þ the adjacent (unemphasized) Det un ‘a’, yielding pas un N ‘not a single N’. In Section 4.1.2.2, I focus on constructions involving pas þ adjacent unemphasized tous les N. In both sections and in the spirit of Baunaz 2008, I look at their monotonicity properties to draw conclusions about their (internal) syntactic structures. 4.1.2.1 pas un N Un can have a numeral reading. pas þ un can also be idiomatic. Besides the numeral and the idiomatic reading, un N is potentially ambiguous between the indefinite and the specific reading (Chapter 2). I claim that un N in pas un N is an indefinite that is locally licensed by the negative Op pas. I conclude that the combination of pas with un N builds a monotone decreasing operator (anti-additive). 9
By the De Morgan Laws (i), anti-additive Operators are those that bear out only (ia):
(i) a. b.
10
:(A _ B) ¼ : A ^ :B :(A ^ B) ¼ :A _ :B
A function f is anti-additive iff f(A[ B) ! f(A) \ f(B). The same is valid for every (ex. from Geurts):
(i) Everyone who had any luck will pass the exam (ii) * Everyone who passes the exam must have any luck
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The sequence pas un N ‘not a single N’ involves unemphasized un N. The article un ‘a’ is arguably derived from the Latin numeral unus ‘one’, and can have a numeral reading in Standard French. Besides a numeral reading, un N is also potentially ambiguous between a non-presuppositional and a specific reading (see Ihsane 2008, Dobrovie-Sorin and Beyssade 2004 and Chapter 2 for details). I claim that un N in the sequence pas un N is an indefinite (in the sense of Heim 1982) that is locally licensed by the negative operator pas. First the numeral reading is available if un is focalised, receiving heavy stress. pas un N is not contrastive in (41): it does not mean that not one single student bought flowers, but two (or more). For pas to be able to negate numerals, the focalizer meˆme ‘even’ must be inserted, (42a). un in pas un N is not a numeral, (41), unless ‘meˆme’ is inserted, (42b) i.e., numeral un needs to be focalized to be interpreted as such. (41) Pas un e´tudiant a amene´ de roses not a student has brought flowers (42) a. * (meˆme) pas dix garc¸ons ont bu du coca Even not ten boys have drank of.the coke ‘not even ten boys drank coke’ b. Meˆme pas un garc¸on n’a bu du coca even not one boy NE has drunk of.the coke ‘not even one boy drank coke’ Second, pas un N in (41) is not a minimizer: when co-occurring with pas, object un N can be treated as a Nominal minimizer. Yet ‘there is a certain degree of idiomaticity, both in the choice of the N [(43a vs. 43b)] (. . .) and in the choice of the V [(44a) vs. (44b)]’ (Tovena et al. 2004:414). If not c-commanded by negation, it appears with a non-idiomatic (specific) meaning (45b). (43) a. b. (44) a. b. (45) a. b.
Il n’a pas dit un mot he did not say a word Il n’a pas bu une tasse he did not drink a cup ne pas prendre une ride NE to remain up–to–date ne pas avoir une ride NE not to have a wrinkle
(Tovena et al. 2004:415)
Il n’a pas dit un mot, (*c’est-a`-dire ‘merci’) un mot n’a pas e´te´ dit, c’est-a`-dire ‘merci’ (a word) NE has not been said (a word), i.e. ‘thank’
Pas un in (41) is semantically and syntactically different from (43)–(45): it is in the subject position and is not idiomatic. Non-idiomatic un N can appear
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post-verbally too, but it must be split from pas by the past participle, (46a), and must outscope negation. de N must show up when negation scopes over existential Q, (Godard 2004), (46b): (46) a. b.
Mika n’a pas vu (*pas) un cheval M. NE has (not) seen (not) some horse Mika n’a pas vu de cheval M. NE has not seen of. horse ‘Mika didn’t see any horse’
(9 > : only)
If the two un Ns are similar, un N in subject position should be able to take wide scope over pas. Contrary to facts. de N does not show up in (41). When preverbal pas modifies un N, it builds a monotone decreasing operator: pas un N is monotone decreasing in both its NP and VP, (47), i.e. constituent negation pas reverses monotonicity in all its arguments. It is also anti-additive: anti-additive functions are a subset of monotone decreasing functions. They have the following property: the union of two arguments corresponds to the disjunctive expression or in natural languages, (48) (Corblin et al. 2004). Ladusaw 1992 argues that monotone decreasing contexts as well as c-command license NPIs. The anti-additive pas un e´tudiant takes scope over the sentence, reversing its polarity, (49): (47) a.
b.
Pas un eˆtre humain a amene´ de roses ! pas un type a amene´ de roses Not a human being has brought roses ! not a guy has brought roses Pas un type a amene´ de roses ! Pas un type a amene´ de roses rouges not a guy has brought roses ! not a guy has brought roses red
(48) Pas un type fume ou boit $ Pas un type fume et pas un type boit Not a guy smokes or drinks $ Not a guy smokes and not a guy drinks (49) Pas un e´tudiant n’a bu quoi que ce soit ‘Not a student drank anything’ Semantically, I claim that, pas un N is interpreted as existential negation, (1a). i.e. pas lexicalizes : and un N overtly realizes 9. Un N is licensed by pas and builds an anti-additive Op that in turn licenses NPIs in object position, via c-command. In Section 4.1.2.2, I investigate the syntax and semantics of the overt realization of a negative operator (pas ‘not’) plus 8Q tous.
4.1.2.2 pas tous les N It is standard to assume that when scope items interact, ambiguity results. Yet (50) is marginally accepted when uttered with no special intonation:
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(50)
4 N-Words ??
Every boy didn’t leave
(Beghelli and Stowell 1997: (28a))
Despite its marginal status, (50) is ambiguous (Zeijlstra 2004:76) between two readings: it may mean not every boy left (inverse scope), or no boy left (surface scope). Zeijlstra also notes that languages like English, have the availability to paraphrase their ambiguous sentences by unambiguous – hence easy to parsesentences. (50), he claims, can be paraphrased by the unambiguous (51a) and (51b): (51) a. b.
no boy left not every boy left
The contrast can be explained in two different ways: either syntactically (B&S 1997, Zeijlstra 2004), or pragmatically (i.e. depending on the situation, one or the other interpretation will be favoured). Zeijlstra 2004:5 notes that ‘[. . .] in Standard Dutch, the only available reading is the one in which the subject has scope over negation [(52)], but Spanish e.g. has only a reading in which negation is higher than the 8-subject [(53)]’. These constructions are marginal in Italian (54) and ungrammatical in Portuguese (55): (52) a.
b.
Iedereen komt niet aan voor 6 uur (Dutch) Everybody arrives not PRT before 6 o’clock ‘Nobody arrives before 6’ Elke man komt niet aan voor 6 uur Each man arrives not PRT before 6 o’clock ‘Nobody arrives before 6’ (Zeijlstra 2004 : 77 (111))
(53) Todo el mundo no vino All the world neg came ‘Not everybody came’ (54)
?
Tutti non parlano inglese All neg speak English ‘Not everybody speaks English’
(55) *Todos na˜o vieram Everybody neg came
(Spanish) (Zeijlstra 2004 :131 (60)) (Italian) (Zeijlstra 2004 :131 (59)) (Portuguese) (Zeijlstra 2004 :131 (61))
Because cross-linguistic variations are observed in that matter, Zeijlstra favors the syntactic account (see Zeijlstra 2004 for discussion). In this section, I focus on pas in sequences involving a universal subject and the bare negative operator (cf. (50)), in non-FQ constructions, as well as in FQ constructions, with pas occurring either in sentence medial
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positions, or in pre-subject positions.11 I conclude that pas is not sentential and does not sit in NegP. Contrarily to pas in pas un N, the scope of pas in (56) is not sentential. When the negative adverb pas co-occurs with a 8QP, the unmarked reading is neg over 812: pas occurs either sentence medially (56a) or above the subject (56b). No particular intonation is put on either tous les e´tudiants or pas.13 (56) a. b.
Tous les e´tudiants n’ ont pas lu Government and Binding all the students NE have not read GB Pas tous les e´tudiants n’ont lu Government and Binding not all the students NE have read GB ‘Not every students read GB’
(56) means that among the set of students only some of them read Government and Binding: pas only negates the participant in subject position, not the event denoted by the predicate, i.e. phrasal negation is involved, and neither (56a), nor (56b) expresses universal negation. The whole constituent does not sit in NegP. Pas is a downward entailing operator; tous les N is upward entailing in its VP. Recall that pre-nominal pas reverses the monotonicity of un, building a monotone decreasing operator (Section 4.1.2.1). When turning to the sequence pas tous with the meaning ‘not every’, a similar behaviour is expected. Recall that 11
For some reasons, pas cannot negate chacun ‘each’ (see also Section 3.1.2):
(i) a. * b. * c. * d. *
Chacun des enfants a pas mange´ des paˆtes each of.the children has not eaten pasta Pas chacun des enfants a mange´ des paˆtes Les enfants ont pas chacun mange´ des paˆtes Juliette a pas mange´ chacune des paˆtes
The impossibility of negating chacun seems to be tied to its distributive status, whereas tous is ambiguous between a collective and a distributive reading (see Beghelli and Stowell 1997; Chapter 3, Section 3.1.2.2). For this reason, only sequences with pas and tous are regarded. 12 A sentence with a 8Q subject and sentence medial negation is bizarre (Zeijlstra 2004). Yet it is productive in spoken French and speakers give uncontroversial judgments: the only possible reading is (: >8). ‘When negation is present, it must take scope over the 8Q and its restriction, but not over the whole sentence’ (http://www.lexilogos.com/, my translation). Intonation is neutral on both items. I think that their awkward status is due to the fact that these sentences are hard to parse as surface structure suggests an interpretation in which the 8Q scopes over negation. Moreover, there is a much easier way to produce a clause with the same reading (: >8 ), namely by putting the negation in front of the universal quantifier at surface structure. In sum, I assume that clauses with an 8-subject are generally blocked by the existences of sentences like [(56b, my example)], where the interpretation is identical, but which are more easy to parse. Zeijlstra 2004 :187 13
If 8Q is stressed, then surface scope results (in the examples under discussion). I leave this open for discussion and concentrate mainly on neutral constructions.
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tous ‘all’ is decreasing in its NP argument, but increasing in its VP argument, i.e. it licenses NPIs only in its NP argument. (see (40)). If pas modifies tous, monotonicity gets reversed in all its arguments: pas tous is decreasing in its VP (57) and increasing in its NP (58). In (59a, b, c), pas tous can never license an NPI in its restrictor, i.e. it doesn’t take sentential scope (vs. pas un N, (59d)). (60) shows that the complex Q is not anti-additive. (57) a. b.
pas tous les gars sont arrive´s ! pas tous les gars sont arrive´s toˆt Not all the guys arrived ! not all the guys arrived early Pas tous les gars sont arrive´s toˆt -/-> pas tous les gars sont arrive´s Not all the guys arrived early -/-> not all the guys arrived
(58) Pas tous les gars de Gene`ve sont arrive´s ! Pas tous les gars sont arrive´s Not all the guys from Geneva arrived ! not all the guys arrived (59) a. *
b. * c. * d. (60) a.
b.
Pas tous les e´tudiants qui avaient quoi que ce soit a` dire ont participe´ Not all the students that had anything to say have participated (Pas) tous les e´tudiants n’ont vu quoi que ce soit Tous les e´tudiants ont pas vu quoi que ce soit (not) all the students have (not) seen anything Pas un e´tudiant n’a dit quoi que ce soit Not a the students (NE) have said anything Pas tous les garc¸ons dansaient ou chantaient ! Pas tous les garc¸ons dansaient et pas tous les garc¸ons chantaient Not all the boys danced or sang ! not all the boys danced and not all the boys sang Pas tous les garc¸ons dansaient et pas tous les garc¸ons chantaient –/-> Pas tous les garc¸ons dansaient ou chantaient not all the boys danced and not all the boys sang –/-> not all the boys danced or sang
If pas tous built a monotone decreasing (anti-additive) operator, the ungrammaticality of (59b) would be unexpected. Pas tous is increasing in its NP argument, suggesting that the syntactic scope of pas is much more local than with pas un, (59d). In (59d), the whole complex DP pas un N takes syntactic scope, licensing the NPI. Pas un N involves existential negation, is anti-additive (Section 4.1.2.1) and checks a negative feature against NegP.14 In (59a–c), though, pas is not strong enough to (i) take sentential scope, and (ii) license NPIs. Hence it does not move to SpecNegP, and no negative feature needs to be checked. In other words, pas in both sentences is not sentential, but phrasal. 14
It is standard to assume that French pas occupies the specifier position of NegP (Pollock 1989). NegP is above TP (Belletti 1990). In that position, sentential pas scopes over the whole TP/VP, i.e. the tense and the event denoted by the predicate, reversing the polarity of the clause.
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From these data, I conclude that the association pas with tous builds a complex constituent (that is non-canonical, in (56a)) and that pas operates locally, over the 8 operator only. If c-command is indeed a licensing condition on NPI formal licensing, then constructions with pas un N and those with pas tous les N must involve distinct internal structures. The position of pas in the sequences pas tous les N and pas un N is discussed in Section 4.1.2.4.
4.1.2.3 pas Is Parasitic on Qs In this section I focus on syntactic interactions of pas with Qs, focusing on FQ structures. I arrive at the conclusion that pas is parasitic on operators, providing more credits to the idea that the combination of pas plus un/tous yield complex Qs. Because sentence medial pas co-occurs with subject Full 8Qs, I conclude that it is parasitic on tous in this construction too. More precisely I propose that phrasal pas modifies the 8 operator in each of its occurrences. This analysis has two consequences: first, it entails that full 8Qs reconstruct, parasitic pas marking their basic position (see Bosˇ kovic´ 2004); second the co-occurrence of pas with tous building a monotone decreasing operator in its VP argument but a monotone increasing in its NP argument, should be analyzed as an adjoined structure. Just like non-FQs and FQ structures have similar truth-conditions. The same if true of pas modifying non-FQ and FQ tous: if the negative marker pas cooccurs with tous, neither (61a), nor (61b/c) express universal negation. Pas negates the participant in subject position, not the event denoted by the VP, and the unmarked reading is neg over 8, it is not all the children that have eaten the chocolate. The scope of pas is phrasal. As such, pas tous does not occupy NegP. The domain of pas in (61) is local, it operates over tous only. (61d) shows that pas cannot float off the 8Q, i.e. it must be parasitic on 8. I argue that the sequence pas plus tous yield a complex Q. Whenever pas and tous co-occur, negation is a modifier, just like the negative prefix in- in in-constant. This has a major consequence: full 8Qs reconstruct, parasitic pas marking their basic position; pas is syntactically to FQ.15 (61) a. b. c. d. *
15
Tous les enfants n’ont pas mange´ le chocolat (: > 8) ; *(8 > :) Les enfants n’ont pas tous mange´ le chocolat (: > 8) ;*(8 > :) Pas tous les enfants n’ont mange´ le chocolat (: > 8) ; *(8 > :) Pas les enfants n’ont tous mange´ le chocolat (not) (all) the children NE have (not) (all) eaten the chocolate ‘Not all the children have eaten the chocolate’
If full 8Qs must reconstruct, then they are interpreted in their base (A)-position: the argument of the verb is the associate-DP, over which 8Q adjoins. FQs cannot reconstruct, i.e. they must occupy a distinct position from full 8Qs, i.e. an ‘adverbial’ adjoined position. The argument of the verb is generated in a A-position (see also Baunaz 2008).
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4 N-Words
The relation between pas and FQ (or non-FQ) tous is insecable and no Q can be inserted in between (62). (62) a. b. c.
Tous les enfants n’ont pas pense´ que Jean aimait une femme All the children NE have not thought that J. liked a woman Les enfants n’ont pas tous pense´ que Jean aimait une femme The children NE have not all thought that J. liked a girl Pas tous les enfants ont pense´ que Jean aimait une femme Not all the children have thought that J. liked a girl ‘Not all the children have thought that Jean liked a girl’
If pas and tous co-occur, the domain of negation is restricted to Q, i.e. pas is a modifier for tous. The ‘not every’ meaning is never disrupted by the scope of the specific 9Q. The latter should be able to take intermediate scope iff pas were sentential, but specific une femme does not and only takes wide scope. Besides being truth-conditionally equivalent, (61) share another property with FQs: inserting a low adverb between pas and tous in (61a) does not preserve the relevant meaning. When it occupies a sentence medial position, the subjectoriented pas obligatorily scopes over tous. The sequence pas-tous does not get interrupted by neither a preceding, nor a following VP-oriented adverb. In (63b, c), pas obligatorily scopes over 8Q (square brackets indicate which item pas is interpreted with): (63) a. * Ils ont [pas pe´niblement [tous]] mange´ le chocolat they have not painstakingly all eaten the chocolate b. (?) Ils ont pe´niblement [pas tous] mange´ le chocolat They have painstakingly not all eaten the chocolate c. Ils ont [pas tous] pe´niblement mange´ le chocolat They have not all painstakingly eaten the chocolate If pe´niblement ‘painstakingly’ is inserted higher or lower than the sequence pas-tous, the sentence is fine, but crucially it cannot occur in between, (63a). In (64), pas and souvent are sentence initial (‘#’ marks comma intonation). In (64a), the sentential adverb souvent takes scope over the whole sentence, while pas clearly modifies tous les enfants yielding surface scope between the two operators. In (64b), pas modifies souvent and does take scope over tous les N. In that case, pas souvent means rarely. In (64b), pas is parasitic on the sentential adverb. (64) a. b.
Souvent (*#) [pas tous les enfants] ont mange´ le chocolat often not all the children have eaten the chocolate [Pas souvent] (*#) tous les enfants ont mange´ le chocolat Not often all the children have eaten the chocolate
If pas appears in sentence medial positions, the occurrence of another operator might break the relationship with the universal subject. Yet, a
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163
significant change in meaning is observable. In (65), the whole Q is fronted, while both pas and souvent are sentence medial. (65a) is ungrammatical with pas at the left edge of VP.16 In (65), pas modifies the sentential adverb, yielding the meaning rarely that in turn operates on the whole VP. As such, pas does not operate on the 8Q, and no interaction between the two operators arise: in (65b), tous les enfants is interpreted collectively, as a group and pas is parasitic on souvent ‘often’: (65) a. * Tous les enfants n’ont souvent pas mange´ de chocolat all the children NE have often not eaten of.chocolate b. Tous les enfants n’ont [pas souvent] mange´ de chocolat all the children NE have not often eaten of. chocolate ‘All the children did not often eat chocolate’ The sequence pas-FQ cannot be interrupted by the universal adverb presque ‘almost’. This adverb can modify the sequence [pas tous], but cannot be inserted in between. presque can modify the VP in (66) meaning that the children are eating, but have not yet finished, or [pas tous] in both subject and object positions (i.e. almost not all that is all have eaten), but not tous alone (67): (66) Les enfants ont presque mange´ the children have almost eaten (67) a. b.
(VP modification)
Les enfants ont (presque) pas (*presque) tous mange´ the children have (almost) not (almost) all eaten (Presque) pas (*presque) tous les enfants ont mange´ Almost not (almost) all the children have eaten
Whenever (and wherever) pas and tous co-occur, negation still is interpreted locally, modifying Q. Their co-occurence is never disrupted by the scope of specific 9Qs: if pas took sentential scope, specific un N should be able to take intermediate scope, but une fille does not and only takes wide scope, (68); if the object is non-presuppositional, the indestructibility of the sequence tous les N – pas is expected again, (69): (68) a.
Tous les garc¸ons n’ont pas vu une fille (i.e. Juliette) *(8 > 9> :) ; ( 9 > [: > 8]) All the boys NE have not seen a girl
16 For Genoveva Puska´s (p.c), given an appropriate context, (64a) is grammatical without ne, with pas scoping over the VP mange du chocolat only, and not over the event itself. This phrasal interpretation is not easily obtained (Christopher Laenzlinger, p.c). Souvent would be required to scope over pas in (68a), yielding a frequency of a negative action, i.e. with the meaning all the children often did not eat chocolate, which is bizarre.
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b.
(69) a.
b.
Les garc¸ons n’ont pas tous vu une fille (i.e. Juliette) *(8 > 9> :) ; ( 9 > [: > 8]) The boys NE have not all seen a (specific) girl ‘All the boys didn’t see a certain girl’ Tous les garc¸ons n’ ont pas vu quelqu’un * ( 9 > [: > 8]) ; ([: > 8] >9) All the boys NE have not seen someone Les garcons n’ont pas tous vu quelqu’un * ( 9 > [: > 8]) ; ([: > 8] >9) the boys NE have not all seen someone ‘the boys did not all see anyone (or another)’
The fact that both medial and initial pas do not operate over VP, but over tous only, suggests that the two items form a syntactic unit. When pas is clause medial, its association with a full universal Q is non-over: tous les N moves to SpecTP, pas indicates its base position. I conclude that pas is to tous what tous is to the associate DP: a modifier, and as such it adjoins to it. Pas tous lexicalizes a complex Q. The next issue concerns the status of pas resembling FQs, and not adverbials beaucoup or souvent. FQs range over individuals and quantify over DPs (i.e. an ec with a pronominal status). Pas does not, i.e. it does not select a restriction. Yet its semantic impact is on 8Q only, and this should be somehow expressed. pas resembles souvent ‘often’ and beaucoup ‘a lot’ in (optionally) occupying a sentence medial position. Contrary to FQs, yet, when DegQs are used adverbially, they take VP as their domain of quantification. Beaucoup must be distinguished from souvent in that the latter is a pure adverb that never quantifies non-canonically (see Chapter 3, Section 3.1.3). Unlike phrasal pas, Q-adverbs like souvent are adverbs ranging over times. They take VP as their quantificational domain. Local pas does not operate over VP: it has no influence whatsoever over the event/action denoted by the predicate, even though it occupies a sentence medial position and its domain ranges over Q. I propose that it builds a complex Q either with the adverb it modifies (yielding pas souvent ‘often’), or with tous. I claim that in the case of pas tous, it adjoins above tous, while in the case of pas souvent it adjoins above the adverb, creating in each case a monotone decreasing operator. 4.1.2.4 The Structure of Monotone Decreasing pas tous and Anti-additive pas un In Sections 4.1.2.1 and 4.1.2.2, pas is argued to occupy different positions in pas un and in pas tous: pas locally licenses un N, building an anti-additive Op which in turns reverses the polarity of the clause, while it only modifies tous. Pas un is a complex Q, in which pas negates un (see also Godard 2004, and Knu¨ppel 2001 for discussion). It involves un N. un in un N is not the numeral un ‘one’: pas cannot modify numerals, under a neutral intonation. I also argued that un is not a minimizer, since minimizers have idiomatic readings that are not found with pas un N. I claim that un is an indefinite, which needs binding for interpretation. As
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165
such it is bound by a relevant operator (which can be 9 in the case of positive existential un Ns). Because un is not bound at the VP level, or by another c-commanding operator, pas is inserted, licensing it.17 The scope of pas alone is phrasal. The combination of pas þ un builds the anti-additive Det pas un N. Pas is not parasitic on un, but a licenser. As such, it does not adjoin to un N. Because pas un N forms a cluster, I propose that pas occupies a position within the extended projection of the DP, i.e. Q (cf. Chapter 2, Section 2.1.5), as in (70), where FP turns the NP into an argument (Ihsane 2008). If NPI licensing needs semantic ‘roofing’ and syntactic licensing (Ladusaw 1992), then pas un N must occupy a position from where it c-commands quoi que ce soit i.e. SpecNegP. The scope of pas un N is sentential. I claim that the complex Q moves to SpecNegP, (71) The whole cluster is negative, so movement to SpecNegP is compulsory. (70) [QP pas [Q8 [þneg] [FP [F8 un [NumP [Num t . . . . [NP t garc¸on]]]]]]] (71) [CP [C8 [NegP [pas un garc¸on] [TP [T8 a [VP lu quoi que ce soit]]]]]] The sequences involve tous plus pas either on its left or on its right, i.e. they never trigger sentential negation, never trigger sentential negation, there is no NegP, and the neg-criterion needs not be satisfied. Pas is a((n) adjunct) modifier and not a licenser: it does not c-command the object NPI, so NPI licensing fails, (72): (72) a. * [CP[TP[DPpas [DPi tous les N]][T8ont [VP ti [V8 lu] [DP quoi que ce soit]]]]] b. * . . . [VP [QP pas [QPi tous [DP pro]]] [VP eci [V8 lu] [DP quoi que ce soit]]] c. * [CP[TP[DPi tous les N] [T8 ont] [VP [DP pas ti] [V8lu] [DP quoi que ce soit]]]]
17 Pas un occurs only in subject position (see also Godard 2004:354, fn.6). I tentatively propose that un N in pas un N constructions under discussion is the indefinite counterpart of de N ‘of.N’, the only obvious difference being that de N only appear in object position. In that position, pas is an adverbial and yields a non-canonical quantification structure (in the sense of Obenauer 1983, 1984, Doetjes 1997). Compare pas with beaucoup (i) , where beaucoup in (ia-b) is an adnominal Q, while in (ic) , it is a VP adjoined element:
(i) a. b. c.
Beaucoup de garc¸ons ont vu Marie A lot of boys have seen Marie Marie a vu beacuoup de garc¸ons M. has seen a lot of boys Marie a beaucoup vu de garc¸ons Marie has a lot seen of boys
a’. Pas un garc¸on a vu Marie Not a boy has seen Marie b.’ ——————————c’. Marie a pas vu de garc¸on Marie has not seen of.boy
Classically, non-canonical quantification structures have adverbials for Qs. (Sentential) pas is an abverb. The question that arises is that of the position of pas/beaucoup: is pas in pas .. de N moved to NegP, or is it base-generated there ? My analysis of pas un N favors the former solution; Doetjes 1997 argues for the latter (for Ihsane (p.c), de Ns in negative sentences are analogous to beaucoup de Ns, yet involving a non-overt quantity). I leave this for further research.
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The behaviour of pas vis-a`-vis tous in FQ and non-FQ constructions is similar: in the unmarked cases, pas and tous form a syntactic unit, with the meaning ‘not every’ (Nothing can ever intervene between the negative marker and tous). I propose that pas acts just like Doetjes’s tous does on a DP, i.e. as a modifier. Obviously FQs and pas are different in various ways: for instance tous are adverbial-like elements taking scope over VP, while quantifying over a pronominal element (pro). Pas does not scope over VP at all, and does not contain a nominal element as its restriction. In that sense, pas, unlike tous in FQ constructions, is not interpreted within the verbal domain.18 It is an operator, which takes scope over tous, without binding a variable.
Puzzle: Universal Objects and Negation The scope of 8Q subjects is ambiguous with respect to 9Q objects, (73). Yet even though (74a) is ambiguous, all the athletes as an object can only take narrow scope with respect to a doctor, (74b) (Brisson 1998). French is similar (75): (73) a. b.
Every man loves a woman All the boys read a book
(74) a. b.
A doctor examined every athlete A doctor examined all the athletes
(75) a.
Un docteur a examine´ chacun des athle`tes A doctor examined each of the athletes Un docteur a examine´ tous les athle`tes A doctor has examined all the athletes
b.
(9 > 8); (8 > 9) (9 > 8); (8 > 9) (Brisson 1998:124, (20)) (Brisson 1998:124, (21)) (9 > 8); (8 > 9) (9 > 8); *(8 > 9)
A word on object related parasitic pas is necessary: negating the argument of a transitive verb results in negating the event/action denoted by the predicate as well as its argument (76a). In (76c), pas only negates the 8Q however. (76) a.
Juliette a pas bu tous les cocas Juliette has not drank all the coke ‘Juliette did not drink all the coke’
18
Object-related FQs and parasitic pas share an important property: both can be separated from their domain of operation (the associate DP) by past participles. Object-related pas resembles tous in (i). Like pas, tous c-commands the object, suggesting leftward tous float and Neg raising: (i) J’ai tous voulu les voir I have all wanted them see ‘I want to see them all’
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
b.
??
c.
167
Juliette a bu pas tous les cocas19 Juliette has drank not all the coke Juliette les a pas tous bus Juliette cl.pl. has not all drank ‘Juliette did not sing them all’
Thanks to the data introduced above, the contrast in (76a and b) is not difficult to explain. (76a) means that Juliette did not drink the whole pack of bottles, i.e. 8Q is interpreted as a group (as in (74b)). So in (76a), pas takes wide scope over both the predicate and 8Q, i.e. it negates the predicate and occupies NegP. (76c) is fine with no special intonation, again with the relevant scope :>8. (76c) is not problematic within our approach of parasitic pas: pas adjoins to FQ.20 Parasitic negation also shows up in other languages.21 Spanish shows inverse scope when a universal subject and a sentence medial negative marker are involved, (77). The sentences in (78) all have the same meaning, i.e. not all the people came, though some did. The Spanish pattern is the same as with French object-related pas, (76) above. As in French, no todo does not license NPIs (75): (77) Todo el mundo no vino All the world neg came ‘Not everybody came’ (78) a. b. c.
?
No todo el mundo vino. vino no todo el mundo No vino todo el mundo. ‘not everybody came’
(Spanish) (Zeijlstra 2004 :131 (60)) (Spanish)
19
Pas tous les N as a cluster in object position is not easy to get. Out-of-the-blue, the sentence in (ib) is ungrammatical, and some context (if pas receives some light stress and pas tous les cocas is a subset of the set of bottles in the fridge) is necessary to improve the sentence (hence the ‘??’ in (76b)). The same contrast does not save pas un N in object position, drawing, again, a clear contrast between the two sequences: (i) a.
?
J’ai bu pas tous les coca, d’ailleurs, y en a encore dans le frigo ‘I didn’t drink all the bottles, besides there are more of them in the fridge’ b. * J’ai bu pas un cosmo, d’ailleurs y en avait plus dans le frigo ‘I didn’t drink a single cosmo, beside there wasn’t any in the fridge’
20
Two questions remain: (i) why can NegP be projected in (76a)? (while it cannot in (76a/b)) and (ii) why does object-related pas favor clause medial positions rather than within the DP? as said above, (i) and (ii) are related to the fact that tous les N appears in object position. 21 Thanks to Lorenza Russo for the Italian judgments, Antonio Leoni de leon, Oscar Diaz and Selja Sepa¨lla¨ for the Spanish judgments, Eric Haeberli, Yves Scherrer and Tom Leu for the German judgments, and Greg Ellison for the English ones.
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(79)
4 N-Words ??
no todos hablan nada ‘Not everybody say anything’
(Spanish)
Italian speakers do not really like non following 8Q, (80). The constituent negation reading is available with non preceding tutti (81a) and with preverbal non related to a postverbal tutti, (81b), like in Spanish and French object-related pas. Again non in non tutti does not license NPIs, (82). These data clearly indicate that no and non in Spanish and Italian operate locally when a universal subject is involved, i.e. Italian and Spanish also have parasitic negation. (80)
?
Tutti non parlano inglese All neg speak English ‘Not everybody speaks English’
(81) a.
Non tutti parlano inglese Neg all speak English ‘Not everybody speaks English’ b. * parlano non tutti inglese c. non parlano tutti inglese ‘Not everybody speaks English’
(82) *
Non tutti parlano niente ‘Not everybody say anything’
(Italian) (Zeijlstra 2004 :131 (59)) (Italian)
(Italian)
Non-NC languages display surface scope: German (Dutch) does not have the inverse scope reading; surface scope is preferred in English, (83).22 If not appears pre-nominally, as in (84), only the constituent negation reading is available: (83) a.
* b. ? (84) a. *
22
Alle Kinder sprechen nicht Englisch All children speak not English No child speaks English Not all children speak English All the children do not speak English No child speaks English Not all the children speaks English
(German)
Nicht alle Knaben sprechen Englisch. Not all boys speak English No boy speaks English Not all the boys speak English
(German)
Genoveva Puska´s (p.c) notes that with the right kind of intonation, German speakers do get the inverse scope (and contrastive topic interpretation as well). In this case, yet, it involves a particular information structure, necessarily different from the neutral information structure, which underlies the whole dissertation. See Molna´r 1998 and references cited there.
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b. *
169
Not all the boys speak English No boy speaks English Not all the boys speak English
Despite the fact that German and English exhibit (obligatory) surface scope, another crucial difference is observed: with nicht alle N and not all the N, NPIs are possible, suggesting that nicht þ alle and not all þ the N do not form constituents, contrarily to the sequences [pas tous], [non tutti] and [no todo]. (85) a. * b. *
Nicht alle Kinder haben jemals Englisch gesprochen Not all the childrens have ever English spoken No children has ever spoken English Not all the children have ever spoken English Not all the students have said anything No student said anything Not all the students have said anything
Zeijlstra 2004 relates the availability of inverse scope in (77), (78) and in French to the availability of NC. NC languages have their NegP filled by the sentential negative operator; 8Q, being generated lower, can take narrow scope (i.e. in their based generated position). In non-NC languages, no NegP is present. The negative operator is located within SpecvP, together with the subject. The negative operator in these languages is not devoted to a particular position, and as such the subject can take wide scope over the negative operator (see Section 4.1.2.2). Based only on the semantics of these constructions, I proposed that NegP is not involved in NC languages with subject-related pas þ tous (FQ or non-FQ), whereas it is with object-related tous.
4.1.2.5 Wrapping up I have shown that there exist constructions where phrasal pas is either parasitic on an adjacent Q (some sentential adverbs, tous), or licenses an indefinite (un, de N). Based on the semantics of these complex DPs, I concluded that pas un N and pas tous les N must have different internal structures, which, incidentally, influence their syntax at the level of the clause. On the one hand, pas un N is a complex anti-additive operator. I have proposed that pas occupies a position within the left-periphery of un N. At the sentence level, the whole XP moves to NegP, to check the negative feature of Neg8. From that position, it c-commands the element in object position. If that element happens to be an NPI, then it gets formally licensed. On the other hand, pas tous les N is not anti-additive, and pas is parasitic on tous. Just like FQ tous, pas is in a fixed position, as such it adjoins to tous. Since pas does not take sentential scope, NegP is absent. Pas does not ccommand the object NPI, and NPI licensing fails. Because existential negation is lexicalized as pas un, there are two possibilities as to the status of N-words: either they are also translated as existential negation,
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i.e. pas un N and N-words would be synonyms, or they involve universal negation. Because French N-words behave like 8Qs I argue they are translated as universal negation. In the next section, I introduce the classical properties discussed with respect to N-words. I argue that they are complex DPs, containing a negative operator and a 8Q, but with reversed scope pattern (86): (86) a. b.
N-words: [ 8 > :] Pas tous les N: [: > 8]
Taking seriously the parallelism between 8Qs and N-words, I conclude that N-words can (c)overtly realize derivations of the FQ type a` la Doetjes 1997.
4.1.3 The Negative Status of N-Words It is traditional to think that N-words express sentential negation, involving movement to SpecNegP (Zanuttini 1991, Haegeman and Zanuttini 1991, Haegeman 1995, a.o). Yet, nothing morphological indicates that French N-words are semantically negative, (90) (vs. Italian, see De´prez 2003)): (87) personne (nobody); rien (nothing); aucun N (no N); aucun des N (none of the N); jamais (never); nulle part (nowhere); pas (not) I argue for an analysis of French N-words as negative. A language is a Negative Concord (NC) language when the co-occurrence of two or more N-words yields a negative reading. A distinction is drawn between strict and non-strict NC languages. The negative sentential marker in strict NC languages has to be present (Greek), whereas it may be absent in non-strict (Italian, French). French is a NC language, as exemplified in (88) and (89): (88) a.
b.
Personne (n’) aime personne nobody NE loves nobody :9x 9y Love(x, y) Personne (n’) a rien aime´ nobody NE has nothing liked :9x 9y Love(x, y)
[NC only] ¼ Nobody loves anybody [NC only] ¼ Nobody likes anything
NC is clause-bound: the co-occurrence of two (or more) N-words in two different clauses yields a Double Negation (DN) reading i.e. two negative elements excluding each other, and thus resulting in a positive proposition: (89)
Personne ne croit que tu as rien fait [DN only] Nobody NE thinks that you have nothing done ‘No one thinks that you have done nothing’ (De´prez and Martineau 2004:5, (7c))
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171
Within the non-strict class, languages are not uniform: the sentential marker pas ‘not’ is excluded from the NC-system of French. DN in French is compulsory when pas co-occurs with another N-word, (90). DN shows up under an appropriate intonation only (see also Corblin and Tovena 2003). DN may arise with two N-words, iff the first (or the last) N-word is emphasized, (Corblin 1996, C&T 2003). This is illustrated in (91), with stress on the first N-word23: (CAPS intend to signify stress): (90) a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
(91) a. b.
Juliette (n’) a PAS vu personne J. NE has not seen nobody ::9x See (j, x) Juliette (n’) a PAS rien vu J. NE has not seen nothing ::9x See (j, x) Marie (n’) a PAS vu aucun des garcons J. NE has not seen none of the boys ¼ J. has seen some of the boys PERSONNE ne vient pas Nobody NE comes not ::9x Come (x) RIEN ne va pas nothing NE goes not ::9x Go (x)
[DN only]
PERSONNE (n’) aime personne NOBODY NE likes nobody Personne (n’) aime PERSONNE :9x :9y Love(x, y)
[DN only] (C&T 2003: 24 (80)
¼ J. has seen someone [DN only] ¼ J. has seen something [DN only]
[DN only] ¼ Everybody comes [DN only] (C&T 2003: 24 (83)) ¼ everything is fine
¼ Everybody loves someone
The DN reading shows that N-words cannot be licensed by sentential negation, i.e. they are not c-commanded by it (see also De´prez and Martineau 2004, for a similar observation). See Zanuttini 1991, Ladusaw 1992, Haegeman and Zanuttini 1991, Haegeman 1995, Giannakidou 1997 (and subsq.), Zeijlstra 2004 (a.o) for syntactic and semantic accounts of NC and DN in Natural languages. See Corblin 1996, Corblin and Tovena 2003, Corblin et al. 2004, De´prez 1997, 1999, Mathieu 1999, 2002, de Swart and Sag 2002 (a.o) for discussions on interpretation of multiple occurrences of N-words in French. A lot of research has been devoted to the negative status of N-words (see Zanuttini 1991 for Italian, Vallduvı´ 1994 for Catalan and Spanish a.o). 23
For Corblin et al. 2004, the co-occurrence of two N-words with overt restrictions yields Double Negation obligatory (see also De´prez 2000). To my ear and the Swiss French speakers asked, this sentence has a DN reading iff the first N-word is stressed, i.e. there might be linguistic variations, though I am not sure why it should be so. This question is left open for discussion.
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Giannakidou’s 2000 argues that Greek N-words are not negative, but 8Qs scoping over sentential negation. They are emphatics. She shows that emphatics should be distinguished from nonemphatics even if they display the same lexical realization. The two have different prosodic and licensing mechanisms: (i) only emphatics bear stress; (ii) emphatics cannot appear in non-negative environments (the sentential marker dhen must be present); (iii) they can appear in subject position above a negative marker and (iv) can be modified by almost; (v) they can appear in fragment answers; (vi) emphatics are clause-bound: they have to appear in the same clause as negation. Nonemphatics do not appear in these environments: (Greek) (92) I Maria *(dhen) enekrine kanena/ KANENA sxedhio the Maria not approved.3sg n. plan ‘Maria didn’t approve any plan’ (kanena-version) ‘Maria approved no plan’ (KANENA-version) (93) a.
Pijes pote /*POTE sto Parisi? (Greek) Went.2 g n-ever in-the-Paris ‘Have you ever been to Paris?’ (Giannakidou 2000:93, (9)) b. KANENAN / *kanenan dhen idha n-person not saw.1.sg ‘I saw nobody’ (Giannakidou 2000:95, (18)) c. Dhen idha sxedhon KANENAN /*kanenan Not saw.1sg almost n-person ‘I saw almost nobody’ (Giannakidou 2000:95, (19)) d. Q: Who did you see? KANENAN ‘Nobody’ (Giannakidou 2000:100,(28)) e. I Illectra dhen ipe oti idhe tipota /*TIPOTA the Electra not said.3sg that saw.3 g n-thing ‘Electra didn’t say that she saw anything.’ (id. :94, (17))
Despite clear evidence for the negative status of emphatics, the negative marker dhen is always required to licence their presence. As such, they are not semantically negative. The fact that DN is never found in Greek upholds this conclusion. Moreover, in elliptical contexts such as in (93d) or in co-ordinations, the elided material contains a negation that associates with the N-word when ellipsis is resolved. Hence, the emphatic item cannot be negative. They are 8Qs taking scope over sentential negation, while nonemphatics are negative existentials. Based on Japanese, Watanabe 2004 takes an opposite side and shows that Nwords in NC languages are intrinsically negative. His argument also covers Greek, both being strict NC languages. Evaluating Giannakidou’s argument about elliptical phenomena, he claims that ‘what is really problematic is a
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173
negative open proposition taking an affirmative open proposition as its antecedent for the purpose of ellipsis’ (Watanabe 2004:567). He shows that the elided material in (94) has no negative import at all: the answer is clearly positive. So the negative marker in the elided part does not do anything in fragment answers and coordinations, hence is semantically empty, if present at all. Hence (95a) can be an answer to (94), (95b) cannot: He concludes that N-words in strict NC languages are intrinsically negative: (94) Q: A: (95) a.
b.
Nani-o mita no? what-ACC saw Q Hebi. Snake Hebi-o mita. snake-ACC saw ‘I saw a snake.’ Hebi-o mi-nak-atta. snake-ACC saw-NEG-PAST ‘I didn’t see a snake.’
(Japanese)
(Watanabe 2004 : 568, (19)) (Japanese)
(Watanabe 2004 : 568, (20))
Similarly English non-negative questions cannot be answered by an NPI: if the elided material refers to the antecedent, then it must be positive in (96), otherwise anything would be licensed.24 (96) Q: A:
what did you see? nothing /* anything
(English)
French N-words must be distinguished from Greek on various points: Greek is a strict NC language, French NC is non-strict: in Greek the negative marker is obligatory when another N-word is present (i.e. they are dependant items); in French it is impossible, pas ‘not’ cannot co-occur with a N-word (de Swart and Sag 2002). French N-words do not bear stress. Another point of differentiation between the two languages is the fact that two N-words may create a DN reading in French, while only NC shows up in Greek.25
24
Thanks to Marcel den Dikken for this point. Italian seems to be halfway between French and Greek: as Zanuttini 1991 shows, N-words in Italian are Negative Qs, but the negative marker non is obligatory only when the N-word is post-verbal, but not when it appears with a pre-verbal N-word. In Greek dhen is always obligatory, and in French pas cannot show up. Another difference between the three languages at stake is the fact that Italian N-words can have non-negative readings, as in the interrogative sentence in (i):
25
(i) Ha telefonato nessuno? Has called anybody
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4 N-Words
These distinctions are related to the status of sentential negative markers in the two languages. Because N-words fulfill the tests proposed in the literature stating the negative status of a constituent, Mathieu 1999, 2002, de Swart and Sag 2002 (a.o) conclude that they are intrinsically negative (vs. De´prez 1997, Rowlett 1998). Following Corblin and Tovena 2003, De´prez 2003 (a.o), I claim that the negative part of N-words is semantic (vs. morphological), i.e. they are not NPIs. French N-words have the following properties: (i) they can appear in fragment answers (96)26; (ii) they cannot appear in non-negative non-veridical contexts, which have a non-negative non-presuppositional reading (i.e. NPI contexts, see Mathieu 2002) (98); (iii) they are anti-additive (99) and as such they can license NPIs (100); (iv) if two N-words appear in the same clause (101), they may give rise to DN readings27: (97) a.
A : Whom did you see? B: Personne/*qui que ce soit Nobody / anybody
(Fragment answers)
26
The presence of negation in the elliptical part is impossible, as (ia) illustrates, since pas ‘not’ is excluded from the NC-system of French, but compulsory in Greek and Japanese (Watanabe 2004). Recall that DN is extremely difficult with the French sentential marker, unless it triggers emphatic stress. The elided material must be identical to its antecedent (ib) (Merchant 2001). Hence, if the full structure is to be spelled out, only (ib) is grammatical.
(i) a. * Je veux marier Anne et/ou [je ne veux pas marier] personne (d’autre) I want marry A. and/or [I NE want not marry ] nobody (else) b. Je veux marier Anne et/ou [je (ne) veux marier] personne (d’autre) I want marry A. and/or [I NE want marry ] nobody (else) ‘I want to marry either Anne or I do not want to marry anybody (else)’ This analysis crucially relies on the idea that the elided material refers to its antecedent, i.e. je ne veux pas marier /je veux marier. Note that (ii) is bad because pas and personne cannot cooccur without yielding DN. DN is unavailable since pas occurs in the elided material (and as such cannot be emphasized), and the sentence is ungrammatical: (ii) *
Je ne veux pas marier Anne et/ou je ne veux pas marier] personne I NE want not marry A. and/or [I NE want not marry ] nobody (else) ‘I do not want to marry either Anne and I do not want to marry anybody (else)’
Hence (i) suggests that personne is intrinsically negative: if the elliptical part contains a negative element, the sentence is out if the negative element within the elided material is interpreted. 27 I have established that N-words are negative. When multiple N-words occur in the same clause, two readings are available: NC and D(ouble) N(egation) (the unmarked reading is NC. Yet depending on the intonation, DN can show up (see Corblin et al. 2004)). The question to be answered is how the disappearance of negation in NC is possible without losing compositionality. Since it is not the aim of this paper to discuss in details the semantic process of NC, I refer the reader to Ladusaw 1992, Zanuttini 1991, Zanuttini and Haegeman 1991, Haegeman 1995, Mathieu 2002, De´prez 1997, 2000 and de Swart and Sag 2002 (a.o).
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
b.
(98) a. * b. *
c. *
d. *
A : Which girl did you see? B: aucune /*qui que ce soit No one / anybody
175
(Fragment answers)
Personne /aucun des hommes n’a appele´? (non-negative) ‘Did anybody called?’ si tu vois personne, fais-le-moi savoir (conditional) if you see no one, let-it-me know ‘If you see anyone, let me know’ (Mathieu 2002: 249, (63c)) Je doute que personne vienne (adversative) I doubt that no one comes.SUBJ ‘I doubt that anyone will come’ (id, (63d)) Je suis surpris qu’il connaisse personne (factive) I am surprised that he knows.SUBJ no one ‘I am suptrised that he knows anyone’ (id, (63e))
(99) personne chantait ou dansait $ personne chantait et personne dansait nobody sang or danced $ nobody sang and nobody danced (100) a. b.
Personne / aucune des filles n’a vu qui que ce soit Nobody / none of the girls NE has seen anybody Jean n’a *(pas) vu qui que ce soit Jean NE has (not) seen anybody
(101) Personne / aucune des filles n’a rien dit Nobody / none of the girls ne has nothing seen (i) :9x 9y See(x, y) (ii) :9x :9y See(x, y)
(NPIs)
(NC) (DN)
Note that NPIs denote the lowest end point of a scale (see Fauconnier 1974): in (102), which is not a negative context, one can detect the existential reading. (102) Si quoi que ce soit vous de´range, faites-le nous savoir If anything at all bothers you, tell us (Corblin et al. 2004:429 (23b)) I have shown that N-words are intrinsically negative, and as such, are not NPIs The existential reading is never detectable with N-words (Corblin et al. 2004): N-words are licensed in anti-additive contexts only, i.e. contexts which must involve either negative Qs, or sentential negation (Mathieu 2002). In Section 4.1.4, I show that they syntactically and semantically behave like 8Qs, rather than 9Qs. The fact that the anti-additive Q pas un N discussed in Section 4.1.2.1 is the overt realization of existential negation suggests that N-words are not 9. A different conclusion would leave the optionality between pas un N and an N-words unexplained.
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4.1.4 French N-Words and Universal Quantifiers N-words can logically be interpreted either as 9Qs or as 8Qs, as well as being inherently negative or not. In this respect, various authors explored the possibility that French N-words are (at least) composed of an indefinite (see De´prez 1997 (and subsq.), Rowlett 1998, Mathieu 1999, 2002, Corblin and Tovena 2003 (a.o)). Based on various syntactic and semantic tests, Zanuttini 1991 and Giannakidou 1999, 2000 argue for the universal status of N-words of Italian and Greek N-words, respectively.28 Although French N-words arguably developed out of indefinites (Corblin et al. 2004, see Section 4.1.1), I argue that contemporary French N-words are not composed of an indefinite (plus negation, for some authors), but rather they show 8Q-like logico-semantic properties (see de Swart and Sag 2002, Corblin et al. 2004, Baunaz 2008 for discussions on that topic). I conclude that French N-words are composed of 8 combined with :. Taking ne indicating where N-words are interpreted, the examples below show that N-words are clause-bound, just like 8Qs (see Zanuttini 1991 and Giannakidou 2000 for Greek and Italian N-words). Crucially, personne in (103a) and (103b) are not trapped in islands. (103) is bad because neither subject, nor object personne can be interpreted in the matrix.29 Note that 28
Zanuttini 1991:138 concludes that N-words are quantifiers consisting of two semantic components, a quantificational and a negative element. While being one constituent from the syntactic point of view, they differ from other quantifiers in the language in having to satisfy the requirements of both their semantic components, the quantificational and the negative one. Hence, unlike nonnegative quantifiers, they have the requirement that they must raise to a position where the negative component can enter a configuration of Spec-Head agreement with a functional element of type X˚ which has negative features.
Greek N-words are not intrinsically negative, rather they are ‘polarity sensitive 8Qs which need negation in order to be licensed, but must rise above negation in order to yield the ordering 8 :’ (Giannakidou 2000:1). They can appear in non-negative contexts, unlike in French (see Section 4.1.3). She claims that NC languages such as Greek involve 8Qs scoping over negation. This order is finally obtained via LF-movement (corresponding to QR) of 8Q in a wide scope position. 29 These data contrast with Kayne’s 1981 examples in (i), which display a subject-object asymmetry. Yet, in the variety of French discussed here, there is no subject-object asymmetry with respect to LF-raising: the sentences in (i) are starred, i.e. French N-words are clausebound. (i) a.
b. *
Je ne demande que la police arreˆte personne I NE ask that the police arrest no one ‘I do not ask that the police arrest anyone’ Je ne demande que personne soit arreˆte´ I NE ask that no one be arrested
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177
(104) is ungrammatical not because a wh-word intervenes (creating a wh island for QR extraction of personne to the matrix, De´prez 1997)), but rather because personne is clause-bound. (103) a. * b. *
(104)
*
Je n’ai dit que personne allait venir I NE have said that no one would come Je n’ai dit que Jean a vu personne I NE have said that Jean has seen no one Tu ne te demandes quand voir personne You NE yourself ask when to see no one ‘you do not wonder when to see anyone
(De´prez 1997:57)
In (105a), une fille cannot co-vary with tous les garc¸ons. In (105b), une fille can take wide scope over the 8Q, but it can also vary with respect to the boys. In (105c), personne can only take scope over the embedded sentence and has no influence whatsoever over the matrix clause: (105c) is not negative. (105) a.
b.
c.
Une fille a dit que tous les garc¸ons e´taient sympas a girl has said that all the boys were nice (9>8) ; *(8>9) Tous les garc¸ons ont dit qu’une fille e´tait sympa All the boys have said that a girl was nice (9 > 8) ; (8 > 9) Une fille a dit que personne n’e´tait sympa a girl has said that nobody NE was nice (9 > :) ; *(: > 9)
Yet there are restricted syntactic contexts where both 8Qs and N-words can scope outside their clause (see Farkas and Giannakidou 1996 for Greek): restructuring contexts like subjunctive na-complements for Greek or non-finite clauses: (106) a.
b.
kapjos kathijitis frondise kathe fititis s’afti ti lista na vri dhulja some professor made-sure every student in this the list subj find.3sg job (Giannakidou 2000:107, (42a)) O Pavlos dheni theli [na dhi KANENANi] the Paul not want.3sg subj see.3sg n-person ‘Paul does not want to see anybody’ (id.106, (41c))
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4 N-Words
When embedded under infinitival complements of modal verbs, French N-words take matrix scope, (107).30 The presence of ne indicates where negation is interpreted and distinguishes between the two readings (De´prez 1999). Similarily, 8Qs can scope over the matrix whose subject is a 9Q, (107c): (107)
a.
Juliette ne peut voir personne Juliette NE can see nobody Juliette peut ne voir personne Juliette can NE see nobody Un garc¸on peut visiter toutes les filles A boy can visit all the girls
b. c.
(9 > 8) ; (8 > 9)
N-words display a behavior similar to the one characterizing 8Qs, (vs. specific 9Qs that are not clause-bound: they take wide scope). A property of N-words is that like 8Qs, they cannot be construed as predicate nominals (Giannakidou 1998, 2000), (108), suggesting that 8Qs and Nwords are generalized quantifiers of type hhe, ti, ti, whereas 9Qs can shift from type hhe, ti, ti to type he, ti, becoming predicative (Partee 1986, Giannakidou 2000): (108)
a.
*
b. c.
*
d.
*
Juliette est personne / aucune des filles Juliette is nobody / none of the girls Juliette est une amie a` moi Juliette is a friend of mine Juliette, Patsy, Edina et Louise sont toutes les amies a` moi Juliette, Patsy, Edina and Louise are all the friends of mine Juliette, Patsy, Edina et Louise sont chacunes les amies a` moi Juliette, Patsy, Edina and Louise are each of the friends of mine
That personne behaves like the partitive 8Q rather than the specific 8Q is upheld by the following properties: modifying chacun and aucun by presque yields the ungrammatical examples in (110), contrasting with the grammatical ones in (109). From this, I conclude that (i) 8Qs come in two different flavors
30
Scoping outside the embedded verb is only possible under modal verbs (i). In (i) no modal is involved: De´cider involves a control structure. As (ia) illustrates, if the ne is in the matrix clause, the sentence is ungrammatical, suggesting that personne cannot scope outside CPs, i.e. it is clause-bound. This fact strengthens my point. It also suggests that embedded clause under modals are cases of restructuring. More work needs to be done, though. (i) a. * b.
Juliette ne de´cide de voir personne Juliette NE decides C see.inf. nobody Juliette de´cide de ne voir personne Juliette decides C NE see nobody
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179
and (ii) personne is closer to tous les N than to chacun des N and aucun des N is closer to chacun des N31, 32: (109) a. b.
Presque toutes les filles ont mange´ des sushis almost all the girls have eaten sushis Presque personne n’a mange´ des sushis Almost nobody NE has eaten of.the sushis
31
The relevance of this test for us is to show that personne patterns like tous les N rather than chacun des N. Zanuttini 1991 and Giannakidou 2000 argue that Italian and Greek 8Qs can be modified by the degree adverb ‘almost’, just like N-words. In French toutes les filles and personne are modifiable by presque ‘almost’, (113); 9Qs aren’t (i):
(i) a. * b. *
Presqu’une fille a mange´ des sushis almost a girl has eaten sushis Presque quelqu’un a mange´ des sushis almost someone has eaten sushis
Although these data lead us toward the universal status of N-words, van der Wouden and Zwarts 1993 argue, on the basis of the contrast in (ii), that the lower N-word of a concord chain is interpreted as an 9Q. De Swart and Sag 2002 provide clear counter-examples to this conclusion (iii): (ii) a.
Presque personne n’a rien dit NC/DN Almost no one NE has nothing said b. Personne n’a presque rien dit DN only no one NE has almost nothing said (iii) Un vieil e´crivain nous a quitte´s sur la pointe des pieds sans que presque personne y preˆte attention. An old writer has left us quietly without that almost no one paid attention to it ¼ hardly without any attention (de Swart and Sag 2002, (6a)) Note that when presque modifies an N-word (or a 8Q) in object position, it gets ambiguous with a VP modification. presque can modify the VP in (iv) meaning that the children are eating, but have not yet finished. Similarily, the same phenomenon occurs with presque modifying completive aspectual tout ‘all’ in (v) (de Swart and Sag 2002, fn.4) (iv)
Les enfants ont presque mange´ the children have almost eaten
(v)
Tous ont presque tout vu Everyone has almost everything see ‘With few exceptions, everyone saw everything’
(VP modification)
(de Swart and Sag 2002, fn.4)
In that sense, when presque modifies a lower N-word too, it can take wide scope over the whole chain. As such, presque-modification does not tell anything about their existential status. See also De´prez 2000 for counter-arguments against this test as a diagnostic in favor of an interpreation of N-words as existential quantifiers. 32 (110) is not rejected equally by all the speakers consulted. A majority simply starred the two examples; a minority liked it. I do not know what to do with this difference.
180
4 N-Words
(110) a. * Presque chacune des filles a mange´ des sushis almost each of the girls has eaten sushis b. * Presqu’aucune des filles n’a mange´ des sushis almost none of the girls NE has eaten of.the sushis In this connection, personne has the distributive/collective ambiguity characteristic of tous les N, rather than the obligatory distributive reading of chacun des N. It can occur as subject of both distributive and collective predicates. Aucun des N, yet, behaves like chacun des N. (111) a. b. c. (112) a. * b. ?? c. ??
Tous les enfants se sont rassemble´s dans le parc pour manifester all the children ref. are gathered in the park to demonstrate Personne ne s’est rassemble´ dans le parc pour manifester. Nobody NE refl is gathered in the park to demonstrate Personne n’a entoure´ le chaˆteau. Nobody NE has surrounded the castle Chacune des filles s’est rassemble´e dans le parc pour manifester Each of the girls refl. are gathered in the park to demonstrate Aucune des filles s’est rassemble´ dans le parc pour manifester. none of the girls refl is gathered in the park to demonstrate Aucune des filles a entoure´ le chaˆteau. none of the girls has surrounded the castle
In Section 3.1.2, we have seen that 8Qs can enter ClLD only if they are interpreted collectively: tous les N can enter ClLD constructions, (113a); chacun des N cannot, (114a).33 In certain registers of French, personne can also be 33
Zanuttini 1991 claims that topicalization is a diagnostic establishing the universal status of Italian N-words. The data discussed raise questions in the light of recent studies on topicalization in Italian (Rizzi 1997 a.o). The Italian strategy corresponds to ClLD, as in (i): If proprio tutti i ragazzi is preposed in (ii), no resumptive clitic is inserted: (i) Gianni, l’ho visto John, cl. have.1.sg seen (ii) a. b*
Proprio tutti i ragazzi, ho visto really all the boys, I-have seen Proprio tutti i ragazzi, li ho visti really all the boys, them have seen.pl
What Zanuttini 1991 considers to be topicalized (proprio niente in (ii)) is probably not topicalized but focalization: proprio is a focus marker (Luigi Rizzi (p.c)); N-words cannot appear in this construction (see Appendix 2), (iib): (iii) a.
Proprio niente, ho detto Absolutely nothing, I have said (Zanuttini (1991:129, (213))) b. * Nessuno, lo ho visto no one, him I-have seen
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181
dislocated, (113b), see Appendix 2; aucun des N cannot (114b). Neither 9Qs, nor NPIs can occur in this configuration, (115). Both tous les N and personne are pronounced with rising stress; coma intonation is obligatory. In (113b) DN is obligatory34: (113) a. b.
(114) a. * b. * (115) a. * b. *
Tous les e´tudiants, je les ai aide´s all the students, I them have helped PERSONNE il fiche rien, a` Toulon Nobody he does nothing in Toulon (Zribi-Hertz 1994:137, (19a); from Mille 1908) Chacun des e´tudiants, je l’ai aide´ each of the students, I him have helped AUCUN DES GARc¸ONS, je l’ai aide´ none of the boys, I him have helped Un e´tudiant/*quelqu’un, je l’ai aide´ a student/someone, I her have helped Qui que ce soit, je l’ai aide´ anybody, I him/her have helped
Again, tous les N and personne behave alike. chacun des N and aucun des N cannot be preposed, suggesting, again, that personne and aucun des N have to be distinguished. A final property grouping N-words with 8Qs (and not with 9Qs) but making a clear distinction between tous les N and chacun des N, comes from scope interactions. Recall that chacun, which I analyze as a specific, distributes over un livre (partitive) in (116a) and un livre (non-presuppositional) in (116c) but cannot in (116b) as specific un N cannot vary (see fn. 66, 68, and Section 2.1.4.1, Chapter 2).
34
Similarily, Zanuttini 1991 observes that depending on the intonation falling on ‘topicalized‘ proprio niente, (i) gets different interpretations (see fn.33): (i) Proprio niente, non ho detto ‘I haven’t said nothing’ ‘I haven’t said anything’ (Zanuttini (1991:129, (214))) If there is ‘(a) primary stress on niente and a secondary stress on the finite verb ho, (b) a pause separates the two, and (c) niente has a rise and a fall on it, then the reading is that of double negation (. . .)’ (Zanuttini 1991:130), a reading normally disallowed in Italian. NC arises if ‘there is (a) primary stress on the preposed constituent and no stress on the rest of the clause, (b) no noticeable pause separating the two parts and, (c) only a fall on niente’ (ibid.), i.e. it is focalized. Yet speakers disagree on this last interpretation: some reject NC under the focal intonation: non being impossible in such a structure (Andrea Cattaneo, p.c). This needs to be worked out.
182
(116) a. Chacun des e´tudiants a lu UN livre b. * Chacun des e´tudiants a lu Ú un livre c. Chacun des e´tudiants a lu un livre Each of the students has read a book
4 N-Words
(8> 9) ; *(9 > 8) (8> 9) ; *( 9 > 8)
If Ú un livre moves past chacun des e´tudiants it crosses a specific Q giving rise to ungrammaticality. Partitive tous les N, distributes over partitive (117a) and non-presuppositional un Ns (117c), but not over specific 9Qs (117b): (117) a. Tous les e´tudiants ont lu UN livre b. Tous les e´tudiants ont lu Ú un livre c. Tous les e´tudiants ont lu un livre All the students have read a book
(8> 9) ; *(9 > 8) *(8> 9) ; (9 > 8) (8> 9) ; *(9 > 8)
W.r.t un Ns N-words behave exactly like with 8Qs: only specific un N takes wide scope over personne, (118b); (119a) is bad for the same reason (116b) is ungrammatical under the intended reading: only distribution over events is possible with specific un N (see fn. 66, 68, and Section 2.1.4.1, Chapter 2): (118) a. Personne n’a vu UN chien b. Personne n’a vu Ú un chien c. * Personne n’a vu un chien Nobody NE has seen a dog
(: > 9); *(9 > :) *(: > 9); (9 > :)
(119) a. * Aucun des e´tudiants n’a lu un livre none of the students has read a (specific) book b. Aucun des e´tudiants a lu de livre (8> 9) ; *( 9 > 8) none of the students has read a book The scope behaviors of N-words parallel those of 8Qs: personne behaves like tous les N, aucun des N patterns like chacun des N. The two tests (i.e. (i) clause-boundness; (ii) predicate nominals) illustrated above show that N-words and 8Qs do pattern alike. As such, they cannot be analyzed as being composed with an 9Q. The last three tests (i.e. (iii) presquemodification; (iv) distributivity vs. collectivity and (v) scope interactions) suggest that personne behave like tous les N, rather than chacun des N and that aucun des N is like chacun des N. Recall moreover that the distrinction is not a matter of collectivity vs. distributivity, but of presupposition (see Section 3.1.2.2). Having argued that the sequence pas tous les N consists of 8Q and parasitic negation, and that French N-words are intrinsically negative and behave like 8Qs, I conclude that the same holds of N-words. Since the sequences pas -8/ 8 pas is always interpreted as [: > 8] (in the unmarked cases) and that N-words mean that for all x, it is not the case that x the logical conclusion concerning the internal composition of N-words is that the order of operators is reversed inside
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
183
the constituent. The only semantic difference between these two complex constituent lies in their internal scope relationships, (120): (120) N-words: [ 8 > :] (121) Pas tous les N: [: > 8] The obvious consequence is that N-words and pas tous les N are lexically similar, they share the same features. What varies is the scope of operators within the constituents, i.e. it is a c-command issue. (120) also suggests that N-words are complex DPs. In (120) and (121), the neg feature exists by itself and is thus independent from the whole Q it modifies. In In other words, the scope relationship displayed suggests that : is above 8 in (121), but below 8 in (120).35 Crucially, neither (120), nor (121) is derived from the other. Both options are used in the language, i.e. they mean different things. In (120), the whole complex DP is spelled-out as one item, while in (121) both operators are spelled-out. Because N-words are clause-bound, and because they behave like 8Qs, I conclude that they have a 8 component as well as a negative one. As such, they cannot be analyzed as being composed with an indefinite. This conclusion is reached on syntactic and semantic grounds, where tests (i) and (ii) hold crosslinguistically (Zanuttini 1991 for Italian, Giannakidou 2000 for Greek) and tests (iii)–(v) are provided for French independently. The last three tests show that N-words are split into two groups: those belonging to partitive 8Qs, and thoses patterning like specific 8Qs. If French N-words are 8Qs, they should also trigger partitive and specific types of presupposition. 4.1.4.1 Existence and Commitment of Existence If N-words have a 8 component, semantic resemblances with traditional 8Qs should be elicited, notably in terms of presupposition. The presuppositional status of N-words is not new (E´. Kiss 2002, Giannakidou 1999). For similar examples, Giannakidou claims that no girls does not mean that there are no girls; rather it means that there aren’t any girls who came to the party in (122). N-words introduce discourse referents, and be antecedents for the pronouns elles and ils ‘they’. Giannakidou’s approach is in line with ours in that in ‘these cases the NP denotation need not be empty’ (Giannakidou 1999). (122) a.
35
Aucune des filles n’est venue a` la soire´e. Elles ont pre´fe´re´ rester chez elles. None of the girls NE is come to the party. They have preferred to.stay at home
I follow Kayne 1994 and assume that right adjunction is banned from syntactic phrase structures, being ruled out for c-command’s sake. Because scope is defined in terms of ccommand, right-adjunction of : is unwanted: if : were adjoined to the right of 8 in (120) and (121), 8 would not c-command it, the scope relationship discussed would fail, an unwanted result.
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b.
Personne n’est alle´ chez Miguel, ils sont tous alle´s chez Oscar. Nobody NE is gone at M’s. they have all gone to O’s. ‘Nobody went to Miguel’s, they all went to Oscar’s’
With N-words, I claim that the set the restrictor belongs to is not empty. The negative operator that negates the presuppositional restrictor provides the negative import. In terms of scope, this view involves a negative operator ccommanding the restriction, negating the presupposition triggered by 8.36 The partitive reading of N-words can also be highlighted with il y a constructions in contexts involving list readings: lists involve finite sets of alternatives (the presupposition is that there is a predefined set) (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.2). The associate DP in il y a constructions can be definite when the list reading is involved. List-existentials typically appear in enumerating contexts. Under a list reading, chacun des N is not licensed (123b)), because of a presupposition problem: List-existentials trigger partitive readings, but chacun des N is specific (see also Section 3.1.2.1, Chapter 3). Interestingly, partitive 8Qs, as well as personne can appear in this construction. Chacun des N cannot, and aucun des N is awkward. As opposed to aucun des N, aucun N would be perfect, though, in (124) (Christopher Laenzlinger, p.c). This is because des N involves a specific set, i.e. a known property, with no available alternatives. The relevant context for (123) and (124) is the following: there was a burglary at Tom’s place. The insurance agent is asking him to list all that has disappeared. Tom enumerates: (123) a. Tom : alors, il y a tous les bijoux, tous les parfums, toutes les toiles . . . Ok, so there is all the jewels, all the perfums, all the paintings. . . b. Tom : * alors, il y a chacun des bijoux, . . . There y has each of the jewels ‘There is each of the jewels. . .’
36
As such, this claim is very controversial, though. Indeed, (i) does not presuppose that unicorns exist (Marcel den Dikken, p.c): (i) There is no unicorn in the garden (ii) is ambiguous. Under a reading, the whole event of talking is negated; no presupposition is involved. Under another reading, it means that among all the people I know that were around me this morning (my colleagues), I talked to no one. The set is presupposed, but negated. (ii) J’ai parle´ a` personne ce matin I have talked to nobody this morning
My claim is that the universal part of the N-word involves a partitive restriction that is negated. It is that latter reading which interests me in this book.
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185
(124) a. Tom: alors, il y a plus rien a` Sara, plus rien a` moi. . . ‘So there is nothing left of Sara, there is nothing left of mine’ b. Tom : ??alors il n’y a plus aucun des bijous, plus aucune des toiles. . . ‘so there is no jewels left, no pictures lefts. . .’ I conclude that tous les N and personne involve intrinsic partitive readings (yet, see fn. 36, this Chapter), whereas aucun des N involves specific readings, like chacun des N. In other words, N-words have presuppositional features of partitive and specific types, just like the ones 8Qs display. Arguably, presuppositional features are related to the NP Q is associated with. This means that its interpretation is closely tied to the NP-argument Q is related to, not to Q itself.37 Hence tout e´tudiant ‘every student’ (litt. all.sg student.sg.) in (125) does not involve the partitive presupposition involved with tous les e´tudiants. In (125), the only possible reading is generic: in general every student has an ID. Incidentally the 9Q object cannot take wide scope. A third difference emerges: the restriction of tout in (125) is the NP e´tudiant ‘student’ and not a DP, as in tous les e´tudiants or chacun des e´tudiants (which is traditionally analyzed as chacun de þ les e´tudiants, i.e. each of the students, see Junker 1995, a.o). Note that tout N does not enter list readings, (126): (125) Tout e´tudiant a une carte de le´gitimation all student has a card of legitimization ‘Every student has an ID card’ (126) * Il y a tout le´gume dans la cuisine There is all vegetable in the kitchen What (125) and (126) tell us is that tout itself does not come with a partitive presupposition, and that the þ/ presuppositional feature is independent of the nature of Q. Personne semantically behaves like tous les N, rather than chacun des N in that they can appear in list-il y a constructions and with both collective and distributive predicates. Aucun des N behaves like chacun des N. Under this analysis, N-words are 8Qs with an intrinsic negative flavor. They behave like universally quantified DPs, rather than 9Qs. The fact that N-words have a 8 status follows from the fact that they are complex DPs, involving 8 scoping over :.
37
That presuppositional features are related to the restriction associated with Q is supported by prosody: recall that wh-phrases in-situ realize the restriction of an abstract Q; on them, stress prominence arises with specificity (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.2, as well as fn. 19, Chapter 3).
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4.1.5 A Typology of N-Words The idea that N-words are 8Qs has often been advocated for in the literature. Subsequently, different directions have been taken: either N-words have been argued to be intrinsically negative (Zanuttini 1991, Puska´s 1998, Mathieu 1999, 2002) or to scope over negation (Szabolcsi 1981, Giannakidou 1998 and subsq.). Among the languages discussed in Giannakidou 2002, two seem to display a similar behavior to French personne: Greek and Hungarian. Giannakidou 2002:43 argues that Greek N-words ‘are NPI-universals that have to scope over negation in order to be properly interpreted’. This claim is based on the fact that Greek N-words, as opposed to the homophonous existential Polarity Items under negation, are clause-bound, cannot license donkey anaphora, cannot be construed as predicate nominals, have the same scope distribution as 8Qs, and give rise to existential presupposition under negation. She also observes that Greek N-words can be topicalized. This is somewhat similar to French (see above). However, a major difference is that Greek N-words cannot appear without the bearer of sentential negation. i.e. they are not intrinsically negative. This conclusion does not hold of French, which has the exact opposite behavior: sentential negation is out of the NC-system (de Swart and Sag 2002, Corblin et al. 2004). This difference between the two languages is then a further piece of evidence for the intrinsic negativity of French N-words. Greek N-words are pure 8Qs, the sentence they appear in ends up being negative as a result of the presence of sentential negation. Similarly to Greek, Hungarian N-words behave like 8Qs (Szabolcsi 1981, Puska´s 1998, 2000, Sura´nyi 2002): they cannot be construed as predicate nominals and cannot license donkey anaphora. Contrary to Greek, though, they can also function as polarity items (PIs). Also, according to Sura´nyi 2002, N-words are ambiguous between an existential and a universal reading: Hungarian N-words are claimed to have a presuppositional and a non-presuppositional interpretation. A major difference between French and Greek is the fact that Greek Nwords are pure non-negative 8Qs. The meaning of (127) is negative, and is obtained by the sentential negative marker dhen, which takes scope over the predicate. The non-negative 8Q occupies a higher position: (127)
KANENAN dhen idha n-person not saw.1sg ‘I saw nobody’
(Giannakidou 2000:95, (18a))
Contrasting with (127), when sentential negation is inserted in French, a different result obtains (see Section 4.1.2.2): under a neutral intonation on both Qs (witnessing no special information import such as focus, topic or contrastive focus), the scope relationships between 8 and : in (128) is fixed: the negative Operator scopes over 8Q:
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
(128) a. b.
187
Je n’ai pas vu tous les garc¸ons I NE have not seen all the boys Tous les garc¸ons n’ont pas vu le livre All the boys NE have not seen the book
The difference between French and Greek N-words has to do with the status of their respective negative operator. In Greek, dhen is the sentential negative marker: it is obligatory and takes narrow scope over 8. In French, neg is allergic to negative contexts, but can appear in sentences like (128). In such cases, it takes wide scope over 8 only. French N-words are negative 8Qs, their negative import is internal to them. it is a phrasal negation, that takes narrow scope with respect to 8. Hence the difference between French and Greek is only a matter of scope. In Section 4.1.6, I investigate the internal structure of French N-words.
4.1.6 The Structure of N-Words The aim of this section is to provide an analysis of the internal stucture of French N-words. I argue that N-words involve complex Qs, each composed of 8 scoping over :. The main argument is based on the syntax and semantics of complex DP which overly exhibits 8 scoping over :, namely pas tous les N ‘not all the N’. This complex operator is not lexicalized as one lexeme, but involves two distinct words, which can sometimes be overtly discontinuous (see Section 4.1.2). Crucially, the negative operator takes local scope. In Section 4.1.2 I have argued that existential negation is overtly lexicalized by the complex Q pas un ‘not a’ and that pas tous is a complex Q, that sometimes exhibits non-canonical quantification: the sequence pas tous consists of 8Q plus parasitic negation and is always interpreted as not every. Because French N-words are (i) intrinsically negative, (ii) behave like 8Qs, and as such are interpreted as for all x, it is not the case that x, the logical conclusion concerning their internal structure is that the order of operators is reversed, compared to pas tous, yielding the order 8 > :. I elaborate on the results of the previous sections, namely on the idea that Nwords are negative 8Qs. As such the fact that they can display (c)overt FQ structures is expected. I argue that argument N-words indeed exhibit FQ structures, a` la Doetjes 1997.
4.1.6.1 N-Words Are (Covert) FQs In earlier stages of French, N-words weren’t negative at all and they could appear with a positive meaning even when appearing in the context of negation. Historically, there has been a semantic change, from minimizers to a negative meaning (Jespersen 1971, Rowlett 1998). Etymologically, aucun is derived from vulgar latin al(i)cunu, itself derived from classical latin aliquem unum, meaning, ‘a certain’. In old French alcun has meant ‘someone’, i.e. it wasn’t negative
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(from 950 circa) (see De´prez and Martineau 2004 for work on the diachrony of aucun). Personne is derived from persona (lat.) meaning ‘person’; rien comes from latin res ‘thing’. In the next sections I give a synchronic account of aucun des N ‘none of the N’, personne ‘nobody’ and rien ‘nothing’. De´prez 2003 points out that N-words are derived from countable nouns. Aucun des N : FQs and N-Words38 I focus on aucun des N ‘none of the Ns’. Aucun in aucun des N shows determinerlike properties similar to chacun: it agrees with the following DP in gender only (tous (but not all) agrees in gender and number) (see fn. 10 of Chapter 4): (129) a. b. c. d. e. f.
Tous les garc¸ons all. MASC.PL. the.PL boys.MASC.PL Toutes les filles all.FEM.PL the.PL girls.FEM.PL Chacun des garcons each.MASC.SG of the boys.MASC.PL Chacune des filles each.FEM.SG of the girls.FEM.PL Aucun des garc¸ons none.MASC.SG of the boys.MASC.PL Aucune des filles each.FEM.SG of the girls.FEM.PL
In Chapter 3, Section 3.1.1, I extensively argued – following Fitzpatrick 2006 on English, that although Qs are traditionally analyzed as D8, tous les N and chacun des N often co-occur with them suggesting a different analysis for 8Qs (Giusti 1997 (a.o)): classical Dets head DPs; 8Qs must be outside that DP. Aucun des N is similar, (130c). Note that like chacun, aucun takes des N as its ‘associate’, not NP restrictions, as classical Dets do (cf. tout ‘all.sg’, chaque ‘every’), (131a,b). Aucun des N is like chacun des N, it has a Det counterpart (131c). (130) a. (*les/ces) tous les/ces garc¸ons (*the /these) all the/these boys b. (*ces /les) chacun des /de ces garc¸ons (*these/the) each of.the/ of these boys c. (*ces /les)aucun des/ de ces garc¸ons (*these/the) none of.the/ of these boys
38
Aucun N is not discussed in this book, for the same reasons chaque ‘every’ and tout ‘all.sg.’ aren’t. see Chapter 1, Section 1.1.1.5. See also fn.12 of Chapter 1.
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
(131) a. * chaque les garc¸ons b. * tout les garc¸ons c. * aucun les garc¸ons
189
vs. chaque garc¸on vs. tout garc¸on vs. aucun garc¸on
Let us now turn to the question of the nature of des N in aucun des N : is it like des N in chacun des N or like that in partitive constructions (plusieurs des N, un des N)? Although chacun des N and un des N look similar, I argued in Section 3.1.1 that not all Qs appearing with de-DPs are true partitives. Various arguments in favor of a clear structural (and semantic) difference between ‘weak’ Qs (true partitives) and ‘strong’ Qs like tous les N/chacun des N have been put forward. The first argument is semantic: tous , chacun and aucun have a totality meaning, i.e. they are not semantically partitive (see Fitzpatrick 2006:179), (132). Un des amis de Jean est venu, mais je n’ai aucune ide´e si il en a d’autres qui viendront. ‘one of John’s students was there, but I have no idea whether he has others that will come later’ b. # Tous les amis de Jean sont venus, mais je n’ai aucune ide´e si il en a d’autres qui viendront. c. # Chacun des amis de Jean sont venus, mais je n’ai aucune ide´e si il en a d’autres qui viendront. d. # Aucun des amis de Jean n’est venu, mais je n’ai aucune ide´e si il en a d’autres qui viendront.
(132) a.
In addition to this semantic difference, a syntactic argument helps distinguishing chacun des N from true partitive (tous les N does not involve de – as opposed to all (of) the N). De can be separated from true partitives (133), though not from chacun and aucun (134) and (135) and de can be preceded by an overt noun phrase with true partitives, but not with tous and chacun and aucun.39 (133) a. b. c. d. (134) a. b. *
39
Plusieurs des e´tudiants de cette classe vont grader cette anne´e. Several of.the students in this class will graduate this year Des e´tudiants de cette classe, plusieurs vont grader cette anne´e. Of.the student in this class, several will graduate this year Un des e´tudiants de cette classe va grader cette anne´e. one of.the students in this class will graduate this year Des e´tudiants de cette classe, un va grader cette anne´e. Of.the student in this class one will graduate this year Chacun des e´tudiants de cette classe va grader cette anne´e. Each of the students in this class will graduate this year Des e´tudiants de cette classe, chacun va grader cette anne´e. of.the students in this class, each will graduate this year
I would like to thank Christopher Laenzlinger for checking these data with me.
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(135) a. b.
??
(136) a. b. c. * d. *
Aucun des e´tudiants de cette classe va grader cette anne´e. None of the students in this class will graduate this year Des e´tudiants de cette classe, aucun va grader cette anne´e. of.the students in this class, each will graduate this year Plusieurs livres de ceux sur la table devraient eˆtre range´s. Several books of those (books) on the table shld be put in order un livre de ceux sur la table devrait eˆtre range´s. one book of those (books) on the table should be put in order Chacun livre de ceux sur la table devrait eˆtre range´s. each book of those (books) on the table should be put in order Aucun livre de ceux sur la table devrait eˆtre range´s. No book of those (books) on the table should be put in order
That (133b)/(134b) and (136c,d) are ungrammatical is unexpected if de is partitive. Hence, de in chacun des N and in aucun des N is not partitive in Fitzpatrick’s sense, i.e. aucun des N and chacun des N must be structurally different from un des Ns and plusieurs des N. I claim that they are not heads, but modifiers (Chapter 3, Fitzpatrick 2006). The position of non-partitive of is not discussed (fn.27 of Chapter 3). The presence of an overt DP with 8Qs opens the possibility to FQ structures (Section 3.1.2.1). As a 8Q, aucun must have a FQ counterpart. Indeed, aucun des N can appear in FQ constructions, when object related (137) vs. (138). Aucun takes des N as DP associate, which moves and leaves Q in-situ. Just like other object-related FQs, the moved associate is a clitic: en-cliticisation is obligatory, (138c). (137) a.
b. * (138) a.
b.
Aucun des enfants n’a lu le livre none of the children NE has read the book ‘None of the children read the book’ Les enfants ont aucun lu le livre The children has none read the book Je n’ai souleve´ aucun des pianos I NE has lifted none of the pianos ‘I didn’t lift none of the pianos’ Je n’en ai (*aucun) souleve´ *(aucun) A NE cl. have (none) lifted (none) ‘I didn’t lift any’
De´prez 1998:5 observes that cliticization of the French clitic en can trigger participle agreement in transitive constructions: (139b) means that from the set of chairs, I painted none of them, i.e. the set of chairs – to which en refers – is known, hence specific. (139) is reminiscent of FQ structures involving chacun (see also De´prez and Martineau 2004:13):
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
(139)
a.
Je n’ai peint aucune des chaises I NE have painted none of.the chairs ‘I painted none of the chairs’ Je n’en ai peinte aucune I NE cl. have painted.fem. none ‘I painted none of them’
b.
(140)
191
a.
b. *
Un clown a souleve´ chacun des pianos. a clown has lifted each of-the pianos ‘A clown lifted each of the pianos.’ Un clown les a (*chacun) souleve´s *(chacun) A clown them has (each) lifted (each) (Puska´s 2002 : 108(8))
Because aucun des N Shares a similar syntax (locality) and semantics (presupposition) with chacun des N, I propose that they are essentially composed of an adnominal negative 8Q and an overt DP-associate (des N). In that sense, aucun des N must necessarily have a different internal structure from overt partitives like un des N. This last claim is challenging and raises the following question: why is it that in negative FQ structures, en-cliticisation obligatorily shows up (138c), (as in true partitives), but it does not with non-negative FQ constructions (140c)? To tackle this (potential) problem, I would like to go back to Chapter 3 for a while. In Section 3.1.3, Doetjes’ observation on DQs was used in order to make a clear distinction between FQs and beaucoup de N ‘a lot’ constructions. D(egree) Qs (DQs) are ambiguous: they can be adnominal, quantifying over Ns (ia), or adverbial, quantifying over VP, (ib). Doetjes claims that inserting en un jour ‘in one day’ distinguishes between the two readings. Whereas beaucoup can quantify either over individuals or over events, tous only quantifies over the closest individual it is related to, even when floated. Doetjes treats adverbial beaucoup and FQ tous as occupying adverbial positions, but clearly states that they should be semantically distinguished. Whereas beaucoup can function as an adverb (i.e. like souvent ‘often’), floated tous cannot. Beaucoup must be contrasted from plusieurs, un des N, chacun des N, aucun des N who are Qs restricted to the nominal domain only. Plusieurs, un, aucun and chacun do not appear sentence medially, but they have to stay in-situ. As such they all behave alike, (141). When the DPassociate is pronominalised, it gets cliticized onto the finite verb in the four cases, (141b–e). (141) a. b. c.
Juliette en a beaucoup chante´. J. CL.GEN has a lot sung Juliette en a (*plusieurs) chante´es *(plusieurs). J, CL.GEN has (several) sung (several) Juliette en a (*une) chante´e *(une). CL.GEN has (one) sung (one) J.
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d. e.
Juliette en a (*aucune) chante´es *(aucune). J. CL.GEN has (none) sung (none) Juliette les a (*chacune) chante´es *(chacune). CL.ACC has (each) sung (each) J.
That en shows up in (141a,b) is expected: de in un/plusieurs des N heads a PP and is partitive. En-cliticisation involves short extraction of the PP to a position within the same TP. The DP-associate of chacun is the only one showing up with accusative case. This fact is expected, too, de in chacun des N is different from de in un/plusieurs des N, it heads a DP. The semantic and syntactic differences between the two types of Qs have been extensively discussed in Chapter 3, Section 3.1.3. What is less expected, though, is that en also appears with aucun: I have extensively claimed in this chapter, Section 4.1.4, this section, that aucun des N is semantically and syntactically the negative version of chacun des N and not of un des N. As such, what is pronominalized in (141d) should be of the same kind as what is pronominalized in (141e): a DP. From this I conjecture that something in (141d) appears to turn the accusative case into a genitive case. The only difference between (141d) and (141e) being the negative import of aucun in (141d), I would like to propose that en in (141d) is of a different sort from en in (141b, c): it is activated by negation.40 I conclude that aucun des N is like chacun des N and that both Qs display FQ structures of the same kind, which must be distinguished from the structures displayed by un des N and plusieurs des N. En with aucun is a kind of ‘negative accusative’ and the pronominalisation of its DP-associate; en with un des N and plusieurs des N is a plain genitive. If this distinction is correct, then, the two groups must necessary have a distinct syntax. Since they show overt FQ structures, a natural analysis is to assimilate them to the FQ structures discussed above. Recall again Doetjes’ analysis: tous is an adnominal Q, selecting pro as its restriction. The whole FQ occupies an adjoined position i.e. FQs are VPadjoined (or adjoined to any position where it c-commands a member of its chain, i.e. the A-moved DP it quantifies over). As such, the complex [FQ Q þ pro] 40
In Russian, direct objects can be in Accusative or Genitive if the sentence contains negation. Generally, referential DPs do not receive Genitive in this configuration, though, and only accusative case shows up (Babyonyshev 1996, Pereltsvaig 1999, a.o), (i). In a footnote, Harves 2002 provides (ii), where Genitive is assigned to the referential DP Masha: (i) a.
b. *
Vanja ne procˇital Vojnu i Mir. Vanya NEG read War and Peace-ACC ‘Vanya didn’t read War and Peace’ Vanja ne procˇital Vojnu i Mira. Vanya NEG read War and Peace-GEN (Babyonyshev 1996:145)
(ii) Ja ne nasˇ el Masˇ i / Masˇ u. I NEG found Masha-GEN /Masha-ACC
(Harves 2002)
Whether there are semantic differences in (ii) is unclear and left for future reseach.
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
193
serves as an adverbial to the VP. The same analysis holds of chac-un. Since prosody, semantics and their external syntax push toward an analysis of aucun des N as a 8Q, I claim that the internal structure of aucun des N involves FQ, intrinsically negative (spelled out as aucun, where -un is the restriction), plus a DP associate, des N. Strictly speaking, en-cliticisation in (139b) is like lescliticisation in (140c). I tentatively claim that en in such structures shows up as an effect of genitive under negation. In other words, en in (139b) is not like en in (141). In FQ constructions, the DP-associate (which is the extension of the restriction: recall that –un, like pro in FQ structures of tous-type, semantically and syntactically mediates the relationship between FQ and its DP-associate) cliticises onto the finite verb and the quantificational part is obligatorily merged to an XP (Doetjes 1997). (142) a. b. c.
aucune des chaises : [DP [FQaucunei] [DPdes chaisesi]] aucun : [QP 8 [qP : [DP un]]] en . . . aucune : enij . . . [XP [FQ:]j . . . [DP tj ]]
Thanks to -un, locality effects observed with FQ constructions and the rise of agreement between FQ and its associate are explained. Agreement arises as a result of binding. Obviously, the DP-associate (be it des chaises or non-overtly realised) is not itself negative, yet en shows up when des chaises is cliticised. I propose that en witnesses Agree of the negative FQ and its DP-associate, which gets negative through agree with FQ, much like agreement arises. I claim that aucun lexicalizes 8Q plus the negative operator, through- Agree, agreement shows up. en being the result of genitive under negation shows up after cliticisation. It is well-known that negation gives rise to inner island effects (Pesetsky 1987, Rizzi 1990 a.o). A natural question at this point is why no inner island effect in (142) arises. The answer is simple and has to do with the availability of extraction out of weak Islands (eWI), discussed in details by Starke 2001 for French. Only elements that involve existential presupposition can escape WIs. Above I came to the conclusion that N-words are negative 8Qs. I have also shown that their restrictions have some semantic import, presupposition. In the case of des chaises, I have shown that the presupposition involved is of the specificity type. The negative operator is intrinsically part of Q. Together they lexicalize, resulting in the lexical item aucun. Hence no inner island effect arises. Finally note that the restriction is not stressed (see Chapter 3, Section 3.1.2.1) and un is unemphazised. In other words, prosody does not give any indication about the presuppositional status of aucun des N. This information must be lexical.
personne and rien Argument N-words do not necessarily appear with DP-associates. Personne ‘nobody’ and rien ‘nothing’ are bare N-words. I argue that they are composed of FQ plus a silent DP-associate.
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4 N-Words
The bare [-animate] [-human] version of personne, namely rien cannot occur post-verbally when in object position (143). This can be seen in complex tense constructions: rien always occurs clause medially when in object position. (147) is highly reminiscent of the position of object related tous, (144)41: (143) a.
Je (n’) ai rien vu I NE have nothing seen ‘I saw nothing’ b.* Je (n’) ai vu rien I NE have seen nothing
[unless rien is emphasized]
(144) Je les ai tous vus I cl. have all seen ‘I have seen them all’ I would like to give a similar analysis for the distribution of both rien in (143) and tous in (144). (144) has been accounted for in Chapter 3, Section 3.1.3, under Doetjes’ approach to FQs: the presence of a FQ is licensed only if it can bind an empty category (ec). In the spirit of recent works by Kayne (see Kayne 2007 a.o), I claim that rien realizes the adjoined negative FQ that binds an abstract THING element (ec) in object position of the finite verb, as in no-thing (145), with which it agrees. When rien is in subject position, either a covert FQ structure similar to (145) is displayed, with the DP-associate generated within VP, successively moved to the subject position, the FQ being merged above IP; or rien and the abstract DP-associate have a structure similar to full 8Qs, as in (146). (145) rien : [VP [QP 8 [QP:NO] [DP pro]]i . . . [VP [DP THINGi ]]] (146) rien : [DP [QPi 8 [QP :NO]] [DPi THING]] Before taking one stand over the other, let’s look at personne ‘nobody’, which differs from rien in that it cannot float in standard French (147a). Yet in some varieties of (Swiss) French, personne can appear either in clause medial position, like rien, (143a), or in argument position (147b), i.e. two structures are possible: (i) a negative Full 8Q (as in (147a)), and (ii) a negative FQ (as in (147b)). (147) a. b.
J’ai (*personne) vu *(personne) J’ai (personne) vu (personne) I have (nobody) seen (nobody) ‘I didn’t see anybody’
(standard French) (varieties of Swiss French)
Because the complex Q personne is the negative version of tous les N, I propose that it involves a null BODY as its DP-associate (as in no-body). Either BODY is 41
Thanks to Marcel den Dikken and Genoveva Puska´s for pointing this out to me.
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
195
bound by a negative FQ, witnessing a FQ structure (148b), or : is adjoined above it, as with universal Q (148c). Since ‘:’ is phrasal, i.e. it takes scope over the restriction (pro the overt restriction), which gets bound by 8. Default agreement results (3rd.p.sg). So when the FQ construction is covert, what counts is that the associate DP be non-overt. In (148), the restriction is nonovert. i.e. it cannot be stressed (vs. wh-phrases in-situ and un Ns, see Chapter 2). (148) a. b. c.
personne : [XP [FQ:NO]i [XP . . . [DP BODYi ]]] (FQ, (153b)) personne : [XP [QP 8 [:NO][pro]]i [XP . . .[DP BODYi ]]] (FQ, (153b)) [DP [QPi 8 [QP :NO]] [DPi BODY]] (full DP structure (153a))
Since : is phrasal, it takes local scope on the restriction, pro, which in turn gets bound by 8. Default agreement (3rd.p.sg) arises only when personne is in subject position. The FQ construction is only overtly found in the Swiss dialect of French. The issue of N-word in subject position arises: are they FQ or non-FQ? That N-words are composed of a FQ adjoined to IP when subject related can explain why they are impossible in (149)–(153), whereas full 8Qs are fine in such a construction: I-to-C movement his blocked by IP-adjunction (Kayne 1984), i.e. both overt FQs and covert ones are banned in Stylistic Inversion.42 That personne and rien are impossible in Stylistic Inversion has been observed by De´prez 2000. Qu’a dit Fred au meeting de Se´gole`ne ? Qu’a dit personne au meeting de Se´gole`ne? Qu’ont dit tous les garc¸ons au meeting de Se´gole`ne? What have said Fred/ nobody /all the boys at meeting of S. ‘What did Fred/nobody/all the boys said at Se´gole`ne’s meeting ?’
(149) a. b. * c.
(150) a.
b. * c.
(151) a.
b. *
42
D’ou` est-ce que te´le´phone Juliette ? From where is-it-that calls Juliette ‘From where does Juliette call?’ D’ou` est-ce que ne te´le´phone personne? From where is-it-that NE calls nobody D’ou` est-ce que te´le´phonent tous les garcons ? From where is-it-that call all the boys ‘From where do all the boys call?’ Dimanche est le jour ou` partira Juliette Sunday is the day where will.leave Juliette ‘Sunday is the days where Juliette will leave’ Dimanche est le jour ou` (ne) partira personne Sunday is the day where NE will.leave nobody
Thanks to Marcel den Dikken (p.c) for pointing this out to me.
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c.
(152) a.
b. *
c. ?
(153) a.
b. *
c. *
d. *
Dimanche est le jour ou` partiront toutes les filles Sunday is the day where will.leave all the girls ‘Sunday is the day where all the girls will leave’ N’a te´le´phone´ que Juliette NE has called that Juliette ‘Only Juliette called’ N’a te´le´phone´ que personne NE has called that nobody ‘Only nobody called’ N’ont te´le´phone´ que toutes les filles NE have called that all the girls ‘Only all the girls called’ Rien ne changera dimanche Nothing NE will.change Sunday ‘Nothing will change on Sunday’ Quand est-ce que ne changera rien ? when is-it-that NE will.change nothing ‘When will nothing change?’ Dimanche est le jour ou` ne changera rien Sunday is the day where ne will.change nothing ‘Sunday is the day where nothing will change’ N’a change´ que rien NE has changed that nothing ‘Only nothing will change’
What this suggests is that when personne and rien are in subject position, the combination of 8 plus : is adjoined to TP, yielding a FQ structure. The DPassociate occupies the specifier of the subject position, i.e. an A-position. This contrasts with N-words with overt DP-associates like aucun des N43: (154) a
Dimanche est le jour ou` (ne) partira aucun des garc¸ons Sunday is the day where NE will.change none of the boys ‘Sunday is the day where none of the boys will change’
43
Thanks to Genoveva Puska´s for confirming this point. Note though, that (i) is ungrammatical: (i) *
N’a telephone´ qu’aucun des garc¸ons NE has called only none of the boys ‘Only none of the boys called’
The status of (i) might have to do with its ‘only’ flavor, i.e. the ungrammaticality of (i) would have to do with the semantics attributed to restrictive clauses in French.
4.1 Introduction: N-Words
b.
197
D’ou` est-ce que ne telephonera aucun des garc¸ons? From where is-it-that call none of the boys ‘From where does none of the boys call?’
Aucun des N, tous les N are compatible with Stylistic Inversion, suggesting that their quantificational part is not adjoined to TP. The idea I tentatively bring up is that full Qs are complex DPs that need to check formal features under SpecTP, whereas FQ constructions with null DP-associates do not. Two remaining issues need to be worked out though: (i) why should it be so? (ii) the optionality of FQs and non-FQs constructions. I unfortunately have no answer (See Valmala 2008 for recent work on the information structures of FQs in Spanish). An other argument in favor of covert FQ constructions with subject related N-words comes from the fact that wh-movement past these items results in Strong Crossover effects (SCO). FQs are composed of Q plus non-phonologically realized restrictions, pro. Fizpatrick argues that pro is a pronoun, equivalent to them. FQ roughly means ‘all of them’ (see Section 3.1.3). He also shows that wh-movement past all of them in (155a) gives rise to SCO effects. Recall that if [all pro] is like [all (of) them], A’-movement is predicted to give rise to the same effect in (155b), but not in (155c), since in (155c), A-movement occurs: (155) a. * b. * c.
Which studentsi did all of themi see ti ? (Fitzpatrick 2006:64, (56)) Which studentsi did [VP[all proi][VP see ti ]]? [the student]i will have [VP [all proi]] [VP ti had lunch]] (Fitzpatrick 2006:66, (60))
If subject related N-words involve a negative FQ, SCO effects are expected in (156). If personne and rien are not coindexed with the wh, both sentences are grammatical, (157): (156) a. * b. * c. * (157) a. b.
Quii est-ce que [personne proi] n’a vu ti? Who is it that nobody NE has seen Quii est-ce que [rien proi] n’arrange ti ? who is it that nothing NE suits Quii est-ce que [personne d’euxi] n’a vu ti? who is it that nobody of them NE has seen Quii est-ce que personnej n’a vu ti? Who is it that nobody NE has seen Quii est-ce que rienj n’arrange ti ? who is it that nothing NE suits
Argument N-words have some kind of pronominal status in French. This status is, I claim, a reflexion of their FQ construction.
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To sum up what this section tells us is that personne and rien show (c)overt FQ constructions a` la Doetjes 1997, as well as full universal negative DPs when in postverbal positions, while aucun DP shows overt FQ structures.
4.1.7 Conclusion Chapter 4 has investigated the nature(s) and the meaning(s) of N-words in French. Taking into account syntax, semantics, and to some extent prosody, I have elaborated a new and detailed characterization of these elements. Although they developed out of non-negative indefinites (Jespersen 1917, Corblin et al. 2004), I argue that contemporary N-words are negative universal quantifiers. At the clausal level, N-words are clause bound, anti-additive and license NPIs in object position. I argued that they have (potential) FQ structures, with their associate-DP undergoing clause-bound A-movement, i.e. their clause-boundnedess is a result of their internal structure. At the DP level, N-words involve a logical negative operator that takes phrasal scope over a phonologically null restriction. The semantics of N-words follow from their structures. The negative import is provided by :, which negates and c-commands its restrictor (pro, -un or an overt DP). Because their restrictions are non-overt most of the time (or involve non-emphatic –un as in chac-un or auc-un), N-words (and 8Qs) are not bearers of particular intonations. Their restrictions cannot be stressed, i.e. specificity and partitivity are not realised prosodically. I argued that these information are lexically marked with these Qs (vs. wh-phrases in-situ and 9Qs). As for their Q status, N-words are considered to (potentially) involve FQ structures a` la Doetjes 1997. Our approach extends Doetjes’s – as well as Fitzpatrick’s – to non-overt FQ constructions. More specifically, it entails that when the FQ construction is covert, the empty category involved does not move. What counts is that the DP-associate is non-overtly realised. I claim that they involves 8 that adjoins either to the DP argument (e.g. full 8Qs) or to any XP (e.g. FQs). My account brings up a new view on French N-words, as well as a new typology of 8Qs.
References Acquaviva, Paolo. 1997 The logical form of negation: A study of operator-variable structures in syntax. Garland Outstanding Dissertations in Linguistics. New York: Garland. Ashby, William J. 1981. The loss of the negative particle ne in French: A syntactic change in progress. Language 57(3):674–687. Babyonyshev, Maria. 1996. Structural connections in syntax and processing: studies in Russian and Japanese. Doctoral dissertation, MIT. Baunaz, Lena. 2008. Floating quantifiers: french universal quantifiers and N-words. In Selected Proceedings of the 34th Incontro di Grammatica Generativa, Special Issue of the Rivista di Grammatica Generativa, vol. 33., P. Beninca, F. Damonte N. Penello (eds). Padova: Unipress.
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Beghelli, Fillipo and Tim Stowell. 1997. Distributivity and negation: The syntax of each and every. In Ways of Scope Taking, Anna Szabolcsi (ed.), 71–108. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Belletti, Adriana. 1990. Generalized Verb Movement. Torino: Rosenberg and Sellier. Beyssade, Claire. 2006. la polarite´. Notes. http://prevert.upmf-grenoble.fr/~alecomte/polarite. doc. Accessed 18 June 2009. Bosˇ kovic´, Zeljiko. 2004. Be careful where you float your quantifiers. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 22:681–742. Brisson, Christine. 1998. Distributivity, Maximality and Floating Quantifiers. Ph.D. dissertation, Rutgers University. Cardinaletti, Anna and Maria-Teresa Guasti. 1993. Negation in epistemic small clauses. Probus 5:39–61. Christensen, Susan. 2003. Analysis of the Standard French ne-drop Phenomenon. In http:// www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/Linguistics/Papers/2003/christensen_susan.pdf. Accessed 18 June 2009. Corblin, Francis. 1996. Multiple negation processing in natural language. Theoria 17:214–259. Corblin, Francis and Lucia Tovena. 2003. L’expression de la ne´gation dans les langues romanes. In Les langues romanes: proble`mes de la phrase simple, Danie`le Godard (ed.), 279–341. Paris: CNRS Editions. Corblin, Francis et al. 2004. Negative concord. In Handbook of French Semantics, Francis Corblin and Henriette de Swart (eds.), 427–461. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications. De´prez, Viviane. 1994. The weak island effect of floating quantifiers. In Functional Projections: University of Massachusetts Occasional Papers 17, Elena Benedicto and Jeff Runner (eds.), 63–84. Amherst: University of Massachusetts. De´prez, Viviane. 1997. Two types of negative concord. Probus 9:103–143. De´prez, Viviane. 1998. Semantic effects of agreement: The case of French participle agreement. Probus 10.1:1–67, Walter De Gryuter. De´prez, Viviane. 1999. The Roots of negative concord in French and French based Creoles. In Language Creation and Language Change: Creole, Diachrony and Development, Michel DeGraff (ed.), 375–428. Cambridge: MIT Press. De´prez, Viviane. 2000. Parallels (A)symmetries and internal structure of negative expressions. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 18:253–342. De´prez, Viviane. 2003. Concordance ne´gative, syntaxe des mots-N et variation dialectale. Cahier de Linguistique Franc¸aise 25:97–118. De´prez, Viviane and France Martineau. 2004. Microparametric variation and negative concord. In Selected Proceedings of LSRL 33, Julie Auger, Clancy Clements and Barbara Vance (eds.), 139–158. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Dobrovie-Sorin, Carmen and Claire Beyssade. 2004. De´finir les Inde´finis. Coll. Sciences du Langage. Paris: E´ditions CNRS. Doetjes, Jenny. 1997. Quantifiers and Selection. On the Distribution of Quantifying Expressions in French, Dutch and English. Doctoral dissertation, HIL, Leiden University. The Hague: HAG. Farkas, Donka and Anastasia Giannakidou. 1996. How clause-bounded is the scope of universals? In Proceedings of SALT VI, T. Gallway et al. (eds.), 35–52. Ithaca, NY: CLC Publications, Cornell University. Fauconnier, Gilles. 1974. Polarity and the scale principle. Chicago Linguistic Society 13:188–199. Fitzpatrick, Justin Michael. 2006. Syntactic and Semantic Routes to Floating Quantification. Doctoral dissertation, MIT, Cambridge, MA. Geurts, Bart and Frans van der Slik. 2005. Monotonicity and processing load. Journal of Semantics 22:97–117. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 1997. The Landscape of Polarity Items. Groningen Dissertations in Linguistics 18.
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Giannakidou, Anastasia. 1998. Polarity Sensitivity as (Non)veridical Dependency. Amsterdam-Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 1999. Affective dependencies. Linguistics and Philosophy 22:367–421. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 2000. Negative concord and the scope of universals. Transactions of the Philological Society 98:87–120. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 2002a. Licensing and sensitivity in polarity items: From downward entailment to (non)-veridicality. In CLS 38, Parasession on Polarity and Negation, Maria Adonis, Anne Pycha and Keiko Yohimura (eds.), 21pp. Chicago, IL: Chicago Linguistic Society. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 2002b. N-words and negative concord. Final, pre-publication version, published in 2006. In The Linguistics Companion. Oxford: Blackwell. Giusti, Giuliana. 1997. The categorial status of determiners. In The New Comparative Syntax, Liliane Haegeman (ed.), 95–123. London and New York: Longman. Godard, Danie`le. 2004. French negative dependency. In Handbook of French Semantics, F. Corblin and H. de Swart (eds.), 351–389. Stanford, CA: CSLI. Haegeman, Liliane. 1995. The Syntax of Negation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Haegeman, Liliane and Raffaela Zanuttini. 1991. Negative heads and the neg criterion. The Linguistic Review 8:233–251. Harves, Stephanie. 2002. Genitive of negation and the syntax of scope. In Proceedings of ConSOLE IX. M. van Koppen, E. Thrift, E. J. van der Torre and M. Zimmerman (eds.), http://www.leidenuniv.nl/hil/sole/, 96–110. Hoeksema, Jack. 1999. Blocking effects and polarity sensitivity. In JFAK. Essays Dedicated to Johan van Benthem on the Occasion of his 50th Birthday, Vossiuspers/Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam; (version odur.let.rug.nl/hoeksema/docs/j50.htm.) Heim, Irene. 1982. The Semantics of Definite and Indefinite Noun Phrases. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts. Hirschbu¨hler, Paul and Marie Labelle. 1994. Changes in verb position in French negative infinitival clauses. Language Variation and Change 6:149–178. Horn, Laurence. 1989. A Natural History of Negation. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Ihsane, Tabea. 2008. The Layered DP. Form and Meaning of French Indefinites Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 124. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Jespersen, Otto. 1917. Negation in English and Other Languages. Copenhagen: Host. Junker, Marie-Odile. 1995. Syntax et se´mantique des quantifieurs flottants tous et chacun. Distributivite´ en se´mantique conceptuelle. Gene`ve: Librairie Droz. Kayne, Richard. 1981. On certain differences between French and English. Linguistic Inquiry 12:349–371. Kayne, Richard. 1984. Connectedness and Binary Branching. Dordrecht: Foris Kayne, Richard. 1994. The Antsymmetry of Syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Kayne, Richards. 2007. A short note on where vs. place. In (a cura di) Miscellanea di Studi Linguistici offerti a Laura Venelli da amici e llievi padovani, R. Maschi, N. Penello, P. Rizolatti (eds.), 245–257. Udine: Forum. Kiss, E´. Katalin. 2002. The Syntax of Hungarian. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Klima, Edward. 1964. Negation in English. In The Structure of Language. Readings in the Philosophy of Language, Jerry. A. Fodor and Jerrold J. Katz (eds.), 246–321. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Knu¨ppel, Veronika. 2001. Die Syntax des Negation im Franzosischen. Tu¨bingen: Niemeyer. ¨ Ladusaw, William. 1980. Polarity Sensitivity as Inherent Scope Relations. New York: Garland. Ladusaw, William. 1992. Expressing negation. In Semantics and Linguistic Theory (SALT) II Proceedings, Chris Barker and David Dowty (eds.). Columbus, OH: The Ohio State University. Linebarger, Marcia. 1980. The Grammar of Negative Polarity. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT.
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Mathieu, Eric. 1999. Wh in-situ and the intervention effect. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 11:441–472. Mathieu, Eric. 2002. The Syntax of Non-Canonical Quantification: A Comparative Study. Doctoral dissertation, University College London. Merchant, J., 2001. The Syntax of Silence: Sluicing, Islands, and the Theory of Ellipsis. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mille, Pierre. 1908. Barnavaux et quelques femmes. Paris: Calmann-Le´vy. Molna´r, Valerie. 1998. Topic in focus: the syntax, phonology, semantics, and pragmatics of the so-called ‘‘contrastive topic’’ in Hungarian and German. Acta Linguistic Hungarica 45:389–466. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1983. Une Quantification Non-Canonique: La Quantification a` Distance. Langue Franc¸ais, 58:66–88. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1984. On the identification of Empty Categories. The Linguistic Review 4:153–202. Pereltsvaig, Asya. 1999. The genitive of negation and aspect in Russian. In Y. Rose and J. Steele (eds.), McGill Working Papers in Linguistics 14:111–140. Partee, Barbara H. 1986. Noun phrase interpretation and type-shifting principles. In Studies in Discourse Representation Theory and the Theory of Generalized Quantifiers, Jeroen Groenendijk, Dick de Jongh and Martin Stokhof (eds.), 115–143. Dordrecht: Foris. Pe´ters, Hugues. 2001. Raising and negative quantification in French. GG@G 2:71–85. Pollock, Jean-Yves. 1989. Verb movement, universal grammar, and the structure of IP. Linguistic Inquiry 20:365–424. Puska´s, Genoveva. 1998. On the neg-criterion in Hungarian. Acta Linguistica Hungarica 45:167–213. Puska´s, Genoveva. 2000. Quantification in the left periphery: A syntactic argument for ‘split’ domains. In CLS 36, Volume 1: The Main Session, John Boyle, Jung-Huyck Lee and Arika Okrent (eds.). Chicago Linguistic Society: Chicago. Puska´s, Genoveva. 2002. Floating quantifiers: What they can tell us about the syntax and semantics of quantifiers. GG@G 3:105–128. Rizzi, Luigi. 1990. Relativized Minimality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Rizzi, Luigi. 1997. The fine structure of the left periphery. In Elements of Grammar, Liliane Haegeman (ed.), 281–338. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Rowlett, Paul. 1998. Sentential Negation in French. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Starke, Michal. 2001. Move Dissolves into Merge: A Theory of Locality. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Geneva. de Swart, Henriette and Ivan Sag. 2002. Negation and negative concord in Romance. Linguistics and Philosophy 25:373–417. Sura´nyi, Bala´zs. 2002. Multiple Operator Movements in Hungarian, Ph.D. thesis, Utrecht, LOT. Szabolcsi, Anna. 1981. The semantics of topic-focus articulation. In Formal Methods in the Study of Language, Groenendijk, Janssen and Stokhofl (eds.). Amsterdam: Matematisch Centrum. Tovena, Lucia, Viviane De´prez and Jacques Jayez. 2004. Polarity sensitive items. In Handbook of French Semantics, Francis Corblin and Henriette de Swart (eds.), 403–411. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications. Vallduvı´ , Enric. 1994. Polarity items, n-words, and minimizers in Catalan and Spanish. Probus 6:263–294. Van der Wouden, Ton and Frans Zwarts. 1993. A semantic analysis of negative concord. In Proceedings of the Third Conference on Semantics and Linguistic Theory, U. Lahiri and A. Z. Wyner (eds.), 202–219. Day Hall Lobby Cornell University. Zanuttini, Raffaela. 1991. Syntactic Properties of Sentential Negation: A Comparative Study of Romance Languages. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania. Zeijlstra, Hedde. 2004. Sentential Negation and Negative Concord. Utrecht: LOT Dissertation Series 101.
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Chapter 5
Intervention Effects Revisited
5.1 Introduction Existential presupposition has been extensively discussed in this book. With the help of semantics, prosody and syntax, I have argued that there are two types of presupposed noun phrases (i.e. already introduced in the discourse, Starke 2001): partitive and specific. On the one hand, partitivity involves a subset of a previously mentioned group (it involves a finite set of alternatives, Enc¸ 1991). The presupposition is that there is a predefined set. On the other hand, specific noun phrases refer to familiar individuals only (i.e. they are identified via a known property). Building on introspective judgments as well as on an experimental study on French wh-phrases (Baunaz and Patin 2009), I have shown that the prosodies of wh-words and un Ns support this distinction: specific un N is generally uttered with a fall-rise intonation; wh-words are exponents of an accent when they involve specificity (which is perceived as a slight fall rise intonation, see Chapter 2). This prosody on a wh-phrase indicates that the speaker has a very good idea that the interlocutor has a specific referent in mind. Interestingly, when wh-phrases escape neg-islands, the prosody attributed to specificity shows up (Fig. 5.1).1 This accent is found neither on partitive wh-words, nor on partitive un N, which can have a falling intonation. Nonpresuppositional phrases do not show particular prosody (mainly rising in questions and neutral with un N) (see Chapter 2). Recall also that un Ns can take wide scope over quantificational noun phrases like tous les N (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.4, and Chapter 3, Section 3.1.2.2). When it does so, a special (specific) prosody on un N shows up (Fig. 5.2, see also Fig. 3.8, Chapter 3). Partitivity and specificity are not restricted to wh-phrases and un Ns, and show up with other Qs which quantify over restricted domains and are
1
Baunaz and Patin 2009 note that although speakers are reluctant to utter wh-phrases in-situ under neg-islands, their utterances generally involved that special ‘specific’ prosody. Note though that extraction out of neg islands of specific wh-phrases in-situ were generally well accepted by informants. See also Starke 2001.
L. Baunaz, The Grammar of French Quantification, Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 83, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0621-7_5, Ó Springer ScienceþBusiness Media B.V. 2011
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Fig. 5.1 F0 curve of qui in-situ in neg-island compared to specific qui in-situ
interpreted with non-empty restrictions. Although partitivity and specificity are encoded in the semantics of 8Qs and N-words, prosody does not discriminate between these two interpretations. The prosody of chacun des N and tous les N is less telling than it is with wh-phrases in-situ/un N (Chapter 3). I conclude that prosody does not play a role in the ‘presuppositional’ interpretation of 8Qs, of which N-words are a subset, as opposed to wh-phrases in-situ and un Ns, and that specificity and partitivity are lexically encoded with them. There is then a distinction between Qs that lexically mark different interpretations (specific
Fig. 5.2 F0 curve of specific un N in a scope island
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205
chacun vs. partitive tous), and Qs that prosodically mark that distinction (specific qui vs. partitive qui vs. non-presuppositional qui). Despite these differences, I claim that when these features interact, they have syntactic reflexes. Besides discourse contexts and prosody, I claim in this chapter that specificity and partitivity can be distinguished in terms of syntax. First, specific and partitive wh phrases in-situ are not sensitive to the same interveners. Second, the mechanism linking the referent of the specific wh-phrase in-situ to the existing discourse referent can get grammaticalized in French: I argue that specificity is overtly marked in the prosody of specific wh-phrases in-situ in French, while syntactically grounded. Typically, specific items take wide scope. Although existential presupposition has been split into two different notions, which are either prosodically or lexically realized, we claim that the semantic properties discussed in the previous sections belong to the same class: the class of existential presupposed features related to Qs. In the spirit of Starke 2001, I show that a feature class hierarchy can be built on the basis of which Relativized Minimality (RM) can operate. More specifically, scope interactions between 8Qs and wh-phrases in-situ/un Ns, as well as extraction out of negative islands, can be treated in terms of RM. I will first lay out Rizzi’s 2002 and Starke’s 2001 approach to RM (Section 5.1.1), then present the relevant data that lead to an extension of their idea to the Qs discussed in this book (Section 5.1.2). A crucial consequence is that partitivity and specificity are syntactically grounded. Section 5.1.3 opens space for issues left for future research and Section 5.1.4 is the conclusion.
5.1.1 Locality Effects 5.1.1.1 Relativized Minimality To capture locality effects, which have been proven to be fundamental in syntactic theory, a locality principle called RM was introduced by Rizzi 1990. The core idea is that structural relations must be satisfied in the minimal domain where they can be satisfied, i.e. structural relations are local. A ‘local structural relation cannot hold between X and Y if Z is a potential bearer of the relevant relation and Z intervenes between X and Y’, as in (1): ‘whenever two elements compete for entering into a given local relation with a third element, the closest always wins’ (Rizzi 2002:1): (1) * X. . .Y. . .Z iff X, Y, Z are of the same type In Rizzi 1990, X, Y, Z were understood in terms of the A/A’ distinction. If we look at adverb placement and wh-adjunct extraction, we indeed observe that adjuncts cannot cross A’-adverbs, like the negative operator pas (2a vs. 2b). With certain adverbs, the pattern does not reduplicate, however (3). Within the
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cartographic approach, Rizzi 2002 redefines RM in terms of feature classes, which are those in (4): Combien de proble`mes ne sais-tu pas re´soudre ___ ? ‘How many of problems cannot you solve?’ b. * Combien ne sais-tu pas re´soudre [__ de proble`mes]? ‘How many cannot you solve of problems?’ (Rizzi 2002: 8, (24))
(2) a.
(3) a. b. (4) a. b. c. d.
Combien de livres a-t-il attentivement consulte´s ___ ? ‘How many of books did he carefully consult?’ Combien a-t-il attentivement consulte´ [___ de livres] ? ‘How many did he carefully consult of books?’ (id: 9, (26)) Argumental: person, number, gender, case Quantificational: Wh, Neg, measure, focus... Modifier: evaluative, epistemic, Neg, frequentative, celerative, measure, manner,.... Topic (Rizzi 2002: 19, (61))
RM operates on features from the same class only, as shown in (5). Each class is confronted to different RM effects, preventing the assimilation of wh-phrases with quantificational adverbs as they do not show to the same feature composition. (5) Y is in a Minimal Configuration (MC) with X iff there is no Z such that (i) Z is of the same structural type as X, and (ii) Z intervenes between X and Y. (Rizzi 2002, (4)) The same structural type is defined in terms of the classes of features in (4). 5.1.1.2 Starke 2001 The part of Starke 2001 I am concerned with is locality. The author concentrates on the unification of various views of locality in order to understand its implications on different issues of syntactic theory, such as phrase structure and movement. The basic idea is that the theory does not need several principles of locality but one should be enough to reduce Strong Islands (SIs), RM, Subjacency, Control, Principles A and B of Binding Theory into one principle of locality. As a first step, Starke 2001 focalizes on wh-movement and tries to unify three main generalizations (weak Islands (WI), extraction out of weak islands (eWI) and SIs) into one. The Locality principle Starke resorts to is a refined version of RM. Starke 2001 assumes Syntax is about features, not morphology per se. These features are organized in a feature tree. Let us see how this works. Wh-phrases can be long-distance extracted, as in (6). Yet, if a quantificational element (Q) intervenes between the extracted site and the landing site of a wh-phrase, movement is blocked (7). The contexts
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207
created are called Scope Islands. Scope Islands are a subset of WIs (Szabolcsi 2005), which are induced by quantificational interveners. (6) How do you think that I should cook this stuff
(7) a. * b. * c. *
Based on the observation that movement of an element is blocked by an intervening element of the same feature class, the following anti-identity constraint can be established (where Q ¼ negation, focus, wh, adverb, i.e. a feature class): (8) * Q1. . .Q2 . . .
(10)
Quantifier
Argument [Φ/Case]
Specific-Q
(Starke 2001: 26, (63))
(10) can be interpreted as a hierarchy of sub- and super-classes, as schematically represented in (11) and (12). Extraction from a weak island (eWI) is possible iff the moved wh is interpreted with wide scope of existential presupposition. If an intervener belongs to a super class (12a) (or to the same class (11a), (12b)), then it ‘intervenes’. If it belongs to a subclass, it does not. (11) a. * b.
a i . . . a j . . . ai ab . . . a ... ab
(Starke 2001: 8 (16))
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(12) a. * b. *
a . . . ab . . . a ab . . . ab ... ab
(Starke 2001: 8 (17))
Starke 2001 makes a distinction between two types of blockers: absolute (ab) vs. selective (a). What (11b) tells us is that if the moving element has something more than the intervener, it can legally move. If the intervener has something more than the moving element, movement is blocked, (12a). Wh-phrases with some additional property (b) can cross WIs as (13b) shows. The exact nature of this additional property is not clear: it has been analyzed in various ways: d-linking (Pesetsky 1987), referentiality (Cinque 1990, Rizzi 1990), range (Rizzi 2002), or theta-roles (Huang 1982) are some examples found in the literature. Starke’s take on that matter is the following. He observes that wh-phrases in-situ in French can extract from WIs when the wh-phrase is interpreted with wide scope existential presupposition, i.e. when there is a referent for the individual that the interlocutor has in mind. The contrast in (13) and (14) shows that only wide scope existentials can extract whereas, if the interlocutor has no referent in mind, eWI is impossible: (13)
You are reading a story to Joey. After a while Joey interrupts you and says ‘‘I wonder what Belga found! Could it be. . .?’’ and stops in the middle of the sentence looking at you starry-eyed. You stop reading and ask: a. So? What do you think that Belga discovered? b. So? What do you wonder whether Belga discovered? (Adapted from Starke 2001, (24))
(14)
I know that you have no clue about what Herbert will cook tonight, and that you are curious about it, so I ask: a. What do you hope that Herbert will cook? b. # What do you wonder whether Herbert will cook
Wh-words (Q) can be extracted out of WIs if they ‘have an additional property b, and applying RM to those phrases yields the result that Qb can jump over an intervening Q because Qb movement only cares about intervening Qb elements’ (Starke 2001: 11). Qb-movement triggers existential presupposition, whereas Qmovement does not. However existential presupposition is not enough: it should also take wide scope. Starke illustrates this point thanks to (15)–(17): (15)
Belgamore and Belfedore lost their dog, and have been unsuccessfully looking for it for 3 days. On the fourth day, Belgamore decides to go out again and continue looking for any clue. Belfedore, tired and despaired, gives up and stays at home. In the evening, Belgamore comes back very excited and . . . . At this point, Joey interjects:
(16)
I wonder what Belga found!
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209
So you stop reading and ask: (17)
a. b. #
. . . and what do you think that Belgamore discovered? . . . and what do you wonder whether Belgamore discovered? (Starke 2001: 11, (20)–(22))
(17b) differs from (13b) in that it is odd in this context: there is something that Belgamore discovered and Joey wonders what that thing is; the existential presupposition does not take wide scope. In (13b), Joey has object-of-discovery in mind too, which takes wide scope over the beliefs about that object. Starke claims that there are two routes out of WIs, which require adequate discursive contexts: one route triggers range semantics (18), the other specificity semantics (19).2,3 (19) is considered more degraded than (18) by speakers: (18) What is it unclear whether we should repair? (Starke 2001: 19, (43a)) (19) What is it unclear how we should repair?
(Starke 2001: 19, (43b))
Starke also observes that the contrast in (18) and (19) recalls that of classical argument/adjunct asymmetry: argument extraction is less degraded than adjunct extraction. Similarly, whether-type eWIs are less degraded than howtype eWIs. Extending what was said above about selective and absolute blockers, whether reacts like a selective intervener, while how like an absolute blocker, i.e. a SI. Starke 2001 observes that French wh-phrases in-situ can appear in embedded clauses (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.2), (20), in WIs, (21), as well as in SIs, (22): (20) a. Tu crois qu’elle a fait quoi? you think that she has done what? b. Tu crois qu’elle s’appelle comment? You think that she is called how ‘what do you think her name is?’
(Starke 2001:22, (50))
(21) a. Tu crois qu’elle a pas fait quoi? you think that she has not done what ? b. Tu crois qu’elle veut pas partir comment? You think that she wants not to-leave how (Starke 2001:23, (52a and b))
2
Range corresponds to our partitivity and specificity to our specificity (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.2). 3 Degrees in acceptability of wh-phrases extractions with whether and how interveners are higher if they embed non-finite clauses, (i): (i) a. b.
What is it unclear whether to repair? What is it unclear how to repair?
(Starke 2001: 19, (44a)) (Starke 2001: 19, (44b))
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
(22) a. Tu crois qu’elle a dit c¸a pour inciter Pierrot a` se´duire qui? you think that she has said this to incite Pierrot to seduce whom b. Tu crois qu’ils vont rembourser ceux qui ont voyage´ comment? you think that they will reimburse those who have traveled how (Starke 2001:22, (51a, d)) Wh-phrases in-situ that can appear in eWIs have a slight accent correlating with specificity-based presupposition. That specificity is triggered, and not range, can be tested. In (23a), de qui ‘of whom’ crosses a specific NP and the result is bad, whereas in (24), it crosses a range NP and extraction is possible: (23) * Tu aimerais avoir cette/ma photo de qui? you would-like to-have this/my picture of whom ? (Starke 2001: 25 (59)) (24) a. b.
Tu aimerais avoir une des photos de qui? you would-like to-have one of-the pictures of whom ? Tu aimerais avoir une photo de qui, parmi les photos disponibles? you would like to have a picture of whom, among the available pictures (Starke 2001: 25 (60))
Hence something more, b in (11b), is existential presupposition plus specificity. This means that specificity is a subclass of Q. Specific-Q movement is then a subclass of Q-movement. The sentences in (21) are instances of (11b). eWIs being accounted for, the availability of wh-phrases in-situ in SIs still calls for an explanation. Surprisingly, both argument and adjunct wh-phrases in-situ in French can occur in SI configurations such as (22). If wh-phrases insitu are involved in any kind of movement, the fact that they can appear in SIs is problematic. Starke 2001 observes a fact in favor of a movement analysis of the wh-phrase in-situ even in this construction: if negation is inserted within the matrix in (22), a sharp degradation is observed, unless ‘a slight accent’ on the wh in-situ is involved (Starke 2001: 23). Starke’s analysis of SIs is that they do not involve Q, i.e. no intervener blocks movement of the wh-phrase in (22). Starke 2001: 26 says: All of this follows if covert-movement is a pure Q-class movement and SpecificQ is a subclass of Q. Covert movement can thus afford to ignore SIs, but it only means to jump over WI is to travel the SpecificityQ route. Overt movement, by contrast, has access to an 4 additional range-based route (. . .), and therefore does not entail specificity.
Starke does not say anything about Qs other than wh-phrases, though. Based on the interpretation, prosody and syntax of wh-phrases in-situ in NSC French, I argue that slight fall-rise (accented) specific wh-phrases in-situ are successfully moved across scope islands covertly, while falling (non-accented) 4
As for the crucial question why classical SIs do not block covert wh-phrasal movement but do block overt phrasal movement, I refer the reader to Starke’s 2001 dissertation.
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211
partitive and rising non-presupposed wh-phrases in-situ are blocked in the same environment. This is due to a locality principle which refines the feature-classes of Qs in (4) in such a way that (5) (i.e. RM) holds. This principle constrains movement operations of wh-phrases in-situ across 8Qs.
5.1.2 Redefining the Feature-Class of Qs: Strength As presented in the preceding Chapters, when different Qs interact, they generate semantic ambiguities: (25) is non-ambiguous, whereas (26) is. In (25), two interchangeable Qs are used as subject and object. (26) exhibits two distinct Qs: a 8Q, every N, and an 9Q, some N, and two readings show up: (25) Every man likes every woman (26) Every man likes some woman a. 8x [man’(x) ! 9y[woman’(y) & likes’(x, y)]] b. 9x [woman’(x) & 8y [man’(y) ! likes’(y, x)]]
(8 4 9); (9 4 8)
In (26a), the reading is such that every N takes surface scope over the quantified object some N. Semantically (26a) is true in the situation where every man likes a different woman, i.e. John likes Mary, Jim likes Jessica. (26b) shows the opposite pattern: the lowest Q is interpreted as taking scope over the highest Q, yielding inverse scope. (26b) is true iff there is a (certain) woman such that every man likes her. A particularity of 9Qs is that they can take wide scope over matrix 8Qs even when embedded in a lower clause; the reverse pattern, is not available, (27a). In French, the same contrast arises: 8Qs are clause-bound; 9Qs aren’t, (28) and (29).5 (27) a. A professor thinks that every student sleeps b. Every professor thinks that a student sleeps (28) a. b.
(9 4 8); *(8 49) (9 4 8); (8 49)
Un prof pense que tous les e´tudiants dorment (9 4 8); *(8 49) Some prof thinks that all the students sleep Un prof pense que chacun des e´tudiants dort (9 4 8); *(8 49) some prof thinks that each of the students sleep
(29) a. Tous les professeurs pensent qu’un e´tudiant dort (9 4 8); (8 49) All the profs think that some student sleeps b. Chacun des profs pense qu’un e´tudiant dort (9 4 8); (8 49) each of the prof thinks that some student sleeps
5
Under the reading 9 4 8 in (29b), there are multiple events of thinking about some specific student by each of the professors, i.e. specific noun phrases do not necessarily take widest scope (vs. Baunaz 2005).
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
In Chapters 2, 3 and 4, I concluded that scope relationships result from the internal structures of Qs: (potential) FQs (N-words and 8Qs) cannot scope outside their clause, because Q occupies a fixed (adjoined) position (either to their DP-associate, or floated and adjoined to VP); (potential) split-DPs (wh-phrases and existential un Ns) can scope long distance, because they are attracted to some position within the left periphery. These noun phrases have extended left peripheric structures: Q is based generated in the left periphery of the DP, selecting for an argument (PropP). In other words, (negative) 8Qs do not select their DP-associates, while 9Qs and wh-phrases do. The result is that the DP-associate of (negative) 8Qs A-moves, while the restriction either moves along, or stay in-situ. With wh-phrases and 9Qs, phonologically null operators undergo A’-movement, while the restriction either moves along, or stay in-situ. My analysis only accounts for their respective scope patterns, i.e. when these Qs do not interact with each other. If the decomposition of 8Qs, N-words, wh-phrases and un Ns into distinct, yet similar, features is on the right track, their interactions should be subject to RM. If locality on Q movement is sensitive to features, RM applies to covert movement as well (Beck 1996). In the remainder of this chapter, I show that the association of specificity (or partitivity) with Q can either (i) create intervention effects or (ii) circumvent interventions. In other words, if Intervention Effects can be understood in terms of RM (Rizzi 2002), the following syntactic behaviours are predicted: (i) specific un N and specific wh-phrases in-situ must be compatible with partitive 8Qs (tous les N, personne), but not with specific 8Qs (chacun des N, aucun des N), and (ii) partitive wh-phrases in-situ and un Ns must be blocked by partitive, but not by specific 8Qs. 6
5.1.2.1 Extracting 9Qs Across Universal Quantifiers In (30), only specific un N takes wide scope over 8Q, (30b). Both partitive and non-presuppositional 9Qs are blocked and must take narrow scope, (30a/c). (30) a. Tous les e´tudiants ont lu UN LIVRE. b. Tous les e´tudiants ont lu _ un livre. c. Tous les e´tudiants ont lu un livre. ‘All the students have read a book.’
(8 4 9); *(9 4 8) * (8 4 9); (9 4 8) (8 4 9); *(9 4 8)
(31) shows that specific chacun des N always takes wide scope over any kind of 9Q. Specific un N cannot enter the configuration (under the distributive reading of 8Q over 9Q (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.4.1; Chapter 3, section ‘‘Beghelli and Stowell 1997’’)): 6
Under the reasonable assumption that the [þwh] feature of C8 needs to be checked, whmovement is obligatory at one point of the derivation (or at least some kind of wh-movement). Being structurally high, the wh-item in SpecCP takes widest scope. Intervention effects are expected to show up if they interact with another Q-element.
5.1 Introduction
(31) a. Chacun des e´tudiants a lu UN livre. b.* Chacun des e´tudiants a lu _ un livre. c. Chacun des e´tudiants a lu un livre. ‘Each of the students read a book.’
213
(8 4 9); *(9 4 8) (8 4 9); *(9 4 8)
According to RM, movement of an element is blocked by any intervening element of the same type. What the data above suggest is that (30b) is a pure case of RM. Recall the properties displayed by these Qs (see Chapters 2 and 3). Tous les N triggers partitivity and is not necessarily distributive, while chacun des N is intrinsically specific and necessarily triggers distributivity. As for 9Qs, a similar partition shows up: the fall-rise un N involves specificity, the downfall un N triggers partitivity, while the neutral un N is crucially non-presuppositional. In Section 2.1.4, I argue that this type of un N is not per se quantificational, but must be novel and introduces new referents by restricted free variables in the universe of discourse. When interpreted existentially, they are existentially closed off. Let us go back to (30) and (31): (30a/c) and (31a/c) show that non-presuppositional and partitive un Ns do not take wide scope over 8Qs. If scope relationships are determined by c-command (see Chapter 1), the obligatory narrow scope of these 9Qs is accounted for by claiming that they cannot cross these presuppositional 8Qs, i.e. they are moved to a lower position. I come back to this point when discussing wh in-situ. (30b), as well as (31b), tell us that specific un N moves to a position above (the landing site of) 8Qs, i.e. higher than partitive tous les N, since it obligatorily takes scope over it (30b), and higher than (or in the same position as) specific chacun des N, since it is blocked by it (31b). Recall that specific un N are Island Free, whereas partitive and nonpresuppositional un Ns are not, (32): (32) a. Tous les garc¸ons se demandent quand Xander invitera _ une fille *(849);(948) All the boys wonder when X. will.invite a (specific) girl b. Tous les garc¸ons se demandent quand Xander invitera UNE fille (849);*(948) All the boys wonder when X. will.invite a girl c. Tous les garc¸ons se demandent quand Xander invitera une fille (849);*(948) All the boys wonder when X. will.invite a girl ‘All the boys wonder when Xander will invite a girl.’ Only specific 9Qs can move: non-presuppositional and partitive 9Qs are blocked (30a/c). (31) shows that the specific 8Q chacun blocks wide scope of the specific un N (31b), suggesting that specificity is the crucial factor. Thus, following RM, the above effects are expected. The crucial point is that Q is associated with specificity. Yet, specificity itself does not do any harm to
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specific Qs. This can be shown, for instance, with specific un N, taking wide scope. In (33), cet homme ‘this man’ does not block matrix wide scope of 9Q: (33)
a.
b.
Il semble que cet homme aime _ une femme (i.e. Marilyn) It seems that this man loves a woman ‘It seems that this man loves a (specific) woman.’ L’homme/Jean/cet homme aime _ une femme (i.e. Marilyn). the man/ Jean/ this man loves a woman ‘the man/ Jean/ this man loves a specific woman.’
Since specific un N are not blocked by specific non-quantificational DPs like cet homme ‘this man’ in (33), but by the specific 8Q chacun, I conclude that specificity itself is not quantificational. What is crucial is the fact that when associated with Q, specificity acts over scope relationships. 5.1.2.2 Comparing Existential un Ns to Wh-Phrases In-situ In this section in the spirit of a preliminary study (Baunaz 2005), I show that when specificity and partitivity are associated with Q, this association can (i) create intervention effects and (ii) circumvent interventions. The sentences in (34) and (35) involve specific un N/wh-phrases in-situ. No matter what kind of 8Qs intervenes, wide scope of the specific un N/quoi is compulsory: e´tudiants a rec¸u _ quoi ? each of the students has received what Tous les e´tudiants ont rec¸u _ quoi ? *(84wh);(wh48) all the students have received what
(34) a. * Chacun des
b.
(35) a. * Chacun des e´tudiants a rec¸u _ un prix. each of the students has received a price (Puska´s 2002:115, (34a)) a. Tous les e´tudiants ont rec¸u _ un prix. all the students have read a prize
* (849);(948)
While wide scope of specific wh in-situ and specific un N is blocked in (34a)/ (35a), tous les e´tudiants does not block wide scope of quoi and un prix in (34b)/ (35b). The specific object obligatorily takes wide scope over the partitive 8Q. Note that plural specific des Ns give a similar result (Tabea Ihsane (p.c)): (36) a. Tous les e´tudiants ont lu des livres (en particulier). (Hamlet, Sula, et Quartet) * (849);(948) all the students have read of.the books in particular (H, S, and Q) b. Des hommes ont gagne´ l’estime de tous les e´tudiants: le doyen et le maire. * (849);(948) Of.the men have gained the esteem of all the students the Dean and the mayor
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215
(34)/(35) are schematized in (37).7 Following the feature-typology approach of RM, specific wh-phrases in-situ are expected to be blocked by specific 8Qs and not by partitive 8Qs, since specific wh-phrases share similar features with the former Qs, and not with the latter. (37) a. * Qspecific. . .Qspecific . . .Qspecific b. Qspecific . . .Qpartitive . . .Qspecific If partitive wh-phrases in-situ and partitive un Ns interact with 8Qs, the sentences get either ungrammatical (38), or the noun phrase has to take narrow scope (39), no matter what kind of Q is used. (38)/(39) are schematized in (40): 7
See Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2. Potential counterexamples to the judgement given in (34a) (and to the analysis that follows) are those given in Zubizaretta 2003. According to her, wh in-situ phrases get obligatory wide scope over chacun in (i):
(i)
Chacun (d’entre eux) devrait inviter qui? ‘Each of them should invite whom?’
*(PL) ; (SP) (Zubizaretta 2003: 5, (16b))
My informants do not like (i) as a real question, though. Yet, the following sentences, with wide scope of a heavy wh-phrase in-situ, are perfect, even for my informants. Contrary to (34a), though, (ii) and (iii) are grammatical. This is unexpected. (ii)
Q:
A:
(iii)
Q: A:
Les enfants se sont mis a` table. Chacun (d’entre eux) a droit a` combien de pizzas ? The children have sat at the table. Each (of them) is entitled to how many pizzas? Chacun (d’entre eux) a droit a` trois pizzas Each (of them) is entitled to three pizzas (Zubizaretta 2003: 4, (12)) Pierre a achete´ plusieurs livres. Il a envoye´ chacun des livres a` qui ? Pierre bought several books. He sent each of the books to whom? Il a envoye´ chacun des livres a` l’un de ses amis He sent each of the books to one of his friends (Zubizaretta 2003: 4, (13))
Yet, compare this with (iv), which involves individual level predicates. No event variable is available and distribution fails: (iv)
a. * b. ??
Chacun (d’entre eux) connaıˆ t qui? Each (of them) knows whom Chacun (d’entre eux) connaıˆ t combien de the´ore`mes ? each (of them) knows how many of.theorems ‘how many theorems does each of them know?’
(iv) is ruled out, as expected, but not by RM, but by a failure of distribution. Unfortunately, I have no solution to the problematic case in (ii) and (iii). A possible way to tackle this problem is to investigate the nature of chacun (d’entre eux): contrarily to chacun des N, chacun (d’entre eux) involves the partitive preposition de, i.e. it might well be the case that chacun des N and chacun d’entre eux involve different structures, as well as different interpretations (specific vs. partitive), yielding different scope relationships with wh-phrases. This needs to be worked out, though.
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(38) a. .* Chacun des e´tudiants a lu QUOI ? Each of the students has read what b. * Tous les e´tudiants ont lu QUOI? all the students have read what (39) a. b. (40) a. * b. *
Chacun des e´tudiants a lu UN livre. each of the students has read a book Tous les e´tudiants ont lu UN LIVRE. all the students have read a book
(8 4 9) ;*(9 4 8) (8 4 9) ; *(9 4 8)
Qpartitive. . .Qpartitive . . .Qpartitive Qpartitive . . . Qspecific . . . Qpartitive
If (38b) and (39b) can be accounted for by RM (a partitive wh-phrase cannot cross another partitive Q, (34a)), at first sight (38a) and (39a) cannot: partitive Qs are blocked by specific 8Qs, (34b); the two Qs do not carry similar features, therefore the ungrammaticality of (38a)/(39a) is unexpected under RM, unless the classes on which RM operates are refined. In Chapter 3, chacun des N and tous les N were distinguished from each other on the basis of existential presupposition: where the specific 8Q cannot appear in partitive ‘list’ contexts, the partitive 8Q can show up in specific contexts. Specific 8Qs require a stronger presuppositional context than partitive-based Qs. Specificity narrows down the context to familiar individuals. In a way, specific Qs involve something more than partitive Qs: it is in that sense that the former involve stronger contexts than the latter. The notion of ‘having something more than’ can be summarized as in Fig. 5.3. Recall Starke’s 2001 generalisations (Section 5.1.1.2) : if a moved element has something more than its (potential) intervener, the former can move past the latter; if the intervener has something more than the moved element, the intervener blocks the moved element. Since both partitive and specific whphrases/un Ns are blocked by chacun des N, I tentatively conclude that specific 8Qs are absolute blockers for extraction. Because it is specific, it involves a stronger context than partitive Qs, and that is the reason why (38a) and (39a) are out. Recall that for Starke 2001, the class of Qs dominates the feature
Q Q partitive Q specific
Fig. 5.3 ‘Having something more than’
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217
‘specific’. Similarly, the scope interactions discussed so far allow us to claim that the class of partitive Qs dominates that of the specific-Qs, (41):
Quantifier
Argument [Φ/Case]
(41)
Partitive-Q Specific-Q Under this approach, then, RM is at stake in (38a) and (39a). Let us turn to interactions between non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ/ un Ns and 8Qs, (42)/(43). In (42a) quoi cannot cross specific chacun des N, as it cannot cross partitive tous les N in (42b). The same facts are noticed with nonpresuppositional un N in (43). This is schematized in (44): (42) a. * Chacun des garc¸ons each of the boys b. * Tous les garc¸ons ont All the boys
a lu quoi ? have read lu quoi? have read
(43) a.
a lu un livre. has read a book lu un livre. read a book
b.
Chacun des garc¸ons each of the boys Tous les garc¸ons ont all the boys have
what what (8 4 9) ; *(9 4 89) (84 9) ; *(9 4 8)
(44) a. * Q. . . Qpartitive . . . Q b. * Q. . . Qspecific. . . Q Following the same reasoning as above, the blocking effects of (42)/(43) should result from RM. Yet, non-presuppositional wh-phrases / un N do not share similar features with partitives, nor with specific 8Qs, i.e. no blocking effects should show up. Some explanation is needed. As said above, chacun des N is an absolute blocker. Under our approach to RM, absolute blockers are interveners for extractions. Then, the sharp degradation of (42a) is expected. Just like the impossibility of a wide scope reading of un livre in (43a) is. What is not expected is (42b) and (43b): not acting as an absolute blocker, tous les N does not share similar features with non-presuppositional noun phrases. The RM approach can be rescued, however, if the reasoning applied above and summarized in the feature tree in (41) is applied again: being partitive, as well as being specific, implies having something that nonpresuppositional wh-phrases lack, i.e. existential presupposition. The contrast in grammaticality in (42) and (43) follows from the internal structures proposed in Chapter 2: non-presuppositional noun phrases involve split-DP structures. Hence (42) involves overt raising of the phonologically null Qwh. As discussed above, RM applies and ungrammaticality results. Recall that non-presuppositional 9Qs are variables that need binding by an appropriate
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
operator (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.4). The 8Qs can achieve this goal and co-variation obligatorily results. As no locality condition is violated 8Qs distribute over un livre and co-variation arises. Being non-presuppositional, un livre stays in-situ. Our investigation on the scope behaviors of the three types of wh-phrases in-situ and their existential counterparts leads to the conclusion that each type takes a similar scope with respect to 8Qs. Moreover, the data presented here suggest that specific Qs are real barriers for extraction, (45a), whereas partitive Qs are not, (45b): partitive 8Qs block partitive and non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ only, but not specific 9Qs / wh-phrases in-situ (45c): (45) a. * Qwh/9 . . . [Qspecific . . . twh/9], where wh/9 are of any type b. Qwh/9 . . . [Qpartitive . . . twh/9], where wh/9 are specific c. * Qwh/9 . . . [Qpartitive . . . twh/9], where wh/9 are partitive or nonpresuppositional The observations in (45) highlight one important point. Specific Qs must take wide scope, whereas partitive and non presuppositional Qs cannot. Partitive Qs, on the other hand, can take wide scope over non-presuppositional Qs, for instance partitive 8Qs must take scope over non presuppositional un N. (45) leads to an important consequence: a hierarchy of strength is emphasized where ‘strong’ corresponds to presupposition of existence (specific and partitive) and ‘weak’ to non-presupposition. As informally put in (46), specificity is a subset of partitivity, which in turn is a subset of non-presupposition: (46) Strength : specific 4 partitive 4 non-presuppositional The notion of strength follows from 24140 properties, where non-presuppositional is degree 0, i.e. it is not strong, and degree 2 is specific, it is strong. Starke’s feature tree can then be completed and modified as follows: (47)
Quantifier
Argument [Φ/Case]
Non-presuppositional Q Partitive-Q Specific-Q Strength distinguishes between specificity and partitivity in terms of semantics, where specificity is stronger than partitivity. It also distinguishes between the two notions in terms of prosody (for wh-phrases in-situ and un Ns) or lexically (for 8Qs). In this section, we have seen that strength distinguishes between specificity, partitivity and non-presupposition in terms of scope, i.e. syntax is
5.1 Introduction
219
at stake, too. The facts that specific Qs (wh and 8Qs) have to take wide scope, that partitive Qs do not and that non-presuppositional cannot, imply that specific Qs have something more than the two others. Partitive 8Qs block non-presuppositional and partitive phrases, but not specific Qs. (46) can be formulated by the following general locality Principle, called the Strength Principle:8 (48) given Q < Q partitive < Q specific, *Qi . . . Qn . . .Qi iff Qn Qi In other words, specificity, partitivity, and lack of both (i.e. non-presupposition) are associated to semantico-syntactic features: strength is about features. In the next section I present intervention effects with N-words and I show that the locality principle in (48) is also operative in these configurations. 5.1.2.3 Negation, N-Words and Intervention Effects The locality Principle stated in (48) makes an interesting prediction with respect to N-words, too. In Chapter 4, I argued that N-words are 8 negative Qs, involving partitivity and specificity. As interveners, personne should (i) not block specific un N and specific wh-phrases in-situ, (ii) block partitive un N and partitive wh-phrases in-situ and finally (iii) block non-presuppositional un N as well as non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ. Aucun des N must be an absolute blocker, just like chacun des N is. I will first review the behavior of un Ns with respect to negative islands and N-words, and secondly, I will review the behaviour of wh-phrases in-situ in the same configurations. In Chapter 2, Section 2.1.4.1, intervention effects between negation and the three different un Ns were presented. Only specific un N can escape negative islands, (49a). To get a non-presuppositional reading with un N, the DP must be modified in such a way that it shows up as de N, (49b). In this case, it gets narrow scope with respect to negation. Partitive un N cannot take wide scope, (50a): (49)
a.
b.
8
Fred n’a pas vu un chien F. NE has not seen a (specific) dog There is a dog, and Fred did not see it Fred n’a pas vu de chien F. NE has not seen of dog Fred didn’t see any dog
(9 4 :)
(: 4 9) only
Thanks to Genoveva Puska´s and Luigi Rizzi (p.c) for discussions and for helping me with the formulation of this principle.
220
(50) a.
5 ??
Intervention Effects Revisited
Fred n’a pas pris UNE CARTE Fred NE has not picked a carte ‘Fred didn’t pick a card’
The overt partitive un des N in that same configuration is grammatical, yet it tends to be interpreted as specific. A natural context where (50b) is uttered is a situation in which there is a group a dogs playing in the garden and Fred is look for his own dog. Then Vanessa utters: (50) b. Fred n’a pas vu un des chiens Fred NE has not seen some of the dogs (50b) means that there is a dog (say Milou) and that among the set of dogs playing in the garden, Fred did not see that dog. In that sense, the existential within the partitive takes wide scope over negation, and is interpreted as specific. Note that the two sentences in (50) are both grammatical under a numeral reading of un N with negation scoping over une carte (see fn. 60, Chapter 2). Recall that pas . . . un is not like the Det pas un N (Chapter 4): pas un N is the subject counterpart of object pas de N, where pas obligatorily binds the non-presuppositional un N that is modified in a way that it is spelled out as de N, yielding a Split-DP construction. The availability of specific un N and its obligatory wide scope with respect to negation follows from (48): a specific Q can cross a bare Q (50a). Specific Qs have to take wide scope. That non-presuppositional un Ns are attested follows from the fact that in that case, the DP is not existential per se, but a pure variable that needs to be bound by a relevant operator, here negation. The crucial point is that it cannot move past negation to take wide scope, (51b): (51) a. Qspec. . . Q. . . Qspec b. * Q. . . Q. . . Q As for the marginal status of partitive un N, this is left unexplained, though. Full grammaticality is predicted, not marginality. I leave this point for further research. Turning to N-words, the following behaviours are attested. Specific un N takes wide scope (52a), and non-presuppositional existential un N cannot show up and must be replaced by de N suggesting that it is bound by the negation (52b) vs. (52c): (52) a. Personne n’a vu _ un chien. b. * Personne n’a vu un chien. Nobody NE has seen a do c. Personne a vu de chien Nobody has seen any dog ‘Nobody saw any dog’
*(: 4 9); (9 4 :)
(:49) only
5.1 Introduction
221
Again, partitive un N cannot occur in this construction (53) unless the obligatory numeral reading shows up, with wide scope of the N-word, as (54) illustrates. (53)
??
Personne n’a vu UN CHIEN Nobody NE has seen a dog
(54) Personne n’a vu un chien Nobody NE has seen one dog ‘nobody saw one dog’
(: 4 9); *(9 4 :)
Specific aucun des N blocks wide scope of specific un N, (55a) and forces nonpresuppositional de N to show up. Recall that de N is some kind of polarity item (Chapter 4, Sections 4.1.2.1). As such it is licensed by negation, i.e. it does not move past it. As for partitive existential un N, the same puzzle as in (50a) and (52) shows up. In (56) the numeral reading is favoured, and negation scopes over it. (55) a. b. (56)
?
* Aucun des candidats n’a eu un poste none of the candidates NE got a (specific) position Aucun des candidats n’a eu de poste (:4 9) ; *( 9 4 :) none of the candidates NE got a position
?
Aucun des candidats n’a eu UN POSTE None of the students NE got a position
(: 4 9); *(9 4 :)
Why the numeral reading with partitive un N is compulsory under negation, must be left, unfortunately, an unanswered issue. In Chapter 2, Section 2.1.3.1, wh in-situ was shown to move on the basis of evidence from negative islands (see also Starke 2001): If negation (neg) intervenes, the much discussed argument/adjunct asymmetry witnessed with wh-fronting appears, (57). (57) a. b.
??
Tu crois qu’elle a pas fait _ quoi ? (NSC French) You think that she has not done what (Starke 2001: 23, (52a)) T’es pas parti _ comment? You are not left how (Starke 2001: 23, (54b))
(48) accounts for neg islands, too. Recall that extraction out of negative islands is not a preferred option, yet when it is done, a specific prosody shows up (see Fig. 5.1, above). With the partitive reading, wh-phrases in-situ can also move out of a wh-island, iff it is an argument, (58). (58) can be uttered in the following gym context. Claire is a regular at Rainbow gym. She goes there 3 times a week. As it is usually the case in gyms, she has a coach. Her coach usually prepares a plan for the day, i.e. she needs to use all the machines listed. That day Claire is a bit tired and she works out more slowly than usual. At the end of the session, she goes to the coach and tells him that she could not use all
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
the machines. The coach, who wants to prepare the next session, is a bit frustrated, so he asks (58). T’as pas utilise´ QUELLE MACHINE ? You have not used which machine b. * T’es pas parti COMMENT? You are not left how c. * T’as pas utilise´ de machine POURQUOI? You have not used of machine why
(58) a.
(NSC French)
A non-presuppositional wh in-situ phrase is unable to escape a neg-island: (59) a * Tu You b.* Tu You
crois think crois think
qu’ elle a pas fait quoi? (NSC French) that she has not done what ? qu’ elle a pas mange´ sa pomme comment? that she has not eaten her apple how
Therefore we arrive at the conclusion that partitive and specific wh-phrases insitu pattern alike, while non-presuppositional ones are blocked in neg-islands (60): (60) a. Qspec . . . Q. . . Qspec b. Qpart. . .Q. . .Qpart c. * Q. . .Qpart. . . Q In other words, (48) is active with neg-islands. Whereas specific (and to a certain extent partitive) wh-phrases in-situ are accepted in neg-islands (even without providing a presupposed context: speakers can reconstruct that context quite easily), wh-phrases in-situ and N-words co-occurring are generally rejected. Yet, if the context is rightly set, one can get specific quel N ‘which N’ out of N-words, but specific qui is trapped. Consider the following context (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.3.1) a conversation between two friends. A is telling B about a hearing where 6 persons are accused of a kidnapping. Since all of them deny, the burden of proof lies on the witnesses. During the process, 5 of the accused were recognized by only one witness, but one of the accused was not recognized by any witness. At this point B asks: (61) I was wondering, by the way, but. . . a. personne n’a reconnu _ quel accuse´? nobody NE has recognized which accused b. ?? personne n’a reconnu _ qui? nobody NE has recognized who c. personne n’a reconnu _ qui-c¸a? Nobody NE has recognized who-that
(wh 4neg) only
Replacing qui ‘who’ by the d-linked wh par excellence wh-c¸a, (61b) becomes possible in this situation (61c) (see Chapter 2, section ‘‘Syntax: Movement or Non-movement’’).
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223
Ultimately, wh-phrases in-situ in (61a,c) are specific, since they refer to familiar individuals. As said above, neither partitive, nor non-presuppositional readings are available. Interpretatively, both sentences in (62) trigger an echo reading, as does (63). (64) summarizes what is happening in (62) and (63): (62) a. * Personne n’a reconnu QUEL ACCUSE´ ? nobody NE has recognized which accused b. * Personne n’a reconnu qui? nobody NE has recognized who (63)
??
(unless echo) (unless echo)
Aucun des te´moins n’a reconnu _ quel accuse´? None of the witnesses NE has recognized which accused
(64) a. Qspec . . . Qpart. . . Qspec b. * Qpart. . .Qpart. . .Qart c. * Q. . .Qpart. . . Q d. * Qspec . . .Qspec. . .Qspec Building on Starke’s observation that eWIs are possible with specific whphrases in-situ, I have provided an analysis of scope interactions in French, involving N-words, negation, 8Qs, un Ns, and wh-phrases in-situ. The Strength Principle constrains movement operations of Qs, and is ruled by RM.9
5.1.2.4 Wh-Phrases and Combien-Extraction: Some Differences Combien de N and wh-phrases in-situ have similar constructions and interpretations: being presuppositional or not, being able to jump islands or not (etc.). Based on this parallelism, I concluded that the two constructions have similar structures: depending on their interpretation, both may involve Split-DP structures (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.3). Being split or unsplit is a property reflected in the external syntax: I observed that split-DPs cannot escape neg-islands, whereas unsplit-DPs can. In this Chapter, we looked in more details at intervention effects, and we concluded that unsplit wh-phrases in-situ are also constrained by islands. The Strength Principle constrains movement operations
9 Note that the Strength Principle has been discovered thanks to scope-taking items in in-situ position. Whether it holds of visible ex-situ movement remains to be tested. For instance, when chacun occupies the subject position, ex-situ wh-phrases are easily extracted, whereas insitu wh-phrases aren’t (see Section 5.1.2.4, ex. (71a)):
(i)
Qu’est-ce que chacun des enfants a fait? What is it that each of the children has done
Ex-situ constructions are left for future research. See also fn. 13.
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
of wh-phrases. Combien de N and wh-phrases in-situ are not identical, however. Although they exhibit similar syntactic constraints (and sensitivity to neg islands), minimal semantic and syntactic distinctions must be noted. As such, wh-phrases in-situ cannot be taken as exact covert cases of combien de N (Chapter 2). It is the aim of this section to highlight these differences. It is well known that non-canonical quantification is more restricted than its canonical counterpart. Typically, in French, overt Split-DPs constructions are cases in point (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.3.3). Split-combien constructions exhibit weak island effects, (1b) (see Obenauer 1983, 1994, Rizzi 1990, 2001, 2002, de Swart 1992, Doetjes 1997, Mathieu 2004)10: (65) a.
Combien de livres (n’) as-tu pas lu? How many of books NE have you not read b. * Combien (n’) as-tu pas lu de livres? How many NE have you not read of books ‘how many books have you not read’
The contrast in (65) has been analysed by Obenauer 1994 in terms of presupposition. Presupposed wh-phrases are those phrases that drag along their restrictions and are interpreted with existential presupposition. Wh-phrases that split their restrictions in-situ are non-presuppositional. Only the former can escape intervention effects. That extractable wh-phrases have special properties has been noted cross-linguistically in the literature (Pesetsky 1987 for English, Rizzi 2001, 2002 for Italian and French, Obenauer 1994, Starke 2001 for French and Chapter 2, Section 2.1.3.3 in particular). De Swart 1992 observes that prototypical scope islands with split-combien constructions are more restricted than those with their unsplit counterparts. (66) illustrates this with floating tous ‘all’: (66) a. Combieni ont-ils tous lu ti de livres? (8 4 wh) ; *(wh 4 8) How-many have they all read of books (8 4 wh) ; (wh 4 8) b. Combien de livresi ont-ils tous lu ti? How-many of books have they all read.MASC.PL ‘How many books have they all read’ (Swart 1992:391) Wide scope of tous is the only available reading with Split-DPs structures, (66a), and the result is a pair-list (PL) reading, i.e. it is asked for all persons how many books they have read: ‘Jean read 3, Pierre read 7’. De N must have narrow scope in (iia) (see Mathieu 2004 for an analysis of de N in terms of semantic incorporation). (66b) is ambiguous between a wide (PL) and a narrow scope reading of tous (i.e. how many books are such that everyone has read them; a single number is asked). (66a) and (66b) are interrogative: the wh-operator 10
De Swart 1992 considers all interveners with split-DP constructions (in French, but also in German and Dutch), and observes that these constructions systematically show weak islands. She argues that the notion of A’-specifier is inadequate to describe weak islands interveners.
5.1 Introduction
225
(combien ‘how’) is interpreted as interrogative, i.e. it has to move to the highest SpecCP to check [þwh] on C. When de N is left in-situ and depends on tous, the PL reading arises; when the restriction moves along to SpecCP, the SP reading arises: de N is not dependant on tous. Mathieu 2004 compares (66) to wh in-situ constructions in French. For him, wh in-situ constructions involve Split-DPs of the combien-type.11 He notes that only the PL reading is available in (67b).12 The stranded indefinite in (67a) takes narrow scope, like in the split-combien above (66a). With fronted wh-phrases, only the specific reading shows up: (67) a. Ils ont tous fait quoi? They have all done what b. Qui’est-ce qu’ils ont tous fait ti? What that they have all done ‘What did they all do?’
(8 4 wh) only (wh 4 8) only (Mathieu 2004: 36, (56))
Under the approach taken in this book (and in Mathieu’s approach), if the parallelism between combien–extractions and wh in-situ constructions holds, then (67b) is problematic. In Chapter 2, Section 2.1.3, I argued on the basis of this parallelism, that presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ undergo covert XP movement and can cross islands, whereas non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ give rise to split-DP structures, and are blocked in islands. The same is true of combienextractions (see Obenauer 1994 and the contrast in (65) in particular). As such, (67a) is expected to be interpreted with wide scope of the wh-phrase in-situ, just like (66b), contrary to fact. Another problem shows up. If (67b) involves bare Q movement – recall that fronted-wh-phrases tend to be interpreted without existential presupposition (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.1), – like (66a), then only the PL reading should be available, contrary to the facts presented here. The data in (66) and (67) are unclear from an empirical point of view. Across French speakers, variations are attested. Szabolsci 1999, 2006 gives a star to (66). According to her, only the independent reading – They all read the same number of books – what (which) number was it? – is available (see Szabolsci 1999: (174)). Judgments by people tested in the Geneva area – including me – give a very different picture. Both (66a) and (66b) can only be interpreted as how many books are such that everyone has read them. The PL reading is systematically rejected although some speakers can reluctantly accept the PL reading with (66b’)). (66) a’. Combieni ont-ils tous lu ti de livres? (wh48) only (NSC French) How-many have they all read of books
11
See Chapter 2, Sections 2.1.2.1 and 2.1.3.3 for differences with our analysis. Recall that for Chang 1997, Cheng and Rooryck 2000, wh-phrases in-situ cannot interact with scope Islands. (67a) is then ungrammatical for them. See Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.1.
12
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
b’. Combien de livresi ont-ils tous lu ti? (wh48) only How-many of books have they all read.MASC.PL ‘How many books have they all read’ As far as this construction is available with chacun ‘each’, (68), only the PL reading shows up. However (68) is almost systematically rejected: (68) a. * b.
?*
(NSC French) Combieni ont-ils chacun lu ti de livres? How-many have they each read of books Combien de livresi ont-ils chacun lu ti? (8 4 wh) only How-many of books have they each read.MASC.PL ‘How many books have they each read’
Under the Strength Principle, (66b’) and (67) are not problematic: the unsplit combien de N being specific, it can cross partitive tous ((66’b), but not specific chacun, (68b). (66’a) is potentially problematic: Qs of any type block overt movement of bare Qs (bare Qs cannot move past partitive [tous þ pro] and specific [chacþ un]), hence combien in (66a’) should not be able to move past tous. Yet, its interpretation is clearly specific wh-combien 4 tous. This suggests that the restriction, which gives the presuppositional interpretation to the whole phrase, somehow moves along with combien as an unsplit DP. As such, the specific Q can move past the partitive Q. How exactly this is achieved remains to be worked out. NSC French speakers can only get the SP reading, in (67a), contrary to the judgments given in Mathieu 2004. Re-consider the context presented in Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.3. A conversation between two friends A and B. A is telling B about a hearing where 6 persons are accused of a kidnapping. Since all of them deny, the burden of proof lies on the witnesses. During the process, only one witness recognized 5 of the accused, but all the witnesses recognized one of the accused. At this point B asks: (69) (et) Les te´moins ont tous reconnu qui? (wh 48) only (and) The witness have all recognized who
(NSC French)
(70) et tous les te´moins ont reconnu qui? (wh 48) only And all the witnesses have recognized who
(NSC French)
The wh-phrase in-situ must be specific. Both floated and non-floated versions of (69) and (70) with chacun are impossible (see fn. 7, Chapter 5), (71): (71) a. * et les te´moins ont chacun reconnu qui? and the witnesses have each recognized who b. * et chacun des te´moins a reconnu qui? and each of the witnesses haverecognized who
(NSC French)
Under the Strength Principle, the NSC data discussed here are not problematic. In covert Split-DP constructions, Qs of any type block overt
5.1 Introduction
227
movement of the bare Opwh (the operator cannot move past partitive [tous þ pro] and specific [chacþ un]). The unsplit version being specific, it can appear in these configurations, and as such, must take wide scope over partitive tous, (69), (70). Specific chacun blocks movement of the specific wh-phrase, as a RM effect, (71). Combien de N and wh-phrases in-situ in NSC French are then identical when weak and scope Islands are involved. This supports the analysis of wh-phrases in-situ given in Chapter 2, Section 2.1.3.3: wh-phrases in-situ are (potential) covert Split-DPs, just like combien de N are potentially overt SplitDPs. Both types were considered similar, and combien de N constructions (split and unsplit) were used as overt realizations of wh in-situ constructions. Yet, these similarities have limits. An important difference is semantic. I claimed in Chapter 2 that combien is the wh-Operator par excellence. This is not quite correct, though, since combien has an additional meaning (despite being fully interrogative): it involves quantity (much like beaucoup ‘a lot’). This meaning is then traced on the Operator itself. As such, combien de N and wh-phrases in-situ are similar, but not identical, although both involve SplitDP structures.13
13
A second difference is related to scope. Whereas covert and overt movement of wh-phrases past specific 8Qs are always forbidden, (71) and (72), the constraint can be somehow relaxed with combien de N. In (ia), both the PL and the SP readings are available, as is attested by the availability of past-participle agreement (Obenauer 1992). In (ib), agreement is compulsory. (i) strongly contrasts with (68), which is ungrammatical (reconnaıˆtre ‘to recognize’ has been replaced by faire ‘to make’). The distinction between the two sets of examples is puzzling. The Strength Principle can deal with (68) and (71), but not with (i): chacun should block movement of the wh-phrase. Note moreover that if chacun is a FQ, the sentence gets degraded, (ii), but not as much as (68b): (i)
a.
b.
(ii)
?
Je voudrais savoir combien de fautes chacun a fait/faites I would-want know how many of errors.FEM.PL each has made/FEM.PL (Obenauer 1992) Je voudrais savoir combien chacun a fait/*es de fautes I would-want know how many each has made/FEM.PL of errors.FEM.PL ‘I would like to know how many errors each made’ Je voudrais savoir combien de fautes les filles ont chacune *fait/faites I would-want know how many errors.FEM.PL the girls have each made.FEM.PL
If wh-phrases in-situ and combien de N were identical, the grammaticality of (i) is unexpected, in view of the ungrammaticality of (71b). With respect to the constructions discussed in (68), (i) and (ii) are doubly unexpected. The difference might also be due to the fact that the Strength Principle holds only of in-situ elements (see fn.9). If this is the case, though, (68) (in particular) is left unexplained. I have no answer to this puzzle, and leave it to further research.
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
5.1.3 Strong Islands 5.1.3.1 Intermediate Scope The intermediate reading (see Chapter 2, ex. (172)) can be dealt with in terms of the Strength principle. Under that reading, only specific un N shows up. In (72), the specific un N can only scope over tous les e´tudiants, but not over chacun. Un livre is dependant on chacun (i.e. they cannot escape the domain of the relativized quantified DP, they have scope properties). Yet, if the matrix subject is partitive tous les N , the specific un N can take widest scope, (73): (72) Chacun des profs a fe´licite´ tous les e´tudiants qui ont lu un livre qu’il a recommande´. ‘Each of the professors has congratulated all the students that have read a book that he recommended.’ For every prof (x), there is a book such that x congratulated all the students that read that book. * there is a book such that for every prof (x), x congratulated all the students that read that book (73) Tous les profs ont fe´licite´ les e´tudiants qui ont lu _ un livre qu’ils ont recommande´ ‘All the prof have congratulated the students that have read a book that they recommended.’ * For every professor (x), there is a book such that x congratulated all the students that read that book. There is a book such that for all the professors (x), x congratulated the students that read that book In (73), wide scope of un livre is favoured. The specific existential un N is interpreted in the matrix clause, as expected by our approach.14 (74) shows that the partitive version of un N cannot scope out of the SI: 14
On the basis of the availability of specific un Ns intermediated scope, Ihsane 2008 gets rid of the Choice function analysis of Reinhart 1997. The Choice function analysis does not take into account the fact that specific un N (S-RefP, for Ihsane), involving both wide scope and intermediate scope, involves specificity, and that this information is intrinsic to the DP, contrasting with partitive un N and non-presuppositional un N. Since my typology of un Ns is quite similar to that of Ihsane and that her following arguments are based on that typology, as well as the syntax of these elements, let me just quote the author. She says that there is [. . .] no explanation as to why an indefinite takes widest or intermediate scope is provided. Furthermore, the fact that the predicate may be responsible for the existential reading of some indefinites is not acknowledged. That not all indefinites assert existence is not acknowledged either. Although Reinhart mentions that indefinites may also be standard existential generalized quantifiers (Q-un-NPs, [i.e. partitive un N]), she seems to suggest that this assumption is not crucial and that it can be dropped (1997: Section 6.2). In other words, a single interpretative procedure could be sufficient to analyze indefinites. (Ihsane 2008: 115–116)
5.1 Introduction
229
(74) Chacun des profs a fe´licite´ tous les e´tudiants qui ont lu un des livres qu’il a recommande´. * For every professor (x), there is a book such that x congratulated all the students that read that book. For every professor (x), x congratulated all the students that read a (different) book (72)–(74) support a (covert) movement analysis of both presuppositional un N. The readings ensuing are ruled out by the Strength principle in (48). 5.1.3.2 Feature Stripping (Baunaz and Puska´s 2008) Negation seems to create super ‘strong’ WIs with wh-phrases in-situ, and it is very difficult for them to move out of such islands, unless a very strong context (triggering specificity) is involved. The fact that only quel N ‘which N’ and whc¸a in (61) can extract out of neg islands triggered by N-words suggests that the more structure a wh-phrase displays, the more it can move (see Chapter 2).15 The same goes with specific un N. Non-presuppositional un N and non-presuppositional wh in-situ are always stuck, in the sense that even when grammatical, they cannot outscope their negative interveners, suggesting that somehow, they are blocked. Partitive wh in-situ can scope out of negative islands, but not outscope N-words, a fact that is accounted for by (48). As for partitive un N it is stuck in all negative configurations, a fact that remains unexplained. Incidentally this analysis of wh in-situ works well in monoclausal sentences, but none of the examples discussed involve biclausal constructions. In (75), any wh-phrase in-situ can enter the derivation: (75) a. T’as mange´ quoi / _ quoi/ QUOI? You have eaten what b. T’as pas mange´ *quoi / _ quoi/ QUOI? You have not eaten what
(NSC French)
(75a) can involve the three wh-phrases in-situ discussed here: specific, partitive or non-presuppositional. It has been discussed at length that in (75b), only presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ are available. The internal structure of presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ involve something more than nonpresuppositional wh-phrases in-situ and as such are able to undergo covert Ihsane 2008 and Chapter 2, Section 2.1.4 show that we need at least a three-way distinction of un Ns, based on their interpretive as well as their scope behaviors and their intonations. 15 Note that if quel accuse´ ‘which accused’ is replaced by the extremely specific wh-phrase lequel des accuse´s ‘which one of the accused’ in (63), the sentence becomes perfect. I haven’t discussed at all this latter construction, but the fact that it is ‘morphologically’ specific (involving the definite specific Det le- ‘the’) predicts that it should be able to move out and to take wide scope, which it actually does. This last fact is problematic, though, since it constitutes a clear violation of RM.
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
movement; non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ are not, and splitting the DP is compulsory. The same reasoning, then, applies to (76): (76) Jean a dit que tu as mange´ quoi / _ quoi/ QUOI? J. has said that you have eaten what So far so good. Islands are presented as diagnostics for movement. At some point, the three wh in-situ are sensitive to these islands (scope and neg), though reacting differently. Yet, Islands were only introduced within the lowest predicate, i.e. within the clause from which the wh-phrase in-situ originates. With a biclausal sentence, (neg) islands can be inserted either in the lowest clause (77a) or within the matrix clause, as in (77b, c): (77) a. b. ?? c. *
Tu crois qu’elle a pas fait _ quoi ? You think that she has not done what tu crois pas qu’elle a fait _ quoi ? you think not that she has done what tu crois pas qu’elle a fait QUOI ? you think not that she has done what
(NSC French) (Starke 2001: 23, (52a))
But only (77a) is grammatical. The data in (77) suggest that depending on where the island is, the sentence gets different grammaticality results. (77a) suggests that (covert) movement past the lowest island is legal, whereas covert movement past a higher island is not (77b, c). The same situation is observed with partially overt wh-movements, such as in clefts: C’est quoi que tu n’as pas achete´ ? it is what that you NE have not bought ‘What is it that you didn’t buy?’ b. * Ce n’ est pas quoi que tu as achete´? it NE is not what that you have bought ‘What is it not that you have bought?’ (Mathieu 2002: 61, (45))
(78) a.
In Section 2.1.1.2, I argued in favour of a movement analysis of wh-phrases in cleft constructions. In (78a), quoi undergoes movement to the matrix clause and crosses a negative island. The sentence is perfect. (78b) suggests that the position occupied by quoi in (78a) is not its final landing site: (78b) is ungrammatical; a negative island has been inserted above quoi. So it seems that longdistance movement works differently from short distance movement in this configuration. Both constructions in (77b and c) and (78b) involve presupposed wh-phrases. Under the approach advocated in this chapter, we predict that these phrases should be able to be extracted also in matrix clause negativeislands, yet they do not. I would like to propose that (77) and (78) involve the same kinds of movements: (a) phrasal movement, and (b) split-DP, to get the highest [þwh] in C checked. Bare Operator movement being subject to islands, (77b and c) as well as (78b) are ungrammatical. Such an analysis takes
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231
into account the fact that the wh-feature, as well as the [spec]ific, [part]itive features must be distinguished, and must be checked on different heads. In (78), spec/part feature checking is done overtly, while [þwh] feature checking is done by bare Op. By analogy, the same analysis could be advocated for (77). Baunaz and Puska´s 2008 claim that a wh-phrase in-situ moves to reach its scope position covertly. They call this phenomenon feature stripping. In the course of the derivation, a wh-phrase gets rid of a feature in order to move higher. With wh-movement, feature stripping is the extraction of a bare wh-operator out of a phrase which bears a presuppositional feature (be it [spec] or [part]). Therefore, there may be two types of movement involved with wh-phrases in-situ, schematized in (79). (79a) is covert XP-movement, which moves the wh-phrase to SpecCP in French, with its presuppositional features. (79b) is stripped Q-movement: after covert XP-movement, the presuppositional layer (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.5) has been peeled off and bare Q-movement applies. (79) a. [ [wh-phrase]i. . . ti] b. wh-Qj . . . [ [wh-phrase tj]i. . .ti] (Baunaz and Puska´s 2008:47, (8)) If the wh-phrase still carries its presuppositional feature, it can escape the domain of negation; if the wh-phrase, which has been peeled off its presuppositional feature, occurs within a neg-island, the movement will be blocked, as is expected of a classical bare Q-movement (Baunaz and Puska´s 2008:48, (9)): (80) [CP wh-Qj . . .*NEG . . . [CP [wh-phrase tj]i . . .NEG. . .
..ti ]
Stripping can account for wh-phrases in-situ in SIs.
Strong Islands Recall that wh phrases in-situ are not always banned from SI (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.3.1). Consider the contrast in (81), from Baunaz and Puska´s (2008 : 48, (12)): Elle a ri [parce que Jean s’est moque´ de qui ?] she has laughed because Jean has made fun of who (¼who did she laugh because Jean made fun of?) b. * Elle a ri [parce que Jean s’est moque´ de qui diable?] she has laughed because Jean has made fun of who devil
(81) a.
(81) shows that aggressively non-d-linked wh-phrases (‘who the hell’) are not licensed in SIs, i.e. the wide scope reading is only accessible to a specific whphrase, (81a). Baunaz and Puska´s 2008 claim that the wide scope interpretation obtains via covert movement, even in the case of SIs. Indeed, the presence of WIs reveals that whereas the wide scope reading of a presuppositional whphrase is not blocked by negation in the adjunct clause (82a), it is not legal in matrix negative contexts (82b) (Baunaz and Puska´s 2008:49, (13)):
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5 Intervention Effects Revisited
Elle a ri [parce que Jean n’a pas aime´ quel film ?] she has laughed because Jean NE has not liked which film ¼For which film is it the case that she laughed because Jean did not like the film? b. * Elle a pas ri [parce que Jean a aime´ quel film]? she has not laughed because Jean has liked which actor
(82) a.
In (82a), quel film has a specific intonation (a fact also noted by Starke 2001). If quel film ’which film’ is presuppositional, the ungrammaticality of (82b) is unexpected. Yet it shows that there must be some movement, since sensitivity to WIs has been taken as diagnosis for wh-movement.They note that ‘it seems unreasonable to claim that there is no movement in the adjunct clause, but that there is movement to the matrix scope position’ (Baunaz and Puska´s 2008:49). Conversely, they add that ‘if there is covert movement of a presuppositional whphrase, there is no explanation as to why it is insensitive to negation within the adjunct clause but sensitive to negation outside it’ (id.49). Baunaz and Puska´s 2008 propose that (82a) and (83) involve two successive movements (see (79) above). The first movement involves a presuppositional wh-phrase (i.e. specific), (76a). The second movement involves a bare-Q: the wh-phrase being stripped off its presuppositional feature is sensitive to negislands, (83b) (Baunaz and Puska´s 2008: 49, (14)): (83) a. [ parce que [wh-phrase]i . . .NEG. . ...ti ] b. * Wh-Qj. . ...NEG. . ..[ parce que [[wh-phrase tj]i . . .NEG. . ...ti ] Under this analysis, the wh-phrase in-situ undergoes covert movement throughout to reach its scope position.16,17
5.1.4 Remaining Issues In this section, I would like to introduce issues that have not been treated in this work, but that the approach(es) adopted (necessarily) raise. This section only provides general outlines on how to deal with these issues, but does not give clear answers. The crucial question that is left for future research is that of the landing site of these Qs (at LF). This question leads to several sub-questions that I want to 16
For discussion about an alternative analysis, see Baunaz and Puska´s 2008. Note that once the in-situ (i.e. the covert movement) problem is solved, another problem shows up: I have claimed that partitive and specific wh-phrases undergo covert phrasal movement (Chapter 2, Section 2.1.5). Covert phrasal movement is the phonologically null counterpart of overt phrasal movement. So how is it that any type of wh-phrase is blocked in SIs with overt movement, while both specific and partitive wh in-situ are fine in these configurations? At this point, I have no answer to that crucial question.
17
5.1 Introduction
233
briefly address. The analyses put forward here force us to claim that there are two syntactic possibilities as to the behaviour of Qs, i.e. some undergo movement (QR or Quantifier Movement (QM)), while others do not, depending on their status. On the basis of the availability of FQs, I arrive at the conclusion that 8Qs do not undergo movement and seem to be interpreted in their spell out position. On the basis of the availability of Split-DPs, I arrive at the conclusion that wh-phrases in-situ are not clause-bound and must undergo movement; comparatively, I argued that the same is the case for existential un Ns, though non-presuppositional un N must always take narrow scope (and take narrowest scope). N-words, I claimed, must be interpreted in SpecNegP. Yet a lot of questions arise at this point: what kind of movement do they undergo? QR or QM? At this point, QM seems more appropriate to account at least for 9Qs and wh in-situ constructions, i.e., covert movement of the specific and partitive un N / wh in-situ to a dedicated position in the left periphery, and not to an arbitrary adjoined position. Under that approach, what triggers movement of un N and wh-phrases in-situ is their dependent interpretation (cf. Beghelli and Stowell 1997, Baunaz 2005, Baunaz and Cattaneo 2005, Ihsane 2008), i.e., their respective landing sites seem to be related to the semantico-syntactic features these Qs involve, namely, [spec], [part] and the syntactic operator they intrinsically contain (see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.5, on the internal structure of these Qs). Movement is triggered by (existential or interrogative) Q and pied-piping is required under certain conditions, i.e., when the Q is presuppositional. That it is Q that triggers movement seems to be clear now. The availability of Split-DP structures, i.e., of pure interrogative Q-movement, has been attested. But what about the status of pied-piping? Are [spec] and [part] features free riders or do these features trigger movement to a devoted position within the left periphery?18 Based on the scope relationships, movement to different positions seems to be at stake: (i) Specific un N and specific wh-phrases in-situ go to the highest position: they take wide scope. (iia) Partitive existential un N ends up in a position lower than 8Qs and negation (neg and N-words). (iib) Partitive existential whphrases must go to a position higher than negation, but lower than N-words and 8Qs. (iii) Both non-presuppostional un N and wh-phrases involve splitting of the operator: The former involve Op9, which binds the variable at the VP level, whereas the latter involve Opwh, moving to SpecCP, leaving its restriction insitu. Both operators are blocked by any other intervening Qs. Non-presupposed un N is interpreted in-situ. The cartographic approach can easily account for these data and the fact that these elements have different syntactico-semantic flavours suggests that they move to different positions. The status of prosody remains to be better understood. It gives information as to the semantics of a given wh-phrase/un N, and to some extent, to its syntactic position, although it does not distinguish between the in-situ and ex-situ positions. 18 This question was partly answered in Section 5.1.2, suggesting on the basis of partial wh movement in French that there should be different positions in which all these features are checked.
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As for 8Qs, specific 8Qs appear to take wide scope. Partitive 8Qs tend to take wide scope, but this is not systematic (see interactions with negation, Chapter 4). Yet, 8Qs do not exhibit special prosodies, and as such, do not play any role in their (i) syntax and (ii) semantics (at least, presuppositionspeaking). So can we maintain that partitive and specific 8Qs occupy different positions? Not necessarily, it could be the case that these elements, being clausebound as a reflex of their internal structures, occupy a fixed position. As for N-words, they must occupy NegP at some point, as claimed in Chapter 4. The exact position of NegP needs to be discussed: because pas ‘not’ and N-words are in complementary distribution (see Chapter 4, Section 4.1.3), they must occupy the same position at some point. If this is indeed the case, there are two possibilities: either NegP occupies a clause-medial position, below TP or above TP (as in Belletti 1990, for instance) or a higher position, within the left periphery (as in Puska´s 2000, for Hungarian). Nothing in the data presented above allows us to make a decision as to the exact position of this projection, though. Mainly for space reasons, all these important questions are left for future research.
5.1.5 Conclusion In the previous Chapters, I have claimed that existential presupposition must be split into specificity and partitivity, mainly based on the semantic and prosodic distributions of wh-phrases, un Ns, 8Qs and N-words. In this chapter, I give more strength to a differential treatment of presupposition in French, focussing on syntactic operations. Following Starke 2001 and Rizzi 2002, I adopt a feature based approach to RM. On the basis of the semantic properties discussed above and a close scrutiny of intervention effects the Qs create with one another, we can build a hierarchy of features. Intervention facts, as well as a locality theory like RM enable us to refine the internal structure of wh-phrases and 9Qs. Each type of (non)-presupposition has a different structure, and the richer presupposition a Q carries, the heavier it is and the more likely it moves. Hence only non-presuppositional Qs show Split-DP structures, while presuppositional Qs move all along to check their semantic-syntactic features. To account for scope relationships, I have elaborated a locality principle, based on the strength Qs have. Strength is defined in terms of specificity, partitivity and non-presupposition. This principle constrains movement operations of Qs. I claim that this is due to RM.
References Baunaz, Lena. 2005. The syntax and semantics of wh in-situ and existentials: The case of French. Leiden Working Papers in Linguistics 2.2:1–27. Baunaz, Lena and Andrea Cattaneo. 2005. Personne ‘nobody’: An instance of universal quantification. G@G 4:47–92.
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Baunaz, Lena and Genoveva Puska´s. 2008. Feature stripping and wh-movement in French and Hungarian. In Selected Proceedings of the 34th Incontro di Grammatica Generativa. Paola Beninca, Federico Damonte and Nicoletta Penello (eds.). Padova: Unipress Special Issue of the Rivista di Grammatica Generativa 33:43–60. Baunaz, Lena and Ce´dric Patin. 2009. Prosody refers to semantic factors: Evidence from French wh-words, talk given at the Interface Discourse-Prosody Conference in Paris 7, September 11th 2009. To be published. In Proceedings of IDP. E. Delais-Roussarie, H.-Y. Yoo, L. de Saussure and A. Rihs (eds.), Etudes de se´ mantique et pragmatique franc¸aises. Berne: Lang. Beck, Sigrid. 1996. Quantified structures as barriers for LF-movement. Natural Language Semantics 4:1–56. Beghelli, Fillipo and Tim Stowell. 1997. Distributivity and negation: The syntax of each and every. In Ways of Scope Taking, Anna Szabolcsi (ed.), 71–108. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Chang, Lisa. 1997. Wh-in situ in French. MA thesis, University of British Colombia. Cheng, Lisa and Johann Rooryck. 2000. Licensing wh-in-situ. Syntax 3(1):1–19. Cinque, Guglielmo. 1990. Types of A Bar-Dependencies. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, Linguistic Inquiry Monograph. Enc¸, Mu¨rvet. 1991. The semantics of specificity. Linguistic Inquiry 22:1–25 Huang, James. 1982. Move WH in a language without WH movement. The Linguistic Review 1:369–410. Ihsane, Tabea 2008. The Layered DP. Form and Meaning of French Indefinites Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 124. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Mathieu, Eric. 2002. The Syntax of Non-Canonical Quantification: A Comparative Study. Doctoral dissertation, University College London. Mathieu, Eric. 2004. The mapping of form and interpretation: The case of optional whmovement in French. Lingua 114:1090–1132. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1983. Une Quantification Non-Canonique: La Quantification a` Distance. Langue Franc¸ais 58:66–88. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1992. L’interpre´tation des structures-wh et l’accord du partiticipe passe´. In Structure de la Phrase et The´orie du Liage, Hans-Georg Obenauer and Anne Zribi-Hertz (eds.), 169–195. Saint-Denis: Presses Universitaires de Vincennes. Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1994. Aspects de la Syntaxe A-Barre. The`se de Doctorat d’Etat, Universite´ de Paris VIII. Pesetsky, David. 1987. Wh-in-situ: Movement and unselective binding. In The Representation of (In)definites, Eric Reuland and Alice ter Meulen (eds.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Puska´s, Genoveva. 2000. Quantification in the left periphery: A syntactic argument for ‘split’ domains. In CLS 36, Volume 1: The Main Session, John Boyle, Jung-Huyck Lee and Arika Okrent (eds.). Chicago Linguistic Society: Chicago. Puska´s, Genoveva. 2002. Floating quantifiers: What they can tell us about the syntax and semantics of quantifiers. GG@G 3:105–128. Reinhart, Tanya. 1997. Quantifier scope. How labour is divided between QR and choice functions. Linguistics and Philosophy 20:335–397. Rizzi, Luigi. 1990. Relativized Minimality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Rizzi, L. 2002. Locality and left periphery. In Structures and Beyond. The Cartography of Syntactic Structures, vol. 3. Adriana Belletti (ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. de Swart, Henriette. 1992. Intervention effects, monotonicity and scope. Proceedings of SALT, vol. 2, 387–406. Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press. Szabolcsi, Anna. 2005. Strong and weak islands. In The Syntax Companion, Martin Everaert and Henk van Riemsdijk (eds.). Oxford: Blackwell. Starke, Michal. 2001. Move Dissolves into Merge: A Theory of Locality. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Geneva.
Chapter 6
Conclusion
In this book, I have shown that apparent scope/lexical ambiguities are dependant on the utterance context and can be (partially) resolved via intonation in French. One of the results reached is the correlation between syntactic positions and semantic denotations, corroborating recent works on the matter (Ihsane 2008, a.o) and suggesting strict syntax-semantics mapping. In addition to semantics and syntax, prosody is taken as a diagnostic discriminating specificity from partitivity and non-presupposition with wh-phrases in-situ and existential un Ns (9Qs). Prosody does not play a role in the existential interpretation of 8Qs and N-words, which discriminate presupposition lexically. I proposed an analysis that takes the behavior(s) of colloquial French whphrases in-situ, 9Qs, 8Qs and N-words into account. During our investigation, several issues were raised – mostly related to the semantic-syntax interface: canonical quantification structures vs. non-canonical, semantic notions like assertion/existential presupposition, specificity and partitivity and their relationship(s) to syntax (among other). Related to the issue of existential presupposition is the importance of prosody in the system, i.e. how prosody, semantics and syntax interact, and to what extent. Finally the issue of the syntactic representations of Qs and their locality conditions is raised. Because the syntax, semantics and prosody of wh-phrases in-situ parallel those of 9Qs, I argued for a similar analysis accounting for their scope behavior. I have claimed that the non-uniformity of scope must be related to structural causes. Qs come in two classes: the first one groups 9 and wh-phrases together; the second one 8 and neg. Using this approach further than had been the case up to now, this book aimed at understanding the real impact of semantics on syntax.
6.1 Results I analyzed these four Qs as instances of two classes: each member of one of the two classes can (potentially) exhibit either overt or covert non-canonical quantification. Non-canonical quantification typically occurs with quantificational L. Baunaz, The Grammar of French Quantification, Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 83, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0621-7_6, Ó Springer ScienceþBusiness Media B.V. 2011
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sentences where Q and its restriction are not adjacent anymore (see Chapter 2). I have claimed that French displays two types of non-canonical quantification, each corresponding to different structures (and semantics): one in which the (lexical) operator is (c)-overtly moved to an A’-position, stranding its restriction in-situ, and a second one in which the restriction A-moves, the operator staying in an adjoined position. Qs can display these structures overtly and/or covertly. The former case corresponds to wh and 9Qs, while the latter to 8Qs and N-words. I called split-DP structures the case of (c)-overt stranding of the restriction by whphrases and existentials, and FQ the case of A-movement of the associate DP of both 8Qs and N-words. Qs with a (potential) Split-DP behavior have scope effects differing from those behaving like FQs: Qs with a FQ counterpart are composed of a Q adjoined to DP, and they are clause-bound; Qs with a Split-DP counterpart are not composed of a Q adjoined to DP and they can have long-distant scope. This book aimed at understanding what existential presupposition means when it is involved with Qs. With the help of semantics, prosody and syntax, I argued that there are two types of presupposed noun phrases (i.e. already introduced in the discourse): partitive and specific. On the one hand, partitivity involves a subset of a previously mentioned group (it involves a finite set of alternatives, Enc¸ 1991). The presupposition is that there is a predefined set. On the other hand, specificity-based noun phrases refer to familiar individuals only (i.e. they are identified via a known property, Starke 2001). Building on (i) introspective judgments and (ii) an experimental study on French wh-phrases (Baunaz and Patin 2009), I have shown that the prosody of wh-words and un Ns supports this distinction: wh-words are exponents of an accent when they involve specificity; un N is perceived with a fall-rise prosody. This prosody is neither found on partitive wh-words, nor on partitive un N (both tend to have a falling prosody), i.e. prosody can mark different discursive status in spoken NSC French. No particular prosody falls on non-presupposed noun phrases. The semantic distinction is also found with 8Qs, but not prosodically. Although existential presupposition has been split into two different notions, which are either prosodically, or lexically realized, I claimed that these semantic properties belong to the same class: the class of existential presupposed features related to Qs. In the spirit of Starke 2001, a feature class hierarchy can be built on the basis of which Relativized Minimality ((RM), Rizzi 2002) can operate, i.e. scope interactions can be treated in terms of RM. A crucial consequence is that partitivity and specificity are syntactically grounded.
6.1.1 Chapter 2: Split-DPs Investigating Qs and their prosodico-semantico-syntactic properties led me take a closer look at their respective internal structures. I have shown that whphrases and existential un Ns come in three flavors each, showing different semantics, syntax and prosody: the domain of non-presuppositional wh-phrases
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239
and un Ns is not constrained, and opens on a non-finite set of alternatives. No familiar individual is involved. Partitive noun phrases are distinguished from non-presuppositional ones in involving a closed, presupposed set of alternatives. As for specific Qs, there is no set of alternatives, but a familiar individual as referent for the noun phrase (that the interlocutor is inferred to have in mind). Note that the notion of alternatives available for speaker or interlocutor is not necessary to define specificity. The crucial point distinguishing specificity from partitivity is tied to the notion of familiarity (Heim 1982). When it comes to the prosody of French wh-phrases in-situ and 9Qs, I observed three distinct prosodic patterns: (a) rising, (b) slightly falling, and (c) slightly fall-rise (or with an accent). (a)–(c) correlate with three different interpretations: (a’) non-presuppositional, (b’) partitive and (c’) specific. That there is a contrast between specific and partitive prosodies has been confirmed by Baunaz and Patin 2009 for wh-phrases ex-situ and in-situ. Besides discourse contexts and prosody, specificity and partitivity can be distinguished in terms of syntax. Specific and partitive noun phrases are not sensitive to the same interveners. I have claimed that the mechanism linking the referent of specific noun phrases to the existing discourse referent can be grammaticalized in natural languages: I argue that specificity is overtly marked in the prosody of specific wh-phrases in-situ and 9Qs in French, while syntactically grounded. Typically, specific items take wide scope. On the basis of weak cross over effects and Intervention Effects I have agued that wh-phrases in-situ and existential un Ns undergo Q-movement of some sort (A’). Their non-uniform syntactic behaviors are due to their internal syntax. Focusing first on wh-phrases in-situ in NSC French, I argued that the three whphrases resemble the behavior of (un)split-combien, i.e. some wh-phrases split, others do not. The distinction between the two structures is reflected semantically and revealed by prosody. Based on an analysis provided by Mathieu 1999, 2002, 2004 for wh-phrases in-situ, I developed an approach to this phenomenon arguing that some DPs split, while other do not. Those which do not are these wh-phrases that involve existential presupposition. Because existential un Ns are similar to wh-phrases in-situ, I proposed to analyze them similarly (Section 2.1.5). Two cases of Split-DPs have been presented: movement of the wh-operator to CP and existential binding of the variable in-situ. The former is concerned with nonpresuppositional wh-phrases in-situ; the latter with non-presuppositional un N, (recall that this un N can be bound by any operator, see Section 2.1.4). I observed that each wh-phrase and each 9Q is composed of an Op plus a DP, which takes an NP complement (its restriction). I have argued that in French, only the restriction is uttered; in Japanese, both Q and its restriction are (Section 2.1.3). That the restriction (and not Q itself) contains information relative to the (non) presuppositional status of these quantificational noun phrases has been motivated by semantics and syntax (on the basis of split and unsplit combien de N constructions, as well as Islands violations). Another argument is prosody: whphrases in-situ realize the restriction of an abstract Q; there, stress prominence arises with specificity, i.e. its interpretation is closely tied to the NP-argument
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Q is related to, not to Q itself. I argued that French wh-phrases in-situ are not intrinsically interrogative: the qu-morpheme composing wh-words in qui, quoi, quel N is not the morphological mark of Opwh, i.e. only the restriction is phonologically realised, i.e, /ki/ is the restriction of the interrogative phrase. Then, the prosodies of existential presuppositions fall on the restriction, not on Op. Similarly, un N is the overt manifestation of the restriction belonging to an existential Q (Section 2.1.4). Following current views on the structure of the DP, I have claimed that quantificational DPs must be split into discrete functional projections, encoding different kinds of information, i.e. the different scope properties these Qs display with respect to each other is caused by their respective internal structures (Section 2.1.5). I adopted the essence of Ihsane’s 2008 hierarchies for the three-way ambiguous un Ns, adapting it to my analysis and applying it to whphrases, (1) and (2). The three types of wh-phrases in-situ parallel the three types of un Ns: non-presuppositional, partitive and specific: (1)
a. b. c.
Non-presuppositional un N : Partitive un N : Specific un N :
PropP > NumP >. . .NP PartP > Q > . . . NP SpecP > Q > . . . NP
(2)
a. b. c.
Non-presuppositional wh-N : Partitive wh-N : Specific wh-N :
Q> PropP > NumP >. . .NP PartP > Q > . . . NP SpecP > Q > . . . NP
Crucially, in (1) and (2), partitive and specific Qs have something more than non-presuppositional Qs: each projects an additional layer, which is what allows pied-piping of the whole complex DP, in order to undergo covert movement. My approach to the internal structure of wh-phrases forces an analysis in which the Opwh is extracted without PP pied-piping, as an instance of leftbranch extraction. A crucial point is that wh-phrases in-situ and un Ns are not ‘morphologically’ quantificational and acquire their quantificational behaviour thanks to Q in their Vorfeld. Put it differently Q selects its complement: qui, quoi, quel N, un N are restrictions, selected by either a non-overt Opwh or a non overt Op9. If Q is not roofed by a SpecP or PartP, it can extract and create a Split-DP. If another layer dominates it, splitting the DP is not possible, and pied-piping is obligatory. Whether un N or wh in-situ undergoes movement, or stays in-situ seems to be dependant on the size (and composition) of its Vorfeld.
6.1.2 Chapters 3 and 4: Floating Quantifiers (FQs) In Chapters 3 and 4, I looked at 8Qs and N-words. 8Qs are clause-bound, a property that sets them apart from wh-phrases and 9Qs. This syntactic property is shared with French N-words: Negative Concord is clause bound, and the scope of a single N-word is restricted to the CP in which it appears. In Chapter 4, I have claimed that N-words are 8Qs, rather than 9Qs, with an additional
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241
flavor: negation, i.e. it involves a 8Q and a negative marker. French can overtly lexicalize these operators as one DP: pas tous les N ‘not all the N’ (see also Baunaz 2008). My main claim is that N-words structurally resemble pas tous, the only difference being scope: whereas pas tous must obligatory display negation scoping over 8, N-words must display 8 scoping over :. Because scope is defined by c-command, I claimed that the difference between the two Dets lies in their internal structures. Various semantic and syntactic tests show that N-words and 8Qs are similar: (i) clause-boundness; (ii) exception-phrases; (iii) predicate nominals; (iv) scope relationships. Two other tests show that personne have similar semantic properties as tous les N and that aucun des N resembles chacun des N: (v) presquemodification, (vi) distributive vs. collective predicates and (vii) preposing. I also argued that partitivity and specificity are not restricted to wh-phrases and 9Qs, and show up with 8Qs and N-words, which quantify over restricted domains and are interpreted with non-empty restrictions (Sections 3.1.2.1/ 4.1.4). Although partitivity and specificity are encoded in the semantics of 8Qs, the distinction argued above for wh-phrases in-situ/9Qs is not prosodic with 8Qs/N-words: prosody does not discriminate between specificity and partitivity. Although these Qs display different syntactic, semantic and prosodic behaviors from wh-phrases and 9Qs, they share a similar syntax with each other: both are clause-bound. At first sight, this property does not seem to be related to their semantics: both Qs are presuppositional, but cannot move out of their clause (vs. wh and 9Qs). Witnessing that N-words successfully pass the tests for negativity (Zanuttini 1991, Giannakidou 2000, a.o), I argued for their negative status. Personne is the negative version of tous les N ‘all the N’, whereas aucun des N ‘none of the N’ syntactically and semantically behaves like chacun des N: the former are (negative) partitive 8Qs; the latter are (negative) specific 8Qs. 8Qs, as well as N-words differ from 9Qs and wh-phrases in-situ in that they do not have a nonpresuppositional counterpart. Investigating the syntax, semantics and prosody of full 8Qs, as well as N-words, led us to a new typology of these elements, (3): (3)
a. b. c. d.
chacun des N ‘each’: [distr.] ; [specific] tous les N ‘all the NP’: [%distr.] ; [partitive] aucun des N ‘none of the Ns’: [neg] ; [distr.] ; [specific] personne ‘nobody’: [neg] ; [%distr.] ; [partitive]
A further property these Qs share is that they can display non-canonical quantification, yet of a different type from Split-DPs: Op stays in-situ, while its DP-associate is A-moved. I have claimed that they must involve different internal structures from 9Qs and wh-phrases, and shown that 8Qs and N-words are best analyzed as adjoined to a maximal projection. Adopting the analysis of Doetjes 1997, I have argued that Q and its restriction are adjoined to a maximal projection (DP, with non-FQ constructions, or VP with FQs). FQs appear most of the time with overt DP-associates. The
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DP-associate is the argument of the predicate. As such, it does not belong to the same constituent, i.e. it is not the complement of the operator, yet it is interpreted as its restriction. FQs and non-FQs are syntactically similar (Doetjes 1997, Fitzpatrick 2006): the DP associate is either moved to, or left in an A-position. pro is the restriction, and semantically denotes an individual (of type <e>). The restriction is generally not phonologically realised, although it can in some case: un in chac-/auc-un is a case in point. With respect to their presuppositional status, I claimed that un in chacun is responsible for specificity, whereas pro is responsible for partitivity. Because their restrictions are either non-overt or involve non-emphatic –un as in chac-un or auc-un, N-words and 8Qs are not bearers of particular intonations: their restrictions cannot be stressed, i.e. specificity and partitivity are not realised prosodically. I argued that this information is lexically marked with these Qs (vs. wh-phrases in-situ and 9Qs). As for the Q status of N-words, I have shown that they involve 8 that adjoins to XP. Hence, the fact that Op occupies an adjoined (fixed) position accounts for its clause-boundness, similarly for 8Qs: their (overt or covert) associate DP undergoes A-movement, a clause-bound movement.
6.1.3 Strength A prediction ensuing from Chapters 2, 3 and 4 is that if the decomposition of Qs into distinct features is on the right track, locality constraints are expected to show up (iff these features are syntactic): the same kind of features on two different Qs should block movement of one past the other. Chapter 5 covers this matter. I have argued for a differential treatment of presupposition with French Qs. Based on the semantic and prosodic distributions of Qs, I have claimed that existential presupposition must be split into specificity and partitivity. Depending on the class it belongs to, Q will either realize presupposition (or its absence) prosodically, or lexically. I have also argued that slight accented specific wh-phrases in-situ/9Qs are successfully moved across scope islands (induced 8Qs and N-words), while downfall partitive wh-phrases in-situ/9Qs and rising non-presuppositional wh-phrases in-situ/neutral 9Qs are more restricted in the same environment. I claim that intervention effects and differential scope effects are local and accounted for in terms of a hierarchy of (semantic) features that is constrained by RM (Rizzi 2002, Starke 2001). I elaborate a locality principle, based on the strength Qs have. Strength is defined in terms of specificity, partitivity and non-presupposition. This principle constrains movement operations of Qs in-situ. In other words, I have shown that Qs are sensitive to finer properties than the traditional A/A’ distinction suggest.
6.2 Perspectives
243
6.2 Perspectives In this book, I focused on the relationship between the distribution and interpretation of French Qs. The aim was to determine whether or not their interpretation is reflected within the syntactic component. The diversity of this field combines both syntax and semantics and I have claimed that prosody plays a major role in resolving scope ambiguities (either between two identical forms, or between two Qs belonging to two different classes). The issue of the meaning-prosody correspondence in all the constructions studied in this book is theoretically crucial. Recall that this work is set within the Chomskyan tradition of Generative Grammar. Elaborating on the Principle and Parameter framework, The Minimalist Program (Chomsky 1995 and subsq.) tries to reduce the theoretical apparatus in order to explain the link between linguistic form and meaning. The language faculty generates linguistic expressions that are sent to the interfaces with the Conceptual-Intentional (CI) system and the articulatory-perceptual (AP) system, where meaning and form are represented. Syntactic principles apply only to two independent levels of representation: Logical Form (LF, the interface between the language faculty and CI) and Phonological Form (PF, the interface between the language faculty and AP). Hence there is no pure syntactic level of representation. The leading idea of this model (also called T-model) is broadly the following: the lexicon contains lexical entries. Lexical items (LI) enter the Computational System (CS) as bundles of features. LI encode all the syntactic information to achieve the derivations. There are three distinct classes of features: formal (inflection, category, etc. . .), semantic (quantificational, focus, topic, interrogative, etc.) and phonological. The phonological features are those sent to PF, necessary for AP; semantic features are interpreted at LF. Interpretable features are those formal features with interpretive import: they are interpretable at LF; uninterpretable features aren’t legible at the interfaces and must be checked (or valuated) before reaching them. This is ruled by the principle of Full Interpretation (FI), which basically says that any syntactic object with uninterpretable features at the interfaces will crash. LIs encode all the syntactic information for the derivation to proceed. This book has focalized on operations at the syntax-semantics interface, i.e. scope relationships. I have argued for semantics feeding syntax. An important thesis lies in the claim that specificity and partitivity, two instances of existential presupposition, have syntactic reflexes (see Starke 2001). I have also described the prosody of Qs. Prosody has yet been used mainly as an additional diagnostic of a particular interpretive mark: I have shown that intonation may resolve scope ambiguities. When a particular intonation falls on a Q, a particular semantic interpretation shows up. The reverse is not necessary though. That is why I spoke of a correlation between semantics and prosody. The next issue is then the relationship between syntax and prosody: In-situ Qs (wh and 9Qs) tend to come with a special prosody which trigger different interpretations
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(existential presupposition vs. non-presupposition) that map different syntactic structures. These facts lead to the conclusion that the T-model might be modified: the model accounting for in-situ wh constructions and 9Qs does not appear as fully compatible with the minimalist model which advocates an independent and autonomous syntax. More globally, a more systematic investigation of the meaning-prosody correspondence in all the constructions studied would help understanding the nature of the link existing between sound and meaning, (if it exists). There are two possibilities: either the model advocates for the existence of a direct link between PF and LF (where syntax, semantics and prosody interact), or these features are integrated into syntax and then these features would be responsible for semantics and prosody. Thanks to an experimental study on wh-phrases, Baunaz and Patin 2009 have discovered that the answer points to the second hypothesis. A more thorough investigation of the wh in-situ phenomenon in French is interesting in that respect. It is the topic of Chapter 2. That the distribution of wh-phrases in-situ is not described in the literature in a homogenized way. However, my informant’s judgments correspond to those described by Starke 2001 and Adli 2006. Recall that for methodological reasons, I called this type non-standard colloquial French (as opposed to standard colloquial French), suggesting a dichotomy between two dialects of French (yet, see Section 2.1.2, fn. 23 in particular). For instance, one of the differences in the use of in-situ wh is the possibility to have them embedded: (4)
tu penses qu’il a fait quoi ? You think that he has done what ‘what do you think that he did?’
(4) is judged ungrammatical by Chang 1997, Boeckx 1999, Cheng and Rooryck 2000, Bosˇ kovic´ 2000, but perfectly grammatical for Starke 2001, Adli 2006 and Baunaz 2005. The different grammaticality judgments given in the literature might be due to the fact that intonation has or has not been taken into account. When it comes to the prosody of wh-phrases in-situ, however, linguists from standard colloquial French do not agree (but remember that they do not totally agree on the syntax of wh in-situ constructions either, see Chapter 2, Section 2.1.2.1). Cheng and Rooryck 2000 observe that yes-no questions and wh-phrases in-situ (i) are prosodically similar and (ii) only occur in strongly presuppositional contexts. In their analysis, the yes/no intonation of these interrogatives is a reflex of the presence of a covert yes/no particle (or Q-morpheme). Wh-phrases in-situ questions are not specified for yes/no questions. They propose that they contain an underspecified Q, marked as [Q: ], inserted in C8. [Q: ] is a root intonation morpheme, present in the numeration. In order to give its interrogative ([þwh]) force to the clause, (and not [yes/no], since an wh in-situ question is a constituent question) at LF, a [þwh] feature, specified [Q: ] gets valuated through feature movement and becomes [Q: wh].
6.2 Perspectives
245
Underspecified [Q:] does not exist with wh-moved structures. Intonation is then represented syntactically, by an intonation morpheme. There is no optionality between the syntactic structure of wh in-situ and that of ex situ-wh: the two constructions are distinct. Authors challenge this analysis empirically. Mathieu 2002 points out that Cheng and Rooryck’s main point, i.e, the fact that wh-phrases in-situ questions involve a rising intonation similar to yes/no questions, is incorrect (see Mathieu 2002:58). According to him, wh-phrases in-situ receive a default stress, involving defocalization of the restriction (i.e. the wh phrases itself). For Adli 2006, the contour displayed by wh-phrases in-situ is not the one displayed by yes/no questions: if the rising intonation is possible, it is yet not systematic. As such, it does not contrast with the typical non-rising intonation of declarative constructions (this contrast is necessary with yes/no questions vs. declarative constructions). Indeed wh-questions can also instantiate a falling contour. In addition, the intonation contour of yes/no questions does not usually fall at the end of questions, whereas this is possible at the end of wh in-situ questions (Adli 2006:18). As for Boeckx 1999 wh-phrases in-situ are focalized (resembling clefts). Starke 2001 identifies them with a slight accent, called ‘fall-rise intonation’. Each of the authors mentioned describes wh-phrases in-situ as receiving a distinct intonation from moved ones. Each has its own description which would correspond to a position in the information structure. All these works do not mention scope resolution by intonation, nor do they discuss clear cases of a potential presupposition-prosody correspondence. In that respect, though, Hamlaoui and Mathieu 2007 propose that French prosodic proprieties are responsible for the licensing of both ex-situ and in-situ wh-phrases. They show that the principle of correspondence Stress-Focus (Reinhart 1995, Szendroi ¨ 2001) is available to questions. They argue that whphrases in-situ constructions involve a restricted focus (where the pre-focalized material is contextually bound, but is not prosodically prominent) and whphrases ex-situ constructions involve a broad focus, not contextually bound. According to them, wh-phrases are intrinsically focalized and discourse bound. Their position is only a syntactic reflex. They claim that the difference between wh ex-situ and wh in-situ lies in the fact that the former belong to the main stressed constituent, while the latter are part of the main stress. The difference between the two structures lies then in the status of the sentence in relation to the discourse in which these questions appear. Hamlaoui and Mathieu 2007 do not discuss Q interactions. In Sections 2.1.2/2.1.4 (see also Baunaz 2005, Baunaz and Patin 2009), I have claimed that the syntactic acceptability of wh in-situ constructions are contingent on different semantic contexts that can be associated to distinct prosodic correlates in colloquial French (the same is true of un Ns). Prosody can affect syntactic judgments: they are sometimes degraded as a result of a mismatch between the interpretation required by prosody and that of the syntactic structure. Based on the distribution of these items, I have claimed that existential presupposition must be split into specificity and partitivity and that both are
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6 Conclusion
syntactically grounded, i.e. these different types of existential presuppositions clearly govern the distribution of wh in-situ and un Ns. Baunaz and Patin 2009 also show that wh-phrases ex-situ are pronounced with a particular intonation, triggering a certain existential presupposition; there is then no difference between wh-phrases in-situ and wh-moved (see Section 2.1.3.4 for an attempt to unsolved the problem).1 All the facts picked up in the literature are not as clear as the dichotomy grammatical vs. ungrammatical suggests: first colloquial NSC French speakers can vary subtly with respect to syntactic judgments (with both negative and scope islands); moreover, the grammaticality of this type of examples does not only vary among speakers, but also intra-linguistically (Eric Mathieu p.c). This book emphasizes that this fact could be related to prosodic constrains. The issue is that of the distinction between the two ‘dialects’. It is very important to account for both the intonations and the interpretive structures of all the constructions in the two dialects at stake, keeping in mind the pragmatic context. It could well be the case that everything depends on the utterance context and that intonation plays a major role in accessing existential presupposition, and then syntactic structures. What we could have discovered in this book, then, is that there are not two different versions of colloquial French, but different ways to approach one single phenomenon. A thorough investigation of the meaning-prosody correspondence in all the constructions studied in the different dialects is then necessary.2 Various phenomena reveal a direct relationship between syntax and interpretation, where prosody plays a significant role in French. N-words and 8Q can also receive particular intonations, triggering distinct interpretations and distinct syntax (Chapters 3-4), yet these intonations do not discriminate between specificity and partitivity (the distinction being lexically encoded): a pitch accent on one of these elements comes with a focus structure (i.e. a cleft), and a fall-rise intonation triggers a topic structure (see Valmala 2008 for Spanish). Rizzi 1997 argues that focus and topic are relevant at the level of information structure for the grammar. Moreover, as far as the interaction of two N-words is acceptable in French (see Corblin and Tovena 2003, a.o ), they must be pronounced with special contours, triggering either Double Negation or Negative Concord. Yet, are they two distinct contours in free variation or do they result from syntactic differences? That the intonation associated to an utterance is determined by three distinct factors is commonly assumed: its syntactic structure, its metrical organization (in terms of the number or the length of syllables) as well as the semantic and pragmatic content that both the constituents and the utterance convey (see Doetjes, et al. 2002 (D, DR, S 2002)). A systematic relation between the position 1
Yet, Chapter 5, Section 5.1.2.4 shows that there might be minimal differences, notably with combien (de N) extractions. 2 I would like to thank Marcel den Dikken more particularly for discussing this issue with me.
References
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of the main prosodic prominence and the focus structure of the sentence has been noted since Chomsky’s 1971 work on focus (see also Jackendoff 1972). For syntacticians syntactic trees are objects over which stress is calculated (Cinque 1993 a.o). The phrasal main stress is assigned by the Nuclear Stress Rule, which applies « bottom up », cyclically, and derives a metrical grid at the output of each syntactic node (see Zubizarreta and Vergnaud 2005 for a revision). D, DR, S 2002 argue that (i) topicalization, which involves left dislocation of a contrastive XP, has a special prosody: ‘H% [cont]inue that is characterized by a rise F0 and an important lengthening of the final syllable of the IP which contains the dislocated constituent’ (D, DR, S 2002:1). (ii) Hanging topics are built with a resumptive pronoun resuming a left dislocated NP. They involve an IP that is independently bound to the right by a H(L)% [int] tone, ‘equivalent to the tone realized at the end of an echo question’ (id.). (iii) Finally, an XP can be left dislocated and resumed by a clitic (ClLD). CILD can involve the prosody displayed by both topicalization and hanging topics. These constructions show that only one syntactic structure can be realized with the two different tones mentioned above. As a consequence, syntactic distinctions are not enough to account for the intonation of left dislocated constituents, i.e. pragmatic information must enter the game. The same conclusion is reached with focalized cleft structures (Doetjes et al. 2004). The issue now is to investigate whether the intonation described for wh-phrases and un Ns (or some element of the contour) constitutes (or not) a morpheme with which the form would be associated to either (i) a type of sentence, or (ii) a type of speech act (interrogative, for instance), or to the relationship between (i) and (ii) (cf. Beyssade et al. 2007). I conclude that that there is a correlation between syntactic positions and semantic denotations, where prosody plays a significant role. This role needs to be further explored. Future works should now consider the issue of quantification within the point of view of the interface between syntax/semantics and prosody.
References Adli, Aria. 2006. French wh-in-situ questions and syntactic optionality: Evidence from tree data types. Zeitschrift fu¨r Sprachwissenschaft 25:163–203. Baunaz, Lena. 2005. The syntax and semantics of wh in-situ and existentials: The case of French. Leiden Working Papers in Linguistics 2.2:1–27. Baunaz, Lena. 2008. Floating quantifiers: french universal quantifiers and N-words. In Selected Proceedings of the 34th Incontro di Grammatica Generativa, Special Issue of the Rivista di Grammatica Generativa, vol. 33. P. Beninca˛, F. Damonte and N. Penello (eds.). Padova: Unipress. Baunaz, Lena and Ce´dric Patin. 2009. Prosody refers to semantic factors: evidence from French wh-words, talk given at the Interface Discourse-Prosody Conference in Paris 7, September 11th 2009. To be published in Proceedings of IDP, Elisabeth Delais-Roussarie, Hi-Yon Yoo, L. de Saussureand A. Rihs (eds.). Etudes de se´mantique et pragmatique franc¸aises, Berne: Lang.
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Beyssade, Claire, Elisabeth Delais-Roussarie and Jean-Marie Marandin. 2007. The prosody of interrogatives in French. Nouveau Cahier de linguistique franc¸aise 28:163–175. Boeckx, Ce´dric. 1999. Decomposing French questions. In University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguisitics 6.1, Proceedings of the 23rd Annual Penn Linguistics Colloquium, J. Alexander, N.R. Han and M. Minnick Fox (eds.), 69–80. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania. Bosˇ kovic´, Zeljiko. 2000. Sometimes in SpecCP, sometimes in-situ. In Step by Step: Essays on Minimalism in Honor of Howard Lasnik, Roger Martin, David Michaels and Juan Uriagereka (eds.), 53–87. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Chang, Lisa. 1997. Wh-in situ in French. MA thesis, University of British Colombia. Cheng, Lisa and Johann Rooryck. 2000. Licensing wh-in-situ. Syntax 3(1):1–19. Cinque, Guglielmo. 1993. A null theory of phrase and compound stress. Linguistic Inquiry 24:239–297. Chomsky, Noam. 1971. Deep structure, surface structure and semantics interpretation. In Semantics, D. Steinberg and L. Jacobovits (eds.), 183–211. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chomsky, Noam. 1995. The Minimalist Program. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Corblin, Francis and Lucia Tovena. 2003. L’expression de la ne´gation dans les langues romanes. In Les langues romanes: proble`mes de la phrase simple, Danie`le Godard (ed.), 279–341. Paris: CNRS Editions. Doetjes, Jenny. 1997. Quantifiers and Selection. On the Distribution of Quantifying Expressions in French, Dutch and English. Doctoral dissertation, HIL, Leiden University. The Hague: HAG. Doetjes, Jenny, Elisabeth Delais-Roussarie and Petra Sleeman. 2002. The prosody of left detached constituent in French. In the Proceedings SPEECH PROSODY 2002, B. Bel and I. Marlien (eds.). Universite´ of Aix en Provence, Avril 2002. Doetjes, Jenny, Georges Rebuschi and Annie Rialland. 2004. Cleft sentences. In Handbook of French Semantics, Francis Corblin and Henriette de Swart (eds.). Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications. Fitzpatrick, Justin Michael. 2006. Syntactic and Semantic Routes to Floating Quantification. Doctoral dissertation, MIT, Cambridge, MA. Giannakidou, Anastasia. 2000. Negative concord and the scope of universals. Transactions of the Philological Society 98:87–120. Hamlaoui, Fatima and E´ric Mathieu. 2007. WH in situ and WH movement at the syntaxphonology interface. The Second Brussels Conference on Generative Linguistics, Alternatives to Carthography, Bruxelles. 25–27 juin 2007. Heim, Irene. 1982. The Semantics of Definite and Indefinite Noun Phrases, Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts. Ihsane, Tabea 2008. The Layered DP. Form and Meaning of French Indefinites Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 124. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Jackendoff, Ray. 1972. Semantic Interpretation in Generative Grammar. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Mathieu, Eric. 1999. Wh in-situ and the intervention effect. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 11:441–472. Mathieu, Eric. 2002. The Syntax of Non-Canonical Quantification: A Comparative Study. Doctoral dissertation, University College London. Mathieu, Eric. 2004. The mapping of form and interpretation: The case of optional whmovement in French. Lingua 114:1090–1132. Reinhart, Tanya. 1995. Interface strategies. In OTS Working Papers in Theoretical Linguistics 55–109. Utrecht University, Utrecht: OTS. Rizzi, Luigi. 1997. The fine structure of the left periphery. In Elements of Grammar, Liliane Haegeman (ed.), 281–338. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
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Rizzi, L. 2002. Locality and left periphery. In Structures and Beyond. The Cartography of Syntactic Structures, vol. 3. Adriana Belletti (ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Starke, Michal. 2001. Move Dissolves into Merge: A Theory of Locality. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Geneva. Szendroi, ¨ Kriszta. 2001. Focus and the Syntax-Phonology Interface. Doctoral dissertation, University College London. Valmala, V. 2008. Topic, focus and quantifier float. In Gramatika jaietan: Papers in honour of Professor Patxi Goenaga, X. Artiagoitia and J. Lakarra (eds.), 837–857. Supplements of ASJU: Donostia. Zanuttini, Raffaela. 1991. Syntactic Properties of Sentential Negation: A Comparative Study of Romance Languages. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania. Zubizarreta, Maria-Luisa and Jean-Roger Vergnaud. 2005. Phrasal stress, focus, and syntax. In The Syntax Companion, Martin Everaert and Henk van Riemsdijk (eds.), 613–628. Oxford: Blackwell.
Appendix
Appendix 1 (to Chapter 4) Another difference between pas un N and pas tous les N is that if pas un occupies the object position, the sentence is ungrammatical, (i). The only grammatical version is that with pas being sentence medial. In that case, it takes scope over the predicate (ii), i.e. it does not mean pas un N. So (ii) is to be contrasted from FQ structures modified by parasitic pas as in (iii): (i)
* Claire (n’) a bu pas une bouteille. Claire NE has drunk not a bottle
(ii) a. b.
Claire n’a pas bu une bouteille. Claire NE has not drunk a bottle Claire en a pas bu une. Claire cl. Has not drunk some
(iii) Claire ne les a pas toutes bues. Claire NE cl has not all drunk
(9 > neg only) (9 > neg only) (neg > toutes only)
Recall that when it is used as a minimizer, pas and un N can be separated, showing surface scope. Yet this construction is limited (Section 4.1.2.1). Despite the fact that pas un cannot appear in object position as a whole, another fact suggests that is structurally different from pas tous: if pas is medial, the counterpart of (iv) is degraded, if not ungrammatical: (iv)
??
Un e´tudiant n’a pas mange´ quoi que ce soit. A student NE has not eaten anything ?? There is an x, x a student and he didn’t eat anything
The only (yet difficult) reading that can be obtained for (iv) is with 9Q taking wide scope, i.e. un . . . pas does not built a monotone decreasing operator, as witnessed by the marginal availability of NPI licensing. (i), (ii) and (iv) suggest that pas and un do not build a syntactic constituent (or that it cannot be discontinuous), i.e. it is not the same pas un N discussed in Chapter 2. L. Baunaz, The Grammar of French Quantification, Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 83, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0621-7, Ó Springer ScienceþBusiness Media B.V. 2011
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Appendix
Appendix 2 (to Chapter 4) In Chapter 4, Section 4.1.4.1, I present various test distinguishing Italian and Greek 9Qs from 8Qs. One of the diagnostics presented by Zanuttini 1991 as establishing the universal status of Italian N-word is that of topicalization. This diagnostic is not valid, though, since her data are not examples of ClLD (see fn. 33 of Chapter 4). Rizzi 1997 claims that N-words cannot enter ClLD constructions in Italian, because Qs must bind traces at LF. In (i), neither nessuno, nor tutto can bind appropriate traces at LF, because neither the clitic, nor its trace qualify as such. Moreover, from Top8, they still need to QR. If they do so, they would leave an A’trace and violate Full Interpretation. This analysis holds only of bare Qs: Qs with restrictions can be topicalized, as Rizzi 1997 argues, because the restriction can stay in Top, while Q is extracted from the DP. Q binds its trace in a A-position: (i) a.
*
b.
*
(ii) a. b.
Nessuno, l’ho visto no one, him I-have seen Tutto, l’ho fatto ‘everything I have done it’
(Rizzi 1997: 290 (19))
Tutti I tuoi libri, li ho rimessi a posto. ‘all your books, I put them back’ (Rizzi 1997, 295: (34b)) Tutti [ec I tuoi libri], [li ho rimessi a posto]
Morphosyntacally, bare Qs cannot QR from the topic position, because they cannot bind appropriate variables; when they have overt restriction, though, binding is possible: Q is extracted from an A position within the DP in topic position. Alexopoulou, Doron and Heycock 2004 (A., D. and H. 2004) note that Hebrew (and Levantine Arabic) N-words and 8Qs can appear in ClLD: (i) and (iii) must be distinguished, though. A., D. and H. 2004 observe that while Italian bare Qs do not have overt restrictions, Hebrew bare Qs are never bare (iii). Under Rizzi’s account, all the sentences in (iii) must be grammatical. Importantly, Hebrew non-bare N-words can be topicalized. Now compare (iv) to (ii)/(iii): under Rizzi’s account, (ivb) is unexpected. They conlcude that given (ivb), Hebrew N-words in (iii) must display a different construction from (iv). The same reasoning can be applied to ‘apparent’ ClLD with French personne ‘nobody’ in (114b) (although personne is a bare Q, its non-bare counterpart cannot function as a topic). I leave this issue open. (iii) a.
b.
af exad eyn l-o savlanut la-dvarim ha’ele (Hebrew) No one (there) is not to-him patience to these things ‘no one has patience for these things’ af exad lo mecapim sˇ e yegale savlanut la-dvarim ha’ele non one not (they expect that (he) will sho patience to these things
Appendix
c.
d.
e.
(iv) a. * b. *
253
‘no one is such that people expect that he would show patience for these things’ kol exad so-o lehasˇ lim im hameci’ut every one end-his to accept with reality ‘everyone ends up accepting reality’ af exad lo maxnisim le-kan et ha’anasˇ im sˇ e ovdim it-o no-one not (they) let in to-here ACC the people who work withhim ‘No one is such that they allow in here the people who work with him’ kol davar yesˇ l-o sikuy everything (there) is to-it chance ‘everything has a chance.’ (A., D. and H. 2004, (33)) Nessuno, lo ho visto Nessun uomo, lo ho visto no man, him I-have seen (A., D. and H. 2004, (34))
Index
A Abney, S., 18, 108 Aboh, E., 91 Accent, 45, 49–51, 55, 79, 203, 210, 238–239, 242, 245–246 Adjunct, 22–23, 32, 42–44, 57, 61–62, 65, 67–68, 72, 108, 111, 165, 205, 209–210, 221, 231–232 Adjunction, 6, 104, 111, 133, 138–140, 183, 195 approach, 133 Adli, A., 8, 33–34, 40, 42–44, 50, 61, 64, 75, 244–245 Adverb A’-, 43, 205 degree, 112, 179 negative, 148, 150–151, 159 Adverbials, 135, 151, 164–165 approach, 6, 135, 140 position, 135, 141, 191 All, 3–5, 75, 87, 104–112, 114–115, 125–126, 145, 153, 197 See also Quantifier Alternative, see Partitivity Ambiguity distributive/collective, 180 scope, 13 A’-movement, see Movement Anti-additivity, 152, 154–155, 157, 160, 164–169, 174–175, 198 Assertion, 237 Aucun des N, 141, 170–171, 175, 179–182, 184–185, 188–193, 196–197, 212, 219, 221, 223, 241
B Baunaz, L., 1, 6, 8–9, 17, 21, 34, 42–43, 45, 49–50, 52, 54–56, 62–63, 76–77, 84, 92, 103, 106, 111, 145–146, 155, 161, 176,
203, 211, 214, 229–233, 238–239, 241, 244–346 Beaucoup, 2, 37, 109, 135, 164–165, 191, 227 Beghelli, F., 1, 85, 112–113, 124, 129, 138, 158–159, 212, 233 Beyssade, C., 76, 82, 156 Boeckx, C., 6–8, 17, 20, 27–28, 33–34, 36–39, 41–42, 45, 52–53, 97, 244–245 Bosˇ kovic´, Z., 8, 17, 33–34, 60, 74, 134, 161, 244
C Canonical quantification, see Quantification, canonical Cartographic approach, 77, 91, 206, 233 C-command, 22, 93, 96, 125, 132, 135, 138–139, 141, 154, 156–157, 161, 165–166, 169, 171, 183, 192, 198, 213, 241 Chacun See also Universal quantifier; Floating quantifier (FQ) Chacun des N, 11, 36, 61–62, 83–85, 87, 105–119, 124, 126–129, 131, 138, 140–141, 159, 166, 179–182, 184–185, 188–192, 204, 211–217, 219, 223, 226, 228–229, 241 See also Universal quantifier Chaque N, 10–11, 104, 111, 118–119, 137, 188–189 See also Universal quantifier Cheng, L., 6, 8, 17, 225, 244–245 Choice function, 228 Chomsky, N., 31, 243, 247 Cleft sentences, 23–25 Collective reading, 113–114, 129, 135, 137 Combien de N, 70–74, 90, 96, 223–224, 226–227, 239
255
256 Combien de N (cont.) See also Split-DP Constituent negation, see Negation Contrastive focus, 26–28, 36, 38, 41–42, 79, 81, 186 negation, 156 stress, 156 Cross-over strong-cross over, 22 weak-cross over, 22
D De ’of all (of) DP, 108 See also Partitive Definite definite article, 18, 110 definite noun phrase, 77, 88 Definiteness effect, 117 De´prez, V., 12, 139, 146, 170–171, 174, 176–179, 188, 190, 195 De Swart, H., 12, 65, 146, 171, 173–174, 176, 179, 186, 224 Diesing, M., 6, 118 Diffe´rent., 125–127, 229 Discourse referent, 47, 56, 76, 205, 239 Distributivity, 112, 114, 124–125, 130, 139–141, 182, 213 Dobrovie-Sorin, C., 76, 82, 156 Doetjes, J., 2, 6, 10, 14, 24, 26, 107, 131, 135–138, 140–141, 146, 165–166, 170, 187, 191–194, 198, 224, 241–242, 246–247 Double negation, see Negation Dutch, 12, 158, 168, 224
E Each, 104, 111–112, 114–115, 125–126, 128, 130 See also Universal quantifier Enc¸, M., 6–7, 46–47, 77, 80, 114, 203, 238 English, 2, 6–7, 11, 20, 22, 63, 75, 77, 80, 84, 104, 106, 108–113, 119, 127–128, 130, 132, 135, 149, 158, 167–169, 173, 188, 224 Event, 2, 37, 83–84, 105, 125–127, 130, 135, 137, 151, 159–161, 163–164, 166, 184, 215 Existential closure, 76–77, 95 construction/structure, 75, 77, 88–89, 117
Index intrinsically, 56 operator, see Operator presupposition, 6–7, 11, 14, 21, 27, 37–38, 42, 45, 55, 73, 79, 94–95, 114–116, 140–141, 186, 193, 203, 205, 207–210, 216–217, 224–225, 237–240, 242–246 See also Partitive, Specific/specificity quantification, 92 quantifier (Q), 2, 9–10, 179 Extraction, 6, 22–23, 31, 62, 70, 72, 139, 177, 192–193, 203, 205–207, 209–210, 216–218, 221, 223–227, 240, 246
F Familiarity, see Individual(s); Specific/ specificity Farkas, D., 6, 75, 177 Feature class, 205–207, 211–212, 238 feature tree, 206–207, 217–218 Fitzpatrick, J. M., 2, 6, 10, 95, 104, 106–109, 111, 131–140, 188–190, 197–198, 242 Floating quantifier (FQ), 1, 13, 19, 103, 128, 131–140, 240–242 Focus narrow, 27 strong, 21, 26–28, 39 Fundamental frequency (F0), 24–26, 43, 47–54, 78–81, 120–123, 204, 247
G Generative Grammar, 243 Generic, 114–115, 118–119, 185 German, 4, 167–169, 224 Giannakidou, A., 12, 14, 114–115, 145, 154–155, 171–172, 176–179, 183, 186, 241
H Haegeman, L., 12, 170–171, 174 Hagstrom, 4, 8, 56, 58, 68, 70 Head movement, see Movement Heim, I., 6, 9, 47, 55, 75–77, 95, 114, 117, 154, 156, 239 Horn, L., 114, 145
I Ihsane, T., 6, 13, 20, 76–77, 80, 83–84, 90–97, 106, 116, 156, 165, 214, 228–229, 233, 237 Indefinite, 31, 47, 75–76
Index Individual level predicate, 84, 129, 215 Individual(s), 2, 7, 46, 54, 75–76, 78, 85, 93, 114–116, 118, 135, 164, 191, 203, 216, 223, 238 familiar, 7, 46, 54–55, 78, 82–83, 85, 93, 115–116, 203, 216, 223, 238–239 In-situ, see Wh-constructions; Wh-phrases, in-situ Interface syntax-prosody, 237–238 syntax-semantics, 13, 91, 237, 243 Intermediate scope, see Scope; Strong islands Intervention effects, 8, 35–36, 40, 58–59, 70, 72, 74, 124, 203–234, 239, 242 Intonation fall-rise (falling), 8, 17, 45, 50, 52, 55, 87, 89, 115, 124, 203, 245–246 neutral, 85, 89, 115, 164, 186 rising, 17, 21, 38–42, 45, 53–54, 89, 245 See also Prosody Islands scope, 8–9, 61–62, 65, 85, 93, 97, 207, 210, 224–225, 227, 242, 246 strong, 17, 22, 29, 32, 62, 86–87, 98, 206, 228–232 weak (neg), 6, 8, 22, 46, 85–86, 193, 206, 224 Italian, 12, 14, 113, 138, 145, 150–151, 158, 167–168, 170–171, 173, 176, 179–181, 183, 224, 252 Items concord, 151 negative polarity items (NPIs), 14, 68, 71, 115, 148, 151, 153–155, 157, 160, 167–169, 174–175, 181, 198 positive polarity items (PPIs), 155
257 Left-dislocation, see Topicalization Left-periphery, 90–94, 96, 169 Licensing local, 155–156, 164 long-distnce, 69, 140 List-setting, see Partitivity Locality effects, 137, 193, 205–211 See also Relativized minimality (RM); Intervention effects Logical form, 243
M Mathieu, E., 1, 6–8, 14, 17, 21–23, 28, 33–35, 37–42, 52, 56–57, 63–65, 68–74, 77, 90, 92, 97–98, 145–146, 171, 174–176, 186, 224–226, 230, 239, 245–246 May, R., 32, 125 McNally, L., 77, 92 Milsark, G., 6, 76–77, 117 Minimizer, 156, 164, 187, 251 Modifier, 111, 134, 162, 164–166, 190, 206 Monotonicity decresing/downward, 153 increasing/upward, 159 Movement A’-, 22, 70, 87, 197, 212 covert, 9, 35, 68, 74–75, 87, 96, 98, 124, 210, 212, 229–233, 240 head-, 94 overt, 9, 29, 32–33, 35, 40, 64, 67–68, 73–75, 87, 90, 96, 98, 124, 139, 210, 212, 226–227, 229–233, 240 phrasal (XP)-, 231 remnant, 37, 64–65 trigger of, 139
J Jamais., 114, 170
K Kamp, H., 75–76 Kayne, R., 5, 10, 31, 108, 131–134, 176, 183, 194–195 Kobuchi-Philip, M., 10, 136–137
L Ladusaw, W., 154, 157, 165, 171, 174 Laenzlinger, C., 90–91, 106, 109, 163, 184, 189
N Narrow scope, see Scope Negation constituent/parasitic/phrasal, 141, 146, 148–152, 157, 159, 167–168, 182, 187 constrastive, 156 double, 12, 170–171, 181, 246 logical, 148 NEG criterion, 12, 165 [neg]-feature, 160, 169, 176 semantic, 77 sentential, 12, 146–152, 165, 170–172, 175, 186
258 Negative concord (NC), 12, 150–151, 168–176, 179, 181, 186, 240, 246 constituent, see N-words context, 63, 154–155, 175–176, 187, 231 expression, see N-words polarity items, see Items quantifier, see N-words word, see N-words Non-presuppositional, 8, 10, 17, 27, 38, 40–41, 43, 45, 52–55, 61–62, 70, 73–74, 80–82, 84–87, 89–92, 94–98, 115–116, 119–120, 123–124, 156, 163, 174, 181–182, 186, 205, 212–213, 217–220, 222–225, 228–230, 238–240 See also Presuppositional Non-specific, 55, 98 See also Specific/specificity Non-standard colloquial French, 8, 42–56, 244 See also Standard colloquial French Nuclear scope, 3, 56 See also Canonical quantification N-words, 2, 6–7, 12–14, 145–198, 204, 212, 219–223, 229, 233–234, 237–238, 240–242, 246, 252
O Obenauer, 1–3, 6, 8, 19, 22, 37, 56, 65, 70–74, 90, 96, 98, 135, 165, 224–227 Of-DPs, see De ’of Operator distributive, 125–126 existential, 9, 94 negative, 12–13, 146, 148–150, 155, 157–158, 169–170, 184, 186–187, 193, 198, 205 silent, 76, 126, 193 Optionality, 13, 33, 40, 73–75, 90, 175, 197, 245 Out-of-the-blue, 47, 52–53, 167
P Parasitic negation, see Negation Partitive covert, 80, 95 true, 106–112, 189, 191 See also De-DPs; Personne; Rien; Tous les N; Un N; Wh-phrases, in-situ Partitivity, 7, 9–11, 20, 46–47, 54–55, 76–77, 79, 82, 85, 89, 94, 96–98, 105, 112, 114–116, 118–119, 124, 140–141, 198, 203–205, 209, 212–214, 218–219, 234, 237–239, 241–243, 245–246
Index Pas un N, 145–146, 150–161, 164–165, 167, 169–170, 175, 187, 220, 251 Patin, C., 21, 43, 45, 49–50, 54–56, 203, 238–239, 244–246 Personne, 13, 50, 141, 170, 174, 176–182, 184–186, 188, 193–198, 212, 219, 241, 252 See also N-words Phrasal movement, see Movement Phrasal negation, see Negation Pied piping, 59, 96–97, 233, 240 Pitch accent, see Accent Polarity, see Items Presque, 112, 114, 163, 178–179 -modification, 114, 179 Presuppositional, 3, 6, 10, 21, 32, 34, 37, 40–41, 43, 45, 52, 54–55, 61–63, 65, 70–73, 74, 83–84, 87, 96–98, 115, 118, 124, 184–186, 229, 231–234, 239, 241, 244 See also Specific/specificity; Partitivity; Non-presupposition Presupposition, see Existential, presupposition Pro, 111, 136–138, 141, 165–166, 192–193, 195, 197–198, 242 Prosody, 7–9, 11, 13, 17, 24–25, 33, 38, 40–42, 45, 47, 49, 55–56, 75–76, 79–80, 85, 89, 94, 97–98, 105, 112, 118–119, 124, 127, 185, 193, 198, 203–205, 210, 218, 221, 233, 237–239, 241, 243–247 Puska´s, G., 11, 13, 17, 30, 62–63, 68, 83, 104–106, 118, 124, 128–130, 134, 137–140, 151, 163, 168, 186, 191, 194, 196, 214, 219, 229–232, 234
Q Quantification canonical, 2–3, 56, 89–90, 103, 135, 187, 237 existential, 92 non-canonical quantification, 2–6, 56, 68, 76, 89–90, 103, 131, 141, 165, 224, 237–238, 241 polyadic quantification, 12 QAD, see Quantification, non-canonical universal quantification, 5 Quantificational force, 69, 76, 154 Quantifier adnominal (=adnominal Q), 6, 14, 132, 135–136, 138, 141, 165, 192
Index anti-additive, see Anti-additivity existential, 2, 9–10, 179 floating, see Floating quantifier (FQ) negative, see N-words strong (=strong Q), 107, 189 universal, 2, 10–11, 83, 92, 98, 103–141, 159, 176–185, 212–214 weak (=weak Q), 107–108, 189 See also Operator Quantifier raising, 217 Quantity, 1, 71, 96, 165, 227 Quel N, 43, 222, 229, 240 See also Wh-phrases Qui, 14, 18, 22, 29, 43, 45, 50, 55, 72, 96, 115, 204–205, 222, 240 See also Wh-phrases Qui que ce soit, 69, 174–175, 181 See also Items Quoi, 18, 28–29, 32, 34, 37–38, 48–49, 51, 55, 64, 69, 71–73, 79, 148, 165, 214, 217, 230, 240 See also Wh-phrases Quoi que ce soit, 165 See also Items
R Range, 2, 21, 39, 46, 62, 79–80, 110, 113, 117–118, 135, 164, 175, 190, 208–209 -based, 210 Reference dependant, 6 speakers’s, 77 See also Referentiality Referent, 37, 46–47, 52–53, 55–56, 73, 76, 78–79, 81, 93, 115, 203, 205, 208, 239 Referentiality, 208 Referential, 6, 22, 46, 72, 75–77, 86, 91–96, 152, 192, 208 speaker, 6 Reinhart, T., 6, 75–76, 106, 228, 245 Relativized minimality (RM), 10, 36, 85, 87, 106, 124, 205–206, 238 See also Locality; Intervention effects Restriction, 1, 3–5, 9, 11, 14, 19, 22, 41–42, 47, 56–57, 59, 65, 70, 72–73, 89–90, 96, 98, 103–104, 111, 113–114, 118, 131–134, 136, 138, 141, 159, 164, 166, 184–185, 192–193, 195, 198, 212, 225–226, 233, 238–242, 245, 252 Restrictive clause, 3 Restrictor, 155, 160, 184, 198
259 Rien, 12–13, 27, 38, 45–46, 52–54, 141, 170–171, 175, 179, 181, 185, 188, 193–198 See also N-words Rising, see Intonation Rizzi, L., 22, 32, 46, 70, 72, 85, 113, 180, 193, 205–206, 208, 212, 219, 224, 234, 238, 242, 246, 252 Rooryck, J., 6, 8, 17, 225, 244–245 Ross, J., 22
S Sag, I., 12, 146, 171, 173–174, 176, 179, 186 Scope ambiguity, see Ambiguity intermediate, 86, 93, 116, 162–163, 228 islands, see Islands marker, 186–187 narrow, 68, 73, 77, 82–86, 91–92, 116, 123, 166, 169, 187, 212–213, 215, 219, 224–225, 233 nuclear, 3, 56 wide, 6, 36, 46, 56, 62–63, 68, 77, 82–86, 88, 93, 95, 97, 105–106, 115, 117–118, 124–125, 127, 157, 162–163, 167, 169, 176–179, 182, 187, 203, 205, 207–209, 211–215, 217–221, 224–225, 227–229, 231, 233–234, 239, 251 widest, 115, 211–212, 228 Semantic incorporation, 92, 224 Semantic type, 76–77, 91 Shlonsky, 5, 132–133, 136, 148 Spanish, 64–67, 138, 158, 167–168, 171, 197, 246 Specific/specificity, 4, 7, 9–11, 13, 20, 31, 46–47, 54–56, 70, 76, 78–79, 82–83, 85, 93–98, 112–116, 118–119, 124, 140–141, 185, 193, 198, 203–205, 209–210, 212–214, 216, 218–219, 228–229, 234, 237–239, 241–243, 245–246 See also Un N; Wh-phrases, in-situ; Aucun des N; Chacun des N Split-DP, 1–3, 8–10, 13–14, 19, 56–57, 59, 65, 70, 73–75, 89–90, 98, 104, 217, 220, 223–227, 230, 233–234, 238, 240 See also Combien de N Stage-level predicate, 84, 129 Standard colloquial French, 8, 34–42, 244 Starke, M., 6–8, 17, 22, 31–34, 39, 42–43, 46, 52, 60–62, 97–98, 106, 115, 193, 203,
260 205–211, 216, 218, 221, 223–224, 230, 232, 234, 238, 242–244 Stowell, T., 112–113, 124, 138, 158–159, 212, 233 Stranding approach, 133 Strength, 8, 56, 64, 147, 154, 218–219, 234, 242 Stripping, 231 Strong islands, 17, 22, 29, 32, 62, 86–87, 98, 206, 228–232 See also Islands Szabolcsi, A., 1, 13, 22, 85, 108, 124, 138, 186, 207 T Topicalization, 22, 180, 247, 252 Tous les N, 13, 83–85, 106–107, 110, 112–119, 124, 126–129, 140–141, 145–146, 152–170, 179–183, 185, 186–189, 194, 197, 203–204, 212, 216–217, 228, 241 See also Universal quantifier Tous, see Floating quantifiers, universal quantifiers Tovena, L., 12, 68, 147, 156, 171, 174, 176, 246 Tripartite quantification, see (non)-canonical quantification U Universal quantifier, 2, 10–11, 92, 98, 103–141, 159, 176–185, 212–214 See also Quantifier Un N, 9, 14, 17–18, 56, 76, 78–82, 84–89, 91, 93–94, 96, 105, 116, 120–123, 145–146, 152–165, 169–170, 175, 182, 203–204,
Index 212–221, 228–229, 233, 239–240, 242, 251 See also Existential, quantifier (Q)
V Variable, 4–5, 8–9, 20, 47, 56–57, 68, 73, 75–76, 91–92, 96, 166, 213, 215, 217, 220, 233, 239, 252 free variable, 47, 76, 213 Veridicality, 114 non-veridicality, 114
W Watanabe, A., 4, 57–59, 172–174 Wh-constructions wh-cleft, 23–33, 38, 52 wh-fronting, 7, 13, 20–34, 37–38, 45, 61, 75, 221 wh in-situ, 46, 60 Wh-phrases fronted wh-phrases, 23, 27, 32, 39, 59, 98, 225 in-situ, 8, 33, 35–36, 52–54, 73, 88–89, 219, 229, 231, 239, 244 Wide scope, see Scope Widest scope, see Scope
Z Zanuttini, R., 12, 14, 145, 170–171, 173–174, 176, 179–181, 183, 186, 241, 252 Zeijlstra, H., 147, 149, 158–159, 167–169 Zribi-Hertz, A., 108, 113, 181