Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1 The FQ and the PNQ
1.1.2 Readings ....................................................................................................................... 1c
The FQ and the PNQ have different readings. To be specific, the FQ can yield
two readings: exhaustive and partitive reading, as displayed in (14), whereas the PNQ
can only be used in the exhaustive context in (15).
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(14) Na-xie xuesheng yiding san-ge ren nenggou zai
that-CL student definitely three-CL person can in
zhe-chang bisai de jiang.
this-CL game win prize
a. ‘Three of those students can win a prize in this game.s (FQ-partitive)
b. ‘Those three students can win a prize in this game.s (FQ-exhaustive)
(15) Na-xie xuesheng san-ge ren a! yiding nenggou
that-CL student three-CL person EXCL！ definitely can
yiqi zai zhe-chang bisai de jiang.
together in this-CL game win prize
a. *‘Three of those students can win a prize in this game.s (PNQ-partitive)
b. ‘Those three students can win a prize in this game.s (PNQ-exhaustive)
In (14), the FQ sanhge ren ‘three peoples can be interpreted as ‘all of those three
studentss or ‘three of those studentss. However, the PNQ in (15) can only yield a
partitive reading, ‘all of those three studentss.
Summarizing section 1.1, the PNQ and the FQ can have either a numeral or a
non-numeral form. If the common noun of the PNQ and the FQ and that of the related
nominal phrase are identical, the common noun of the quantifier can be omitted but if
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they are different the common nouns of both the quantifier and the related nominal
phrase should be present. Furthermore, the second pattern of the non-numeral
quantifier in (8) is different from the pattern of the numeral quantifier in (6) and the
first pattern of the non-numeral quantifier in (7). The common noun of the
non-numeral quantifier in (8) must be present.
The other point about the PNQ and the FQ is that their interpretations can be
different. The PNQ can only yield an exhaustive reading whereas depending on the
context, the FQ can have either an exhaustive or a partitive reading.
1.2 Other superficially similar but underlyingly different numeral phrases
In addition to the FQ mentioned in the previous section (see ex.(16)), there are
at least two more kinds of numeral phrase in Chinese, as shown in (17) and (18), that
seem to have FQ-like behaviors. I argue that the FQ in (16) is superficially similar to
the FQ-like numeral phrases in (17) and (18) but underlyingly differs from them.
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(16) Na liang-dui shuangbaotai xiongdi hui si-ge ren yiqi dao
that two-CL twins brother will four-CL person together arrive
taishang biaoyan.
stage.top perform
‘Those two pairs of twin brothers, four people, will perform on the stage
together.s
(17) Shang ge xueqi, zhe ji-ge tongxue dou liang-ge
last CL term this several-CL classmate always two-CL
ren xi wan.
person wash dish
‘Last term, these several classmates washed dishes in groups of two.s
(Lee 1986:82)
(18) Ta yiding yi-ge
ren lai zher.
he definitely one-CL person come here
‘He will definitely come by himself.s
(Huang et al. 2009:c05)
The numeral phrase in (17) is a manner adverb, pointed out by Lee (1986) and
the numeral phrase in (18) is an emphatic adverb, pointed out by Huang et al. (2009).
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Depending on their behaviors, I will call the numeral phrase in (17) numeral manner
adverb and the numeral phrase in (18) numeral emphatic adverb. The two FQ-like
numeral phrases are not taken into consideration in this thesis for the following
reasons.
First of all, the numeral manner adverb in (17) is different from the FQ at issue,
syntactically and semantically. Lee (1986) claims that it is a manner adverb since it
modifies the action of the sentence. That is, in (17), the action xi wan ‘do the dishs is
done in groups of two people. Syntactically, the numeral manner adverb and the FQ do
not have a similar distribution. Examples are shown in (19)-(21).
(19) a. Na-dui fuqi yinggai hui
kuaisude yiqi
daothat-CL husband.wife should will quickly together arrive
wenjudian caigou.
stationery.store do.shopping
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b.*Na-dui fuqi yinggai kuaisude hui yiqi dao
that-CL husband.wife should quickly will together arrive
wenjudian caigou.
stationery.store do.shopping
‘That married couple will likely go shopping quickly in the stationery
together.s
(20) a. Xia ge xueqi, zhe ji-ge tongxue hui dou liang-ge
next CL term this several-CL classmate will always two- CL
ren
yiqi xi wan.person together wash dish
*b. Xia ge xueqi, zhe ji-ge tongxue liang-ge ren hui
next CL term this several-CL classmate two-CL person will
dou yiqi xi wan.
always together wash dish
‘Next term, these several classmates should do the dishes in groups of two.s
(21) a. Na-dui fuqi yinggai liang-ge ren hui yiqi
that-CL husband.wife should two-CL person will together
dao wenjudian caigou.
arrive stationery.store do.shopping
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b. Na-dui fuqi yinggai hui liang-ge ren yiqi
that-CL husband.wife should will two-CL person together
dao wenjudian caigou.
arrive stationery.store do.shopping
‘Both of that married couple will likely go shopping in the stationery
together.s
Consider (19)-(21). It is obvious that the typical manner adverb kuaisude
‘quicklys in (19) and the numeral manner adverb lianghge ren ‘two peoples in (20)
have a similar distribution. However, the FQ lianghge ren ‘two peoples in (21) has a
different distribution from them. The manner adverb kuaisude ‘quicklys and the
numeral manner adverb lianghge ren ‘two peoples both have to occur in a lower
position than the modal hui but the FQ can occupy a higher position than the modal hui.
On the other hand, semantically, the numeral manner adverb and the FQ have
different interpretations. To illustrate, the numeral manner adverb in (20) is used to
express the way the action takes place like the canonical manner adverb kuaisude
‘quicklys in (19) so it is unsurprising that Lee (1986) regards it as a manner adverb.
However, the FQ in (21) is not used to modify the action of the sentence but to
quantify the subject. Based on the syntactical and semantic dissimilarities between the
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FQ and the manner adverb, we can distinguish the FQ from the numeral manner
adverb effortlessly.
As to the numeral emphatic adverb in (18), it means ‘by oneselfYalones in
Chinese and its number is only restricted to one (Huang et al. 2009). Thus, Huang et al.
(2009) deems it as an emphatic adverb. Comparing the emphatic adverb and the FQ, I
found that even though the FQ and the emphatic adverb have a similar distribution
(see ex.(2) and (22)), they still cannot be treated as the same type of element for some
reasons.
(22) Ta yinggai (yi-ge ren) hui (yi-ge ren) dao
he may one-CL person will one-CL person arrive
taishang biaoyan.
stage.top perform
‘He will likely perform on the stage by himself.s
First, the number the FQ indicates is not restricted to one but the numeral
emphatic adverb is; second, the interpretation of the FQ is different from that of the
emphatic adverb. The emphatic adverb expresses the meaning ‘aloneYby oneselfs
while the function of the FQ is to emphasize the quantity of the associated nominal
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phrase and refer to the associated nominal phrase. Due to their different
interpretations, we can differentiate the FQ from the numeral emphatic adverb.
To sum up, first, the numeral phrase of the manner adverb type proposed by Lee
(1986) has a different distribution and properties from the FQ; second, the numeral
phrase of the emphatic adverb discussed by Huang et al. (2009) has a similar
distribution to the FQ but has different interpretations from the FQ. Based on the above
arguments, I claim that the FQ is different from the numeral manner adverb and the
numeral emphatic adverb. Therefore, I will not take these two kinds of numeral phrases
into consideration. In this thesis, I propose that the PNQ and the FQ are used to
quantify and emphasize the quantity of their related nominal phrases.
This thesis is organized as follows: chapter 2 presents the previous studies on
the FQs in English and Japanese, and on the FQs in Chinese; chapter c provides the
syntactic analyses for the PNQ and the FQ in Chinese; chapter 4 gives the conclusion
and implications of this thesis.
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