Abstract
Partee (2004) claims that many and few are ambiguous between the cardinal meaning and the proportional meaning. Various studies have been conducted on this topic (see e.g. Milsark 1977; Barwise & Cooper 1981; Westerståhl 1985; Partee 1995; Herburger 1997; Cohen 2001; Romero 2015), but not much on Mandarin Chinese. This paper studies henduo ‘many’ and henshao ‘few’ and compares them with English many and few on the basis of the dichotomic properties of quantifying words including the cardinal/ proportional readings, strong/weak quantifiers and D-/A-quantifications (see e.g. Lewis 1975; Heim 1982; Partee 1995).
Henduo and henshao are generally translated as many and few in English. While many and few are a pair of antonyms with similar syntactic distributions and grammatical functions, henduo and henshao demonstrate asymmetrical syntactic distributions, with different grammatical functions, as shown in (1).
(1) (a) Tamen chi-le henduo pingguo.
they eat-LE many apple
‘They ate many apples.’
(b) *Tamen chi-le henshao pingguo.
they eat-LE few apple
Intended: ‘They ate few apples.’
While the use of henduo is grammatical in (1a), the use of henshao in (1b) gives an ungrammatical sentence. (1a) and (1b) show that henduo and henshao cannot be the same, at least in terms of their syntactic distributions and grammatical functions. The use of “many” and “few” are acceptable in both sentences, as revealed in the English translation of (1a) and (1b).
Raw data are collected from the CCL corpus and the data show the followings.
(i) Henduo and henshao do demonstrate an asymmetrical distribution, with henduo primarily functioning as the attributes and henshao being the adverbials.
(ii) “Henduo + CL” is licensed while “henshao + CL” is not in Mandarin Chinese. The structure of CIP (Rothstein 2017) is adopted to analyze the structure of “henduo + CL”.
(iii) Henduo and henshao differ in whether they serve as a quantifier or a modifier in the sentence.
Based on the above findings and the comparative analysis of henduo/henshao and many/few, we argue that henshao is not functionally equivalent to few and it functions more like a modifier in Mandarin Chinese, and many should be translated as xuduo rather than henduo in Chinese. Our study shows that Chinese may not be the same as English and other languages in the syntax-semantics mapping of quantifying words.
Henduo and henshao are generally translated as many and few in English. While many and few are a pair of antonyms with similar syntactic distributions and grammatical functions, henduo and henshao demonstrate asymmetrical syntactic distributions, with different grammatical functions, as shown in (1).
(1) (a) Tamen chi-le henduo pingguo.
they eat-LE many apple
‘They ate many apples.’
(b) *Tamen chi-le henshao pingguo.
they eat-LE few apple
Intended: ‘They ate few apples.’
While the use of henduo is grammatical in (1a), the use of henshao in (1b) gives an ungrammatical sentence. (1a) and (1b) show that henduo and henshao cannot be the same, at least in terms of their syntactic distributions and grammatical functions. The use of “many” and “few” are acceptable in both sentences, as revealed in the English translation of (1a) and (1b).
Raw data are collected from the CCL corpus and the data show the followings.
(i) Henduo and henshao do demonstrate an asymmetrical distribution, with henduo primarily functioning as the attributes and henshao being the adverbials.
(ii) “Henduo + CL” is licensed while “henshao + CL” is not in Mandarin Chinese. The structure of CIP (Rothstein 2017) is adopted to analyze the structure of “henduo + CL”.
(iii) Henduo and henshao differ in whether they serve as a quantifier or a modifier in the sentence.
Based on the above findings and the comparative analysis of henduo/henshao and many/few, we argue that henshao is not functionally equivalent to few and it functions more like a modifier in Mandarin Chinese, and many should be translated as xuduo rather than henduo in Chinese. Our study shows that Chinese may not be the same as English and other languages in the syntax-semantics mapping of quantifying words.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | 形式语言学语言接口研究国际研讨会 |
| Subtitle of host publication | 会议手册 |
| Pages | 44-45 |
| Number of pages | 2 |
| Publication status | Published - 23 Nov 2019 |
| Event | The International Symposium on Interfaces in Generative Linguistics - South China Normal University, Guangzhou, China Duration: 23 Nov 2019 → 24 Nov 2019 https://linguistlist.org/issues/30/30-1381.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook |
Conference
| Conference | The International Symposium on Interfaces in Generative Linguistics |
|---|---|
| Country/Territory | China |
| City | Guangzhou |
| Period | 23/11/19 → 24/11/19 |
| Internet address |