Search

We show that some elements in Mandarin that have been considered as pre‐verbal adverbial modifiers are actually the main verbs of the sentences. Three sets of phenomena are discussed: the degree gou 'enough' construction, the "Adv/Adv‐di" contrast, and two types of "manner wh‐adverbs". These phenomena make Mandarin a typologically interesting case, as it stands in contrast to languages such as English on the one hand, where adverbs are adjuncts, and to Formosan languages on the other, where manner modifiers realize as the main verb of the sentence. We also discuss the possible parameterization in grammar that is responsible for this distinction. We suggest that grammatical theory provides an option to languages, in the form of a parameter, which licenses complementation of an un‐subcategorized expression YP to a head X, when X denotes a manner (or more generally, an event modifier) of YP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies preverbal objects in Taiwan Southern Min (TSM), which are defined as NPs that occur after the subject, before the verb, and are subcategorized for by the verb. This paper adopts five syntactic tests taken from Rizzi (1997) to judge the status of preverbal NPs in TSM, topic or focus. First: A topic (but not a focus) may contain a resumptive pronoun in the comment clause. Second: A topic does not result in weak crossover effect, yet the focus does. Third: More than one topic is allowed in one sentence, while the number of the focus is limited to one. Fourth: Bare quantificational elements cannot be topics, yet they can be a focus. Fifth: A wh-operator is compatible with a topic, but not with a focus. Three more factors discussed in the literature on preverbal NPs in Mandarin Chinese are also considered. First: In a topic construction, the VP can be questioned, while in a focus construction, it cannot. Second: A focus can be indefinite but a topic cannot. Third: The bare NP in the pre-adverbial position functions as a topic and it has to be specific, while the NP in the post-adverbial, preverbal position serves as a focus and it can be nonspecific. The test results show that preverbal NPs in TSM can function as either topic or focus when appropriate contrasts are provided. Moreover, through tests, this paper further distinguishes focuses from contrastive topics, which carry intonational stress as focuses do but display features of topics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an analysis of the ambiguous interpretations of the durative complements in the Hakka verb copying construction, schematically represented as "NP1 V-NP2 V C3", in terms of the constructional approach and the cognitive approach. This study has the following proposals. First, the interpretation of the durative complement hinges crucially on the aspectual properties of the V-NP2 unit. Second, contrary to what is generally assumed, a verb copying sentence may be ambiguous between the continuity reading and the repetition reading and can be viewed as a case of constructional polysemy. Third, such ambiguities arise due to the interaction between the episodic/generic duality of the V-NP2 unit and the duration/lapse of time duality of the durative complement and are a natural consequence of the gestalt effect. Finally, the varying degrees of markedness of such a sentence, influenced by world knowledge, depend mainly on the compatibility of the V-NP2 unit and the durative complement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Postlexical prosodic phenomena in Austronesian languages have received relatively little attention, and consequently their patterns remain unknown. This paper aims to bridge this gap by investigating how syntactic structure interacts with postlexical prosodic phenomena in Saisiyat, an endangered language spoken in Taiwan. Several significant findings are made. First, Saisiyat sentential fundamental frequency (F0) patterns are based largely on its original lexical-level word F0 contour. The accent of a content word in sentences usually falls on its ultimate syllable, while trisyllabic or quadrisyllabic content words may sometimes undergo postlexical accentual modifications such as accent spreading, accent fronting, and accent adding. Function words, in contrast, play a role of interpolation as an intermediate site in bridging the F0 of their preceding and following syllables. Second, a yes-no question exhibits substantial prosodic modification by influencing its word preceding sentence-final interrogative particle aj, as compared with its counterpart in a declarative sentence. Third, agents in agent-focus sentences and patients in patient-focus sentences demonstrate higher values with respect to F0 peak, mean F0, and mean intensity. We provide typological explanations for these findings and explore the theoretical implications of postlexical prosodic patterns of Formosan languages in Taiwan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]