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Attributive Measure Phrases in Mandarin: Monotonicity and Distributivity

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Monotonicity in Logic and Language (TLLM 2020)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 12564))

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Abstract

This paper investigates the interpretation of measure phrases (MPs) in attributive constructions in Mandarin. Contra Schwarzschild [1], we argue that the attributive position is not bound to a non-monotonic reading for MPs, and that Mandarin attributive MPs are subject to both monotonic and non-monotonic readings, which are to be recast as a contrast between object-level and kind-level readings. The alleged non-monotonic reading for attributive MPs is argued to be a result of the distributivity effect [2, 3]. It is observed in Mandarin that attributive MPs always have a distributive reading on monotonic and non-monotonic readings, which originate from two different sources. We propose that on the monotonic reading, the attributive MP distributes over the predicate Classifier-Noun, which denotes a set of non-overlapping individuals, and that the apparent non-monotonic reading is a consequence of the (sub)kind reading, such that the property expressed by MP is distributive over the instantiation set of the relevant (sub)kind. As far as their semantics is concerned, we claim that attributive MPs on the non-monotonic reading are intersective adjectives, which compose with NPs via Heim and Kratzer’s [4] rule of Predicate Modification, but attributive MPs on the monotonic reading compose with NPs with functional application, as induced by the predicativizer de, whereby they denote degrees serving to saturate the degree argument associated with the semantics of dimensional adjectives, which is at type <d, et>.

This study is supported by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Project NO.: 2020QNA107). This paper is a substantially revised version of my 2019 paper written in Chinese [10], in which the issue of distributivity was not touched at all. Among other things, the current version makes two major changes/improvements. First, we tease apart the relation between monotonicity and distributivity. Second, monotonic and non-monotonic MPs are argued to be composed in two different ways, either by the rule of Predicate Modification or Functional Application. I would like to express my gratitude to the anonymous reviewers, whose critical comments help to improve the readability of the paper. I am solely responsible for the errors.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The semantics in (14b) was simplified by getting rid of the derivation from the root meaning of nouns to a set of atomic individuals.

  2. 2.

    Schwarzschild (2006) treats such QAs as many and much to be realized high in some functional projection, e.g. at or above MonP.

  3. 3.

    The modification marker de is able to turn any phrasal elements into attributive modifiers, which is schematized as “XP-de-NP”.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chinese, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Xuping Li

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chinese Languages and Literatures, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China

    Dun Deng

  2. Department of Philosophy, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China

    Fenrong Liu

  3. Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures, Tsinghua University, Bejing, China

    Mingming Liu

  4. Department of Philosophy, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

    Dag Westerståhl

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Li, X. (2020). Attributive Measure Phrases in Mandarin: Monotonicity and Distributivity. In: Deng, D., Liu, F., Liu, M., Westerståhl, D. (eds) Monotonicity in Logic and Language. TLLM 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12564. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-62843-0_4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-62843-0_4

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