Universal Quantifier PPIs

Why have Positive Polarity Items (PPIs) that are universal quantifiers only been attested in the domain of modal auxiliaries (cf. Homer t.a., Iatridou & Zeijlstra 2010, 2013) and never in the domain of quantifiers over individuals? No PPI meaning everybody or everything has ever been reported. In this paper, I argue that universal quantifier PPIs actually do exist, both in the domain of quantifiers over individuals and in the domain of quantifiers over possible worlds, as, I argue, is predicted by the Kadmon & Landman (1993) - Krifka (1995) - Chierchia (2006, 2013) approach to NPIhood. However, since the covert exhaustifier that according to Chierchia (2006, 2013) is induced by these PPIs (and responsible for their PPI-hood) can act as an intervener between the PPI and its anti-licenser, it is concluded in this paper that a universal quantifier PPIs may scope below it and thus appear in disguise; their PPI-like behaviour only becomes visible once they morpho-syntactically precede their anti-licenser. Another conclusion of this paper is that Dutch iedereen (‚everybody’), opposite to English everybody, is actually a PPI

Syntactic structure and modal interpretation: the case of basque "behar"

391 p.This dissertation is an investigation of the syntactic structure and modal interpretation of clauses involving the denominal necessity predicate behar `need¿ and an infinitival complement. On the one hand, it analyses the syntactic status of non-finite complements of denominal behar by examining their interaction with syntactic phenomena sensitive to different structural and locality conditions, and concludes that the infinitival complements of behar can correspond to different underlying structures. The largest type of infinitive is a non-restructuring infinitive that projects a full clausal architecture (i.e. a CP), and the smallest one is a reduced restructuring infinitive that projects up to vP. There is evidence for intermediate types projecting up to the inflectional domain (IP/TP). On the other hand, the dissertation examines the thematic and scope properties of the subjects in each of the different structural types and the modal interpretation that they can give rise to. On the basis of this analysis it is argued that modal interpretation is not constrained by any single factor (the presence of restructuring, the referential status of the subject and its relative scope vis-à-vis the modal predicate, among other frequently mentioned ones), but depends on the cumulative effect of several factors working together. The dissertation also shows the necessity of adopting a more fine-grained view of root modality, one that allows a simpler mapping of syntactic structures into modal meanings

The epistemic use of yào in Mandarin Chinese and its theoretical implications

The epistemic use of the Mandarin Chinese modal yào comes with typologically interesting properties. In this paper, the distribution and meaning of the epistemic use of yào will be described first. This use of yào is restricted to certain explicit strict comparative constructions, but forbidden in many other degree and non-degree constructions. Second, epistemic yào cannot appear above or below negation. Third, epistemic yào has a quantificational force stronger than that of existential modals, yet weaker than that of strong necessity modals. In the theoretical component of the paper, I argue that epistemic yào is a modifier for strict comparative morphemes, a syntactic/semantic function that sets it apart from many other epistemic modals that take propositions as direct argument. The weak necessity quantificational force of epistemic yào is encoded in its semantics by making recourse to alternative modal bases. Epistemic yào's inability to form scopal relation with negation arises from two factors: (i) its status as a strict comparative morpheme modifier, and (ii) competition between lexical items with identical semantics. Through investigating the epistemic use of yào, some hitherto unnoticed interesting modal properties in natural language are brought to the forefront, and new intra- and inter-linguistic variations in the distribution and meaning of modals are revealed

The role of intonation and context in lack of necessity meanings in negated deontic necessity modals in child Romanian

The current paper experimentally addresses the question of whether Romanian 5-year-olds interpret negated deontic necessity modals as interdiction initially, and to what extent intonation and situational context may act as cues for a more adult-like interpretation. We find that, in the absence of situational context, children initially interpret all negated deontic modals as interdiction. Prosodic cues are on their own not enough to lead to an adult interpretation. However, in the presence of situational context, children are able to tease lack of necessity and interdiction apart and even show sensitivity to prosodic differences among negated modals

Multidominance, ellipsis, and quantifier scope

This dissertation provides a novel perspective on the interaction between quantifier scope and ellipsis. It presents a detailed investigation of the scopal interaction between English negative indefinites, modals, and quantified phrases in ellipsis. One of the crucial observations is that a negative indefinite in object position cannot scope out of a verbal ellipsis site, while Quantifier Raising (QR) of a quantificational object can escape a verbal ellipsis site. This dissertation presents a unified account of this state of affairs in the context of multidominance. It is argued that both English negative indefinites and quantificational determiners decompose into two independent elements. Their formation is the result of a morphological process, Fusion Under Adjacency. The locality/adjacency required for fusion is established under remerge (multidominance), in combination with cyclic Spell-Out/linearization. The main claim of this dissertation is that the PF-process of ellipsis can block this morphological process. It is proposed that the timing of Fusion Under Adjacency and (derivational) ellipsis plays a crucial role: Fusion Under Adjacency has to take place before the ellipsis licensor is merged. The lack of a blocking effect of ellipsis in QR is accounted for by the fact that QR always has a landing site below the ellipsis licensor. In addition to providing an account for the scopal behavior of quantificational elements under ellipsis, this dissertation also sheds new light on the syntax-to-PF mapping. It contributes to our understanding of how multidominant phrase markers are transferred to PF for (non-)pronunciation in a cyclic model of the grammar. This study is of relevance to scholars interested in the nature of ellipsis and quantifier scope, and the syntax-PF connection, as well as to a general syntactic readership.LEI Universiteit LeidenLanguage Use in Past and Presen

Epistemic Containment and the Encoding of Scope

This paper is concerned with the phenomenon of epistemic containment (von Fintel and Iatridou 2003). We discuss epistemic containment with modal auxiliaries, model adverbs and modal raising predicates and argue that the full data pattern provides strong support for a syntactic encoding of scope that relies on the projection of scope indices (in the spirit of a proposal first made in Williams 1994) combined with a particular condition on scope shift (the CSS; Neeleman and van de Koot 2012). The CSS-based theory of scope predicts an asymmetry between overt and covert scope-taking that we show is also present in the epistemic containment data. In particular, covert scope extension exhibits restrictions not present with its overt counterpart. Such an asymmetry seems unexpected on a QR-based alternative. The CSS-based account of epistemic containment correctly predicts a further scope freezing effects with epistemic modals that we believe have not been previously reported in the literature, as well as the existence of structures in which an epistemic category occurs in the c-command domain of a deontic category

Ambiguous than-clauses and the mention-some reading

This paper addresses the ambiguity of comparatives that contain a permission-related existential modal in their than-clause. For example, given the context that the interval of permitted speed is between 35 and 50 mph, the sentence Lucinda is driving less fast than allowed is ambiguous between two readings: (i) her speed is below the minimum (i.e., 35 mph); (ii) her speed is below the maximum (i.e., 50 mph). Previously, this ambiguity has been attributed to either the scopal interaction between a negation element and a modal (Heim 2006a) or the optional application of a silent operator (Crnic 2017). Here we show that these two lines of accounts under- or over-generate. Instead, we propose that the source of this ambiguity is located in the ambiguous answerhood for wh-questions corresponding to this kind of than-clauses (e.g., how fast is Lucinda allowed to drive). The current proposal consists of three parts. First, based on Zhang & Ling (2015, 2017a,b), we adopt a generalized interval-arithmetic-based recipe for computing the semantics of comparatives. Second, the semantics of than-clauses is considered equal to that of short answers to corresponding wh-questions. Third, since the use of existential priority modals in wh-questions leads to the 'mention-some/mention-all' ambiguity for answerhood, we propose that this ambiguity projects in further derivation and leads to the two readings for comparatives like the Lucinda sentence.