ADJECTIVES, NUMBER AND INTERFACES WHY LANGUAGES VARY
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[email protected] ADJECTIVES, NUMBER AND INTERFACES WHY LANGUAGES VARY
DENIS BOUCHARD Universite du Quebec a Montreal, Canada
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NORTH-HOLLAND LINGUISTIC SERIES: LINGUISTIC VARIATIONS
Series Editors
Advisory Board
Johan Rooryck (Leiden University) Pierre Pica (CNRS, Paris France)
Noam Chomsky (MIT, Cambridge, MA) Guglielmo Cinque (University of Venice) Marcel den Dikken (CUNY Graduate Center) Zygmunt Frajzyngier (University of Colorado at Boulder) Ken Hale (MIT, Cambridge, MA) Anders Holmberg (University of Durham) Harry van der Hulst (University of Connecticut) Michael Kenstowicz (MIT, Cambridge, MA) Sige-Yuki Kuroda (University of California, San Diego) Vladimir Nedjalkov (Academy of Sciences, St Petersburg) Aryon Rodrigues (Brasilia National University)
Editorial Board Paola Beninca (University of Padova) Richard Larson (SUNY, Stony Brook) Alain Rouveret (University of Paris VII) Esther Torrego (University of Massachusetts, Boston)
The goal of this collection is to put at the disposal of the linguistic community studies which contribute to a deeper understanding of the nature of linguistic variation within the generative tradition that has been developing since the middle of the twentieth century. The series pays particular attention to the tension between descriptive and explanatory adequacy more accurately reformulated as a tension between the simplicity of the language faculty and its apparent complexity. Volumes will cover the traditional domain of syntactic studies, but also include related areas such as semantics, morphology, phonology and the lexicon. The series aims at distributing theoretical and empirical studies which constitute important contributions to the field, in particular to the domain of micro- and macrovariation. The particular aim of the series is to publish both theoretical and empirical studies of language. Although the main focus of the series will be on generative linguistics, it will not exclude studies of a more general nature or from different schools of thought, insofar as they contribute to our understanding of the language faculty.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I have benefitted greatly from the comments of members of the audiences to which I presented parts of this material in Paris, Trondheim, Bordeaux, Utrecht, Lille, London, Nancy, Siena and Montreal. Special thanks are due to Pierre Pica and Johan Rooryck who provided me with helpful criticism of the pre-final manuscript. Jennifer Ormston made some extensive comments that helped me see what was wrong and what could be right. This work was supported in part by a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. On the very same day that I sent in this manuscript, Nicolas Ruwet passed away. Je te salue a toutes volees, mon cher Nicolas.
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ix
CONTENTS CHAPTER 1 ADJECTIVES, INTERFACES, AND EXPLANATION
1
INTRODUCTION
1
1. ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION
4
1.1. Apparent Noncompositionality of Adjectival Modification
6
1.2. Numerous Other Properties of Adjectival Modification
10
2. EXPLANING ADJECTIVAL MODIFCATION
14
2.1. Attempts at Technical Solutions
14
2.1.1. Additions to the semantics
15
2.1.2. Additions to the syntactic units
17
2.1.3. Additions to the constructions
18
2.2. Inadequacy of Technical Solutions
20
2.2.1. Multiple meanings of ADJ-N combinations
21
2.2.2. Multiple classes of adjectives
21
2.2.3. Cross-linguistic variation
25
2.3. Understanding the Lack of Explanation
27
3. EXPLANATION IN LINGUISTICS: THE ROLE OF INTERFACES
34
3.1. Variation at the SM Interface: a Second Facet to Saussurean Arbitrariness
37
3.2. Variation at the CI Interface: Another Facet of Saussurean Arbitrariness
39
3.3. The CI and SM Properties of Number
41
Notes
48
:
CHAPTER 2 ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION IN FRENCH
57
1. A STRICTLY COMPOSITIONAL ANALYSIS OF ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION
57
2. BASIC PHENOMENA
68
2.1. Clear Meaning Differences Between ADJ-N and N-ADJ Combinations
73
2.2. Intensional Adjectives
76
2.3. Quantitative Adjectives
80
2.4. Evaluative Adjectives
89
2.5. ADJs that Express Concrete Properties
100
2.6. ADJs and Proper Names
107
2.7. The Anaphoric Use of a Prenominal ADJ
113
2.8. The Scope of Double Prenominal ADJs
116
X
2.9. The Scope of Double Postnominal ADJs
121
2.10. Scopal Ambiguity in ADJ-N-ADJ
122
2.11. Sandhi Phenomena
133
2.12. The No Complement Restriction
140
3. FACTORS FAVORING PRE-N ORPOST-N PLACEMENT OF ADJS
147
3.1. Semantic Factors
147
3.2. Phonological Factors
149
3.3. Syntactic Factors
149
3.4. Morphological Factors
151
3.5. Nongrammatical Factors
152
4. CONCLUSION
153
Notes
154
CHAPTER 3 CROSSLINGUISTIC VARIATION IN ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION
169
1. THE CAUSES OF VARIATION
169
2. A COMPARISON WITH ENGLISH
171
2.1. Why English has mostly Prenominal ADJs
171
2.2. The Mirror Order of French Postnominal ADJs and English Prenominal ADJs
176
2.3. The old friend Problem
185
2.4. Intonation and Functional Covariation
187
3. A BRIEF LOOK AT OTHER LANGUAGES
191
3.1. Celtic Languages
191
3.2. Walloon
194
3.3. Rumanian
202
4. EVIDENCE FROM CODES WITCHING
204
5. CONCLUSION
207
Notes
208
CHAPTER 4 THE OMISSION OF N
219
1. EXPRESSIONS INCLUDING PARTITIVITY
220
2. CLASSIFYING ADJS
225
3. LONE DETERMINERS
234
3.1. Syntactic Accounts
237
3.1.1. Chomsky's analysis
237
3.1.2. Cardinaletti & Starke's analysis
244
xi
3.1.3. Why syntactic accounts fail
246
3.2. An Affixal Account
247
3.3. Determiners, Tense, and Number
251
3.3.1. ActAffs as regular affixes
251
3.3.2. Accounting for the data
259
4. CONCLUSION
263
Notes
264
CHAPTER 5 THE OMISSION OF DET
273
1. NUMBER AND THE DET
273
2. INTENSIONAL DETERMINERLESS NPS IN FRENCH
275
2.1. Predicative N
276
2.2. Attributive N
278
2.3. Verbal Expressions
280
2.4.N de N
282
2.5. N a N
284
2.6. Negation and Privative Elements
286
3. REFERENTIAL DETERMINERLESS NPS IN FRENCH
289
3.1. Contact of the Word with the Referent
290
3.2. Deictic NPs
292
3.3. Proper Names
293
3.4. A Single Det and Coordinated Ns
295
3.5. Determinerless Coordinated Ns
295
3.6. de + Prenominal Adjective
297
4. THE INTERPRETATION OF DETERMINERLESS NPS IN ENGLISH
298
5. DETERMINERLESS NPS IN ITALIAN
307
6. CONCLUSION
309
APPENDIX
310
Notes
313
CHAPTER 6 ADAPTIVE GRAMMAR
321
1. THE BROAD PICTURE
321
2. PROGRESS IN GENERATIVE GRAMMAR AND SIMPLICITY
325
2.1. Progress in Generative Grammar
325
2.2. Formal Simplicity
327
xii
2.3. Functional Simplicity
330
2.4. General Simplicity
337
3. NONMINIMAL RESIDUES
339
3.1. Displacement
340
3.2. Locality
342
4. A PARSIMONIOUS ANALYSIS OF LONG DISTANCE DEPENDENCIES
344
4.1. Long Distance Dependency is not Displacement
345
4.2. Locality
348
4.3. Summary
358
5. THE ORIGINS OF VARIATION
359
5.1. Variation by Saussurean Arbitrariness is Motivated
360
5.2. Variation by Displacement Internal to a Language
361
5.2.1. Facilitating processing
362
5.2.2. Different types of semantics
363
5.2.3. Agreement with uninterpretable features
366
5.2.4. Expletive constructions
368
5.2.5. Wh in-situ
370
5.2.6. Displacement: Artefact rather than fact
377
6. DISPLACEMENT AND CROSSLINGUISTIC VARIATION
377
6.1. Crosslinguistic Variation in the Basic Order
378
6.1.1. A universal basic order
378
6.1.2. Crosslinguistic variation by displacement
382
6.2. Free Order and Functional Covariation
382
7. INNATENESS AND LEARNABILITY
390
8. AN ADAPTIVE MODEL OF THE FACULTY OF LANGUAGE
395
APPENDIX: COUNTERARGUMENTS TO COMPOSITIONALITY?
401
A.1. Compositionality and Multiple Interpretations: Meaning versus Interpretation
405
A.2. Compositionality and the Contextual Meaning of if and unless
407
Notes
411
REFERENCES
433
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 1
1
ADJECTIVES, INTERFACES, AND EXPLANATION "Having for thirty years believed and taught the doctrine of phlogiston ... I for a long time felt inimical to the new system, which represented as absurd which I hitherto regarded as sound doctrine; but this enmity ... springs only from force of habit." Joseph Black to Lavoisier, 1791.
INTRODUCTION This is a study of the distribution and interpretation of adjectives in the Noun Phrase. The study has two main objectives. First, there is a descriptive goal: to provide as comprehensive as possible a description of the phenomena surrounding adjectival modification in French, and to use this as a basis to understand variation found in other languages. Chomsky (1995: 382) estimates that "we still have no good phrase structure theory for such simple matters as attributive adjectives." Indeed, as we will see, current analyses are merely descriptive at best. Moreover, the data relevant to understand adjectival modification and its variation across languages go well beyond superficial properties of order and the structure deriving from it. They involve all the different aspects of form and meaning: semantics, syntax, morphology and phonology, and even phonetics, pragmatics, or frequency of occurrence. It is no accident that current proposals do not have much success with the phrasal properties of adjectival modification, and do not address many of the other properties. This state of affairs derives from the way of looking at syntax. This brings us to my second objective of explaining why languages vary. To attain this goal, we must change the way the theory interacts with initial
2 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces conditions: rather than appealing to external properties to motivate descriptive tools, we must take external properties as the foundations from which analytical tools are derived. Language would not have the properties it has if the general cognitive system or the physiology of humans were significantly different. Given these initial conditions, we can explain why languages vary. Chomsky (1995) raises at the outset two fundamental questions that drive Generative Grammar: "(1) what are the general conditions that the human language faculty should be expected to satisfy ? and (2) to what extent is the language faculty determined by these conditions, without special structure that lies beyond them ?" In asking question (1), we assume that conditions are imposed on the language faculty by virtue of its place within the cognitive systems of the mind. I propose to follow very strictly an approach that takes fully into account the consequences of the effects of the interface properties, i.e., of the fact that the brain in which the language system is represented also contains a conceptual system with its own properties, and is set in human bodies that have particular sensorimotor systems that determine the kind of form which can participate in language. Immediate consequences of this embodiment of language are that meaning is restricted to notions that may link up to our Conceptual-Intentional system (CI) and form is constrained by the physical properties of our Sensori-Motor system (SM). Therefore, some interface properties are logically anterior to linguistic theory, in the sense that they must preexist linguistic theory since its object of study presupposes them. Thus, the sciences to which observational propositions of the SM system and the CI system could be subjected are assumed to be logically anterior to linguistic theory (such as acoustics, the physics of articulation, the cognitive aspects of how humans conceptualize the world, and so on). For instance, words must be ordered in oral languages because our articulatory system does not allow the production of two words simultaneously.1 The explanation for this fact lies more in human biology than in linguistic theory. In this vein, when Kayne (1994) proposes to derive most aspects of syntactic hierarchical structure from properties of sequencing of sounds, he assumes that the articulatory apparatus of human beings which produces the sounds of language has physical properties which are logically anterior to the syntactic properties he is studying.2 This restatement of the traditional self-evident observation that language is a relation between form and meaning is at the heart of Chomsky's second question above: is the language faculty entirely determined by interface conditions, or does it require special structure that lies beyond them? Early generative work contended that quite a lot of special structure is required. The current view expressed in Chomsky (2001) is that we should account for properties of language
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 3 in terms of interface conditions and general properties of computational efficiency, and that ideally, a strong minimalist thesis should be maintained which keeps to this kind of principled explanation and does not have to resort to language-specific properties. However, if we look at the actual content of the proposals, not their minimalist rhetoric, there remain critical nonminimal tools, particularly in the use of Move to account for language variation. I argue that it is possible to eliminate these "imperfections" and to have a fully principled explanation of properties of language. To proceed on this path, we must follow normal scientific practice very scrupulously and take properties which are logically anterior to those under study as the axiomatic base of the theory, i.e., properties of the conceptual and sensorimotor systems. What emerges is that the computational system for human language (CHL) does have highly specified properties, but these are in most part (maybe completely) determined by a quite limited number of logically anterior properties. Variation among languages is very restricted, not because we have a highly specialized and specified CHL, but because our SM and CI make-ups drastically narrow the parametric possibilities of how the form and meaning of language can be related to each other. The nature of the objects being related determines the kind of relation that may be established between them. Close scrutiny of the effects of interfaces also leads us to surprising conclusions about potential sources for variation. According to the standard view (presented for instance in Chomsky 2001), it is generally taken for granted that the phonological component is highly variable among languages, but that both the semantic component and narrow syntax are uniform across languages. Concerning the latter, the central operation Merge is taken to be the only means to indicate that a relation is established between two elements A and B. However, the central operation required by a recursive system is actually Associate, and Merge is part of an external system, it is a physiological expression of this operation, namely, the juxtaposition of two elements. We will see that the juxtaposition of two elements is not the only means provided by human physiology to convey the information that elements A and B are related. Variation therefore arises because languages choose among equally valid means to express various types of relations. As for the thought system, there are cases in which it provides more than one way to conceptualize an element. Variation arises because the encoding of the element may be based on one conceptualization in the grammar of one language, and on another conceptualization in another language. In sum, variation arises in all components whenever there is more than one optimal solution to the legibility conditions of the external systems. Variation is therefore an
4 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces optimal property of language. The range of typological variation is simply the one allowed by preexisting physiological and cognitive properties of human beings. That is what is universal in language, not stipulated restrictions. As a precise illustration of how external systems introduce variation, I discuss the CI import of Number in nominal expressions, and the various equally valid ways to express Number in the SM system. We will see that the interface properties of Number provide a simple and precise solution for longstanding problems for compositionality raised by adjectival modification, as well as a unified analysis of the many other properties involved. The interface properties of Number also provide a principled explanation of the variations found across languages in the placement of ADJs, as well as variations concerning nominals without determiners (Bare NPs) and determiners without nominals (clitics). The end result is not just a good theory for adjectival modification and other constructions, but a quite different view of grammar altogether. In particular, the new model can help us not only describe possibilities of variation among languages, but actually explain why variation takes place at all, and what forms it takes. To that end, some detailed comparisons will be established with data from English, and occasionally from other languages.
1. ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION The distribution and interpretation of adjectives in the noun phrase has puzzled scholars for hundreds of years. Waugh (1977) presents a fascinating picture of the history of scholarly interest in adjectives in French, starting from the lexicographer Pierre Joseph Andre Roubaud who, in 1786 in his Nouveaux synonymes francois, made several inciteful observations. Interest in the behaviour of adjectives, in French and cross-linguistically, is still very much alive, to judge from the range of authors who have studied it in recent years: Jackendoff (1972), Kamp (1975), Waugh (1977), Rizzi (1979), Siegel (1980), Klein (1980), Stowell (1981), Higginbotham (1985), Keenan & Faltz (1985), Sproat & Shih (1988, 1990), Delbecque (1990), Chierchia & McConnell-Ginet (1990), Lamarche (1990, 1991), Valois (1990, 1991), Giorgi & Longobardi (1991), Bernstein (1993), Degraff & Mandelbaujn (1993), Cinque (1994), Sadler & Arnold (1994), Kamp & Partee (1995), Bosque & Picallo (1996), Sleeman (1996), Bouchard (1998a),
etc.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 5 The reason for this continued interest lies mainly in properties of adjectival modification that do not match our intuitive expectations about how elements that combine together ought to be interpreted: some combinations of adjectives and nouns appear not to be compositional. The notion of compositionality was first introduced formally by Frege (1977 [1923]). His principle of compositionality states that the meaning of a complex expression is a function of the meaning of its parts and of their mode of combination. The intuition behind the principle has been part of the study of language from the outset, since compositionality is perceived as a natural explanation of how a human being can understand sentences never heard before (see for example Katz & Fodor 1963 on the psychological motivation of compositionality). Compositionality also has a strong heuristic value: it places severe constraints on admissible systems of syntax and semantics since we must decide what are the basic units of meaning and of form, and how they combine. Moreover, compositionality makes the study of semantics possible: semantics would be almost inaccessible for study if the relationship between form and meaning was not regular. Compositionality also helps solve the induction problem for language acquisition: since the combination of perceptual forms is the most concrete data on hand, acquisition is greatly simplified if there is a homomorphy between semantic composition and composition of perceptual forms, i.e., we can then suppose that access to the composition of forms provides a fairly direct access to semantic composition. Most frameworks adopt the heuristic that syntactic constituency reflects semantic combination in some fairly direct way. Generally, they take the strong position that a homomorphism holds between some properties of semantic structure and syntactic structure. For instance, it is central to all of Jakobson's work. Montague grammar explicitly assumes a homomorphism mapping elements of the syntactic algebra onto elements of the semantic algebra, and it is a central feature of categorial grammar that category names encode an intimate correspondence between syntactic category and semantic type (Partee 1996). In generative transformational grammar, the effects of compositionality can be found in the concept of Deep Structure, and later Logical Form, which are both assumed to be homomorphic with some representation of meaning. Compositionality is also central in Generative Semantics, which mixes prelexical and postlexical transformations, resulting in a LF-to-PF computation, or in the Projection Principle of Government & Binding, or in convergence at LF for Full Interpretation within the Minimalist Program. Given this broad appeal of compositionality, it comes as no surprise that adjectival modification has puzzled linguists over the years: three salient properties of adjectival modification do not
6 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces match our intuitive expectations about compositionality. First, there are many instances in which a noun phrase built from the same ADJ and the same N, with apparently the same syntactic relation, results in a complex expression with more than one meaning. The second problem for compositionality has to do with crosslinguistic variation: a certain meaning expressed by some syntactic combination in a first language is often expressed by a different syntactic combination of equivalent parts in another language. A third problem is that, though an N and an ADJ each express a property that defines a set, the combination of an ADJ and an N is not always interpreted as a simple intersection of sets.
1.1. Apparent Noncompositionality of Adjectival Modification Consider the first case. I use English examples to illustrate the point, but this holds in other languages as well. As all the authors who have worked on adjectival modification have observed, the same ADJ+N pair can often have a range of interpretations, as in the examples in (1). (1)
a
old friend (= aged friend; antonym: young friend)
b
old friend (= long-time friend; antonym: new friend)
Here, the same parts, apparently syntactically combined in the same way, result in a complex expression with different meanings. The availability of two readings in (1) suggests that the intuitive assumption that a simple concatenation of words should be associated in a one-to-one relation with a similar semantic representation must be wrong. The second problem for compositionality comes from cross-linguistic variation. For instance, in French, a difference in the order of the ADJ relative to the N corresponds to a difference in meaning:3 (2)
a
homme pauvre man poor (= not rich man)
b
pauvre homme poor man (= pitiful man)
These kinds of examples are problematic when we compare them with English because different syntactic combinations of equivalent parts express the same meaning, so that the correspondance
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 1 is not one-to-one between syntactic and semantic combinations. Thus, the French concatenation N+ADJ of (2a) corresponds to the English concatenation ADJ+N of (3a). (3)
a
John lost all his money on the stock market. Now he is a poor man. (=not rich man)
b
John lost his left arm in an industrial accident. Oh, the poor man (=pitiful man)
Cross-linguistic variation has revived much interest in adjectival modification in recent years because of the prevalent conception of universality in Generative Grammar. Not only is the meaning of particular complex expressions compositional, but the mapping between syntax and semantics is assumed to be universally uniform, so that variation is a prima facie imperfection (see the discussion of Chomsky's (1999) Uniformity Principle in chapter 6 below). Consider now the third problematic case. The following ADJ+N pairs in English seem to respect the homomorphy of syntactic and semantic composition: (4)
carnivorous mammal, square table, red ball, married man
For instance, the meaning of carnivorous mammal appears to be an intersection of the meanings of carnivorous and mammal. This fits in with an intuitive analysis of the expression: at a surface level of syntactic analysis, the sequence carnivorous mammal appears to be a simple concatenation of words, and it seems natural to associate the sequence with a semantic representation that has a similar elementary kind of association, such as predicate conjunction or set intersection. Indeed, since syntactic combination is the most concrete data on hand in this respect, it is normal to initially simplify matters and assume that there is isomorphy of syntactic and semantic composition. In order to understand precisely how the syntax and semantics can "match up" in combinations like these, we need to have some idea of what the semantic representation of words looks like. It is generally agreed that the semantic part of the entry of a common N like mammal is a network of interacting elements. I will follow the tradition of Montague Semantics in assuming that a noun includes "elements" (or "functions") such as the following: -a characteristic function f which provides the property that interprets the N ("a measure of the degree to which an object falls in the extension of a given concept" (Kamp & Partee 1995: 131)); -a specification for a time interval i, which tells us at what moment/holds;
8 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces -an indication of the possible world w which allows us to know whether/holds in the "actual" world or in some other imagined world in which/is not necessarily false; - a variable assignment function g, that allows us to determine the truth value of the final formula by associating each variable with a particular entity in the model. This network of elements determines the set of things that have the property of being a f in w at i, i.e., in our example, the extension of mammal, the variable assignment function g determines the denotation of the expression.4 An ADJ like carnivorous also defines a set on the basis of a property. Combining the adjective with the noun produces a new nominal whose extension is the intersection of the two sets defined by its parts. This intuitive analysis works fine for a broad class of adjectives. However, the following sets of data show that not all adjectives are interpreted in this way. (5)
skillful liar ~ skillful surgeon big butterfly ~ big elephant small butterfly ~ small elephant
(6)
the future president, a perfect scoundrel, a false eyelash, an alleged communist
The adjectives in (5) are not intersective, but rather subsective: the ADJ is not interpreted in an absolute way, but relative to the N it modifies, depending on a scale determined by that N (Siegel 1980, Kamp & Partee 1995, and many others). So a skillful liar could be quite incompetent as a surgeon, and conversely, a skillful surgeon may be an inept liar. The third set of adjectives in (6), often called "intensional" adjectives, are neither intersective nor subsective. For instance, a future president is not someone who is future and who is president, nor is it someone who is future as a president: a future president is neither future nor president. The data in (5) and (6) seem to suggest that the relation between the syntactic rules and the semantic rules is not one-to-one. A tempting solution is to attribute the difference to the adjectives, since the differences show up when the noun is kept constant: (7)
a
the future president
(intensional reading)
b
the carnivorous president
c
the tall president (subsective reading)
(intersective reading)
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 9 This would allow for a compositional analysis of the constructions, albeit a complex one: though the syntactic relation would be the same in each case, the semantic relation would depend on the adjective in addition to the syntactic relation. Indeed, this is the line of argument developed in almost all analyses as we will see shortly. The apparent incompatibility of the data in (1) to (6) with the elemental notion of compositionality is the main reason why adjectival modification has been so widely studied. Countless scholars have strived to provide analyses of these data that reconcile them with compositionality. However, as we will see in section 2.1, the various solutions proposed only solve the problem of compositionality in a technical way that does address the psychological motivation for the principle. Compositionality has some methodological value only if it relies on fairly directly accessible surface properties (Partee 1997: 61; Hausser 1984; Hintikka 1983). But previous analyses of adjectival modification all have in common that they add various covert elements and operations to the theory (new lexical categories of adjectives or nouns, new syntactic categories, multiple lexical entries for some adjectives, new movement operations triggered by new functional features, etc.). The added elements are not accountable to either interfaces, so that compositionality is only satisfied in a technical way. Compositionality that is merely technical loses the motivation for the principle, i.e., to explain how a human being understands a newly encountered sentence, since we are never sure what elements are present, or what their individual meaning is. Either the effect of compositionality is lost, or compositionality must be shored up with new assumptions stating that some added elements are part of Universal Grammar and need not be learned (which is begging the question). However, I will argue that all the cases presented above are actually strictly compositional, that they only appear to be non-compositional from the way of looking at syntax. The problem is certainly real for the currently held set of assumptions, which has syntactic representations based narrowly on what is derived from linear order. But if we change our assumptions, if we ground the theory on the full set of logically anterior properties of the interfaces of form and meaning, the problem goes away. For instance, we will see that there is an independent difference between French and English about the way they choose to grammaticalize5 the CI property of Number: French encodes semantic Number on Det, whereas English encodes it on N. From this difference, it follows that in order to bear on the same element in the nominal, the ADJ cannot be in the same linear position in examples like (2) and (3).
10 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Moreover, the shift in assumptions also allows us to explain numerous additional properties surrounding adjectival modification that are generally missed by other accounts.
1.2. Numerous Other Properties of Adjectival Modification As interesting and complex as these problems of ordering and interpretation are, they are only a small subset of the range of facts to be understood in adjectival modification. I will introduce the other facts briefly here; a detailed discussion of each of them, with relevant references, will be presented in chapter 2. So far, we have looked at simple ADJ+N combinations. A noun is often modified by two or more adjectives. In English, adjectives are almost exclusively prenominal and in an example with two adjectives like (8), the leftmost ADJ gets "wide scope" as indicated by the bracketing: a set is established by small dog and nice determines a subset out of this set. (8)
the [nice [small dog]]
The same scope in interpretation holds for French prenominal adjectives, as indicated in (9): (9)
le [beau [petit chien]]
However, adjectives may also follow the noun in French. In this case, the order of the adjectives with respect to one another is the mirror of the order found in the equivalent English example in which the adjectives must be prenominal: (10) a b
brutal technical measures des mesures techniques brutales
Though the facts in (8)-(9) are very frequently discussed, the contrast in (10) is usually glossed over. In particular, analyses that account for the prenominal/postnominal difference between French and English by a movement do not provide a unified account of this mirror order and must rely on additional assumptions that hold just for this fact (Bernstein 1993, Cinque 1994). Moreover, the very fact that languages vary in whether they allow prenominal or postnominal
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 11 adjectives, as French and English do, is presented as accidental. I will show that it actually follows from a deep parametric choice on how these languages encode the notion of Number, a choice forced by independent external conditions. French also allows adjectives to appear on both sides of the N:
(11) une nouvelle proposition interessante a new proposition interesting a new interesting proposition OR an interesting new proposition As indicated by the two translations, there is a scopal ambiguity between the two adjectives in this case. This fact is unexpected under most assumptions and hardly ever discussed, let alone explained. I will show that it follows from the same independently motivated choice in the encoding of Number arising from properties logically anterior to linguistics. Moreover, it is quite common in French for adjectives to either precede or follow the noun they modify, and as we saw in (2), repeated as (12), the difference corresponds to differences in interpretation. The fact that there is always a meaning difference, albeit a subtle one at times, will be shown to also derive from this parametric choice. (12) a b
homme pauvre man poor (= not rich man) pauvre homme poor man (= pitiful man)
The meaning difference is always the same: the postnominal adjective applies to the whole network of the N, whereas the prenominal adjective applies to only a subelement of this network. This will also follow in a principled way. There is a restriction in both English and French that an adjective with a complement may not precede N but must follow it: (13) a b (14) a b
*a proud of his daughter man. a man proud of his daughter. *un fier de sa fille homme un homme fier de sa fille
12 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces The few accounts of this fact deal with it as a quirky property, with a special condition or filter (Zwarts 1974, Emonds 1976, Williams 1982, Flynn 1983, Abney 1987, Di Sciullo & Williams 1987, Giorgi & Longobardi 1991, Sadler & Arnold 1994, Abeille & Godard 2000). I will show it follows from my basic assumptions about prenominal adjectives. A similar comment applies to the sandhi phenomenon of liaison, which takes place very productively between a prenominal adjective and N, but is highly restricted between N and a postnominal adjective (x y indicates liaison; x / y indicates impossibility of liaison). (15) a b
bon__ami good friend jambon/andaloux
andalousian ham
There are also a number of heterogeneous factors that play a role in whether an adjective appears prenominally or postnominally in French. I simply list them here and return to their analysis in section 3 of chapter 2. (i) Prenominal ADJs express inherent properties, which belong naturally to the N, whereas postnominally they express newly attributed qualifications. (ii) Prenominal ADJs assign less concrete properties, they take on a more abstract meaning. (iii) The more the semantics of the N is complex, the easier it is to have a prenominal ADJ; conversely, the simpler and more general the semantics of the N, the more likely the ADJ will be postnominal. (iv) Prenominal ADJs tend to be of smaller dimension than postnominal ADJs. (v) A definite Det allows prenominal ADJs more easily than an indefinite Det. (vi) ADJs modified by an adverb are significantly less frequent in prenominal position. (vii) Comparatives and superlatives with an evaluative interpretation strongly tend to be postnominal; with an elative, absolute interpretation, they may appear in prenominal position. (viii) ADJs which are morphologically participials appear mostly in postnominal position. (ix) ADJs with a high frequency of use in the language are more likely to be prenominal. (x) Prenominal ADJs typically belong to the old stock of words of French. Most recent analyses either ignore or gloss over these more complex facts, choosing instead to attempt an analysis of phenomena that are said to be more definite, less graded, such as the more "basic" problems of relative order (though the serialization of ADJs is in fact not definite but graded). A comprehensive analysis, however, must consider the entire range of facts. Indeed, I
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 13 will show that once we have gotten away from the "linear" viewpoint that makes even the ordering facts difficult to handle, we can account for a wide range of facts that other analyses cannot even attempt to explain. Moreover, the comprehensive approach reveals new correlations. Thus, the differences in adjectival modification between French and English correlate with other differences in the behaviour of their nominal expressions. For example, in English, nouns may appear quite easily without determiners, whereas in French, this kind of usage is very rare. (16) a b
Beavers build dams. Les castors construisent des barrages. (*Castors construisent barrages.)
In French, however, a Determiner phrase may behave like a "noun phrase" even if there isn't a noun, while in English, this is only possible in a few restricted, very specific contexts. A "dummy noun" such as one is required. (17) a b
Passe-moi la verte Give me the green one
These two differences between French and English have been studied extensively. I will argue for a unified account of these facts in chapters 4 and 5, showing that they depend on the same deeply motivated difference in grammaticalization of external properties that accounts for the differences between the two languages with respect to adjectival modification. In presenting my account of the data, I will start first with French, mainly because a comprehensive account of the phenomena analyzed requires a very intimate knowledge of the language that can only be done on one's native language. I will then consider closely related variations in English and in some Romance languages to show how the basic assumptions made for French account for variation directlly, with no additional tools. Before turning to a detailed discussion of the data in chapter 2, I will first indicate in the next section why current analyses can't handle this data, and what is wrong with them in general. The rest of the chapter discusses how we can remedy to these problems at a general level by modifying the currently held set of assumptions about the dependency of syntax exclusively on what is derived from linear order. I present fundamental reasons why we should change these assumptions, and ground the theory on logically anterior properties of the interfaces of form and meaning.
14 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
2. EXPLAINING ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION
2.1. Attempts at Technical Solutions Data such as those presented in section 1 seem problematic for any analysis which assumes that semantics should be compositional. Over the years, in various frameworks, many authors have attempted—and, I will argue, failed—to provide a satisfactory compositional analysis of the various data on adjectival modification. The strategies might seem quite different initially, ranging from new lexical categories to new functional categories, from new meanings to new functional features such as [+/-prepose] or [+/lite], from new operations that reduce relative clauses or move ADJ or N to new structures altogether. However, all of these attempts are actually very similar in the way they proceed, and they all share the same weakness: they manage to provide analyses which are technically compositional, but only by making intensive use of elements and operations which introduce undecidability for a speaker facing crude new data: so they lose the methodological value of the principle and they do not really help us understand how a human being interprets sentences never heard before. This weakness is not restricted to analyses that deal with the compositionality of adjectival modification: it is found in most analyses that try to resolve problems of compositionality in general. Janssen (1997), in his detailed discussion of the role of compositionality in recent history, shows that the attempts to bring back to the fold the counterexamples to compositionality all make use of one or more of the following three general methods.
(i)
Additions to the semantics: Propose a change to the semantics, such as assuming new
meanings for some lexical items. (ii)
Additions to the syntactic units: Propose a modification to the syntax. For example, add
new parts such as additional entries for lexical items, or add new lexical or functional categories, together with different meanings for the new expressions or new categories. (iii) Additions to the constructions: Introduce new rules to build expressions or to relate syntactic expressions to semantic expressions.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 15 As we will see directly, these three strategies have been applied to the problems that adjectival modification raises for compositionality. In fact, all approaches to adjectival modification, whatever their individual details, tend to have aspects of all these three "types" that Janssen identifies. I cannot discuss all proposals, which number in the hundreds, but varied representative cases will be sufficient to make my point, namely, that these strategies are only technical solutions that do not go at the heart of the problem. 2.1.1. Additions to the semantics. This strategy is particularly used to account for the fact that some combinations of an ADJ and an N have more than one meaning, as in poor man andpauvre hommelhomme pauvre. Lexicographers and grammarians of the French tradition have long distinguished those adjectives that may appear in prenominal position from those that may appear in postnominal position in French on the basis that the former have a more general or reduced meaning. Adjectives that may appear on either side of N are typically said to undergo a reduction of meaning when they are prenominal. This strategy of adding a reduction process to the semantics of the adjectives is found in virtually all studies on adjectival modification in some guise or other. Waugh (1977: 3ff) provides several quotations from the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries. The strategy is still very present in more recent proposals. For instance, the early transformational analysis of Cintas (1969, 1972) assumes that when moving an adjective into prenominal position is correlated with a change of meaning, the [+preposed] marking is associated with a particular meaning of the ADJ. Other analyses assume that adjectives like poor have different meanings which are associated with different base positions, such as Jackendoff (1977), Abney (1987), Valois (1991), Bernstein (1993). Cinque (1994) assumes that such an ADJ with multiple meanings can appear in different positions, i.e., in the Spec of different functional categories, because each meaning can satisfy the selectional restrictions of a different category. Sadler & Arnold (1994) and Abeille & Godard (1999, 2000) claim that the position of adjectives in French is determined by an abstract feature of "weight" that they carry: Crucially, adjectives that show a clear meaning contrast associated with their prenominal or postnominal position are assumed to have different meanings which are associated with different weight markings. Additions to the semantics are also used to account for the differences in interpretation between intersective, subsective and intensional adjectives. For instance, Katz and Fodor (1963), discussing the meaning of good, suggests that it is not an adjective that is categorematic (i.e.,
16 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces intersective), but a syncategorematic element that cannot stand alone as a complete concept: it is a function that operates on other meanings rather than being an independent attribute. So this kind of adjective has a new kind of meaning (together with a different semantic rule associated with it). This strategy to account for the differences between intersective, subsective and intensional adjectives is also found in Vendler (1968), Kamp (1975), Siegel (1980). New meanings are also implicit in the new rules of interpretation of Higginbotham (1985) (6identification, qmarking, and autonymous q-marking), which are also used by Degraff & Mandelbaum (1993). Instead of making additions to the semantics of the adjectives, some authors propose to augment the semantics of the N, so that an ADJ may combine with it in several different ways. For instance, Pustejovsky (1995) takes on the. familiar observation that the meaning of an ADJ-N combination often appears richer than a simple conjunction: (18) a
a good knife = a knife that is good for cutting
b
a good road = a road that is good for traveling on
c
a good typist = someone who is good at typing
Rather than saying that adjectives are multiply polysemous and change their meaning depending on the noun they modify, he assumes that the meaning differences arise from the semantic complexity of the noun. In particular, he assumes that the semantic make up of a noun includes what he calls "qualia", subelements which include specifications such as the object's appearance, how it comes into being, how it is used, and so on. For example, the noun book would have a specification in its qualia structure stating that its function is for people to read it. Furthermore, he assumes that an ADJ may modify individual qualia within a noun, rather than the noun itself as a semantic unit. Since each N has a different qualia structure, the ADJ appears to inherit part of its meaning from the N because it modifies a subpart of the N which is particular to that lexeme. For example, assuming that good evaluates an object in its capacity to serve some function and that knife has a specification FOR CUTTING in its qualia structure, good modifies this subpart of knife in (18a). In a similar fashion, he assumes that good modifies the part of the qualia structure of road that specifies that it is an object over which one travels, and that the qualia structure of typist indicates that it is a person who types.6
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 17 This is in line with the proposal of Katz (1964) that the semantics of evaluative qualifiers like good does not compose with the semantics of the head noun as a whole, but only with the evaluative marker present in each N. See also Marchand (1966) about the narrow scope reading of examples like free thinker - "one who thinks freely." However, Pustejovsky extends the possibility of modifying subparts of the N beyond Katz' simple cases and generalizes it to various parts of qualia structure. Jackendoff (1997) follows Pustejovsky and assumes that qualia structure plays an important role in adjectival modification. Beard (1991) proposes a similar analysis, but in terms of inherent sublexical semantic features of the type found in Jackendoff (1983, 1987). At the core of his analysis is the Principle of Decompositional (featural) Composition (his (21)): (19) The semantic features of an attribute subjoin with one and only one semantic feature of its head. All the analyses above claim that the semantic representations of adjectives or of nouns must be expanded to account for the composition found in adjectival modification. 2.1.2. Additions to the syntactic units. As I said, practically all studies on adjectival modification assume that additions to the semantics is needed. This almost invariably results in also adding to the syntactic units, typically as subcategories of adjectives corresponding to the added semantic classes. It can range from a few subcategories like intersective, subsective and intensional (as in Katz 1964, Vendler 1968, Kamp 1975, Siegel 1980, Higginbotham 1985, Degraff & Mandelbaum 1993, Sadler & Arnold 1994, Abeille & Godard 1999, 2000), to fairly large classes defined on a cognitive and semantic basis that determine the serialization of adjectives, such as SIZE, COLOR, SHAPE, AGE, PROVENANCE (Sproat& Shih 1988, 1990, Cinque 1994). To account for the scopal relations among prenominal adjectives—the leftmost ADJ having widest scope—, Abney (1987) assumes quite new selectional properties for adjectives: they are heads that select an NP complement or another ADJP complement. Adding to the syntactic categories is currently a very popular strategy in Generative Grammar, as evidenced by the introduction of several new functional categories. Valois (1991), following the strategy of Jackendoff (1972) for adverbs, suggests that different classes of adjectives are correlated with different adjunction sites: some adjectives are adjoined to Number Phrase, others
18 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces to the NP complement of Number, others again to either of these. Bernstein (1993) assumes a Number Phrase, to which nonrestrive adjectives adjoin, and a Word Marker Phrase, to which restrictive adjectives adjoin. Some adjectives are assumed to belong to both classes and may be generated in either position. In addition, to account for the initial position occupied by intensional adjectives in the sequence of adjectives, she assumes that the category adjective splits into the subtypes 'lexical' and 'functional'. Intensional ADJs are functional, and as in Abney's analysis, they are heads; their complement is NumP.7 Cinque (1994) assumes that all ADJs are generated in the Specifier of different functional categories depending on their class. To account for apparent surface restrictions on serialization given in (20), he is compelled to extend both the class of adjectives and the class of matching functional categories accordingly, with no clear criteria, giving the impression of an almost open-ended list. (20) a
Serialization of adjectives in event nominals: poss> cardinal> ordinal> speaker-or> subj.-or> manner> thematic
b
Serialization of adjectives in object-denoting nominals: poss> cardinal> ordinal> quality> size> shape> color> nation.
All the analyses add new parts to the theory, either as additional entries for lexical items, new lexical categories, or new functional categories. 2.7.3. Additions to the constructions. The introduction of new meanings and new syntactic units invariably forces the introduction of new rules to build the semantic expressions or to relate syntactic expressions to semantic expressions, at least in those analyses that aspire to a certain degree of formalization. For instance, early transformational proposals assume different underlying structures that correspond to paraphrases of the various interpretations—most often in the form of relative clauses— and new rules to transform these paraphrases into the surface structures. The transformational rules operate differently for each class of adjectives, changing the paraphrase into an ADJP and moving it into the appropriate position (Katz 1964; Vendler 1968; Kamp 1975; Siegel 1980). In a base-generated approach such as Abney (1987), the proposal that prenominal adjectives are heads that select NP or ADJP complements requires a new notion of "abstract" selection (his f-selection).
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 19 Differences in interpretation such as the one between intersective, subsective and intensional adjectives impel Higginbotham (1985) to propose three different rules to map syntactic combinations to meanings (these rules are adopted by Degraff & Mandelbaum (1993) with minor modifications). Alternatively, some authors propose a single rule mapping syntax to semantics, but add rules to the semantic component: each adjective is entered in the lexicon in its simplest type, and general type-shifting rules or meaning postulates are articulated to obtain additional (predictable) interpretations, as suggested by Kamp & Partee (1995). The analyses of crosslinguistic facts have brought about a proliferation of new rules. This started in early transformational accounts. For instance, to account for the fact that, in French, both the prenominal and the postnominal positions may host an ADJ, Cintas (1969, 1972) assumes that all ADJs are generated in post-N position: this new structure is then subject to a new rule that moves an ADJ to prenominal position if it is marked by the new feature [+preposed] in the lexicon. Current transformational analyses use exactly the same strategy, under a new vocabulary. Several studies try to elucidate the similarities and differences in order between English and Romance languages. For example, while adjectives may appear in prenominal or postnominal position in French, they generally are prenominal in English. Yet in many cases, the linear order of the two ADJs with respect to one another is the same in both languages (this is an oversimplification, as we will see later). (21) a b
un gros ballon rouge a big red ball
This has led linguists to propose that French and English have the same underlying structure (the one with prenominal adjectives that surfaces in English), and that N bears a feature [+F] that must be checked. In these systems, features are assumed to need "checking" in functional categories. A functional category that bears the same [+F] feature as the noun is assumed to "attract" the noun to it for checking purposes. In French and other Romance languages, the feature has the additional property that it must be checked overtly: this forces the N to raise to some functional category overtly (see for example Valois 1991, Bernstein 1993, Cinque 1994). This functional category, which varies from one author to the other, conveniently happens to be between the two adjectives (or among several as in un nouveau gros ballon rouge americain lit.:
20 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 'a new big ball red American'). Note that the notion of "a feature [+F] triggering overt movement" says no more than [+prepose N] of earlier proposals. 2.2. Inadequacy of Technical Solutions The general weakness of these strategies is that they solve the problem of compositionality only in a technical way that does not address the motivation for the principle. The interest of a compositional analysis is its ability to explain how a human being understands a newly encountered sentence. The technical strategies presented above fail in this respect. The analyses all have in common that they add various covert elements and operations to the theory (lexical and syntactic categories, doublet lexical entries, functional features triggering movement, etc.). The added elements are not accountable to either interfaces, so that compositionality is only satisfied in a technical way. However, the principle of compositionality has some methodological value only if it is built on properties that are quite directly linkable to tangible interface elements (Partee 1997: 61, Hausser 1984, Hintikka 1983). In these analyses, however, in the presence of two surface morphemes A and B, we can never be sure that some as yet unknown covert category, feature or operation might not be present, or that A or B may be assigned an additional meaning. The result is fatal for the motivation for compositionality: if we can never be sure to a strong degree of what elements are present, or what their individual meaning is, we never know for sure how to combine these elements, even if all the forms are familiar. Therefore, we no longer can explain how a human being can understand sentences never heard before.8 As Janssen (1997: 456) observes,
"without constraints on syntax and semantics, there are no
counterexamples to compositionality." In that case, compositionality loses it explanatory appeal. This kind of technical approach to the problem of compositionality introduces another problem: the theory is not sufficiently constrained. Since the means being used are only very indirectly linkable to tangible interface elements, there is practically no constraint on what can be proposed. For instance, in syntax, the structure can be manipulated to obtain whatever hierarchical relation is wanted and any desired surface order, so we obtain only weakly descriptive predictions even about elementary properties of order. As the three following subsections show, a simple survey of the solutions proposed for the three problems of compositionality presented in section 1 quickly reveals the unconstrained nature of the theories adopted.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 21 2.2.1. Multiple meanings of ADJ-N combinations. Consider the accounts for the fact that some combinations of an ADJ and an N have more than one meaning. Most analyses add to the lexicon by augmenting the entries of these ADJs, assigning them more than one subcategory and more than one meaning accordingly. These ADJs are then treated as separate items. As Siegel (1980: 56) notes, "a doublet theory considerably complicates the lexicon." Indeed, as soon as more than one entry is admitted for a lexical item, any counterexample to the predicted behavior of the item can be attributed to yet another entry. Explanation is reduced to an uninformative list. 2.2.2. Multiple classes of adjectives. To account for the problem raised by the fact that adjectival modification is not always intersective and may have different kinds of interpretations associated with it, the analyses add to the inventory of categories, dividing adjectives into subclasses. The meaning of a complex expression consisting of an N modified by an ADJ is made to be a function of the meaning of the parts of the expression and of their syntactic mode of combination by attributing different types of meanings to each subclass of adjective, with each subclass being attributed its own interpretive rule to combine the semantics of the ADJ with the semantics of the N. Many analyses correlate these different classes of ADJs with different underlying syntactic relations with the N. These analyses claim that the syntax of adjectival modification is not as uniform as the overt distribution suggests: either the ADJs come from different covert relative clauses transformed into an ADJP (Vendler 1968, Siegel 1980), or the ADJs appear in different structural positions which happen to give the same surface distribution (Degraff & Mandelbaum 1993, Bernstein 1993, Cinque 1994). For instance, old in old friend would appear in the Spec of (or adjoined to, or as the head of) different covert functional categories. So there is always more than a relation between an ADJ and an N. In the earlier proposals, it is a relation between a subclass of ADJ, an N and a tranformation operating on them. In the more recent proposals, it is a relation between a subclass of ADJ (including a category of functional adjectives for Bernstein), an N, and functional categories that somewhat mirror these classes of adjectives since they have similar properties (particularly in Cinque's proposal: cf. the serializations in (20)). Yet there is no independent evidence for a difference in the syntactic structure corresponding to the two semantic combinations of a phrase such as an old friend. As Siegel (1980: 56) notes, a theory which treats subclasses of adjectives quite differently from one another "generalizes the strange claim that adjectives do not form any kind of unified category." This is even more critical when there is a proliferation of adjectival classes and functional categories.
22 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces To account for the fact that the interpretation of adjectival modification seems to fall into different types, other analyses attribute special properties not to the adjective, but to the noun: they expand the semantics of the N in terms of qualia or inherent semantic features, so that an ADJ may combine with it in several different ways (Beard 1991; Pustejovsky 1991, 1995; Jackendoff 1997). Proponents of these analyses claim that they do not open the theory to unbridled additions since the semantic features proposed are independently motivated. For instance, Pustejovsky (1991, 1995) argues that the qualia of the N book are independently required to analyze a sentence such as (22): (22) Mary began the book. The interpretation proceeds in two steps. The verb begin selects semantically for an activity. To get this result when the object of begin is not an NP denoting an activity, as in (22), a rule first introduces a general function which says to interpret the NP as an unspecified activity involving the NP. The second step of interpretation specifies the activity. Pustejovsky assumes that this is done on the basis of the qualia of the N. The proper function of a book is for people to read it, so (22) is characteristically interpreted as 'Mary began reading the book'. If the story was that simple, the qualia approach would indeed be on the right track. However, this kind of active composition operates not on meanings, but on elements inferred from knowledge about the referents involved. For instance, in order to know how to interpret began in (23), we must know what Dostoievsky refers to and some properties of that referent, as well as properties of the referent of I/he/she. (23) I/He/She began Dostojevsky. If the Dostojevsky in question is indeed the author, and if the name is used by metonymy here to refer to a book by him or to his entire work, the referent of I/he/she could be a reader, a printer, an editor, a book-eating freak, etc., with the meaning of began varying accordingly in an analysis based on active composition (if Dostojevsky is used to refer to a wax statue, this induces more new meanings for began). But the information required cannot come from proper names and pronouns, since they do not have qualia of the kind needed in the active composition account. Proper names do not carry a concept, they do not define a natural class: they reveal no attribute,
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 23 no property of the individual that they designate, except that it bears this name (Kleiber 1981: 315). Pronouns also do not carry specifications such as the object's appearance, how it comes into being, how it is used, and so on. The fundamental problem in this approach is that it is too situational, in the sense of Bouchard (1995): it incorporates into the grammar inferences drawn from the background knowledge shared by speakers, elements from the nonlinguistic context that do not belong to semantics. So there is no independent linguistic motivation for qualia: they are not grammatical notions. Moreover, this reliance on context gives rise to a second major problem: the rules of this kind of generative lexicon are defeasible in context. Defeasability has devastating effects for the analysis of adjectival modification. For example, in particular contexts, a good knife could be good at something else than cutting. The idea of contextual determination is already present in Ziff (1960), who comments about good, "if an element of an utterance is modified by 'good' then if the utterance is to be nondeviant the element modified by 'good' must there serve to characterize something that may or may not answer to certain interests" (p. 213). He adds: "...which interests are in question being indicated either by the element modifying or being modified by 'good' or by certain features of the context of utterance" (p. 218; my emphasis). Unfortunately, defeasibility in context makes the analysis noncompositional: if a rule is defeasible in context, we cannot explain on linguistic grounds how a human being can understand sentences never heard before. By allowing defeasibility in context, the analysis sidesteps the problem of having multiply polysemous adjectives that change their meaning depending on the noun they modify, but only by transferring the problem onto the noun: now it is nouns that are multiply polysemous and change their meaning depending on the context. This kind of polysemy is common in philosophy of language (cf. for example Ricoeur 1975:25-26): it appears to have limited effects at first, but quickly reveals its lack of restraint as more examples are taken into account. Inherent semantic features suffer from the same open-ended appeal to contextualization. As Beard (1991: 220-221) notes, the hypothesis that some ADJs may subjoin with a sublexical semantic feature of the N cannot explain the full range of data. The interpretation of the examples in (24) involves more than having the N underlying the ADJ serving as an argument of the head N: the interpretation seems to require a 'virtual function' which is not an inherent feature of the head N, i.e., which is not essential to the definition of the N.
24 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (24) a
musical clock
makes music
b
electric clock
uses electricity
The problem is the same as the defeasibility of qualia structure: the virtual function is determined on the basis of the pragmatic situation, a rather unconstrained possibility. Beard also observes a converse effect of context on inherent semantic features, what he calls Preferential Feature Selection. ADJs of measure, shape and color do not subjoin with any feature of the head. "A big house, for instance, is never a house simply with big windows or doors. A tall tree may be a tree with a tall trunk or crown, but not branches or leaves. A round house is not a house with round windows, although it might be one with only a round roof [...] a house with red windows is not referred to as a red house, even though a pencil is red by virtue of having either a red lead, sheath or by writing red" (p. 224).9 Note that combining the semantics of big with the feature WINDOW and all the other nonoccurring associations is not due to semantic anomaly. So some features of an N are predominant, and this seems to be due to contextual notions such as saliency. A similar problem arises with agentive nouns derived from names of musical instruments. Spencer (1988) observes that these do not induce narrow scope readings: (25) a
silver flutist player of silver flute
b
rented flutist
player of rented flute
c
expensive flutist player of expensive flute
Yet, we could expect FLUTE in (25) to serve as a salient inherent feature on a par with NOVEL in romantic novelist = 'writer of novels of romance'. Beard (1991: 225-226) observes that the difference is that in (25), the inherent feature is concrete, but it is abstract in romantic novelist. However, this constraint only holds if the N is agentive: it does not apply in good knife, greasy ax, broken bicycle. In sum, qualia structures and sublexical semantic features are defeasible, they may be added on the basis of contextual information, and they may be inert due to contextual reasons. The fact that the relevance of qualia structures and semantic features appears to be unpredictible on a strictly linguistic basis means that this kind of semantic approach fares no better than one which assumes that adjectives are multiply polysemous and change their meaning depending on the noun they modify: The use of qualia and inherent features simply transfers the problem of polysemy onto the N, with no linguistic criteria on which to rely. This boils down to the very old
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 25 problem of determining what is the central meaning of a lexeme —in terms of decompositional semantics, how the inherent features or qualia structure are determined. Following the suggestion of Morgan (1970) with respect to ADV+V constructions, Beard (1991: 212, note 5) proposes that "the properties of the reference of the term or predicate determine both the nature and number of the features of the lexical item." He says this can be tested by evaluative adjectives: if an evaluative adjective can bear on some property of N without the addition of a complement like for Z, specifying this property, then it is an inherent feature of the N. For instance, a good knife may refer to a knife which is good for cutting, so [CUT (XY)] would be an inherent feature of knife. On the other hand, in order for a good knife to refer to a knife which is good for opening cans, we must add an overt qualifier like for opening cans, so[OPEN(XY) CANY] is not an inherent feature of knife. This strategy is implicit in most decompositional analyses. It fails because it is based on reference, hence on context, and qualia/features are defeasible in context, as Ziff and Pustejovsky observed. There is no need for an overt qualifier such as for opening cans in order for good to be interpreted as if it combined with [OPEN(XY) CANy], as long as the context is clear. Since the test relies on reference, hence context, the reason why good knife may not require the addition of for cutting to get the reading in which good modifies [CUT (XY)] may also be contextual: without a specified context, we provide the unmarked, prototypical, habitual context. The fact that meaning is underspecified in this way with respect to interpretation is no accident or weakness, but a necessary property of language (see chapter 6). In sum, the technical solutions proposed for the apparently different types of adjectival modification are at the expense of having multiply polysemous adjectives that change their meaning depending on the noun they modify, or multiply polysemous nouns that change their meaning depending on the ADJ that modifies them. 2.2.3. Cross-linguistic variation. To account for the fact that different languages express the same meaning combinations through different surface orders, most analyses assume an abstract level of representation in which all these constructions are identical across languages and strictly compositional, with subsequent operations that mask this uniformity by transforming the underlying structure into different surface structures. Some of the recent analyses make changes to the inventory of semantic elements. Bernstein (1993) posits a class of functional adjectives with reduced semantics. In Cinque (1994), new
26 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces functional categories duplicate the semantic properties of adjectival subclasses. Correlations are claimed to hold between certain positions and certain classes of adjectives (hence indirectly with how these adjectives are interpreted), but no indication is given about how these interpretations obtain. The new semantic elements appear to have only a distributional purpose. For instance, the hierarchy of the functional categories in Cinque (1994) crucially derives the order of the ADJs, but the structure is stipulated—we are given no indication about the nature of these categories or their selectional properties. This is equivalent to introducing a component as overly powerful as rewriting rules. Cinque acknowledges the importance of the question of the labels of these categories, but goes no further. Yet anyone who claims that there is a serialization like [poss> cardinal> ordinal> quality> size> shape> color> nation] because the head of a Size Phrase selects a Shape Phrase, whose head selects a Color Phrase, whose head selects a Nation Phrase, must explain how selection operates among these categories. For her part, Bernstein (1993: 105, note 47) comments: "Still to be worked out is how exactly these interpretations may be "read off the adjunction site." Despite the appearance of being highly syntax-oriented, these analyses are actually strongly dependent on semantic notions, notions which are undefined, thus leaving the theory unconstrained. Even the strictly distributional aspects of these analyses are descriptive at best. The typical claim is that in French a feature [aF] on N forces it to move overtly to some functional category bearing a shadow copy of [aF], a category which happens to be conveniently placed in the right position in a series of adjectives. This is no more informative than a pretheoretical description of the facts, because the feature [aF] and the position of the functional category are ad hoc.10 As Chomsky points out (1995: 233) "assumptions that are of roughly the order of complexity of what is to be explained" only advance our understanding if they have "broader scope. ... But sometimes they do not." In that case, we only have "a restatement of a problem in other terms." Unfortunately, as we have seen, nonexplanatory restatements of the problem are recurrent in attempts to deal with examples that seem to contradict the theory of compositionality.11 The key to true explanation, I will argue, is to better ground the theory in properties of the conceptual and sensorimotor systems. This becomes clear when we try to understand why these various proposals are unexplanatory, and offer only poor descriptions.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 27 2.3. Understanding the lack of explanation If we look in particular at the syntactic aspects of the form-meaning mapping, the problem is that the proposals deal with the data almost exclusively in terms of phrasal-structural means. They hardly ever take into account how phrase structure derives from external properties and how this may influence its functioning, nor the fact that these external properties derive other mapping operations which interact with phrase structure. When facts suggest that such other operations are at play, most of the time they are translated into phrasal-structural terms. This reductionist approach faces the empirical problem that there are several cases where different types of semantic relations (intersective, subsective, intensional) appear to be expressed by the same form of concatenation in syntax, sometimes for the very same elements (cf. old friend). The distinctions cannot be made strictly on the basis of phrasal-structural properties derived from temporal ordering, since there are no differences at the perceptual level. Therefore, in order to save compositionality, the approach is forced to introduce elements which do not have content which is subject to temporal ordering, or any perceptual content at all: subclasses of adjectives for which there is no overt morphological or syntactic evidence (such as two adjectives old), covert functional categories, features which are uninterpretable at both interfaces. So it must be claimed that cases where no differences are present according to the basic premisses of the theory actually have some hidden differences. Conversely, some cases exhibit clear differences according to the premiss that phrasal-structural properties are derived from temporal ordering, such as order differences (un homme heureuxla happy man), yet they are assumed to have no differences in a structure which is augmented with elements unrelated to perceptual content. Temporal ordering is attributed a central role in this model, yet the link with this interface property ends up being extremely remote, to a point of being obfuscated by the numerous covert elements and operations that are introduced. The correlations between meaning and form are so remote that the theory as it stands offers no real insight into the interpretation of the expressions: what functional elements are present and how they relate is of such a stipulative nature that no interpretive property follows from the theory. Thus, in many instances, the theory is not affected if the structures are interchanged. Let's take Bernstein's (1993) analysis of French as an example, but assume that the meaning associated with the structure of postnominal ADJs is found on prenominal ADJs, and vice versa. Nothing fundamental would change in the theory. In fact, the few indications we are given about
28 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces interpretation wrongly predict that such a reversal of the meaning associations should actually hold. Bernstein assumes that in French, an adjective like rouges may appear prenominally or postnominally because it adjoins to NumP or NP, and N moves to Num as follows (pp. 55-57):
She says that color ADJs in prenominal position (les rouges cerises 'the red cherries') "express inherent qualities of the noun they modify" (p. 57). The meaning differences for an adjective in prenominal and postnominal position have been described in similar terms from the earliest studies (see references in Waugh 1977). More recently, Kamp (1975: 153) says that a prenominal qualitative adjective "contribute[s] to the delineation of the (class of) objects that the complex NP of which it is part is designed to pick out" while a post-nominal adjective "help[s] to determine the particular individual which is the intended referent of the description in which the adjective occurs" (See also Bolinger (1967) who says that prenominal adjectives delineate the reference of the expression, while postnominal adjectives delineate the referent of the expression). In section 2.4 of chapter 2, I will provide tests that support this intuition that in the first interpretation, the adjective is more closely related to the N— it is a combination at the level of the intension of the expression and ADJ+N defines a single set of individuals on the basis of a double property—, whereas the adjective is less closely related to the N in the N+ADJ combination—the combination being at the level of the extension of the expression, with two sets intersecting. Given these well-known semantic differences, which Bernstein herself recognizes, the most likely adjunction site for the adjective when it "expresses inherent qualities of the noun" would be the closest one to N, i.e., NP, resulting in a postnominal order in her analysis of French, and the adjective pertaining to the referent should be adjoined higher, to NumP, resulting in a prenominal order. So when there is a likely correlation, it is the opposite of what is predicted by Bernstein's analysis.12
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 29 The same lack of independent motivation can be seen in other analyses, such as Degraff & Mandelbaum (1993). They assume that autonymous q-marking derives the relative reading in which old friend is interpreted as 'friend whose frienship is old' and that this corresponds to a relation between a head ADJ and a complement NP. On the other hand, q-identification derives the absolute reading in which old friend is interpreted as 'friend who is old' and it involves adjunction of ADJP to NP. But this association of meanings and structures does not follow from any fundamental property, and hence could just as well be reversed. If anything, Degraff & Mandelbaum predict the opposite order to what is observed. They note (p. 126) that there is isomorphy between the head-complement structure inside the NP and the structure of a transitive VP. They assume that the semantic relation between a V and its direct object is simple qmarking. Therefore, we expect them to claim that the relation between a head ADJ and an NP complement is the same "simple theta-marking." But they associate the NP-internal headcomplement structure with autonymous q-marking, not simple q-marking. Abeille & Godard (1999) derive the correct order of elements by assuming that some ADJs are marked [+light] while others are marked [-light], and that the [+light] ones appear in prenominal position, whereas [-light] ADJs are postnominal. These markings are ad hoc and make no predictions or generalizations about the semantic properties of either prenominal or postnominal adjectives. For instance, it is an accident in this analysis that intensional adjectives are prenominal in French: they are prenominal because they are marked [+light], but the only reason they are marked [+light] is because they are prenominal. The arbitrariness of the structures and features in all these analyses is as unrevealing from an explanatory point of view as rule features of early transformational analysis: in Cintas (1969, 1972), a subclass of French ADJs is associated with the prenominal position because they are marked [+preposed] in the lexicon; another subclass is associated with the postnominal position because they are marked [-preposed]. In several current analyses, it is the N which is marked [+preposed] in French (via a less forthright feature that triggers its movement to some functional category), but not in English. Similarly, some ADJs are merged with a functional category or attracted to it because they are prenominal, and other ADJs are related to a different category because they are postnominal. But the only reason why the N is marked by a checking feature and why the functional categories appear in a given position is because that is where the N and the adjectives appear: there is no independent motivation and the distributions are stipulated.
30 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces In all these analyses, key structures or features are ad hoc. Because these structures and features are not related to other properties of the languages,these analyses are all simply correlating a fact with itself: a distributional fact is correlated with a feature whose sole purpose is to encode this fact. Though the analyses are formal, key notions are left quite vague. No independent criteria are given for the association of a particular structure or feature with a particular interpretation or with other properties of the languages. The elements function as diacritics whose sole motivation is to indicate the positioning of the adjective or noun under a certain interpretation. In short, the proposals are intricate, but end up being blunt statements about order with little explanatory appeal. A system is explanatory if it produces logical or causal relations that are informative in that they allow us to understand why things must happen as described, and they anticipate new facts. But diacritic elements that try to save compositionality in a technical way, such as checking features, are not informative. It has now been recognized for some years that "the sole function of these feature checkers is to force movement" (Chomsky 1995: 278) and that this kind of formulation "is a restatement of the basic property, not a true explanation" (ibidem: 233). The reason for this lack of explanation comes from the fact that the frameworks do not rely enough on the external properties to determine what should be considered as axiomatic. The formal notions being used translate properties of substance into symbols. In the best of cases, these formal notions work because they reflect the effects of the properties of substance that they mask: they are engineering solutions that restate the facts. In the worst cases, these formal notions introduce possibilities which are not allowed by substance and so produce systems that do not correspond to any possible human language. A system that allows the interchange of structures or features for the same meaning in adjectival modification is of this latter type, since such an interchange does not seem to take place in human languages. The uninformative nature of this kind of analysis is fairly obvious and it has been noted countless times. For instance, we find it in Chomsky & Halle (1968:400): "The problem is that our approach to features, to rules, and to evaluation has been overly formal. Suppose, for example, that we were systematically to interchange features or to replace [aF] by [-aF] (where a is +, and F is a feature) throughout our description of English structure. There is nothing in our account of linguistic theory to indicate that the result would be the description of a system that violates certain principles governing human languages. To the extent that this is true, we have failed to formulate the principles of linguistic theory, of universal grammar, in a
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 31 satisfactory manner. In particular, we have not made use of the fact that the features have intrinsic content." Hale & Reiss (2000) counter that a theory of phonology that is strictly formal and makes no reference to the substantive content of phonological entities is not really a problem if it turns out that the nonoccurring combinations of feature values are impossible on phonetic grounds. They even make the stronger claim that such nonoccurring cases should not be ruled out in phonology because this would be a duplication of the phonetic principles, which should be avoided since it departs from optimal design. I agree with them in principle. However, if it turns out that all the effects of a certain theoretical tool are always canceled out by some independent principle, this tool should not be considered part of what is computationally possible: rather, optimal design asks that the tool be removed; otherwise, anything goes. Also, if a tool with broad application only has very limited effects on the surface, it is usually good heuristics to seek for an alternative analysis based on a tool with a more restricted application. Finally, in the converse situation where the effects of a certain theoretical tool are all derived from some substantive properties, it should be kept in mind that this tool is but a convenient description of the substance, and that a true understanding of the facts will come from a proper analysis of the substantive properties. I contend that appealing to substantive properties external to linguistic theory and logically anterior to it provides a general explanatory theory (as in the case of phrase structures that represent that linear order is being used in a grammatically significant way). The recent attempts in Chomsky (1999, 2000) to provide external motivation for movement can be seen as heading in this direction. Unfortunately, the proposals are far from convincing. He says that the property of displacement "has (at least plausible) external motivation in terms of distinct kinds of semantic interpretation and perhaps processing. If so, displacement is only an apparent imperfection of natural language, as are the devices that implement it" (Chomsky 1999: 3). He has never discussed this external motivation in detail, which is surprising, considering his general stance that any departure from optimal design must be strongly motivated. In Chomsky (1995: 317), he makes the very general comment that displacement could be motivated by invoking "considerations of language use: facilitation of parsing on certain assumptions, the separation of theme-rheme structures from base-determined semantic (6) relations, and so on." He does argue, somewhat tentatively in Chomsky (2000), that perhaps dislocation plays a functional role in marking the distinction between two kinds of semantics, his 'deep' and 'surface' interpretive principles. He claims that the deep structure "enters into determining quasi-
32 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces logical properties such as entailment and theta structure" and the surface structure determines "properties such as topic-comment, presupposition, focus, specificity, new/old information, agentive force, and others that are often considered more discourse-oriented, and appear to involve the "edge" of constructions." "If the distinction is real" he says, "we would expect to find that language design marks it in some systematic way—perhaps by the dislocation property, at least in part. To the extent that such ideas can be given substance, it would follow that the dislocation property is required." The rationale for separating these two kinds of semantics is not given, but we may assume that the separation has a functional role: the distinction is better expressed/perceived by the language user if each type is associated with a different position. Note that displacement is not an imperfection to the extent that what motivates it is external to the faculty of language: however, the assumption that this separation of semantic kinds is external to the faculty of language is far from obvious. Even more crucially, it is not at all clear that there are principled reasons to make the distinction, (see chapter 6). According to Chomsky (2001), there is even more reason to consider that displacement is not an imperfection. Displacement is claimed to be motivated not only on the grounds of its correlation with one of the elements of the duality at the CI interface, but also by general properties of computational efficiency. First, he assumes that the operation Merge is free "in that it is required in some form for any recursive system: the operation Merge [...] takes two elements a, b already constructed and creates a new one consisting of the two" (p.5). Second, Merge can be external or internal. "Under external Merge, a and b are separate objects; under internal Merge, one is part of the other, and Merge yields the property of "displacement," which is ubiquitous in language" (p. 7-8). However, as I mentioned in the introduction, the central operation required by a recursive system is not Merge but Associate. External Merge is a physiological means to express the operation Associate—juxtaposition of a and b—and it derives from properties of sequencing of sounds (cf. Tesniere 1959, Kayne 1994). External Merge is therefore a principled operation satisfying an interface condition of SM. Internal Merge, on the other hand, is a very different operation. It is not accounted for in terms of an interface condition. Moreover, internal Merge is not a primitive operation: it is always an instance of "remerge" since the "displaced" element b has already undergone external Merge during the construction of a. A detailed discussion of these issues is presented in section 3 of chapter 6.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 33 In sum, the attempt to provide a principled account of displacement falls short. Giving to Move the name of internal Merge does not change the fact that it is a very different operation from Merge. Contrary to external Merge, the operation of internal Merge is not motivated on the basis of general properties of computational efficiency—a recursive system functions very well without Move, but could not with only Move since internal Merge has external Merge as a prerequisite. Internal Merge is not motivated by the SM condition of sequencing of sounds. It is not motivated by its correlation with one of the elements of the duality at the CI interface: the distinction between the two types of semantics is dubious and this distinction is introduced just to motivate the distinction between internal and external Merge. However, I think that looking for external, logically anterior notions to ground the theory is in the right direction to improve upon the bare statement of the properties and to go beyond engineering solutions that are arbitrarily complex. This becomes very clear if we look at languages for which some interface conditions are quite different, such as sign languages. As indicated in Bouchard (1996a), the sequencing properties of gestural signs are significantly different from those of sounds, and studying them helps us put in a better perspective the role of the interface property of sequencing in the grammar of both gestural and oral languages. Current models do not take sufficiently into account the fact that language is an embodied activity, and that logically anterior properties have direct consequences regarding meaning and form, and hence on the system that relates one to the other. Consequently, these models rely too much on special structure: it is as if they all followed Milner (1982: 304), who presents linguistics as a "scientia infima" without a logical predecessor. Since it is a central flaw, this weakness isn't specific to the analysis of adjectival modification: it is a very general property of these various theories, which suggests that the problem is deeply embedded in the foundational notions. The remedy therefore lies not in corrective devices applying only to adjectival constructions, or any particular construction, but in a broad shift. Instead of looking almost exclusively at analytical tools like phrase structures, which are derived from external properties, and at the formal artefacts of phrase structure, we should investigate these external properties themselves in order to get a deeper understanding of what is going on.
34 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
3. EXPLANATION IN LINGUISTICS: THE ROLE OF INTERFACES There are two central traits of adjectival modification in French that derive from external properties. The first one is the high dependency on linear order, which relates to properties of the SM system. The second trait, which we will see in the next chapter has a decisive effect on adjectival modification, is that a bare ADJ must apply to an N independently of the semantic effects induced by Number. Number is linked to both interfaces: it's semantic import is tied to properties of the CI system, and the means to express it in language are dependent on properties of the SM system. To get a true explanation of the facts, we must therefore understand how order and Number come into play given the conditions imposed by our two external systems of physiology and cognition. With respect to order, we must understand why and how it is used in grammar. We will see that the substantive temporal relation 'order' provides a perceptual form to a semantic relation. Of particular interest will be the question of how using different forms like ADJ-N vs N-ADJ affects what semantic relation is expressed. As for Number, it is not simply some formal notion that is arbitrarily assumed to be active in the CHL: both the presence of Number and the variations in its realization derive from external, substantive notions. Why Number is encoded in language at all is forced by CI properties: it comes into grammar as part of a grammaticalization of the logically anterior notions of 'actant' and 'set'. Why Number varies in how it is realized is due to the fact that independent SM conditions force a choice upon languages. French expresses Number on Det, English on N, Walloon as an independent word, because these options correspond to different equally efficient ways to give a perceptual form to Number in the SM system: any of these forms is as good as the other to express the Number of a nominal expression. We will see that the fact that Number can have different grammatical instantiations has far reaching effects, effects that explain ordering restrictions, differences in interpretation with different orders, etc. To understand the precise import of order and Number in adjectival modification, we must place them in the general context of how external systems determine properties of the language system, and how this contributes to explaining the facts. Good design would have it that a model of the faculty of language should be grounded entirely on self-evident, logically anterior elements needed to satisfy initial conditions arising from the interfaces of meaning and form, and to the mechanisms which can minimally relate them to one
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 35 another which are determined by the nature of the elements of meaning and the elements of form. This would be a "perfect" system: the properties of language would derive entirely from the physical and conceptual make-up of human beings, so that only inescapable, logically anterior elements would be considered as axiomatic and there would be no need to postulate language-specific axiomatic notions. However, it is generally assumed that such an optimal theory fails in many cases. Most linguistic theories assume that language departs significantly from perfection (or unwittingly operate as if language does if they deny the assumption). But the main reason for this stance is that they take little explicit account of the interface conditions and the anterior sciences attached to them: almost no attention is given to the restrictions imposed by these external properties or the variations they may induce. In Generative Grammar for instance, variations and restrictions are investigated almost exclusively in terms of computational/formal properties. Thus, the huge amount of work devoted to uncovering universal restrictions in language has centered on the fact that the range of possible natural languages is restricted compared to all logical possibilities that may arise in a computational system. Even in the Minimalist Program, which puts the question of interfaces to the forefront, the objective seems to be mere compatibility of the outputs of the computational system with the interfaces: this is a much weaker goal than attempting to identify very precise interface conditions from which to derive precise linguistic properties. Since only computational/formal properties are considered, the only way to account for the severe restrictions on possible natural languages on the one hand, and the crosslinguistic variations observed on the other hand, is by postulating several conditions specific to the computational system of language, making language look very different from anything found in the organic world (Chomsky 1995:2). But it is premature to take this position before having thoroughly investigated to what extent these restrictions and variations could be explained by logically anterior, external properties. Language-specific conditions can only be postulated if serious attempts in this direction do not succeed to account for the restrictions and variations found in natural languages. In order to create an analysis that is true and not arbitrarily complex, we need to have a proper conception of variation at the interfaces: what is precluded by external properties, when are equal options admitted that induce variations, what are the effects of particular options. Only a precise study of all constraining aspects of the two interfaces of form and meaning will reveal whether external properties can explain the extent to which languages may vary. I will argue that external properties do indeed provide a deeper understanding of what is going on, and that there is no need of language-specific conditions of
36 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces the usual sort (like parameters restricted to formal features of functional categories, or an operation like Move, or principles like Subjacency and the ECP). My position is that the CHL is highly determined by properties of the interfaces taken as axiomatic, and these self-evident properties are in a quite small number. Variation among languages is very restricted because our SM and CI make-ups drastically narrow the parametric possibilities of how the form and meaning of language can be related to each other. To repeat, the nature of the objects being related determines the kind of relation that may be established between them. The thesis that the CHL is strongly determined by external constraints on the SM and CI components is similar to Chomsky's (1999: 1) "strongest minimalist thesis" and it "becomes an empirical thesis insofar as we are able to determine interface conditions and to clarify notions of "good design."" However, actual work in Minimalism almost never pursues this goal. More typical is the attempt to reduce forms of variation other than Saussurean arbitrariness (the relationship between "form" and "meaning" is arbitrary) to uninterpretable features of functional categories. But neither these features nor these categories are linked to interface properties. The result is just an engineering solution with no explanatory import, and this weakness is the main reason why Chomsky attempts to motivate displacement on an external basis (with inconclusive results as we saw above). In generative models, very little attention is given to the restrictions and variations arising from external properties because it is implicitly assumed that, aside from classical Saussurean arbitrariness which pairs a meaning unit with a form, no variation can come from the interfaces—in particular, no variation concerning the syntax of languages. This crucially affects how the theory deals with language variation. Since the CHL is the only possible locus of variation that is not lexical in this approach, and since it is a fact that there is variation other than the one found in minimal sound-meaning pairings of lexical items, generativists conclude that the faculty of language requires arbitrarily complex conditions specific to that system. The preconception rests on an implicit view of universality as narrow uniformity: the system of thought of human beings and their sensorimotor system are assumed to be universal, i.e., all humans have the same systems. From this invariance, it is deduced that the interfaces of the faculty of language with these external systems—the CI and SM interfaces—cannot introduce any variation. But this is a non sequitur. Even assuming that all human beings share the same thought and sensorimotor systems, linguistic variation could come from the fact that these
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 37 systems allow variation internally to them. A classical case of variation arising from SM properties is Saussurean arbitrariness, according to which a meaning unit is arbitrarily paired with a form: the form used for a particular unit varies considerably from one language to another. Variation also arises internally to the thought system. For instance, consider the concept of a set: a set can be specified on the basis of a property shared by all its members, or on the basis of its instantiations.13 Though the system of thought of every human being presumably has the capability of using either specification of a set, which particular specification is used in a given situation may vary. Therefore, the two external systems with which the faculty of language interfaces do exhibit variation in their internal functioning. Given that some variation may be introduced by the thought system and the sensorimotor system, there may be more than one optimal solution to the mapping of a meaning to a form.
3.1 Variation at the SM interface: a second facet to Saussurean arbitrariness Crucial to the analysis of phenomena such as adjectival modification is the fact that properties of the sensorimotor system induce variation not only at the level of lexical units as in classical Saussurean arbitrariness, but also in the epitome of formal domains—the morphosyntax of languages. Not only must meaning units be paired with a form, but the relation between these units (which carries its own meaning) must also be provided a perceptual form. It so happens that our sensorimotor system provides diverse means to encode the fundamental associative function that is required in the recursive system to obtain semantic combination. This gives rise to arbitrariness which is another facet of Saussurean arbitrariness. In a typical task of Grammar, there are two "units of meaning" A and B, with a Head-Dependent relation that holds between them (where 'Dependent' generalizes over arguments, modifiers). This must be given a perceptual form if an exchange is to take place between speakers. Having associated each of A and B with a form, there are four ways to physically indicate that a relation is being established between the two elements A and B, and language uses all four. We may first, by Juxtaposition, position one element with respect to the other so that they share an edge: such a Juxtaposition results in temporally ordering the sets of sounds A and B (morphemes, words or constituents), as in languages like English and French that make extensive functional use of order.14 Second, by Superimposition, A and B may share a temporal area, as when A is a set of
38 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces temporally ordered sounds and B is a modulation superimposed on A to express grammatical functions in various tone languages.15 Third, by Dependent Marking, one may modify the form of the dependent element to indicate that it establishes a relation with the Head. Thus, suppose that in our example, B expresses a predicate meaning and A expresses an argument meaning. Then the form of the argument A may be modified, by a Case marking for example, to indicate which grammatical relation holds between A and B. Fourth, Head Marking is the counterpart of Dependent Marking: here it is the form of the predicative element B which is modified to indicate that it holds a certain relation with a Dependent A, as in polysynthetic languages. This is summarized in (27): (27) Ways to give a form to semantic relations in an oral language i Juxtaposition. A and B are ordered temporally next to one another, deriving the structural relation of sister and immediately contain. ii Superimposition: B is a modulation superimposed on A, such as intonations to express grammatical functions in tone languages. iii Dependent Marking: the dependent gets a marking, such as Case marking. iv Head Marking: the head is marked, as in predicate marking (polysynthetic languages). Marking is actually Juxtaposition or Superimposition at the word level instead of the phrasal level. This is the traditional distinction between morphology and syntax.16 These ways of expressing a relational "meaning" are equivalent, all are equally valid. As expected, languages vary in which of these modes they use to express semantic relations. For instance, in English, the relation 'Indirect Object' is expressed by order (28a). This is also the case for full NPs in French: they express the relation by Juxtaposition to the right of the preposition a and Juxtaposition of the resulting constituent to the right of V and direct object (28b). On the other hand, weak pronouns in French have the relation expressed by Case Marking (29a), and in Latin, the relation is expressed by Case Marking (29b) for all NPs. (28) a b (29) a b
Give me a book. *Give a book me. Jean donne un livre a Marie. Jean me donne un livre. Da mihi librum. Da librum mihi. Librum mihi da. Etc.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 39 Because it allows four equally efficient modes to code a semantic relation into a perceptual form, the SM system introduces very specific forms of variation in the morphosyntax of languages. The proper understanding of these variations is to be found in the external properties of the SM system, not in their translation into CHL restatements.
3.2 Variation at the CI interface: another facet of Saussurean arbitrariness If we turn to the influence that the thought system and the faculty of language may have on each other, we enter an area of heated debate. The questions are invariably said to be much harder and more obscure than those pertaining to syntax or phonology, but they cannot be avoided if we want to find out to what degree the faculty of language is determined by the logically anterior properties of the external systems. Much has been said about how the CI is modulated by the faculty of language, how thought is indirectly modulated by language, following the ideas of Benjamin Whorf. Similar ideas have been elegantly argued for in other schools of thought: see in particular the study by Benveniste (1966) on the possible influence of specific properties of the verb entendre on the thought of French philosophers working on perception. In Generative Grammar, numerous studies have looked into the link between how things are said and how they are interpreted, in particular, syntactic conditions that affect our way of referring (binding theory conditions) and that determine the scope of quantification (cf. the seminal work of Lasnik 1976 and May 1985). My interest here is more in how the CI is modulated by the thought system, how thought influences the functioning of language. Of course, there is a trivial level at which this holds: if I want to express the thought that 'John loves Mary', I will not say the same thing as when I express that 'The weather is nice today'. There is also a general level at which we recognize that meaning is restricted to notions that may link up to our Conceptual-Intentional system. But these are not very useful in understanding the intricacies of the functioning of the faculty of language. A more fundamental question is whether there are cases in which thought actually affects variation in how syntax operates? There seems to be.17 Consider again the fact that a set can be specified on the basis of a property shared by all its members, or on the basis of its instantiations. This distinction directly affects the functioning of nominal expressions in language because of the type of information that a nominal expression provides in a sentence.
40 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces I have to restrict myself to a broad outline, but it will suffice for our present purposes. A sentence describes an event involving actants.18 The typical role of a nominal expression is to provide information to identify one of the actants of the event described by the sentence, i.e., a noun is the canonical realization of an actant in grammar.19 A common noun expresses a property—for instance 'dog'—which defines a set whose extension corresponds to the ideal generated by the totality of the individuals—in this case, the totality of dogs. So the common noun dog has the semantics of a Kind, which can be modelled as a stabilized, conventionalized set. As indicated by Chierchia (1998), at this level where the property defines a Kind, singulars and plurals are not distinguishable: Fido is as good an example of 'dog' as Fido and Barky are. The property of a common noun is not atomized, i.e., it does not define the quantity of individuals to which it may be applied, and is thus seen as a mass: it applies in an undifferentiated way to all individuals of the set, to the set itself and to all its subsets.20 This grammaticalization of a set by an N induces interpretations that do not distinguish between mass-count or singular-plural. So a significant for TOMATO at this level of grammaticalization does not distinguish between a tomato, the tomato, some tomatoes, the tomatoes, or tomato as a mass. Given the usefulness of such distinctions in identitying more precisely the participants in the event, most languages have a second level of grammaticalization regarding the means to "atomize" the set defined by a common noun. For instance, distinctions like these may be grammaticalized by means of a classifier system. This is what seems to be the case in Mandarin and Korean.21 However, in French and many other languages, atomization is done by adding features of Number, defmiteness, specificity, demonstrativity, etc. and it steers the referential potential of the N to a particular possibility. The general context for CI variation is one in which there is more than one way to think about something, to conceptualize it, and a language Lx grammaticalizes one way, whereas another language Ly grammaticalizes another. This does not mean that a speaker of Lx and a speaker of Ly think differently: they both have the same thought system, but have grammaticalized different aspects of it where an option has arisen. In our example, they both can conceptualize sets in two different ways, but their language grammaticalizes one of these specifications. Like the SM system, the CI system therefore also gives rise to very specific forms of variation in the morphosyntax of languages, variations whose explanation depends on external properties, not on their translation into CHL restatements.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 41 3.3. The CI and SM properties of Number Of the various features that have atomization effects, Number is the most often grammaticalized one because it is a minimal means to atomize a set and provide access to individuals: Number indicates that the set has a cardinality, that it contains a certain number of elements, thus providing information about the nature of the actant involved in the event. Since it must be given a perceptual form, the grammaticalization of Number brings about additional subchoices: the nature of the SM system of an oral language allows more than one way of expressing the relation between Number and a nominal, ways which are equally satisfactory with respect to the CI requirement. So we get crosslinguistic variation of the type predicted by the four modes of encoding semantic relations into perceptual forms in (27). For instance, Number can be expressed in a nominal by marking the N directly in the morphology, as in English, where Number is coded at the word level: the marking can be a Juxtaposition by addition (30a), or an alternation of part of a string of Juxtaposed elements (30b). Number can also be expressed by having an element of the periphery of N bear Number, as in French, where Number is coded at the phrasal level of the nominal on the Det (and marked morphologically on the Det itself) (31). Number can also be purely phrasal, as in Walloon: it is not on N or Det, but an independent word that heads its own projection, appearing even with a cardinal as in (32).22 (30) a b
dog ~ dog-z man ~ men
(31) l'ami [lami] ~ les amis [lezami] the friend thePLURfriend (32) traze piceur thirteen PLUR shots In many instances, Number is visible on more than one element in the nominal expression. Thus, in some cases in French, Number may appear on the Det, the ADJ and the N: le loyal cheval 'the loyal horse' — les loyaux chevaux 'the loyal horses'. There are languages in which Number surfaces on both Det and N: il ragazzo 'the boy' — i ragazzi 'the boys' (Italian); das Buch 'the book' — die Biicher 'the books' (German). An economical system is expected to code Number for semantic interpretation only once in the nominal expression, the other surface realizations of
42 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Number having no semantic import. A close look at the data shows that this is indeed the case and that we can determine which element codes Number in a way that is relevant for semantic conditions, and which elements realize Number only by superficial agreement, in a way that is semantically irrelevant. Several sets of data from French and English are revealing in this respect and corroborate the hypothesis that Number is on Det in French and on N in English. For instance, Number is obligatorily audibly marked on Det in French (33a), but the Number on N is audible only in a few cases (33b) and appears to be on its way out of the language. (33) a
le [1 ], la[lae], les [le], ma [mae], mes [me]
b
saut [so], sauts [so], patte [paet], pattes [paet], mal [mael], maux [mo]
Conversely, it is the Number on N which is obligatorily audibly marked in English (34a), whereas Det only occasionally expresses Number (34b). (34) a
book [bok], books [boks], dad [daed], dads [daedz], mass [maes], masses [maesLz] the (singular) [q ], the (plural) [95], my (singular) [may], my (plural) [may],
b
that [daet], those [dowz] A second set of facts concerns compounding. It has often been noted that combinations of [V+N] can function as a compound N in French, but not in English. (35)
a
1'ouvre-boTte
b
*the open-can (compare the can-opener)
the open-can
the can-opener
A [V+N] compound seems not to be a noun in some sense. For one thing, it does not have the morphological properties of an N. It could be that this is because the V still functions like a head and the N as a dependent, but I will leave the question open. Crucially, a compound like *opencan is not compatible with the assumption that Number is obligatorily realized morphologically on a head N in English since there is no such N head on which Number could be realized.23 In French, this problem does not arise since Number is marked on the DET, not on the compound N. Therefore, l'ouvre-boite is fine.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 43 A further correlation with the difference in Number realization is found in the following contrast (cf. Longobardi (1994) who noted this difference for English and Italian): (36)
a
The secretary of John and collaborator of Paul is/?are at the station. (possibly two referents)
b
La secretaire de Jean et collaboratrice de Paul est/*sont a la gare. (only one referent who is both a secretary and a collaborator)
According to Longobardi, some speakers of English can use a single DET with two N projections to refer to two individuals (36a). This is compatible with Number realized on N: each N may have a minimal atomization. On the other hand, it is generally impossible to have such a plurality of reference in French (but see section 3.4 of chapter 5): this comes from the fact that the Number is on the DET, which is singular here.24 Conversely, determiners (definite, indefinite, demonstrative or POSS) in French can be conjoined to indicate Number uncertainty, but this is very odd in English (Miller 1992).25 (37)
a
Vous prendrez le ou les garcons que vous trouverez.
a'
*You will take the or the boys that you find.
b
Prends une ou des pommes.
b'
??Take a or some apples.
c Il faudrait envoyer ce ou ces livres. c'
??One should send this or these books.
d
Je prendrai ton ou tes livres.
d'
*I will take your or your books.
There is therefore good preliminary evidence that French and English pick different options in equally valid ones allowed by the SM system to express the relation between Number and a nominal. Much more in depth evidence will be provided by the other chapters of this book, which will be devoted to detailed analyses of three sets of differences that follow from the fact that Number is coded on Det in French, whereas it is coded on N in English: 1) adjectives are free to occur in postnominal position in French (chapter 2) but not in English (chapter 3); 2) the N may be fairly easily absent from a nominal expression in French but not in English (clitic pronouns and constituents like la verte 'the green one'; chapter 4); 3) an NP without a Det can
44 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces still refer minimally in English, but bare NPs have a much more restricted distribution in French (chapter 5). This approach to nominal expressions is in the spirit of work by Grimshaw (1979), Pesetsky (1982), Chomsky (1986), Rochette (1988), in which constituent selection in the syntax (cselection) is assumed to be a canonical expression of selection on the basis of semantic features (s-selection), so c-selection is not a primitive but derives from s-selection. The crucial notion here is not s-selection in terms of features or theta grids, but rather the semantic properties of the head: this is the sense to be given to my use of s-selection henceforth. In the particular case of nominal expressions, the primitive requirement is also semantico-cognitive: actants must be identified, and expressing Number in a nominal expression contributes to that process. This semantic import by Number does not presume a rigid correlation with one particular morphosyntactic realization: any of the narrowly restricted options allowed by the SM system and adequately expressing the relation between Number and the nominal is equally optimal. So Number is not assumed to be universally tied to a single position in syntax: a language grammaticalizes how it expresses Number according to any one of the modes of coding that allow it to fulfill its role of atomization. Similarly, a nominal expression is not assumed to be an argument only if it is introduced by a Det: rather, it is an argument if it has what it takes to identify an actant at CI (which need not always involve the presence of a Det). The presence or absence of a Det is not simply correlated with the presence or strength of some ad hoc feature whose sole motivation is to encode the fact: rather, it ties in with logically anterior properties of the CI, the variation resulting from the fact that there are different, equally valid ways to provide the information that allows the proper identification of actants. I am following here an idea that has frequently been put forward in morphology (and occasionally in syntax for WHconstructions with percolation of the WH-feature, as in The president of which company did you interview?). For instance, Bloomfield (1933) held that words such as horses, oxen, men involve more than strictly distributional properties like the linear location of elements relative to one another, but also features of selection, modulation and phonetic modification: they are different words united by the same meaning. Similarly, Chomsky (1965) criticizes the distributionalist approach. He assumes that plural is not a formative, not a morpheme, but a feature assigned to lexical formatives by a syntactic rule: [+plural] is added to the syntactic representation of an N, and vowel change, etc. takes place at the phonological component.26 In essence, I propose to treat Number in a way similar to features in portmanteau cases, such as the French du 'of-MASC-
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 45 SING-DEF, des 'of-PLUR-DEF, au 'to-MASC-SING-DEF' and aux 'to-PLUR-DEF'. These words have features of both a preposition and a determiner, and yet the sets of features appear to interact with other constituents independently from one another. Thus, in aux enfants 'to the children', aux expresses both the features of a preposition (a) that has a DP argument and the features of the Det (definite plural).27 In many current analyses, the restriction that semantically relevant Number is coded only once is expressed by postulating a functional category of Number in syntax (cf. Ritter 1991). I do not adopt such a means to express the restriction, because it gives the impression that both Number and the uniqueness restriction on it are arbitrary notions, when in fact they both arise from substantive properties. The semantic uniqueness condition can and even should apply directly to the coding of Number without such an additional syntactification: the different ways in which Number may be expressed across languages are predicted in this approach, whereas the functional category approach treats all but one as "deviant" cases which require corrective operations to bring them in line. What is universal is not syntax, not c-selection, but the sselection that underlies it, s-selection itself deriving from CI properties which are logically anterior to linguistic theory, such as identification of actants in the present case. Rigid correlations between s-selection and c-selection in the form of functional categories and other phrasal structural elements is a widely accepted means to instantiate a certain conception of universality and economy. In this view of universality, the kind of four-way choice shown in (27) is considered a less efficient system, under the implicit assumption that UG is maximally efficient if CHL accesses only one mode of coding information, since no options at all would be available in the way the interpretive component interacts with syntax: it would have only one type of coding information to interpret. A single type of computation would need to be considered by a learner, thus potentially contributing to the primary goal of explanatory adequacy. For instance, Kayne (1994) argues that the temporal ordering of elements in the sensorimotor apparatus at the SM interface determines phrase-structural properties of the CHL, deriving the essentials of X-bar theory. Moreover, he seems to assume that the CHL is uniquely determined in this way for all languages. As I indicated above, Chomsky takes the same view when he conflates the fundamental associative function (which is required to combine elements and their meanings) and Merge (which is a particular, phrasal-structural instantiation of the associative function): "The indispensable operation of a recursive system is Merge (or some variant of it), which takes two syntactic objects a and b and forms the new object G = {a,b} [...]
46 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Merge yields two natural relations: Sister and Immediately-Contain" (Chomsky 1999: 2). This conflation of the associative function and Merge is the reason why he assumes that Merge comes free and any other operation requires justification. But Merge is the formalization of Juxtaposition, of linear ordering, as is clear from the two structural relations it is said to yield. This is but one physical realization of the deeper associative function: it does come free given general external conditions, but so do the three other realizations of 'Associate' in (27), and they require no more justification than Merge. The hypothesis that temporal ordering is the only mode of coding accessed by the interpretive component, hence that all languages are strictly phrasal-structural at some level, faces problems of both conceptual and empirical nature. On the empirical side, it is a fact that languages make use of the different available modes of coding in (27). In my terms, any arbitrary choice between these four modes of coding relations will satisfy the requirement to encode semantic relations in a sign—the second facet of Saussurean arbitrariness. In a reductionist approach, this arbitrariness is denied. Moreover, if we assume that one of these modes of coding is more basic, conceptual problems arise. First, the idea that one physical form is receded into another is quite odd, even at the level of their representations. Second, we must posit a type of general computational process which can access all modes of coding, in order to recode all of the "secondary" modes into the basic mode. So there is no simplification nor increase in efficiency, in the end, since at some level of processing, all modes must be accessible in any event. In fact, a reductionist model may induce a less efficient processing, since it requires the additional recoding of all "secondary" codings. The model must make the inefficient assumption that this general computational process may not simply apply freely. It may relate one particular mode, designated as universal on an a priori basis, directly with the interpretive component; it may also relate any of the other modes to the "universal" mode; but oddly, the general computational process must be specifically precluded from relating any of these other modes directly with the CI interface, even though it must be compatible with all of them. Additionally, there is a certain inconsistency in considering that representations which feed semantic interpretation have such phrasal-structural properties. These properties are derivative, arising from the need for sequentiality at the SM interface. It is usually assumed that sequentiality is not a property of the level on which semantic interpretation operates. Therefore, it is inconsistent to assume this level to have phrasal-structural properties. What is required for interpretation to take place is the fundamental associative function, not one of its perceptual expressions such as Merge.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 47 The reductionist model assumes that all languages express certain relations with the same form: for instance, all complement relations would be expressed by the temporal ordering HeadComplement universally. Very few scholars would be willing to deny arbitrariness in the expression of meaning units in a form, yet such a denial of arbitrariness is widely accepted in the expression of meaning relations in a form. This is an incoherent position. The argument of simplicity holds no more for relations than it does for units. It is true that it would be apparently simpler if all languages used a single form to express semantic relations, just as it would be simpler if all languages used the same forms to express each semantic unit. We would then all speak the same language (which would be much less interesting, and not just for linguists). However, I claim that neither of these options would be simpler, since we would have to explain why the arbitrariness predicted by the external systems does not actually obtain. Given the numerous potential forms that can express a meaning unit or relation, it would be an astonishing accident if all communities of human beings had chanced on the very same form case after case. Initial conditions require that meanings and semantic relations must be encoded in a form having certain physiological properties accessible to a perceptual system of human beings, so that the semantic information can be passed on between speakers: this much is universal, otherwise language is not usable. But there is no a priori requirement that this relation between form and meaning be established in a single, uniform way, only that it be established in some way. Quite to the contrary. The perceptual systems of human beings (as well as their conceptual system) must come into play in language. Given the nature of the logically anterior properties of these systems, we actually expect there to be variation, within narrow bounds precisely set by the modes of coding determined by these perceptual systems, and presumably functional considerations that delimit upper and lower bounds on how much each mode can code. In other words, variation is not an imperfection if it takes place between modes of encoding semantic relations in a form and each mode is an optimal solution to linking the two interfaces. I am arguing that there are very strong empirical reasons to believe that languages differ in what conceptualization of some notions they grammaticalize, and in what perceptual forms they choose to express not only semantic units, but also semantic relations. These variations directly affect the functioning of syntax, in particular of nominal expressions. The important point is that there are in principle ways in which thought and physiology influence the functioning of language, not just in the lexicon, but deep in the computational system.
48 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces The faculty of language could be this adaptation of previously existing capabilities at the conceptual level and at the articulatory-perceptual level and setting them for the specific task of linking the two, with general conditions of economy and efficiency interacting to determine the grammaticalization of one option when choices arise. The variation induced by the initial conditions of SM and CI is not an imperfection, but derives directly from the logically anterior properties of these external systems. It just happens that there are some instances in which some elements can be arranged in diverse ways that are equally accessible for these external systems to make use of them. Therefore, it is incorrect to say that we cannot entertain an optimal theory because languages are not uniform: optimality is not premissed on uniformity. The interesting question is whether it is possible to account for all language variation on the basis of interface properties. Needless to say that this can only be answered by a long and careful study of the type of variation that may be induced by the two interfaces, which will require the concerted efforts of many scholars. The following chapters are contributions to that effort. Notes 1
Christopher Miller pointed out to me that there are very limited cases in which some
autonomous sounds are combined with others as secondary articulations. These secondary articulations may have a morphemic function, such as the /w/ of passive or the /y/ of feminine in gourague. The cases are restricted to single sounds: simultaneous productions of longer sequences of sounds are impossible. This physical restriction is no doubt the reason why we do not find the simultaneous production of two words in oral languages. 2
The assumption is so obvious that it is left totally implicit. All that Kayne says is that "[a]t least
in the PF wing of the grammar, the terminal symbols must be linearly ordered" (p. 4). The assumption has been part of the linguistic tradition for some time. For instance, Tesniere (1959), following Saussure, expands on the theoretical importance of the fact that two phonemes cannot be simultaneous, that words occur in an irreversible, asymmetric temporal sequence. In a passage precursory of Kayne's Linear Correspondence Axiom, he says: "Le principe fondamental de la transformation de 1'ordre structural en ordre lineaire est de transporter les connexions de 1'ordre structural en sequences de 1'ordre lineaire, de fapon que les elements qui sont en connexion dans 1'ordre structural se trouvent en voisinage immediat sur la chaine parlee" (Tesniere 1959:20).
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 49 3
An ADJ in prenominal position can also have the "literal" reading (i.e., un grand homme can
mean 'a tall man' as well as 'a man of importance, significance (moral, social, whatever)'). However, even in this case, there is a subtle meaning difference with what is expressed when the ADJ is postnominal. I will address this difference in chapter 2. 4
My analysis is not tied to general assumptions of Montague Semantics, but only to the
assumption that distinct elements like these are part of the network of a common noun. We will see later how these subparts of the noun are important in understanding the behaviour of apparently noncompositional adjectives. 5
There are two main perspectives on grammaticalization. The first one concerns diachronic
change internal to language whereby function words, affixes, etc. emerge out of earlier lexical forms. This is the most common use of the term. The second perspective is typological: it concerns the different ways in which languages can encode elements external to language. Unless I specifically indicate otherwise, the terms grammaticalize and grammaticalization will always refer to typological grammaticalization in this book, not to diachronic grammaticalization. 6
This proposal is similar to mine in that we both assume that some adjectives modify subparts of
the noun, only instead of assuming "qualia" I assume things like "characteristic function", "possible world indicator", etc. However, this is only a superficial similarity. As we will see, qualia are "contextual" notions and therefore cannot be part of the semantic make up of nouns. 7
Unbeknownst to her, she follows the French tradition in assuming that some adjectives are
semantically reduced, functional elements—an assumption that is very explicit in the functionalist school of Andre Martinet. Weinrich (1966) follows Martinet in assuming that monemes (elementary meaningful units) divide into two classes: (i) morphemes are grammatical elements with a very broad extension, an open distribution, have a narrow meaning, and are part of a paradigm; (ii) lexemes are the basic units of the lexicon. Weinrich assumes that prenominal adjectives are morphemes, whereas postnominal adjectives are lexemes (though he notes the problem raised by adjectives that appear to belong to both classes). 8
It also raises problems of learnability noted by Dresher (1999). See the discussion in chapter 6. This is not quite accurate and actualy depends on external circumstances. For instance, Jennifer
Ormstown (personal communication) says that if we are building a set for a movie, and we have created five houses that are EXACTLY the same, except for the colour of the window trim, it is possible to say: "The director wants us to move the red house a little to the left for the next shot."
50 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 10
Cinque tries to provide some motivation for the triggering of N-movement in Romance and its
absence in Germanic: he relates the difference to the fact that number and gender features are morphologically expressed in Romance, but not in Germanic. This is inaccurate for number, which is morphologically expressed in Germanic. One could say that there is a [+/-strong] distinction on number between these families of languages, but this is a restatement of the facts, not independent motivation. As for gender, it is also inaccurate to say that it is always morphologically expressed in Romance, but not in Germanic. The fact is that in French, for example, where N-movement is said to operate, gender is a lexical property of Ns, but there is no morphological realization of gender on the N for a vast number of Ns. For instance, nothing morphological indicates that table, fleur are feminine, whereas arbre, bane are masculine. The only morphological evidence for the gender of these Ns is in adjectives, singular determiners and pronouns that agree with them. In many French Ns, there is indeed a morphological expression of the gender, particularly in pairs involving male/female distinctions such as acteur/actrice, boulanger/boulangere, chienlchienne. But English also has similar pairs, such as actor/actress. English also has a morphological expression of the gender of all nouns in pronouns that agree with them. Of course, the contrasting pairs are much more frequent in French, and more elements show gender agreement. This is the old problem of comparing paradigms: how much of a paradigm must have a morphological expression of gender to consider that all members of the paradigm have the feature triggering movement? Moreover, rules depend on individual forms, not paradigms. Yet French forms that have no morphological expression of gender are considered [+strong] and move, [ike fleur in une fleur blanche, but English forms that do have a morphological expression of gender are considered [-strong] and do not move, like actress in an Italian actress. The correlation with gender marking is therefore stipulative (see Marantz (1995: 357) for a similar observation about verbal morphology and movement). In any event, it is not enough to have a correlation between the presence of gender in a language and the fact that N-movement takes place: it must be shown that the presence of gender has an effect on N-movement. In Cinque's analysis, this means we must be able to relate some property of the functional category where the N lands to the presence of gender on N, independently from N-movement , i.e., in a way that is not stipulative nor a restatement that N-movement takes place.
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 51
Moreover, if the process of agreement is not properly constrained, there is no independent motivation. For instance, given that prenominal adjectives in Romance show agreement in gender and number, despite the fact that they are not in a Spec-Head relationship with N at the surface level, Cinque assumes that this is checked at LF. But then if LF checking can license overt markings, we have no principled reason to have overt N movement in Romance. We are back to the position that marking N with a triggering feature [+F] simply means [+prepose N]. In fact, as Williams (1997) points out, in a theory in which agreement is done through checking of features depending on [+/- interpretable] markings, the features possibly being covert and checking possibly taking place covertly at LF, no prediction is made about the correlation between movement and morphological realization of agreement features. Thus, if we assume that object agreement is mediated by a Spec-head relation in a category AgrO (or any such category), a language could have overt markings of agreement and overt movement, overt markings with covert movement, no overt markings but overt movement, and no overt markings but covert movement. 11
The realization that some avenues explored by the theory are restatements of the facts has been
a regular trait of Generative Grammar. For instance, Jackendoff (1972: 9) made the following comment about Generative Semantics: "As deep structures become more and more "abstract," they gradually become denuded of syntactic significance. Distributional facts that can be captured naturally by a relatively "shallowly" conceived base must instead be explained by somewhat arbitrary restrictions on transformations. Thus, aspects of linguistic description [...] must instead be relegated to a much more powerful transformational component, complete with a full and extremely powerful theory of exceptions." The comment is still remarkably relevant today. If we take checking theory as an example, we see that, in a way, it generalizes exceptions, since just about every element of a syntactic structure is given at least one diacritic marking in the form of an attracting/attracted feature. There is a very large number of such features, since each small class of element is governed by an exception feature. We could say that the added elements which are not accountable to either interfaces do not really create a problem for learnability: they would be part of Universal Grammar, so they do not have to be learned. But this is begging the question and amounts to listing the properties, to giving up the search for an explanatory solution.
52 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 12
Bernstein later revises her analysis: the adjectives no longer adjoin to NP, "but may adjoin to
NumP, WMP, and whatever other functional XPs may be assumed" (p. 104), making the link with the N even more tenuous. 13
This is a very common view. See Partee et al. (1990: 4-8). There is a third possibility: a set
may be specified by means of recursive rules. But I do not think this applies to natural languages, in particular not to nouns. I am aware that specifying a set on the basis of a property leads to Russell's paradox. However, language may allow such exotic cases to crash without really affecting its usability: they hardly ever arise in language, and when they do, they are treated humorously rather than tragically. It took many centuries and a genius to notice their importance for set theory. Yet people have used language before and after without problems. In fact, as noted by Partee et al., "[t]he earlier method of specifying a set by giving a defining property for its members has not been abandoned in practice, since it is often convenient and since paradoxical cases do not arise in the usual mathematical applications of set theory. Outside of specialized works on set theory itself, both methods are commonly used." Let alone in language. 14
The boundary is temporal in the case of oral languages because the auditory-oral channel is
restricted to the single physical dimension of time. A complete picture of aspects of the human sensory-motor apparatus relevant for language should include properties of other channels than the auditory-oral channel. In particular, the visual-gestural channel makes use of the dimensions of space in addition to time. This has important effects in sign languages, such as Juxtaposition in space but not in time. These effects are explored in some detail in Bouchard (1996a). 15
Superimposition also encodes lexical distinctions in many tone languages. In English and
French, it mainly expresses distinctions at the sentential level, such as affirmation, question, or exclamation. 16
At the deepest level of description, therefore, there are only two core ways to encode meaning
into a form: Juxtaposition and Superimposition. Thanks to Patrick Sauzet for pointing this out to me. 17
I restrict myself to the effects of the GI on morpho-syntax because this is what is relevant for
the analysis of adjectival modification. But the CI has other effects on the functioning of the faculty of language. For instance, some studies look into a form of conceptual relativism about our way of referring to objects: they investigate how an NP can be used to refer in different ways to the same object in the world. This has been discussed in numerous works, such as Carlson
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 53
(1980), Dowty (1979), Kratzer (1988), who propose a stage/individual distinction, where 'stage' refers to temporal slices of individuals, their manifestations in space and at individual times, whereas an 'individual' is whatever ties stages together and makes them a single unit. Coppieters (1982) and (1990) takes up such a distinction between a Substantive (which can be an Intentional-Subject) and a Concept, and he shows that it is involved in determining the choice of some pronouns in French (see also Cadiot (1988)). The choice between pronouns /'/ and ce/$a in French correlates with different ways of referring. When using ce, a speaker presents an entity from an external point of view, i.e., as a Concept. On the other hand, // is used to indicate that the entity is aware of its own state. Consider the passage in (29), from Coppieters (1982) (The C" in C 'etait is a variant of ce that must be used before a vowel like e.) (i)
Jean se rendait enfm compte qu'il avait tout essaye et tout rate. Il/C'etait un homme pauvre desormais. Pourquoi avait-il eu tant de malchance. Jean finally realized that he had tried everything and failed at everything. Henceforth he would be a poor man. Why on earth had he been so unlucky?
The use of il in (i) implies that Jean is aware of his situation and that he realizes that he is a poor man: the question Pourquoi avait-il eu tant de malchancel expresses his anger and despair. On the other hand, the use of ce indicates that what is expressed is the opinion of the speaker about Jean's misfortune: the question is then rhetorical. Along the same lines, Coppieters (1990:15) suggests that the different interpretations of a sentence like Mary struck Paul simply come from the different ways the subject Mary can be used to refer: if Mary refers to a Concept, we get a psychological reading as when Mary struck Paul as a nice person; if Mary refers to a Substantive, she inadvertantly struck Paul when he walked by; if Mary refers to an Intentional-Subject, we get the "agentive" reading. The Psych interpretation of strike (and many similar verbs) comes from using the subject to refer to a Concept. Following Coppieters' proposal and extending an idea of Grimshaw (1990), in Bouchard (1995, chapter 4), I discuss several peculiar properties of Psych constructions for which a unified analysis cannot be achieved by means of a phrasal A-movement transformation or a binding account and show that if we take into account the way of referring involved when
54 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
using these Psych constructions, a unified explanation based on semantic/pragmatic factors can be provided. Studies like these that use distinctions between Concept, Substantive and Intentional Subject help us understand how thought influences the functioning of language. However, their effects on the functioning of language are rather limited. Variation in cases like these usually consists in whether a language makes the distinction in its lexicon or not: thus, the grammar of French has two pronouns that correspond to the distinction in (i), whereas English does not mark this distinction. 18
Both 'actant' and 'event' must be understood in a broad sense, covering arguments and
adjuncts on the one hand, states and activities on the other. 19
Languages usually have four means of identifying actants:
(i) common nouns; (ii) proper names, which rigidly designate the actants; (iii) demonstratives and deictics, which indentify the actants directly; (iv) anaphora/cataphora, which indicate that the actant is identified elsewhere in the discourse or context. Here, I will only discuss common nouns, the mode of identification most directly relevant for the point at hand. 20
The notion of atomization corresponds to the notion of 'extensity' (extensile) discussed in
Wilmet (1986). 21
See Chierchia (1998), Cheng & Sybesma (1999). I simplify matters a lot here; additional
constraints are involved. 22
Delfitto & Schroten (1991) also assume that Number is not on N in French. On Number as an
independent word in Walloon, see section 3.2 of chapter 3 and the references therein. 23
If we assume that V still functions as the head internally to the compound, though it does not
determine the category of the compound for external purposes, the impossibility for [V+N] to bear Number could be due to the fact that Number here is very different from the Number that comes with Tense from agreement with the subject: this Number on an N (compound or not) is an indication of plurality at the unit level, not some agreement feature indicating that a relation holds with another element like a subject (see the discussion of agreement in chapter 6). Such an indication of plurality would not be compatible with the verbal features of the head of the
Adjectives, Interfaces and Explanation 55 compound ^open-can. As for can-opener, it is not an N+V compound which would reflect some relation between a dependent and a functor category. Rather, can-opener is an N+N compound: the suffix -er is added to open to form the N opener, which is compounded with the N can. Thus, we can invent compounds in which the N opener holds a very loose relation with the first N: lefty-opener (for left-handed persons), nighttime-opener (with an integrated light). 24
As suggested by Longobardi (1994, note 14), the unacceptability of a plural DET with two
singular N projections as in *Les secretaire de Jean et collaboratrice de Paul sont a la gare, is probably due to a low-level condition "requiring morphological agreement between the features of the determiner and those of each of the head noun." This requirement holds even in a language that allows reference to two individuals like English: *Those secretary of John and collaborator of Paul is/are at the station. An interesting question is what happens if this low-level condition is not violated, as in the following example from Grevisse (1986: §668) in which the Det is plural, as well as all the Ns: (i)
Les officiers, sous-officiers et soldats The officers, non-commisioned officers and soldiers
Grevisse observes that the article is not repeated only if the set of nouns forms a narrowly united whole in one's thought. So the reference does not seem to be to different individuals, but to a group described by the Ns. This is the expected interpretation if semantically relevant Plural is marked only once on the Det: there is a single plurality, a single group. The following additional examples also have the single plurality reading: les dimanches et jours feries (the Sundays and holidays), les Ponts et Chaussees (the bridges and roads). If the coordination bears not on plain Number but on a difference between quantifiers (i), or on a difference between two aspects of demonstrativity (ii), or on a distinction between possessors not morphologically neutralized (iii), then the result is acceptable. Thanks to Anne Zribi-Hertz for bringing these facts to my attention. (i) (ii)
Take one or several apples, a
*One should take this or these books,
b
One should take these or those books.
56 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (iii) 26
I will take your or my book(s).
Matthews (1993: 92) describes Chomsky's stance as follows: "Chomsky then argues that this
treatment is better than that of an 'Item and Arrangement' grammar, in which plural and the like form sequences of morphemes. One reason is that 'many of these "morphemes" are not phonologically realized' and we must therefore state specific rules which indicate that they are null. 'More generally, the often suppletive character of inflectional systems, as well as the fact t h a t . . . the effect of the inflectional categories may be partially or even totally internal, causes cumbersome and inelegant formulation of rules' when they apply to sequences of morphemes in the 'Item and Arrangement' style (173). Furthermore, 'the order of morphemes is often quite arbitrary'. By contrast, his restatement of the traditional approach requires no rule when features are unrealised, 'suppletion and internal modification cause no special difficulty', and the categories are unordered. 'I know', he says, 'of no compensating advantage for the modern descriptivist reanalysis of traditional paradigmatic formulations'. It 'seems', he concludes, to be an ill-advised theoretical innovation" (174)." For an analysis of Tense similar to the one presented here for Number, see Bouchard (1998b). 27
The idea that selectional requirements imposed on a nominal expression may be realized in
different components of this expression is somewhat implicit in the proposal by Abney (1987) that N is the semantic head of a nominal expression, and Det its structural head; this is even more directly expressed in Grimshaw (1991), who assumes that the N-D system is a multi-headed extended projection, and that N and D belong to the same category [-V, +N], the difference being that N is lexical, whereas D is functional.
Adjectival Modification in French 57
2
ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION IN FRENCH "Que n'a-t-on tente pour eviter, ignorer ou expulser le sens? On aura beau faire: cette tete de Meduse est toujours la, au centre de la langue, fascinant ceux qui la contemplent." Emile Benveniste, Problemes de linguistique generate, p. 126.
1. A STRICTLY COMPOSITIONAL ANALYSIS OF ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION To understand how and why variation takes place across languages with respect to a certain phenomenon, such as adjectival modification, we must first have a comprehensive description of the phenomenon in one language, and provide a principled account of the relevant properties in that language. Once we have a very good account of what a phenomenon like adjectival modification involves in one language, then we can figure out what exactly varies in other languages. Moreover, if we make the strong hypothesis that all variation arises from logically anterior properties, i.e., whenever there is more than one optimal solution to the legibility conditions of the external systems, then we must determine why these external properties induce the observed variations. In this chapter, I use French as my basis to understand adjectival modification. At the outset, we must identify the general interface properties involved in the relation between an ADJ and an N, so that we may then begin the analysis of the French data. In order to understand the modification of a noun by an ADJ, we must understand why the ADJ has a relation with the N, and the possible nature of this relation. There are two aspects to the relation, one of form and one of meaning. Therefore, a proper analysis of adjectival modification lies in understanding the mode of
58 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces encoding information at the SM interface which the languages under discussion have chosen to express the relation between the ADJ and the N, and in having a clear notion of the elements of meaning that are being expressed. Since linear ordering and the structure that derives from it plays a crucial role in adjectival modification in French, we must investigate how exactly linear combination actually works in the system based on interfaces that I am adopting, i.e., how the notion of Juxtaposition actually operates in a linguistic system. At the same time, we must study what is being expressed: what is the semantic contribution of various ADJs and what are the elements of meaning of Ns. Moreover, given that we are looking at a relation established inside a nominal expression, properties of the expression as a whole may interact with those of the ADJ and impose conditions on it. Therefore, we must take into account the semantic contribution that a nominal expression makes to a sentence, and what semantic elements are required for the expression to be able to make that contribution. It is also important to determine how the elements of this contribution could be expressed at the SM interface, and what particular options have been chosen by each language. With regards to the SM properties of the modification of an N by an ADJ, the means used to encode this relation in French is Juxtaposition of sound-bearing elements, which results in a temporal linearization. I assume that the resulting structure has strictly those properties which directly obtain from the temporal linearization. The bare phrase structure theory that I adopt is therefore similar to the proposals in Bouchard (1979, 1982, 1991, 1995) and Chomsky (1994, 1995), but more stringent than these proposals which at times depart from minimal assumptions. The central assumptions are given in (1), and some of the consequences in (2). (1)
Basic assumptions of Integral Bare Phrase Structure: i.
The only structural primitives are lexical items and an associative function Merge
that combines them together. ii.
Since the only primitives available are those taken from the lexicon, the result of
Merging a and |3 is of the categorial type a or (3; hence the property of endocentricity follows. (Labels like N, A, P have no status in the theory, and are just convenient abbreviations). iii.
Given that Juxtaposition is a means to encode a semantic relation, the Merger of a
and p is triggered by semantic properties.
Adjectival Modification in French 59 iv.
The functor category is the one that projects (Flynn 1Q83, Speas 1986): this follows
from the fact that, even though a category X is slightly changed since it is saturated or modified by its sister category, it remains essentially an X. (2)
Consequences of Integral Bare Phrase Structure: i.
Structure is minimal: a head projects if and only if it combines with another element,
and as many times as necessary. Therefore, there are no nonbranching projections. ii.
Bars or other indicators of levels of projection have no theoretical status. (Given the
hierarchy of the tree, plus the content of the daughter nodes, it is easy to determine what relation holds: a distinction by bars is a redundant receding.) iii.
Adjunction, with a node interpreted as being split in two segments, also has no
theoretical status.l Assumption (l.iii) is crucial. It expresses the intuition that human languages combine meaningful elements into larger ones. Several authors have remarked that semantic selection is a crucial notion for licensing Merge (Bouchard 1979, Grimshaw 1979, Pesetsky 1982, Rochette 1988). If the combination of a and p cannot be interpreted in a meaningful way by the semantic rules of the language, the result is syntactically well-formed, but gibberish. Merge and the selection licensing it are inseparably linked, otherwise the system vastly overgenerates. This interdependency between Merge and semantic selection is implicit in most analyses. For instance, in the LCA approach of Kayne (1994), the notion of complement plays a key role: holding a complement relation determines that branching will be nonsegmented, whereas a non-complement relation induces a segmented branching, with subsequent effeqts on order. Whether a complement or non-complement relation is at play is determined by selectional considerations, which means the distinction is tied to the meaning interface. Let us look at the two elements of the interdependency in more detail. In the semantic relation established between two elements of meaning A and B, an element is combined with another to add something to it, either an argument or a modifier. There is always a fundamental asymmetry like this at the level of semantic combination. This observation dates back to the earliest studies that treated language as a system. A system presupposes a commonality which links its elements, as well as distinctiveness among them: this is the essence of the systematic opposition between subject and predicate put forward by Aristotle. Moreover, according to Plato, we perceive distinctiveness as
60 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces a dichotomy, from -which -we may derive the fundamental binary asymmetric combinations which are the material of natural language semantics. Let us use the general terms Junctor and dependent to refer to these elements of the semantic asymmetry.2 Something must indicate which one of A or B acts as a functor and which one as a dependent. When Juxtaposition of sound-bearing elements is the means to encode this relation (i.e., Merge), a temporal linearization results from having two elements A and B share a temporal edge: at the SM interface, A either precedes or follows B. This observation also has its roots in the earliest studies on language and has gained renewed importance by the use of it in the Linear Correspondence Axiom of Kayne (1994). The fact that the observation is considered self-evident is not surprising, since the source of the fundamental asymmetry in temporal Juxtaposition lies in inherent physiological properties of the human SM apparatus. Since temporal linearization and semantic combination must be matched, and since both exhibit a fundamental asymmetry, it follows that their asymmetries must be matched. Therefore, linearization is a natural means to indicate which of the forms A or B corresponds to the functor in the semantic combination. The choice of temporal order is arbitrary: this arbitrariness forces the association of the semantic and linear asymmetries to be conventionalized. This conventionalization is in line with the standard observation that the arbitrariness of a sign forces it to be constant (Benveniste 1966:4955, Milner 1989: 97-98). Accordingly, the central linearization parameter is defined on the functordependent relation established between two elements:
(3)
Linearization Parameter: The functor precedes/follows its dependent.
c This is the simplest type of mapping between form and meaning, i.e., a homomorphy between semantic composition and composition of perceptual forms: the asymmetry in temporal Juxtaposition is matched with the asymmetry in the semantic relation. A head parameter like (3) is not a stipulation: it arises from the interaction of necessity and constraints on usability—when temporal Juxtaposition operates, the output must be ordered—and this is required by the logically anterior legibility conditions. Therefore, the parameter is optimal since nothing is added to the theory. It ascribes a clear and determinable role to the temporal ordering induced by our physiology, a role not obfuscated by having covert elements in the structure that are not related to interface properties. Moreover, the variation found in the basic order of languages is not an imperfection, but
Adjectival Modification in French 61 arises because there is more than one optimal solution to the legibility conditions of the external systems. A language must choose between the two possibilities of linearization for the information to be consistently encoded: it must conventionalize its choice. In French, the parameter is set as in (4): (4)
In French, the functor category precedes its dependent.
Given this setting, the asymmetry in the order of the concatenation [N+ADJ] in French reflects the simplest form of asymmetric semantic association in which the N is the head and the ADJ its dependent. The relation of set intersection which postnominal ADJs entertain with N falls naturally in this picture: the head N denotes a set of entities, and the adjective narrows it down to a subset. Since lexical semantics play a crucial role in the licensing of the syntactic operation Merge, it is important to look into the nature and organization of semantic components of lexical items involved, in order to determine at least in broad outlines how these components operate in the licensing of syntactic combination. Recall that for a common N such as mammal, the semantic part of its entry is a network of interacting elements: the characteristic function f, the time interval i, the possible world w, and a variable assignment function g. This determines the set of things that have the property of being a mammal in w at i, i.e., the extension of mammal, and in conjunction with g, we obtain the denotation of the expression. Given that the network of sub functions of an N is unified into a lexical item, it generally functions as a whole with respect to selection and the licensing of Merge. In other words, when an N acts as a functor category and merges syntactically with some modifier, it does so as a fully specified set of descriptive features which is closed off, and this functor category gets modified as a whole. This seems to be the general case. Thus, the parameter in (4) directly determines the order between an ADJ and an N in French when the set determined by the ADJ narrows down the main set determined by all the subfunctions of the N, i.e., with the set of things that have the property of being an N in w at i'. Under this intersective interpretation, the nominal is fully specified in all its subfunctions and gets modified by the ADJ as a whole: this whole-to-whole relation is isomorphic with the relation between the two forms being combined, therefore the head N must precede the dependent ADJ according to (4). This accords with the common observation that French postnominal adjectives are extensional: they "help to determine the particular individual which is the intended referent of the description in
62 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces which the adjective occurs" (Kamp 1975: 153). In terms of Siegel (1980: 150), they are of the type t///e, they modify extensions of noun phrases. However, a simple rule of intersection with the functor category —with the whole network of the N—does not seem to hold for all ADJs. We saw briefly in chapter 1 that subsective ADJs such as skillful are not interpreted in an absolute way, but relative to the N they modify, and that intensional adjectives likefoture, false, alleged are neither intersective nor subsective. It is possible that part of the problem is only apparent. Kamp & Partee (1995) argue that a substantial proportion of subsective ADJs may be brought under the rules governing intersective ADJs by taking into account contextual recalibration: subsective ADJs like those in (5) would actually be intersective, but context-dependent. (5)
a
Sam is a giant and a midget,
b
Sam is a giant midget,
c
Sam is a midget giant.
With overt conjunction as in (5a), the sentence is interpreted as contradictory (unless other respects are introduced, such as a mental giant and a physical midget). In (5b) and (5c), the predicate serving as head N is interpreted relative to the external context, and the predicate functioning as a modifier is recalibrated to make distinctions within the class of possible referents of the N: the interpretation of the modifier is adjusted according to the context created by the head N. In fact, intersective ADJs are probably all contextually calibrated. As indicated in Bouchard (1998a), very typical intersective ADJs —such as color ADJs, shape ADJs and relational ADJs— are contextually calibrated. For instance, a sheet of paper of the same color as awhile person is not considered white. A purple finch or a pink frog may show very tenuous shades of those colors. A round face is not like a round wheel. A hard mattress is soft compared to a hard bench. An eldest son is not necessarily an eldest child. There may therefore be a vast class of ADJs for which the simple hypothesis of intersection holds, taking into account the effects of contextual calibration. There still remains the class of intensional ADJs which apparently do not fall under a simple isomorphic compositional analysis based on intersectivity. This is what lead formal semanticists to propose that these ADJs are not functions that map sets with sets, but properties with properties, that is, that they are intensional rather than extensional. The property that a predicate stands for determines not only its actual extension, but also the extensions which it would have in other
Adjectival Modification in French 63 possible circumstances (i.e., by varying the values of i, w, and other such elements). This spectrum of actual and potential extensions presents an intensional view of the predicate. It is this aspect of the nominal that would be affected by intensional ADJs. Note that these ADJs do not affect the intension of the N by targeting the whole complex of subparts of N that allow it to range over extensions, but only one of those elements in particular. In fact, each of these subparts can be targeted by different adjectives, which provides independent support for these subparts of nominal expressions. Which subpart of N is targeted depends on the meaning of the ADJ (a temporal ADJ like future is compatible with the interval of time i, perfect with the characteristic function f, false with the possible world w, alleged with the value assignment function g; I return to the precise analysis of each of these adjectives in section 2). Given that the semantic part of the entry of an N is a network of subfunctions, this is not unexpected: nothing rules out the possibility that Merge be licensed by a subpart of this network in some cases. This kind of relation of an element with only subparts of another element is recurrent in language. For instance, it is the rule rather than the exception for agreement to hold for only some of the features of a constituent. Phonological processes may affect a complete feature bundle, as in final consonant deletion in French. But more often than not, phonological processes affect only a subpart of the features: for example, this is typical of processes of spreading or assimilation.3 If an ADJ targets only a subpart of N, not the whole N as a full closed-off functor category, then the N may not precede the ADJ according to (4): the order N+ADJ signals a relation between a head N and a dependent, but here we have a relation between a subpart of N and a modifier. The setting for French in (4) therefore predicts that this different kind of selectional licensing should have structural effects of its own: since the relation is not whole-to-whole, it cannot be encoded by the order N+ADJ. Since the relation that is being encoded is other than the one between a functor N and a dependent ADJ, the setting in (4) must apply in an Elsewhere fashion: an order other than N+ADJ must encode the relation between a subpart of N and an ADJ. There is only one other possibility: the order must be ADJ+N. This is indeed what we find in French: ADJs with an intensional reading, i.e., which modify a subpart of N, occur in prenominal position. (6)
a
le futur president
the future president
b
de parfaits scelerats
perfect scoundrels
c
de faux diamants
false diamonds
d
ce presume communiste
that alleged communist
64 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces More generally, the Elsewhere application of (4) predicts that any element that holds a homomorphic relation of whole-to-part(s) rather than whole-to-whole should appear in pre-head position. This is confirmed by the fact that the Elsewhere application extends to a well-known class of exceptions to the No Complement restriction on left branch projections. This restriction holds for languages which have the setting Head-Dependent like French and English and can be observed in an example such as *a proud of her son mother (see section 2.12 below). As Emonds (1976) points out, there are three important exceptions to the No Complement restriction: each specifier in (7) contains a complement, yet it is a phrase that is on the left branch of a head to which it is related. (7)
a
Spec of IP (subject) The president of the university was fired,
b
SpecofCP(WH) Which part of the car was damaged?
c
Spec of DP (Genitive NP) The president of the university's report
Far from being exceptions, these three cases actually follow from the present analysis, thus giving it additional support. In all three cases, the phrasal element is actually engaged in two relations, one "thematic" and one functional. A subject as in (7a) relates thematically to VP and functionally to Tense; a sentence-initial Wh-phrase as in (7b) relates thematically to a sentence-internal element and functionally to C; a Genitive NP as in (7c) relates thematically to N and functionally to Case features of Det. In all three cases, the phrasal specifier does not establish a "whole-to-whole" relation with the head that follows it, since it is split between two relations. Therefore, the functorhead parameter setting for English, which is the same as in French, does not apply directly to these Phrase+Head combinations, because the Phrase does not hold an exclusive relation with one head that would allow them to be ordered by (4). So there are two cases in which (4) applies in an Elsewhere fashion to derive an order in which the functor category follows an element. First, if the relation is too tight, as in the case of prenominal ADJs, which do not hold such a whole-to-whole relation with a whole functor category, but modify a subpart of N, then (4) forces the order ADJ-N, since the order N-ADJ would imply a functor-saturator/modifier relation, which is not the intended interpretation. Second, if the relation is too loose, since it is split between two elements, the parameter in (4) forces the order to be Subject-T, WH-C and Genitive-D in an Elsewhere fashion.
Adjectival Modification in French 65 The simple parameter in (4) allows us to account for (i) the order of a head and its dependents, (ii) the order of a head and an element that has a relation with a subpart of this head, such as ADJ-N, and (iii) the fact that a phrase holding a split relation with a head appears in the opposite order of the head-complement combination, i.e., that Spec is on the opposite side of the complements.4-5 In other words, the Linearization Parameter determines an isomorphic—one-to-one—relation for whole-to-whole, true intersection in adjectival modification, and its Elsewhere application determines a homomorphic—one-to-many—relation for cases where the adjective modifies only a subpart of the N. Like Katz (1964), Pustejovsky (1995), Beard (1991) and Jackendoff (1997), I allow an ADJ to modify only a subpart of N. However, there is a fundamental difference with these analyses: I do not allow modification of elements internal to the characteristic function / providing the property that interprets the N, but only modification of/itself, as well as /', w, g. These are not contextdependent notions like qualia, but general, nondefeasible subparts that all common nouns have. I therefore avoid the problem of multiple polysemy created by the defeasibility of the qualia structures and sublexical semantic features of these authors.6 In sum, I am claiming that all ADJs are intersective. The difference between ADJs traditionally analysed as intersective and ADJs that are subsective or intensional is that the latter attribute a property that is compatible with a subpart of N, so that these ADJs may combine with only this subpart of the N. There is no need to say that there are different types of ADJs. The differences in the semantic properties being attributed are not typological, not a trait distinguishing classes of ADJs, but a lexical characteristic of each ADJ: the fact that the semantics of a certain ADJ is applicable to the time interval / of N, for example, is on a par with the fact that the semantics of some ADJs is compatible with an N such as person, others with table, others again with idea. The strongest version of compositionality can be maintained. Under the present analysis, the structures involving a prenominal and a postnominal adjective in French are minimal and are not distinguished by different bar levels, or different types of structural combinations (such as Merge vs node-splitting Adjoin).
66 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces All the information required to properly interpret these combinations is present. The effects of Merge and linear order in syntactic structures are decoded by the Linearization Parameter and the setting (4) of French. It follows from the way French matches the asymmetry in temporal Juxtaposition with the asymmetry in the semantic relation that the N espion 'spy' entertains a headdependent relation with the postnominal ADJ americain: the ADJ applies to the whole network of elements that determine the extension of the N (i.e., the network formed by the characteristic function/of the N, its time interval /', its possible world w, and its variable assignment function g). In traditional terms, this is a case of restrictive modification, whereby the ADJ helps fix the identity of the referent by narrowing the description of the N: there is a set pre-established by the N which is intersected by a set determined by the ADJ. On the other hand, the prenominal position of the ADJ presume 'presumed' indicates that this is not a case of a head-dependent relation. The ADJ presume does not apply to the extension of espion, it does not determine a set of things that intersects with the set of things that have the property of being a spy in w at /. Rather, presume provides some information about some element (whichever is compatible with its semantics) in the network of interacting elements that determine the denotation of the expression with espion: so presume changes what falls in the extension or denotation of espion. There are two subelements of the N which are compatible with the semantics of presume. First, presume may target the characteristic function of espion: the property espion is said, alleged to apply to someone. Second, presume may apply to the variable assignment function g. The interpretation then is that some agency or other has alleged that there is a spy, that some value may be found for the function g. Both claims are actually made by the simple act of using the word espion, since one then indicates that a certain individual has been assigned as a value by the function g of espion and has the property 'espion'. But by explicitly indicating by the adjective presume that this has been done, the speaker prompts the inference that the property 'espion' may be wrongly attributed to the individual. Under the first interpretation in which presume applies to the characteristic function, the inference is that the individual identified by the value does not have the property: someone is (wrongly) said to be a spy. If presume applies to the variable assignment function, the inference is that no value should be assigned at all. In other words, either there is someone whose spying is supposed, or a spy is supposed to exist.7 Both allegations made by unpresume espion may be denied, the first one as in (9a), and the second one as in (9b):
Adjectival Modification in French 67 (9)
a
Ce presume espion n'en est pas un.
b
Ce presume espion n'existe pas.
This alleged spy is not really one. This alleged spy does not exist. The idea that a prenominal ADJ like presume changes what falls in the extension of the nominal is different from the traditional view, in which nonrestrictive modification is usually described as providing a secondary comment on the N (cf. Croft 1990). In the present analysis, nonrestrictive modification does not contrast with restrictive modification in being a secondary comment, but by participating in establishing a single set with the N rather than by restricting a set pre-established by the N (It is in this sense that presume is intensional here). Therefore, in terms of functor and dependent, presume is not a dependent that adds something to the functor by saturation or modification, but participates in the determination of the functor category itself: presume and espion form a complex functor category. We are thus driven on principled grounds to the conclusion that prenominal ADJs are somewhat closer to the head N than postnominal ADJs. It is interesting to note that this idea has been proposed on empirical grounds by several authors in the past—on phonological, syntactic and semantic grounds—and is in line with a tradition that extends over more than two centuries. Waugh notes that the lexicographer Pierre Joseph Andre Roubaud made the observation in 1786 in his Nouveaux synonymes frangois. She provides several examples of the observation being repeated in various forms by almost all the numerous authors who have studied French adjectives since then. The following passage from Lafaye (1841) is typical (quoted p. 3 of Waugh 1977): "L'adjectif prepose exprime une qualification essentielle, caracteristique; c'est une epithete de nature. L'adjectif postpose exprime une qualification accessoire, accidentelle; c'est une epithete de circonstance[...] En mettant 1'adjectif avant le substantif nous les unissons si etroitement qu'ils s'identifient en quelque sorte et deviennent comme inseparables, la chose ne se concevant plus sans la qualite [...] Au contraire, 1'adjectif postpose n'est jamais au substantif que comme 1'accident a 1'egard de la substance; son idee n'est que secondaire, indicative." This description accords with my conception of restrictive vs nonrestrictive modification, and it finds an explanation in the application of the Linearization Parameter and the setting (4) of French to minimal structures as in (8).
68 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces It is important to note that the structures in (8) and their interpretations are not obtained by adding auxiliary assumptions to the grammar, but rather by making explicit much of what is implicit in many theories, and removing all that is in excess of the strictly minimal properties derivable from external systems logically anterior to linguistic theory. This cleaning up provides a more explanatory theory. In addition, it is descriptively more adequate: we will now see that the analysis is supported by the simple account it provides of extremely intricate properties of adjectival modification regarding the semantic, phonological and syntactic facts.
2. BASIC PHENOMENA "Souvent on a essaye de mettre en doute les distinctions de sens, dont une grande partie a deja ete maintes fois notee, et les contradicteurs ont eu beau jeu d'opposer aux grammairiens qui avaient etabli ces distinctions, des cas contraires qui a leurs yeux enlevaient tout fondement a la theorie. Selon nous, ces cas contraires demandent a etre examines un par un; bien analyses, ils serviront a faire comprendre la complication des forces en jeu et la valeur relative des differents points de vue, mais non a en exclure un seul." Blinkenberg 1933: 52-53. The standard approach to adjectival modification is to assume that adjectives fall into subclasses such as predicative, intersective, subsective, intensional, restrictive, and so on. These subclasses would be defined by semantic criteria and are said to correlate with particular syntactic positions or features. However, this kind of classification turns out to be rather weak, since the typological distinctions are not absolute, but are fuzzy because they are determined pragmatically. For instance, color and shape ADJs are presented as typical intersective ADJs: the conclusions of the following syllogisms appear to be true, as they should be for intersective ADJs (Vendler 1968, Kamp 1975). (10)
a.
All mice are mammals. Freddy is a white mouse. Therefore Freddy is a white mammal, (apparently TRUE)
b.
All tables are pieces of furniture. This is a square table. Therefore this is a square piece of furniture, (apparently TRUE)
Adjectival Modification in French 69 Examples (a-b) are usually assumed to be true insofar as color and shape are not clearly relative to the kind of object they describe (cf. Sproat & Shih 1988). But this conclusion is incorrect and appears to hold only because of the pragmatics induced by the lexical choices. Thus, the conclusion of (11) is much less certain than the one in (l0a): (11)
All men are mammals. Denis is a white man. Therefore Denis is a white mammal. (TRUE?)
Color and shape ADJs are just as much on the scale of the N as non-intersective ADJs: a square face is not like a square piece of furniture, and a sheet of paper of the same color as my face is not considered white, though I am a white person. Similarly, RED is relative to the N in the following examples, both quantitatively and qualitatively. (12)
a
John is red.
b
The car is red.
c
I drink red wine.
d
This is a red strawberry.
Just as we must know what X is in order to determine whether the size of a particular referent is considered as a big or small X, we must know what X is in order to determine if it counts as red or not: a strawberry the color of John's face would probably not be considered red. See Wheeler (1972) on red as a relative ADJ. So the classification of ADJs into subclasses is not at all straightforward, since a color ADJ is sometimes intersective (l0a), sometimes scalar nonintersective (12).8 This difficulty to find clear criteria to delimit the subclasses is quite general. For instance, a crucial property attributed to intensional ADJs like suppose is that they are non-predicative. This would be confirmed by a simple test: these ADJs should not appear in the NP BE AP, as shown in (13): (13)
a
ce suppose communiste
that alleged communist
b
*Ce communiste est suppose.
That communist is alleged
70 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces However, the ungrammaticality of (13) does not come from the fact that suppose is used predicatively, but rather that there is a category mistake: with an appropriate argument, we obtain a legitimate predication. (14)
Son communisme est suppose.
His Communism is alleged. (Higginbotham 1985)
So either the test doesn't work, or in terms of classes, we must admit that suppose belongs to (at least) the two subclasses of intensional and predicative ADJs.9 In fact, it seems to be much more the norm than the exception for an individual ADJ to fluctuate from one class to another. Even nationality ADJs like italien, which are classified as thematic ADJs and strongly tend to get a predicative reading, may get a manner interpretation. In particular, by modifying the ADJ with a degree adverb (15a), this reading is made more transparent, as the thematic reading becomes unavailable.10 Manner is also the highly favored reading if the nationality ADJ is prenominal as in (15b). Such a manner use of "geographic" ADJs is very frequent with city ADJs likeparisien. (15)
a
cette invasion tres italienne de 1'Albanie that very Italian invasion of Albania (i.e., in a typical Italian fashion)
b c
cette (tres) italienne invasion de 1'Albanie une revue tres parisienne qui nous vient de Grenoble (Forsgren 1978) a very parisian magazine that comes to us from Grenoble
In sum, ADJs range rather freely over both type and position in which they may appear in French. So it appears as if there are many different subclasses of ADJs, and that individual ADJs typically belong to more than one subclass. This would require many more functional categories or similar devices, and an important augmentation of lexical entries of ADJs in order to account for their various uses and positions. Such a lexical solution is very doubtful: just about every ADJ would require more than one entry, so that language would seem to suffer from generalized homonymy. Yet ADJs form a unified class. There are two main indications that this is so. First, from the earliest studies, such as Arnauld & Lancelot (1660), it has been noted that ADJs have a semantic function of modification of a type that applies to nominal elements. Second, ADJs have the morphological property that they agree with a nominal element—a property which many see as the formal
Adjectival Modification in French 71 counterpart of the first property of semantic dependency (see for instance Riegel 1993). Thus, in French, an ADJ always agrees in gender and number with the N: la pomme verte (theFEM appleFEM greenFEM), le bane vert (theMASC benchMASC greenMASC). The N may be ellipted fairly easily (see chapter 4). In that case, the gender and number of the ADJ (and determiner) are those of the "missing" N: thus, we get la verte (the-FEM green-FEM [one]) if the ellipted N is feminine, but le vert (the-MASC green-MASC [one]) if the missing N is masculine. If it is the property GREEN that is denoted, then the gender is always masculine: le vert = the color green. Therefore, we will have to explain how ADJs form a unified class, and yet most individual forms seem to belong to several subclasses, correlating with meaning and (sometimes) position changes. In my analysis, the fact that ADJs appear to range rather freely over both type and position does not mean that there are several classes of ADJs. Such subclasses of ADJs do not have a theoretical status: they are not formal classes to which ADJs belong, but only indications of statistical tendencies due to what the meaning of each ADJ is compatible with. Thus, some ADJs express concrete properties: they express relations of an object with another (16a), or are referential (16b), or are processual participles (16c), or express perceptions of form or color (16d). (16)
a
le fils aine the elder son, un oiseau captif a captive bird un homme marie/celibataire/veuf/divorce a married/single/widowed/divorced man
b
victoire italienne Italian victory, route napoleonnienne Napoleonian road
c
une decision attendue an expected decision, des jeux interdits forbidden games des circonstances attenuantes mitigating circumstances
d
table ronde round table, etoffe blanche white material
As observed as early as Diez (1844), adjectives of these four "classes" generally appear in postnominal position. This is explained in the present analysis, since the kind of concrete property they express is typically assigned to intended referents, i.e., to sets of individuals determined by the whole network of components of N (the characteristic function/ the time interval /, the possible world w, and the variable assignment function g). Being related to the whole of the N, they must follow the N according to (4). This is statistically the overwhelmingly most frequent position for these adjectives, since an association of their semantics with an extension is natural. But under certain conditions, some of these adjectives may combine solely with a subpart of the N—with its characteristic function, in which case the adjective appears in prenominal position (see section 2.5).
72 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Other ADJs have semantic properties that are easily applicable to subparts of N (f, i, w, g): they appear in prenominal position when they combine with one of these elements. For some, such as suppose, their semantics is such that there are very few other possibilities than modifying a subpart of N, so they almost always appear in prenominal position. Finally, ADJs that have semantics easily applicable either to the whole network of N or to a subpart of it appear in either postnominal or prenominal position, respectively. The relative freedom of distribution of an ADJ varies according to its potential of semantic compatibility. Almost every ADJ may depart from the combination normally expected by its semantics. This is not because it changes class or changes meaning, but simply because it occurs in an association that is less frequent due to extralinguistic factors. Moreover, the departure is not erratic. On the contrary, each distribution ADJ-N and N-ADJ has a clear theoretical status and is very consistently associated with a strict formal relation, both in syntax and in semantics. As indicated above, there is a common property to each alternating pair ADJ-N and N-ADJ: in the ADJ-N combination, the ADJ modifies a subpart of the N, whereas in the N-ADJ combination, the ADJ modifies the whole network of the N. So the freedom of distribution of ADJs is only apparent: in fact, the prenominal/postnominal placementof an ADJ is strictly determined. Crucially, the present analysis predicts that there is always a meaning difference between the prenominal and postnominal constructions in French. Moreover, the difference in meaning is regular, predictable, because it is compositional and derives from the fact that the ADJ modifies different elements in these two positions. In the following subsections, I look at pairs of prenominal and postnominal adjectival modification. The examples are numerous and varied because, as indicated in the quotation from Blinkenberg (1933) at the beginning of this section, it is often claimed that meaning differences between ADJ-N and N-ADJ combinations are only sporadic and idiosyncratic. This is still the case today: even careful authors such as Abeille & Godard (1999, 2000) deny that there is a systematic semantic difference correlated with the two positions of adjectives. So like others who take the same position, they feel justified to analyze the pairs that exhibit a clear meaning difference by merely listing the ADJs as lexical doublets; the meaning differences in each pair are assumed to be diverse, unrelated to the differences in other pairs, so that each pair with a meaning difference constitutes a separate empirical discovery. "Despite the hesitations of some individuals, it is clear that we must in certain cases distinguish between two lexemes: even if we feel that the semantic relation denoted by the adjective has something in common in the two occurrences, the argument of the adjective is not the same whether
Adjectival Modification in French 73 the adjective is intensional or not. Thus, un ancien coffre [a former chest] is not un coffre ancien [an old chest], it is not even a chest in the reference situation, but something which was a chest in another situation or world; we therefore distinguish ancien 1, intensional and proposed, from ancien 2 intersective, classifying and postposed" Abeille & Godard (1999: 13). In the following subsections, I present a variety of data about adjectival modification in French. As we will see, the data support the analysis that I advocate: there is always a meaning difference in these pairs ADJ-N/N-ADJ, and it is not erratic but regular, generalizing to all pairs.
2.1. Clear Meaning Differences Between ADJ-N and N-ADJ Combinations Let us start by pairs on which people generally agree that they exhibit a clear meaning contrast. (17)
a
eglise ancienne church that is old
b
ancienne eglise former church
The reason why there is a meaning difference between eglise ancienne and ancienne eglise is not that the ADJ has two lexical entries with different meanings, or that there is a difference in the type of the ADJ (lexically specified or obtained by type shifting). There is a single adjective ancienne which means 'old, aged' in both constructions, but the relation is not with the same semantic unit of the N, so the resulting meaning is compositionally different. In eglise ancienne, the ADJ combines with the whole network of the N, so it modifies the extension of eglise: the set of things that have the property of being a church in w at / intersects with the set determined by the property 'aged' of ancienne, hence the interpretation of a church that is old. In ancienne eglise, the ADJ only modifies the subelement to which the temporal property 'aged' is applicable, i.e., the time interval / at which the characteristic function of eglise holds. This time interval / is deictic, defined on the basis of NOW, the moment of speech; the interpretation when ancienne applies to the / of eglise is therefore 'something characterized as a church at an interval of time in the past', i.e., 'former church.' We therefore have a direct explanation for the intuition that the ADJ has common semantics in the two constructions—ancienne has only one meaning, one entry—and for the fact that the prenominal ADJ gets an "intensional" interpretation—it targets a subpart of N— as well as the fact that the postnominal ADJ gets a classifying reading—it targets the whole network of N subfunctions.
74 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Consider now the ADJparfait 'perfect', which expresses a judgement by the speaker and exhibits a clear contrast in what is being modified in examples such as (18): (18)
a
des fleurs parfaiies perfect flowers (property assigned to the set of individuals determined by fleurs)
b
de parfaits imbeciles perfect imbeciles, de parfaits seelerats perfect scoundrels (perfection not assigned to the set of individuals determined by imbecile, scelerat, but assertion that the characteristic function is perfectly filled, fits perfectly)
In the postnominal construction des fleurs parfaites, a property is assigned to a subset of the individuals determined by fleurs. But when parfait appears in prenominal position de parfaits imbeciles, de parfaits scelerats, perfection is not assigned to some individuals determined by imbeciles, scelerats: that would be contradictory, given their meaning, and indeed placing the ADJ in postnominal position scerelats parfaits is semantically odd because these two sets of individuals are not expected to intersect. Rather, it is asserted in (18b) that the characteristic function is perfectly filled, fits perfectly, that all the attributes of the N are clearly present (which explains why NPs like these are often paraphrased as de complets imbeciles, de complets scelerats, and why prenominal parfait is often translated in English as 'complete', 'total' or 'thorough': these expressions have similar uses, but not the same meaning as prenominal parfait). If we construe the characteristic function of the N "as a measure of the degree to which an object falls in the extension of a given concept" (Kamp & Partee 1995: 131), then parfait in prenominal position seems to indicate that this degree is at its utmost.12 Other ADJs that exhibit a clear contrast are those which express a judgement by the speaker about truth value, such as vrai 'true', faux 'false, fake', reel 'real', authentique 'authentic'. Thus, consider the scope of the modification of the AD] faux in (19).
(19)
a
des pianos faux
some pianos false pianos that are out of tune
b
de faux pianos
false (fake) pianos
In the postnominal use of the ADJ faux in (19a), there is something inexact about the set of individuals denoted: by inference, since they are pianos, they are out of tune. In the prenominal construction de faux pianos, the individuals denoted have properties of a piano, but only in some
Adjectival Modification in French 75 world w, not in the "real" world: they are not true to the reality of a piano in some respect (for instance, they may have the shape and color of a piano, but have no strings and related structure inside them; similarly, unfaux oil 'a false eyelash' does not, in fact, grow from anyone's eyelids). These are pianos, but not "real ones", they cannot do all that real pianos do. In other words, the characteristic function fits, but the possible world indicator is incorrect with respect to the real world.13 A similar strong contrast is found in pairs with an ADJ that expresses a positive judgement from the speaker, like authentique (examples from Delbecque 1990): (20)
a
C'est un chef-d'oeuvre authentique: les experts 1'ont certifie. It's a masterpiece which is authentic: the experts have certified it.
b
C'est un authentique chef-d'oeuvre: il fait 1'admiration de tous. It's an authentic masterpiece: everyone admires it.
Postnominal authentique in (20a) indicates that the individual denoted by the nominal has been properly identified as a masterpiece. Prenominal authentique does not apply to the denotation, but indicates that the characterictic function applies exactly, that all the properties required by it are verifiable. A very similar contrast holds between un besoin reel 'a need that truly exists' and un reel besoin 'something which truly is a need', the only difference being that the meaning of reel indicates that the authentification is done by the speaker here. If we take an N that lexically defines an assignment of truth value, such as mensonge 'lie', which denotes an untruth, then applying to the denotation of the N the ADJ vrai that expresses the opposite value results in a contradiction, as in (2la); but there is no contradiction if the ADJ is prenominal as in (21b) since the judgement it expresses applies not to the denotation of mensonge, but to the value assignment: the assignment of mensonge to a certain statement is said to be truthful, exact: 14 (21)
a
#un mensonge vrai a lie that is true
b
un vrai mensonge a true/real lie
76 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Not only do the examples in this section show a clear meaning difference between prenommal and postnominal positions of the ADJ, they also show a regularity in this difference, having to do with modification of the N as a whole or of a subpart of the N.
2.2. Intensional Adjectives ADJs that are classified as intensional are generally assumed to appear strictly in prenominal position in French.15 The semantics of these ADJs applies very readily to subparts of N, hence their prenominal position. But they are not exclusively prenominal: there are cases in which their semantics appropriately applies to the denotation of some N, in which case the ADJ is postnominal, with a corresponding meaning difference for the combination. We already saw in (17) that this is the case for the temporal ADJ ancien, which applies to the deictic temporal interval i when prenominal, but to the whole network of the N, in a nondeictic fashion, when postnominal. The same contrast is found regularly with other temporal ADJs. For instance, consider the ADJ futur in the following examples:16 (22)
a
le futur president the future president
a'
#le president futur the president of the future
b
#un futur fait a future fact
b'
un fait futur a fact of the future
In (22a), futur is not predicated of president, but is about the interval of time i at which the characteristic function of president holds: futur president indicates that some individual has all the properties required to fall in the extension of the concept of president, except that the status is not yet attained and is to be later. Example (22a') is odd because a temporal ADJ is applied to an expression denoting a human being: this is not a temporal concept, so the result is pragmatically odd. But given a proper context in which human beings are presented like concepts rather than individuals, the combination gets a felicitous interpretation, as in the following example quoted in the Tresor de la Langue Franfaise:
Adjectival Modification in French 77 (23)
On est frappe de voir que tous, sans exception, s'en remettent, centre leurs juges, a la justice d'autres hommes, encore a venir. Ces homines futurs, en 1'absence de valeurs supremes, demeuraient leur dernier recours. We are struck to see that all of them, without exception, rely, against their judges, on the justice of other men, yet to come. These men of the future, in the absence of supreme values, remained their last resort.
Interestingly, we get the opposite judgements with the Nfait. The deictic use of futur in prenominal position in (22b) is odd because it is difficult to conceptualize what kind of object has the properties to be a fact, but will only be attributed factuality later. On the other hand, applying futur to an expression denoting a fact creates no pragmatic problem: so futur may be postnominal as in (22b'), as well as with other Ns that have appropriate semantics, such as those in the following examples in the Tresor de la Langue Fran9aise: (24)
a
[...] il parait cependant que dans une edition future, la citation sera en entier
b
Les poesies ne sont qu'une preface a un "livre futur"; et tous de rever sur ce livre
// seems however that in a future edition, the quotation will be complete futur, aboutissement ideal de la revolte litteraire. Poetries are but a preface to a "futur book" [to appear later]; and all dream about this future book, ideal result of the literary revolt c
La tache du materialisme historique ne peut etre que d'etablir la critique de la societe presente; il ne saurait faire sur la societe future, sans faillir a 1'esprit scientifique, que des suppositions. The task of historical materialism can only be to establish the criticism of the present society; it could only make suppositions about the future society, without failing scientific spirit.
d
Si Ton evoque, pour la musique future, des rassemblements semblables a ceux des physiciens autour d'un cyclotron, on suscitera le sarcasme ou 1'indignation. If we conjure up, for the music of the future, gatherings similar to those of physicists around a cyclotron, we will.arouse only sarcasm or indignation.
The ADJpresent shows a similar contrast between the two positions:
78 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (25)
a
les presents directeurs the present directors
b
les directeurs presents the directors present
Present has a single meaning, indicating correspondence in time or place with some other element. In prenominal position (25a), presents applies to the time interval / and indicates that the property of being directeur holds now; in (25b), presents applies to the denotation of directeurs and indicates that these individuals are here now. Other temporal ADJs that are less obviously intensional exhibit the same behavior. Thus, eternel has the meaning 'with no temporal end' and may appear in either position: (26)
a
la vie eternelle eternal life, des discussions eternelles eternal discussions
b
les eternelles questions/discussions the eternal questions/discussions
In postnominal position, the individuals denoted last for ever; in prenominal position, the interpretation is not that the question or discussions go on forever, but rather that the property of questioning is ongoing, that the status of having a discussion is constantly renewed (with the insinuation that we are getting tired of discussing the subject). This ADJ is often used in expressions such as son eternelle canne a la main 'his/her eternal cane in hand' in which the prenominal ADJ applying to / indicates that canne a la main is a perpetually valid property, that there is a perpetual association of the person with a cane; if the ADJ were in postnominal position, this would be making the pragmatically odd statement that the cane lasts forever. The ADJ prochain indicates a close proximity on a certain scale. This can be a temporal scale as in (27), but also a spatial scale as in (28) or a causal scale as in (29): (27)
a
1'annee prochaine the coming year, la rencontre prochaine the meeting coming soon, son depart prochain his impending departure
b
la prochaine annee the next year, la prochaine rencontre the next meeting, son prochain depart his next departure
(28)
(29)
a
les villages prochains the villages close by
b
les prochains villages the next villages
a
la cause prochaine the immediate, direct cause
b
la prochaine cause the next cause
Adjectival Modification in French 79 In postnominal position, prochain indicates that a relation holds between a pre-established set determined by the N and some other element of a similar nature on a common scale: thus, son depart prochain is a thing which is a departure that will occur soon in time, and les villages prochains is the set of entities which are villages and close to some place of reference. When prenominal, prochain applies to /', indicating that the application of the property of the N is close in time: so son prochain depart is the next application of the property of being a departure, and les prochains villages is the set of entities to which the property VILLAGE will apply next (either because that is the direction we are going in, or they are on the next photos you will be shown, etc.). Note that it is possible that les prochains villages do not exist yet, that they are to be created, whereas les villages prochains necessarily already exist. The closely related ADJproche shows the same contrast: (30)
a
un parent proche a relative who is close
b
un proche parent a close relative
The phrase in (30a) says that a close personal link is held with an individual who is a relative (though the genealogical tie may be distant), whereas (30b) is about the parent relation, there is a close genealogical link (though there may be no personal ties involved). Finally, consider the ADJ suppose, which is generally taken to be a typical example of an intensional adjective. Its meaning is very close to that of presume which we have already seen in the discussion of (8b). The combination of suppose with an N also gives rise to at least two interpretations when it is prenominal because its semantics is compatible with two subparts of N: un suppose espion is one whose quality as a spy is questioned, or whose very existence is doubted. Interestingly, even this paragon of an intensional ADJ may appear in postnominal position: (31)
La solution italienne fut la perspective, reseau ideal de lignes convergeant vers un point de fuite suppose. (Tresor de la Langue Francaise) The Italian solution was perspective, an imaginary network of lines converging towards a supposed vanishing point.
The interpretation here is not that the object may not be truly a vanishing point, or that its existence is unsure, as would be the case if suppose were prenominal; rather, postnominal suppose applies to
80 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces the extension of the N and indicates that the set of things that have the property of being a vanishing point intersects with the set of things that are supposed, imaginary: the vanishing point exists, but in our minds only, not as a brushstroke in a painting or any such concrete manifestation. Finally, it is a common observation that an "intensional" reading is not possible for these adjectives in the predicative construction with BE: in (32), ancienne only gets a reading similar to the one obtained in postnominal position. (32)
Cette eglise est ancienne. That church is old (eglise ancienej i^That is a former church (ancienne eglise,)
In my analysis, this follows from the fact that the ADJ in (32) is not in a position to modify an internal part of the N eglise, but must apply to the whole NP, hence to the whole network of the N. Summarizing, "intensional" ADJs may appear in prenominal or postnominal position. There is always a meaning difference between the two constructions, and it is regular: the unique semantics of each ADJ applies to the denotation of the N when the ADJ is postnominal, and their semantics also applies readily to some subparts of N, in which case the ADJ is in prenominal position.
2.3. Quantitative Adjectives A good number of French ADJs have a meaning which is related to quantity. Phrases with these ADJs in prenominal and postnominal position show the same regularity in meaning difference as those of the previous sections. For instance, when the ADJ nouvelle 'new-FEM' is used postnominally as in (33 a), the stage that Mercx won has been newly created (a town not previously part of the Tour de France, for example): the quantity of stages has recently been increased by one, i.e., there is an intersection between the set of things that have the property of being a stage and the set of things that are new. But when the ADJ is prenominal as in (33b), a new value has been added to the variables in the model, i.e., nouvelle applies to the function g, a subelement of the nominal: so Mercx added one more stage victory to his record, although it could be a stage that has been part of the Tour for a while; the quantity of his victories has increased by one, but not the quantity of stages in the Tour.
Adjectival Modification in French 81 (33)
a
Eddy Mercx a remporte une etape nouvelle. EddyMercx has won a stage which is new.
b
Eddy Mercx a remporte une nouvelle etape. EddyMercx has won a new stage.
A similar effect relating to quantity also shows up in (34): (34)
a
une femme seule
a woman who is alone
b
une seule femme
a sole woman, only one woman
c
La seule femme seule s'est isolee dans un coin. The only woman who was alone isolated herself in a corner.
In its postnominal use in (34a), seule 'sole, single' modifies the whole network of the N, its denotation, hence it indicates that there is only one referent in the relevant context.17 In its prenominal use in (34b), seule indicates that there is a single value assignment to which the characteristic function applies, that only one individual has the characteristic properties of a woman in the model. Thus, a man could be present in the context of (b), but not of (a). Note that since the ADJ does not modify the same element in these two positions, it is possible to have the same ADJ twice as in (34c) without being tautological. The ADJ rare 'not frequent' exhibits a similar contrast: (35)
a
un jardin avec des fleurs rares
a garden with flowers that are rare
b
un jardin avec de rares fleurs
a garden with few flowers
c
un jardin avec de rares fleurs rares a garden with few rare flowers
Postnominal rare derives an intersective reading between the denotation of the N (used metonymically here to refer to species of flowers rather than individuals) and the set of things that are rare. Prenominal rare applies intensionally and indicates that the type 'flower' is rare, hence that there are few tokens of that type in the garden. We see in (35c) that here too filling the two positions with the same ADJ is not tautological. The ADJ nombreux 'with many elements' also quantifies different elements depending on its position:
82 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (36)
a
les families nombreuses
the large families
b
les nombreuses families
the numerous families
c
#des individus nombreux
individuals with many elements
d
de nombreux individus
numerous individuals
e
une famille nombreuse
a large family
f
#une nombreuse famille
a numerous family
g
les nombreuses families nombreuses the numerous large families
Postnominal nombreux says that the set denoted by families intersects with the set of things that are with many elements: these are families with many members (36a), or one family with many members (36e). If the N does not denote objects conceptualized as made up of several parts, such as individu, it is not semantically compatible with this postnominal use of nombreux (36c). In its prenominal use, nombreux says that the type of elements that have the property of being a family or an individual has many elements, that there are many tokens of this type (36b, 36d). That is why it is not compatible with a singular N as in (36f).18 If the requirements for both the prenominal and postnominal interpretations are met, then the ADJ may appear in both positions without inducing a tautological reading (36g). Blinkenberg (1933: 51) observes that a contrast is also found with the ADJ different. (37)
a
les cas differents
the cases that differ, not the same cases
b
les differents cas
the various cases
With postnominal different,
a differenciation is asserted among the denotata of the N: the
instantiations of the N, the individuals, are distinct from one another with respect to some property. But with prenominal different, the differenciation applies only to the variable assignment function g internal to N: values may be attributed that are distinct, not similar, hence the quantitative interpretation. Blinkenberg provides the following example to clearly illustrate the contrast: (38)
On a constate dans notre ville differents cas, identiques entre eux, de cette maladie inconnue jusqu'ici. We discovered in our city various cases, identical with each other, of this disease unknown till now.
Adjectival Modification in French 83 Another ADJ which expresses distinctiveness, autre, exhibits a very similar contrast: (39)
a
un avantage autre
an advantage of a different kind
b
un autre avantage
an additional advantage
ADJs that express similarity rather than distinctiveness also show clear contrasts of interpretation when they appear in prenominal and postnominal position. (40) (41) (42)
a
les memes listes
the same lists
b
les listes memes
the lists same the very lists
a
(un) pareil argument a like argument
b
un argument pareil
such an argument
a
(une) semblable deconvenue a disappointment to that extent
b
une deconvenue semblable a similar disappointment
an argument that is the same
In (40a), prenominal meme applies to the variable assignment function g internal to N indicating that values being attributed are the same. In (40b), memes applies to the whole network of the N and the interpretation is one of autoreflexivity (cf. also lui-meme 'himself, id meme 'at this very place', aujourd'hui meme 'on this very day').19 In (4la), pareil pertains only to the characteristic function of argument, the argument is of the same type, there is a similarity in the intension. Thus, the Larousse dictionary paraphrases en pareil cas as en un cas de cette sorte 'in a case of that sort'. But in (41b), it is the denotata that are similar, there is identity in the extension. We get a similar effect with semblable in (42). The ADJ plein 'full' always expresses a notion of quantity, but with respect to different elements depending on its position. In postnominal position, plein indicates that there are no gaps in the content of the N viewed as a container, that the N container is actually fully occupied by a content: the adjective modifes the denotatum determined by the full network of the N. (43)
un verre plein
a glass full (of liquid or some other content)
une tasse pleine (de bouillon)
a cup full (of bouillon)
une rue pleine de gens
a street filled with people
une lumiere pleine
a light with no gaps
84 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces On the other hand, prenominal plein is intensional, it applies only to the characteristic function. Thus, the examples in (44) express the utmost quantity of matter that a glass, hand or street could hold: so the denotation is of the content that can fit into these containers, not of the containers.20 As forpleine lumiere, it involves the full potential of something that emits light. (44)
un plein verre
a "real" glassful
une pleine tasse (de bouillon)
a "real" cupful (of bouillon)
une pleine rue de gens
a streetful of people
en pleine lumiere
in full (exposure of the) light
Nouns that denote containers can always receive a metonymic reading where the potential content is what is denoted: un verre de biere may denote a glass with beer in it, or it may denote the quantity of beer that this certain glass may contain. However, due to the prenominal ADJ, un plein verre de biere, une pleine tasse de bouillon are intensional and have the additional indication that the quantity is at its utmost: these expressions can only denote the content, not the container. That is why (45a) is odd (you can't hold such a quantity in your hand) and also (46b), which says that both the content and the container go into the pot. (45)
a
#Jean a un plein verre de biere a la main. John has a glassful of beer in his hand.
(46)
b
Jean a un verre plein de biere a la main.
a
Vous ajoutez une pleine tasse de bouillon aux poireaux. You add a cupfull of bouillon to the leeks.
b
#Vous ajoutez une tasse pleine de bouillon aux poireaux.
So once again, the two positions of the ADJ correlate with different ways of combining meanings, and the difference is the regular one predicted by the analysis. The ADJ certain and its close equivalent in various languages have interesting properties that have brought about many studies (Barwise & Cooper 1981, Kamp 1981, Heim 1982, Hornstein 1984, Hintikka 1986, Wilmet 1986, En9 1991, Riegel et al. 1994, Curat 1999, among many others). The present analysis throws a new light on these properties. First, consider the postnominal use of certain in French.
Adjectival Modification in French 85 (47)
a
un fait certain
a sure fact
b
une victoire certaine a sure victory
c
des temoins certains witnesses who I think are sure to testify or who are sure of their testimony
If we assume that the meaning of certain can be paraphrased as something like 'considered assured by some person X' this applies to the whole network of the N in (47): the fact or victory are assured by the speaker to hold at some time interval /', past, present or future, for some value assignment g in possible world w. In the case of the witnesses, it can either be the speaker or the witnesses themselves that are assured. In its prenominal use, certain applies only to a subpart of the N network, namely the value assignment function g: it is considered assured by the speaker that a value can be assigned. In terms of Barwise & Cooper (1981), value-loading is said to be possible. So in (48), the speaker says that there is a possible value for fait, victoire and temoin. (48)
a
un certain fait
a certain fact
b
une certaine victoire a certain victory
c
un certain temoin
a certain witness
This explains why certain (and its equivalents) is often considered to be somewhat specific in its prenominal use. For instance, Lambrecht (1994) defines a specific NP as having a referent identifiable by the speaker: that prenominal certain is specific in this way follows from the possible value-loading induced. On the other hand, this possible value-loading differs slightly but crucially from the characterization of loup (1977) and Hellan (1981). They say an NP is specific when the speaker has an individual in mind as its referent: but the value would be loaded in this case, whereas according to my analysis prenominal certain only says a value is loadable, not that it is loaded. That is why, as En? (1991:19) observes, "acquaintance by the speaker does not seem to be a necessary condition since sentences like [(49a)] seem acceptable without such an implication [...] [(49a)] is acceptable even if the set of relevant tasks has not been introduced into the domain of discourse previously." The observation also holds for French certaine in (49b), and is explained in my analysis.
86 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (49)
a
The teacher gave each child a certain task to work on during the afternoon.
b
L'enseignante a donne a chaque enfant une certaine tache a accomplir durant 1'apresmidi.
Another view of specificity is based on scope, as in Fodor & Sag (1982): a specific NP is one that has wide scope over an operator such as a quantified NP, negation, modals or prepositional attitude verbs. But the analysis runs into problems with certain. Fodor & Sag (1982: 362) note that adjectives like English certain "correlate with scope in only a very rough way" and they consider the semantics of an NP like a certain book as obscure. Indeed, Hintikka (1986) observes that English certain need not have wide scope over a quantified NP and may have the narrowest possible scope in examples like (50a), and Enc (1991) shows that this is also possible with respect to the epistemic operator BELIEVE (5la); these properties hold for French certain as well (50b)(51b). (50) (51)
a
Each husband had forgotten a certain date—his wife's birthday.
b
Chaque mari avait oublie une certaine date—celle de 1'anniversaire de son epouse.
a
John believes that there are unicorns living in his backyard. He claims that he can
distinguish each unicorn from the others, and has given then names. He believes that a certain unicorn is responsible for destroying his roses, and wants to catch him. b
Jean croit qu'il y a des licornes qui vivent dans son jardin. II pretend qu'il peut les
distinguer les unes des autres et leur a donne des noms. II croit qu'une certaine licorne est responsable de la destruction de ses roses, et il veut Fattraper. These problems arise in the scopal definition of specificity because specificity corresponds to having a value loaded, but prenominal certain only indicates that it is loadable. This quasispecificity of prenominal certain follows directly in my analysis. There are other indications that prenominal certain only expresses possible value-loading, not actual value-loading, i.e., that it is not a true marker of specificity. First, whereas a truly specific NP may stand on its own because it is sufficiently informative through its value-loading, NPs with prenominal certain require that some precision be explicitly expressed, otherwise the utterance sounds incomplete (cf. En? 1991:20): thus, (52b) is odd without a continuation like sa mere.
Adjectival Modification in French 87 (52)
a
Tout britannique admire une femme. Every Englishman admires a women.
b
Tout britannique admire une certaine femme—sa mere. Every Englishman admires a certain women—his mother.
Second, a truly specific NP appearing in the ily a construction is interpreted as presentational only, not as existential, because the value-loading of specificity already establishes existence so that it cannot be established again. In contrast, an NP with prenominal certain is interpreted as both presentational and existential, the reason being that the value-loading induced by certain is only potential, so that existence is not pre-established and may be established by ily a. (53)
II y a un certain homme pret a partir accomplir cette mission sur Mars. There is a certain man willing to take on that mission to Mars.
Third, prenominal certain often gives rise to a degree interpretation as in (54). (54)
a
une personne d'un certain age a person of a certain age
b
une certaine opposition a certain (degree of) opposition
This effect of gradation directly follows from the fact that the value-loading expressed by prenominal certain is only potential. Thus, in (54a), I the speaker am saying that I could provide a value for age, that a value is loadable, but I refrain from giving a specific value. Similarly, in (54b), by specifically saying that a value for opposition is loadable, but that I don't actually load it, this can convey that what could receive such a value is tenuous. In both cases, there is no actual meaning of degree, just an inference of degree. Prenominal certain may also be applied to proper names, as in (55). (55)
Un certain Jean Valjean veut vous voir. A certain Jean Valjean wants to see you.
As is well known, a proper name is very different from a common noun. Most crucially, a proper name does not determine a class of objects on the basis of a common property, but designates a
88 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces particular individual in the domain of discourse. In terms of Kripke (1972), it is a rigid designator. Or in terms of Kleiber (1981), a proper name names in a conventional way. A proper name does not bear a concept, it generally does not reveal an attribute of the individual it designates. So a proper name may be assigned to individuals that do not fall in a "natural" class. In terms of Lyons (1977), since a proper name does not bear a meaning which could identify the kind of individual to which we could refer when using it, but only designates an individual directly by contextual convention, it does not denote before it refers. Therefore, when certain is applied to the value assignment function g of a proper name as in (55), this indicates that the speaker is sure that a value can be assigned for that name, that the name applies to some individual. The fact that the speaker does not directly attribute the name to the individual but specifically takes pains to indicate that the name is potentially attributable to this individual gives rise to a weakening of the naming process: some doubts are raised in the hearer as to whether the name actually applies (these doubts being amplified by the use of the indefinite determiner). Just as we saw in the case of intensional adjectives in the previous section, when quantitative adjectives appear in a predicative construction, they only receive the interpretation corresponding to the one they get in postnominal position. I illustrate this with the ADJs certain and seul. (56)
Ce mecanicien est certain (de son travail). =That mecanic is sure (of his -work). £This is some mechanic.
(57)
Cette femme est seule.
-That woman is alone. ^There is only one woman.
The blocked interpretation obtains only when the ADJ modifies a subpart of the network of the N, but it is not in a position to do so in (56) and (57): the ADJ in a predicative construction applies to the whole NP, hence to the whole network of the N. Note that some of the ADJs of this section have interesting effects on the determiner system due to their peculiar semantics: prenominal differents, pareil(s), semblable(s) and certain(s) may appear without a determiner. As we saw above, differents+N
indicates that values may be attributed that
are distinct, not similar: this implies a quantitative interpretation that has an effect similar to atomization, hence a Det bearing Number is not required to induce this process. In the case ofpareil and semblable, their prenominal use indicates that the referent is similar in kind to some other element: this has the same effect as Number in that it provides access to individuals in the set, hence
Adjectival Modification in French 89 Number is not required. As for prenominal certains, it indicates that it is considered assured by the speaker that values can be assigned, that value-loading is possible; the quantity that is implied has an atomization effect that renders Number unnecessary (singular certain in this use is archaic). I will return to the absence of Det in chapter 5. Finally, note that various interpretive and distributional properties of these quantitative ADJs can be accounted for without complicating the theory by attributing to them different adjectival categories, or altogether different categories like Quantifier, Degree, or Determiner.21 The semantics of these ADJs is applicable to different elements in a nominal, and which element is being affected determines the overall interpretation of the phrase as well as whether the ADJ appears in prenominal or postnominal position. Phrases with quantificational ADJs in these two positions show the same regularity in meaning difference as those of the previous sections.
2.4. Evaluative Adjectives A vast class of ADJs are said to be evaluative (or subsective) because their interpretation is dependent on a scale determined by the N. In French, this scale varies according to the position of the ADJ. To illustrate, consider the most studied ADJ of this class, ban and its equivalents in other languages, which is discussed at length in just about every study on ADJs. The ADJ ban indicates that what it modifies has the qualities that befit its nature according to the speaker. A prenominal ADJ is evaluated on an internal scale, the scale of the N: it says something about the property expressed by the N. Thus, in (58a), ban restricts the set that the interpretation of the nominal expression relies on: this set will consist in individuals that can efficiently fulfill the property interpreting the N. So in un ban chef, we infer that the individual should be good at what a chef usually does, i.e., cooking, and in un ban couteau, we may infer that the knife is good for cutting. (58)
a
un bon chef
a good chef
b
un bon couteau a good knife
On the other hand, a postnominal scalar ADJ is put on a higher order, external scale, and determines the set of individuals being characterized: so in (59), the quality of being good applies on a broader scale, such as being good as a human being for chef, (59b) is odd because it is hard to see what this
90 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces external scale could be for a knife on a general basis and becomes acceptable only if some precision is added such as pour decouper la viande 'to carve meat'.
(59)
a
J'ai connu beaucoup de chefs qui etaient durs envers leurs marmitons; ?a fait plaisir de rencontre un chef bon. / have known many chefs who were hard on their kitchen help; it's a pleasure to meet a chef who is good.
b
#un couteau bon
a knife that is good
These observations fit in directly with my proposal: when a "scalar" ADJ like bon is prenominal, it modifies a component internal to N, namely, the property which makes an object qualify as a member of the restrictor set determined by the N: hence the evaluation is on an internal scale (good as an N). When postnominal, a scalar ADJ modifies the network of the N as a whole, hence an external scale ensues for the evaluation (good in general). Support for the analysis comes from the observation by Vendler (1968) that good and bad are interpreted in an absolute way in (60a), hence are antithetical, but they are interpreted in a relative way in (60b), hence there is no contradiction.
(60)
a
#John is good and bad.
b
John is a good teacher and a bad researcher.
In my terms, the external scale in (60a) comes from the predicative construction (cf. (32), (56), (57) above), whereas the internal scale in (60b) comes from the fact that the adjective applies only to the characteristic function, not the whole network of the N. We can tease out the contrast further by looking at French examples in which the order clearly indicates whether the ADJ applies to the whole N or just a subpart of it. Thus, (6la) is essentially like its English counterpart in (60b). In (61b) however, the postnominal ADJs convey that John is good on an external scale when acting as a chef, but bad on an external scale when acting as a professor. The feeling here is of a Dr Jekill and Mister Hyde sort of situation, John having a radically different character, being a different person, depending on his occupation.
(61)
a
Jean est un bon chef et un mauvais professeur.
b
Jean est un chef bon et un professeur mauvais.
Adjectival Modification in French 91 As already noted in chapter 1, section 2.2.2, what qualities the speaker considers make something good vary according to the context. Thus, the road may be considered good in (62a) because its surface is smooth to drive on, or the scenery is agreable, or it is well built and resistant to wear, or that it is well chosen to get somewhere fast or easily, and so on.
(62)
a
une bonne route
a good road
b
un b on j our
a good day
Similarly, the day may be good in (62b) because the weather is appropriate for some activity (no rain for a picnic, rain for a certain farming activity, wind for surfing), or because things happened that day that the speaker considers are good. The speaker may also use un bonjour to indicate that the day is/was/will be well selected, in which case the expression gets translated as 'one of these days'. This is the argumentative use of bon discussed by Ducrot (1984), Franckel & Lebaud (1990), Delbecque (1990), in which the personal point of view or attitude of the speaker expressed by bon becomes the dominant information conveyed by the ADJ (as well as a few other such evaluative ADJs \ikepetit, long): (63)
a
dans une bonne semaine in a good week, un bon moment a good moment, une petite heure a small hour, de longs mois long months
b
un bon trois kilometres a good three kilometres, dans trois bons kilometres in three good kilometres
c
une bonne tasse de bouillon a good cup of bouillon
The appreciation of the speaker typically bears on expressions of measure, such as a time expression (63a), an expression of distance (63b) or content (63c). Objectively, the amount being measured does not vary, but subjectively, it is perceived as long or short (unepetite heure, de longs mois). In une bonne semaine, the ADJ indicates that the period of time considered has the properties to fulfill the characteristic function of semaine well, hence by inference that this period will be no less than a week. Similarly, in (63b) and (63c), bon is used to convey that the distance is no less than three kilometres, the content no less than a cup (in the latter, bon may bear on the quality of the content bouillon, i.e., its taste, rather than on the quantity).22
92 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces A reviewer of Bouchard (1998a) raised an objection to my generalization that only prenominal ADJs modify components internal to the network of the N: postnominal ADJs modified by certain adverbs appear to modify components internal to N.
(64)
un bon couteau a good knife—un couteau extremement bon an extremely good knife un mauvais chef a bad chef-—un chef incroyablement mauvais an incredibly bad chef
It is true that the knife is most likely interpreted as extremely good as a knife in this case, and the chef as incredibly bad as a chef. Since I assume that a postnominal ADJ modifies the whole set of components of the N, it indirectly modifies the most salient, discriminating component of N , i.e., the property interpreting the N. But the postnominal ADJ cannot target this property as directly as the prenominal ADJ can, if my analysis is correct. It does seem that there is a contrast between the two. For instance, because the prenominal ADJ joins with the property interpreting the N to create a new kind and is thus presented as known by the hearer, an ADJ modified by the adverbs above will preferably appear in prenominal position if the context indicates that the association is (or should be) known by the hearer, as in the anaphoric use in (65): (65)
Paul a engage Jo Jeanjean. Get incroyablement mauvais chef/#ce chef incroyablement mauvais va lui ruiner son restaurant. Paul hired Jo Jeanjean. This incredibly bad chef will ruin his restaurant.
The possibility of using both mauvais chef and chef mauvais to refer to similar situations at times does not mean that they are synonymous. Synonymy is a property of the linguistically given constant meaning of forms, not of the referential situations of their use. It is a recurrent observation that the situations of use may overlap without the meaning of the forms being the same, as in The blue square is on top of the green square and The green square is under the blue square23 The ADJ gros 'big, large, fat' also shows a clear contrast in interpretation between prenominal and postnominal position.
(66)
a
un mangeur/fumeur/buveur gros
an eater/smoker/drinker who is big
b
un gros mangeur/fumeur/buveur
someone who eats/smokes/drinks a lot
Adjectival Modification in French 93 Assuming that gray means something like "surpasses the norm in volume," in postnominal position, it modifies the whole network of the N: so it indicates that the individuals denoted surpass the norm in volume, size being the most salient feature of volume. In prenominal position on the other hand, gros only intersects with the characteristic function of the N: the norm in volume is surpassed qua eater/smoker/drinker, hence by inference with respect to food/smoking/drink. Since the ADJs do not bear on the same element in these two positions, it is possible to have two ADJs at the opposite end of the scale like gros and petit apply to the same N without contradiction, and to have the same ADJ appearing in both positions without being tautological:24
(67)
Les gros fumeurs petits sont beaucoup plus frequents que les gros fumeurs gros. People who smoke a lot and are skinny are much more frequent than people who smoke a lot and are fat.
Abeille & Godard (1999) discuss examples like (66) and acknowledge that there is a difference in meaning correlated with the positions of the ADJs. However, they say that these examples do not really support the hypothesis that the difference is systematic as claimed in Bouchard (1998a), because pairs like these are misleading: the prenominal position is compatible with both interpretations: "It is possible that the postposed ADJ in [unfameur gros] is in fact accentuated, or that the postposition seems natural only to the extent that we build a contrast with the other interpretation, which seems available for that ADJ only in prenominal position" (Abeille & Godard 1999:13).25 It is indeed the case that gros receives an accent in postnominal position (66a) that it does not get in prenominal position. However, this is not a contrastive stress, but simply the regular French accentuation of the end of a major constituent (a contrastive stress could be added too). So accentuation does not seem to be the key here. Note that Abeille & Godard recognize a certain systematicity in the interpretation of gros. In postnominal position, gros only gets interpreted on an external scale. This is a fact that must be accounted for, and my analysis provides an explanation for it. In prenominal position, the most salient interpretation is for gros to apply on an internal scale, which also follows from my analysis. The question is why gros seems to also get interpreted on an external scale in prenominal position, so that un gros fumeur corresponds to 'a fat smoker'. My answer is that this is not obtained by applying gros to the whole network of the N as in postnominal position, but by contextual recalibration. As we saw for expressions like une bonne route, un bon jour in (62), the criteria by
94 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces which a speaker evaluates the property attributed by an ADJ vary contextually. This is also the case for a size ADJ like grew, grand 'tall' etc. Consider the sentences in (68) and (69).
(68)
A cette epoque, nous avions du quitter la cour des Petits — ou nous etions les Grands — et passer dans la cour des Moyens, ou nous fumes les Petits. (Marcel Pagnol, Le Temps des Amours) At that time, we had to leave courtyard of the Small [kids]—where we were the Big [kids]—and go to the courtyard of the Middle-sized [kids], where we were the Small [kids].
(69)
a
My 2-year-old son built a really tall snowman yesterday.
b
The D.U. fraternity brothers built a really tall snowman last weekend.
As Kamp & Partee (1995:142) remark, adjectives like these "are context-dependent as well as vague, with the most relevant aspect of context a comparison class which is often, but not exclusively, provided by the noun of the adjective-noun construction [...] the relevant contextual cues need not be provided by the noun alone" as we see in (69). This shows that 'external scale' is a vague notion that actually covers at least two realities. First, evaluation on an external scale may be induced by modification of the whole network of the N, as with postnominal ADJs in French. Second, it may be induced by the fact that the speakers evaluate the property attributed by the ADJ on the basis of criteria external to language, in which case even a prenominal ADJ may be on an "external scale". For instance, grosfumeur will most naturally be evaluated with respect iofumeur, to the high volume of smoke intake. But in a context in which the conversation is about the physical size of smokers, grosfumeur may then be about the big size of an individual as a smoker. However, it is only in a very particular context like this that the prenominal ADJ can be evaluated on an external scale. Once we have clarified these two aspects of what is an external scale, the systematic difference in interpretation predicted by my hypothesis holds perfectly. The analysis says that in an example like (70a), the N britanniques defines the set of individuals who are British, and the ADJ flegmatiques defines the set of individuals who are flegmatic. This second set intersects with the first one and this intersection determines a subset of the pre-established set of British individuals, i.e., those among the British who are flegmatic: it is this subset of individuals who will accept the recommendation. On the other hand, in (70b), flegmatiques britanniques is not presented as an intersection: there is no set pre-established by the network of the N nor an intersection with that set, but the ADJ
Adjectival Modification in French 95 combines only with the characteristic function of the N, thus defining a single set based on this complex property. The impression is that one could not be British without also being fiegmatic. All members of that set will accept the recommendation. (70)
a
Les britanniques flegmatiques accepteront ses recommandations. The fiegmatic Brittons will accept his recommendations,
b
Les flegmatiques britanniques accepteront ses recommandations.
In short, the combination N+ADJ defines two sets, each with their property, and a fortuitous, nonnecessary intersection of these two sets: it is a combination at the level of the extension of the expression. The combination ADJ+N defines a single set of individuals which bear two properties presented as necessarily linked, forming a natural class, a Kind: it is a combination at the level of the intension of the expression.26 The difference between the two constructions—one involving a pre-established set intersecting with another set, the other involving only one set— is brought out clearly by three tests that highlight their different interpretations: in a context of comparison (71), with respect to 'quis' (D-linked) and 'qualis' (non-D-linked) questions (72), and in a context of negation (73). In (7la), the subset of fragrant flowers is compared with the pre-established set of flowers, whereas (71b) is odd without a context that establishes another set to make the comparison, since only one set is defined with the prenominal ADJ.
(71)
a
Les fleurs odorantes coutent plus cher (que les non odorantes). Flowers which are fragrant cost more (than non-fragrant ones).
b
#Les odorantes fleurs coutent plus cher (que quoi?). Fragrant flowers cost more (than what?).
Similarly, a subset of the guests have been expelled in (72a), so that this sentence may answer the 'qualis' question, whereas in (72b), all individuals present have been expelled, being undesirable, so that the sentence answers the 'quis' question (examples discussed in Forsgren (1978:35)).
96 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (72)
a
II chassa les convives indesirables. (Lesquels a-t-il chasse?/# Qui a-t-il chasse?) He expelled the guests who were undesirable. (Which ones did he expel? #Who did he expel?)
b
II chassa les indesirables convives. (Qui a-t-il chasse?/#Lesquels a-t-il chasse?) He expelled the undesirable guests. (Who did he expel? ftWhich ones did he expel?)
The difference in interpretation between prenominal and postnominal placement is also made clearly visible in a context of negation. Thus, the sentences in (73) do not have the same presuppositions: (73)
a
Jean n'embauchera jamais un gros fumeur. John will never hire someone who smokes a lot.
b
Jean n'embauchera jamais un fumeur gros. John will never hire a fat smoker.
In (a), gros and fumeur create a new kind, and the sentence says that Jean will not hire this kind of individual: it presupposes nothing more about his hiring intentions. In (b) however, we do not have a new kind, but rather the subset of smokers that have the property of being fat: the negation bears on this link, and though the sentence indicates that Jean will not hire a smoker who is fat, there is a strong presupposition, absent from (a), that Jean will hire some other type of person. The differences observed in (70) to (73) are systematic and exactly as predicted by my analysis. Therefore, the objection of non-systematicity raised by Abeille & Godard (1999) does not hold. In their note 4, p. 28, Abeille & Godard present another objection to my claim: they take up the frequently made claim that no semantic difference is perceptible in cases such as the following: (74)
a
un charmant jeune homme
a charming young man
b
un j eune homme charmant
a young man who is charming
It is true that the semantic difference is not easy to perceive, but some authors have described a subtle difference. For instance, Cledat (1901) says that in un voyage charmant 'a trip that is charming' the ADJ qualifies the trip we are talking about, whereas in un charmant voyage, charmant qualifies the type of trip taken, i.e., in my terms, the characteristic function. By working
Adjectival Modification in French 97 on the context, the semantic difference can be made more transparent. This is what happens if we put the expressions of (74) in contexts of comparison, questioning and negation as we did with other ADJs above. Thus, in a context of comparison like (75a), the subset of young men who are charming is compared with the pre-established set of young men, whereas the expression with a prenominal ADJ defines only one set, so it is odd in (75b) without a context that establishes another set to make the comparison (such as charming young men in the past). (75)
a
Les jeunes hommes charmants sont plus rares (que ceux qui ne sont pas charmants). The young men who are charming are more rare (than those who are not charming).
b
# Les charmants j eunes hommes sont plus rares (que qui?). The charming young men are more rare (than who).
There is also a clear contrast in answers to D-linked and non-D-linked questions: the sentence containing a postnominal ADJ (76a) functions well as an answer to lequel 'which one' but is odd with qui 'who' whereas we get the opposite if the ADJ is prenominal (76b). (76)
a
Q: Lesquels a-t-elle invites?/#Qui a-t-elle invite? Which ones did she invites? #Who did she invite? A: Elle a invite les jeunes hommes charmants. She invited the young men who are charming.
b
Q: #Lesquels a-t-elle invites?/Qui a-t-elle invite? # Which ones did she invites? Who did she invite? A: Elle a invite les charmants jeunes hommes. She invited the charming young men.
The constrast is also quite perceptible under negation. (77)
a
Marie n'a pas rencontre decharmantjeune homme. Marie did not meet any charming young man.
b
Marie n'a pas rencontre de jeune homme charmant. Marie did not meet any young man who was charming.
98 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces With prenominal charmant, sentence (77a) says that Marie has not met an individual of the kind having the complex property 'charmant jeune homme': there is no presupposition about other kinds of individuals that she could have met. In (77b), there is a strong presupposition that Marie has met young men, but that they were not charming. All these facts show that the ADJ charmant does exhibit a perceptible semantic difference correlated with prenominal and postnominal positions, and that this difference is systematic. Here are a few more examples of evaluative ADJs that demonstrate the systematicity of the semantic difference between the two positions.
(78)
a
Jean est un furieux menteur/un furieux mangeur. Jean is a compulsive liar/a ravenous eater.
b
Jean est un menteur furieux/un mangeur furieux. Jean is a furious liar/a furious eater.
In the postnominal uses (78b), furieux applies to the individual in general and the reading is intersective. The situation is quite different in (78a), where the interpretation of the prenominal ADJ is on the scale of the N because it applies only to the characteristic function, forming a complex/ Moreover, though the meaning differs depending on the N, this does not mean that the ADJ has several meanings. As Waugh (1977:89) observes, "[a] furieux mangeur would be such because he overeats or eats quickly and ravenously or simply because he loves to eat. A. furieux menteur would be such because he lies all the time or he lies compulsively or he finds a certain satisfaction in lying. Although the two referential situations (mfarieux menteur anA furieux mangeur) are quite different, one can see a common thread: in pre-position/wr/'e«x means an excessiveness or an over-indulgence in the state of affairs given by the lexical meaning of the substantive." Blinkenberg (1933:108) notes that (79a) singles out a part of the writers as being mediocre (restrictive, intersective reading), whereas (79b) qualifies all writers as mediocre. (79)
a
nos ecrivains mediocres
our writers who are mediocre
b
nos mediocres ecrivains
our mediocre writers
Finally, consider the ADJ habile 'skillful': as we saw in chapter 1, this kind of ADJ is said not to be intersective and not to fall under a simple isomorphic compositional analysis. But in my analysis,
Adjectival Modification in French 99 there is nothing special about habile and its interpretation in prenominal and postnominal position is perfectly compositional.
(80)
a
Enfm un habile chirurgien
Finally a skillful surgeon (as a surgeon)
b
Enfm un chirurgien habile
Finally a skillful surgeon (for a surgeon)
In prenominal position, habile only affects the property interpreting the N chirurgien, hence the 'as a' interpretation. In postnominal position, habile gets a 'for a' interpretation because it modifies the whole network of components of the N.27 The difference between prenominal and postnominal habile is very subtle, but nonetheless real. If the only contexts given for (80) are the sentences themselves, it is very hard to see the difference because the property interpreting the N is the most salient, discriminating element among the semantic components of N: so it is the major provider of contextual information. Therefore, the interpretation of postnominal habile modifying the network of the N is very close to the interpretation in which habile affects only the property interpreting the N. However, the difference can be teased out in appropriate contexts. For instance, if a group of friends at a hospital regularly get together to play hockey, and surgeons who have showed up in the past have all been poor players, but tonight surgeon Richard is burning the ice, then it is appropriate for someone to shout (SOb), but not (80a). In this context, Dr Richard is not skillful as a surgeon (he may in fact not be that sharp a surgeon), but the fact that he is a surgeon is relevant: he is skillful for a surgeon—i.e., among the set of individuals determined by the whole semantic network of chirurgien, its extension—but his skill bears on something else than surgery. Summarizing this section, in French, a prenominal "evaluative" ADJ combines semantically with a subpart of the network of the N, specifically, the characteristic function, and they form a complex/ which defines a newly created natural class: this is what derives the impression of an internal scale for the evaluation.28 When postnominal, the ADJ modifies the whole network of the N, hence the external scale effect. This meaning difference between prenominal and postnominal placement of the ADJ is systematic and is the same as with other classes of ADJs. In the argumentative use of an evaluative ADJ, the appreciation of the speaker pertains to the properties expressed by the characteristic function of the N: so the appreciation bears on the intension of the N, and as predicted by the analysis, the ADJ must appear in prenominal position in French. Moreover, the basis for the evaluation varies enormously and depends on elements of the background knowledge (cf. (62) and (69)). Any attempt to incorporate these factors into grammar
100 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces by means of qualia or sublexical semantic features would require a costly apparatus reduplicating properties that are present in our CI system independently of language. We saw in chapter 1, section 2.2.2, that this costly reduplication also holds for cases in which there is a typical use, such as un bon couteau 'a good knife'. As Stati (1979:70) remarks, un ban couteau does NOT mean the same thing as a knife that cuts efficiently: a speaker of French can understand the meaning of un bon couteau without knowing what knives are used for. If I invent a word and talk about un bon schmout, even if you don't know the word schmout, you know that I am saying it has the properties to fulfill its function efficiently.29 Similarly, the problems raised for qualia by proper names also hold in adjectival modification. A proper noun has an intension reduced to the property of bearing this name: that is all its characteristic function indicates and there are no qualia or sublexical semantic features present since a proper name does not correspond to a natural kind and the same proper name could be the name of any kind of individual. Yet adjectives may combine with a proper noun to form a complex charateristic function: the intensions of the expressions in (81) are determined by the property of bearing that name and of having the property of the ADJ. (81)
fat Albert, big Bertha, le grand Charles, le gros Pierre
The only way to determine the scale of the ADJ on the basis of qualia is to identify the referent of the proper noun in order to identify its natural kind and then evaluate whether Bertha, for example, is big for a human being, horse, bell, computer, bomb, or whathever it refers to. Clearly, this takes us out of the realm of grammar and into language use: reference is not part of grammar, but of language use in its connection with the objects in the world. We may therefore conclude from the discussion in this section that a prenominal "evaluative" ADJ does not bear on some qualia, but on the characteristic function alone, something that every common noun has. The potential links with qualia are infered contextually. This view of meaning is in line with Bouchard (1995) and references therein that meaning in general does not incorporate background knowledge.
2.5. ADJs that Express Concrete Properties We saw in (16) that ADJs that express concrete properties generally appear in postnominal position, and that this follows in the present analysis from the fact that a concrete property is typically
Adjectival Modification in French 101 assigned to intended referents, i.e., to individuals in a set determined by the whole network of components of N. There are two broad types of ADJs that express concrete properties: relational ADJs and ADJs of perception. Consider ADJs that express relations of an object with another (82a), with which we may group "referential" ADJs (82b).30
(82)
a
trafic ferroviere rail traffic, commerce fluvial water commerce, temoin oculaire eye
witness, chaleur solaire solar heat, etoile polaire polar star, vegetation tropicale tropical vegetation, fils aine elder son, oiseau captif captive bird un homme marie/celibataire/veuf/divorce a married/single/widowed/divorced man b
victoire italienne Italian victory, route napoleonnienne Napoleonian road
As observed by Frei (1929), Bally (1932), and many others, in the rare cases in which this kind of ADJ appears before an N, it cannot be relational but takes on a figurative meaning (as predicted by my analysis, since it is not in a position to relate to a denotatum determined by the whole network of the N). Thus in (83), epileptique is not relational but descriptive: whereas un bonhomme epileptique has epilepsy, un epileptique bonhomme looks like it has epilepsy, is crooked, clumsy. (83)
Je dessinais d'epileptiques bonhommes que j'enluminais ferocement. (Verlaine, Confessions) / drew epileptic figures that I colored ferociously.
Furthermore, though some of these ADJs (tropical, captif, marie...) easily enter the predicative construction, others are odd:
(84)
a
?Le commerce de ce pays est surtout fluvial. The commerce of that country is mainly fluvial.
b
?*Ce temoin est credible parce qu'il est oculaire. This witness is credible because he is ocular.
c
?Cette energie est inepuisable parce qu'elle est solaire. That energy is inexhaustible because it is solar. (compare: L'energie du futur sera-t-elle solaire?) Will the energy of the future be solar?
102 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces It is not clear to me why this is the case. It may be related to the 6-like nature of these ADJs, but this is too vague a notion to be useful, and it does not appear to distinguish those relational ADJs that can be used predicatively from those that cannot.31 Relational ADJs also cannot be modified by degree adverbs (85a) or be in the superlative (85b).
(85)
a
*Ce pays a un trafic extremement ferroviere. 772/5 country has a traffic pertaining a lot to rail.
b
*La troisieme crise est moins ministerielle que les deux premieres.
c
La troisieme crise est moins ministerielle que presidentielle.
The third crisis is les ministerial than the first two. The third crisis is les ministerial than presidential.
This follows from the fact that the semantics of these ADJs is not gradable: a relation holds between two individuals or it does not. Note that if the degree bears not on the relation itself, but on whether the degree of responsability of the crisis depends on one or another relation, then a superlative is possible (85c). The different semantics of these ADJs is also sufficient for them not to count as "same" as other ADJs, so that they cannot be coordinated with them (86), as observed by Glatigny (1964) and Schmidt (1972); a relational ADJ may however be coordinated with another relational ADJ (87). (86)
#un feu pascal et brillant a pascal and brilliant fire #la jungle concentrationnaire et affreuse the concentrational and awful jungle #un directeur commercial et aimable a commercial and friendly director
(87)
le commerce fluvial et ferroviere the fluvial and "ferrovial" commerce un directeur commercial et technique a commercial and technical director la presse dominicale et quotidienne the dominical and daily press la gestion industrielle et fmanciere the industrial and financial management une mesure electrique et mecanique an electrical and mechanical measurement
In short, the semantics of relational ADJs relate an individual to another, which explains why they cannot get a degree reading, and why, assuming my analysis, they must appear in postnominal
Adjectival Modification in French 103 position under this interpretation, but receive a figurative interpretation not targeted at an individual if in prenominal position. The second type of ADJs linked with concrete properties express perceptions of form or color. They strongly tend to be postnominal. The rare cases in which they appear in prenominal position are dismissed as having a highly marked, literary status, and as borrowings from an older system, as in the following from Abeille & Godard (2000). (88)
son blanc manteau its white coat les vertes frondaisons the green foliage la royale aventure de la maison de Savoie the royal adventure of the Savoie House
It may be that some prenominal uses of these ADJs are remnants from a previous stage of French. But this construction is still productive, both for perception ADJs (89) and relational ADJs (90). (89)
la blanche colombe the white dove, le noir cormoran the black cormorant, sous les verts pommiers under the green appletrees, blanc fantome white ghost (Grevisse)
(90)
la francaise Compagnie internationale pour l'informatique (L'Express 1144, p. 71) the French international company for data processing la feodale Eglise de 1200 the feudal Church of 1200 (Stati) Elles se sont reveillees dans leurs banlieusardes petites cuisines. They woke up in their subaurban little kitchens. tes lisses cheveux your sleek hair ce plat pays thatflat country (Jacques Brel) ma verte prairie my green prairie
These too could be dismissed as being literary, creating a "poetic" effect. But this raises the question of what is stylistics, and of its relationship with grammar. Just dismissing this use as a poetic effect is no more helpful than vague comments that have been recurrent over the centuries, such as the following from Vinet (1838): "We could say that in general the spirit places the epithet after the substantive, and the soul places it more willingly before."32 That is, placement of the adjective after the noun is more objective or intellectual, while placement before the noun is more subjective or emotional. Yet, as noted by Blinkenberg, the figurative use of color ADJs does not
104 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces come from anteposition per se: une melancolie noire 'a black melancholy' is clearly figurative. Frozen expressions are also constructed with postnominal ADJs just as well: il fait le dos rond lit. 'he makes the back round' 'he gives in'. Rather than dismissing these poetic effects as outside the scope of grammar, I will show that they derive from formal aspects of the analysis. I therefore follow a long tradition in rhetorics, traceable back to Aristotle, Cicero, Quintilian, which takes the frequency of figures of speech as an indication that they are not deviations, but essential attributes of language. This position is presented in more linguistic terms in Du Marsais (1801),33 and in particular in Weinreich (1966), who considered doubtful a semantic theory that could not account for figurative language. So, is there anything more revealing that can be said about examples like those in (90)? If style is a deviance with respect to the norm, which deviances are allowed, which ones not? In all the examples in (90), placing the ADJ in prenominal position induces a special semantic effect of reinforcement which the English translations do not convey. Thus, mfrancaise
Compagnie,feodale
Eglise, banlieusardes cuisines, it is as if the ADJ was modified by a degree adverb like tres 'very'. My analysis predicts that there should be such an effect and that there should be a common feature to the meaning change. Recall that the analysis says that a prenominal ADJ in French applies to a subelement of the network of the N. Given the semantics of these concrete ADJs, they cannot be assigned to elements such as the variable assignment function g, the time interval ;', or possible world \v. The only possibility is for them to create a complex characteristic function with the/ function of the N. This is quite different from the normal use of these ADJs, hence the "poetic" effect induced. Normally, these ADJs combine with an N postnominally, their property being presented as nonnecessarily related to that of the N: there is a fortuitous intersection of two sets, each with their property. But in the exceptional uses in (90), the property of the ADJ is presented as necessarily linked with that of the N, as forming a natural class with it: the combination ADJ+N defines a single set of individuals which bear a complex of two properties. Set theory does not really allow us to make this distinction clearly, yet psychologically it is not a vacuous distinction. For instance, with a postnominal ADJ, pays plat presents a property 'country' which determines a set of individuals, and a property 'flat' which defines another set: the intersection picks out a subset of the pre-established set of pays. But in plat pays, the country is not merely described as being flat, it is defined as flat, as if it could not be otherwise, as if it were a natural kind. Not all individual concepts are kinds: only those that identify classes of objects with a sufficiently regular function and/or behavior qualify. What counts as a kind is not set by grammar, but by the shared knowledge
Adjectival Modification in French 105 of a community of speakers (cf. Chierchia 1998). Normally, lexical nouns identify kinds, whereas complex nouns may or may not. What takes place in the ADJ+N construction is that the combination is presented as if it were noncontingent, forming a natural kind. So in Brel's famous song, by using ce plat pays, he presents his country as having the defining property that it is flat, and the rest of his song describes the consequences of the country's having this inherent property. The same holds for the other examples, where the property of the ADJ is asserted to be part of the defining features of the object in question. The poetic effect arises from an interaction of grammatical and pragmatic factors. Something which is not usually considered as a natural kind in the shared knowledge of a community of speakers is introduced in a grammatical construction which says it is, that the property of the ADJ and that of the N form a defining trait of a natural kind. Thus, the poetic effect comes from this assertion that Brel's country does not simply have the property of being flat, but that it is another kind of object, a flat-country, that it would be so in all possible worlds and could not be conceived otherwise. Similarly, in tes lisses cheveux, we have the impression that the poet finds the hair even more beautiful, sleek, because this inherent attribution as a natural kind presents the person not as merely having sleek hair, but as a person with another type of object, SLEEK-HAIR, hair that would be sleek in all worlds, not conceivable as different. Placing in prenominal position an ADJ that expresses concrete properties is indeed a deviance with respect to the norm, in the sense that it establishes an unusual natural kind. However, this deviance is not haphasard but arises from a precisely identifiable and regulated grammatical process. According to my analysis, this construction has testable properties since it defines a single set of individuals bearing a complex property, in contrast with the two intersecting sets defined by the postnominal construction. We saw in the preceding section that the difference comes out clearly in contexts of comparison, D-linked or non-D-linked questions, and negation. If we apply these tests to a "poetic" expression like blanche colombe and compare it with the more usual colombe blanche, the results are as predicted by the analysis. Consider first comparison: in (9la), there is a set preestablished by the N with which the subset of colombes blanches can be compared, whereas there is no such pre-established set in (91b). (91)
a
Les colombes blanches sont plus frequentes (que celles qui ne sont pas blanches) Doves which are white are more frequent (than those which are not white)
b
# Les blanches colombes sont plus frequentes (que quoi?) White doves are more frequent (than what?)
106 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Similarly, sentence (92a) may answer the 'qualis' question since a subset of the doves have been released, whereas sentence (92b) answers the 'quis' question since all the doves present have been released.
(92)
a
Q: Lesquelles a-t-elle relachees?/#Qu'a-t-elle relache? Which ones did she release? What did she release? A: Elle a relache les colombes blanches. She released the doves which are white.
b
Q: #Lesquelles a-t-elle relachees?/Qu'a-t-elle relache? Which ones did she release? What did she release? A: Elle a relache les blanches colombes. She released the white doves.
Finally, putting the two expressions under negation also shows the expected constrast: in (93 a), there is no presupposition that Marie has released anything, whereas (93b) carries the presupposition that doves other than white ones were released.
(93)
a
Marie n'a pas relache de blanches colombes. Marie did not release white doves.
b
Marie n'a pas relache de colombes blanches. Marie did not release doves which are white.
Summarizing, since a concrete property is typically assigned to intended referents, ADJs that express concrete properties generally appear in postnominal position, where they may be applied to individuals in a set determined by the whole network of components of N. When these ADJs appear in the prenominal position, which is much less usual for them, this is not a stylistic quirk to be dismissed as not pertaining to grammar, but actually a precise grammatical construct which explains exactly in what way the interpretation is unusual. As is often the case, the apparently marginal constructs are actually very useful in understanding central properties of modification. The laws of normal modification are best formulated and understood when the causes of their exceptions can be established.
Adjectival Modification in French 107 2.6 ADJs and Proper Names
ADJs have a particular effect on proper names in French. Whereas many proper Ns appear without a Det in standard French, the Det becomes obligatory if an ADJ is present.
(94)
a
*Vieux Jean est venu hier.
b
Le vieux Jean est venu hier.
Old John came yesterday.
The old John came yesterday.
In order to understand this correlation, we must understand why a Det is not required with some nouns in the first place. We could propose a mechanical account as in Longobardi (1994) and many proposals using a similar type of descriptive apparatus (Szabolcsi 1983, Stowell 1989): a nominal expression would be an argument only if it is introduced by a Det, and a Det could be superficially absent only if it is filled by a phonetically empty 0-Det, or if something is moved to fill the Det position. For proper Ns, Longobardi assumes that the second strategy is at work: the N moves into Det. The movement of N is assumed to be triggered by the fact that Det has "an abstract feature ±R (suggesting "referential"), which must be checked with respect to at least one of its values" (Longobardi 1994:659). If a Det has a +R value, then raising a proper N to Det checks that value since a proper N has a +R feature by definition. This R feature is strong in Romance, so the movement is overt, whereas it is weak in Germanic, so the movement is covert. As a result, the proper N precedes the ADJ in Italian (95a), but follows it in the English equivalent (95b). (95)
a
Roma antica fu la citta piu importante del Mediterraneo.
b
Ancient Rome was the most important city of the Mediterranean.
Longobardi provides a very interesting and useful discussion of diverse data concerning the respective roles of the N and the Det in the interpretation of nominal expressions. His analysis provides a certain level of description, but as I said in chapter 1 and as now recognized by Chomsky (2000, 2001), this kind of approach, in which uninterpretable features play a central part, does not provide an expiation of the facts, in the sense that no property derives from some other independently motivated property: there is a list of abstract features and each one is correlated with
108 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces an element in a list of distributional properties, but these features have no other import in the theory. So a language with a strong ±R feature has the distributional property that a proper name precedes the ADJ, a language with a weak ±R feature has the distributional property that a proper name follows the ADJ, an N with a +R feature does not need to have an overt Det to be an argument. Each feature just "represents" the property in the second list in an ad hoc fashion: this provides a name for each distributional property, but it does not improve our understanding of them. Moreover, since the +R feature of Longobardi is meant to "suggest" that a proper N is referential, a proper N should be a possible argument on its own, as Chierchia (1998) points out, and there is no need to code this property redundantly in syntax by moving the N to Det.34 Chierchia suggests an alternative solution in which proper Ns are typologically promoted into intransitive Dets, thus directly satisfying the requirement that an argument be introduced by a Det. His own proposal therefore introduces the same redundancy as the one he objects to: if a proper N is referential by definition, and if this property allows it to be an argument, why should this be additionally encoded by some categorial promotion to Det? The peculiar manner of referring of proper Ns, which are inherently referential, explains both the absence of Det and the special interaction between proper Ns and ADJs illustrated in (94). As we saw in the discussion of the ADJ certain in (55) and in the discussion of qualia in sections 2.4, a proper name does not bear a meaning which could identify the kind of individual to which we could refer when using it, it does not denote before it refers. That is why a proper N can be assigned to individuals that do not fall in a natural class, like the name Dede, which could be attributed to a human being, an animal, a boat, a car, a laser beam, a computer, a plant, etc. Since a proper N has no range, there is no reason for it to have an operator-like Det to bind a variable in that range nor for the proper N to be related to a Det position: a proper N obtains its specific definite reading by inference, i.e., from the fact that it designates a unique individual directly by contextual convention. This explains the well-known observation that a proper N always has a transparent, de re reading: the direct naming function of a proper N implies the unconditioned existence of its designatum. However, if a proper name is modified by an adjective or a relative clause, indicating that it is not conceptualized as a unique individual (or a unique stage of an individual) and that it has intensionality, this makes the proper name fall under the requirements of a common noun in the language. As expected, a Det is then required (cf. (94)), as is normally the case with common nouns in French. This is what usually holds for proper Ns which are conceived as punctual entities, such as names of persons. I return to other types of proper names, which require a Det, as well as more
Adjectival Modification in French 109 general aspects of the interaction between Det and reference in chapter 5, including an analysis of the variation between French and English regarding the overt presence of Det. Let us now consider in more detail the data concerning adjectival modification of proper Ns. There are two descriptive factors to take into account, giving rise to four possibilities: whether a Det is present or not, and whether the ADJ is prenominal or postnominal. Consider first the sequence Det+ADJ+N as in (94b) above and (96). (96)
le brillant Shakespeare [the] brilliant Shakespeare, le sto'ique Racine [the] stoic Racine, la belle Helene [the] beautiful Helene, la religieuse Irlande [the] religious Ireland
Waugh (1977:135) observes that with the ADJ in prenominal position, the property is presented as if it is inherent and often as fully characterizing the individual named by the proper N. For instance, la religieuse Irlande conveys the impression that Ireland could not be anything but religious, that religion is a defining properly of that nation. This is what we expect in the present analysis. Being in prenominal position, the ADJ must be related to a subpart of the network of the N. As we saw in section 2.4, evaluative ADJs like these can do this by forming a complex characteristic function with the original/ thus defining a single set on the basis of a complex property. In order for this to be possible, the naming function of the proper N is treated as a characteristic function based on a property: essentially, a proper N like Racine is treated as having an impoverished property that defines a natural class, namely all the individuals named that way (or the stages of some individual named Racine}. This defines a range as does a common noun, so a Det is required in order for the nominal expression to denote.35 Siegel (1980:52) says that proper names appear only with intersective ADJs (in her analysis, this is due to the assumption that intersective adjectives combine with full NPs, and that proper names are always full NPs). Thus, intersective ADJs as in (97a) are fine, adjectives that belong to more than one class like beautiful are unambiguously intersective as in (97b), and exclusively nonintersective ADJs are impossible (97c) (all examples from Siegel 1980): (97)
a
They've always wanted to meet heal thy/angry/naughty/aged Carla.
b
The person I need is responsible (trustworthy)/terrible (scary)/old (aged) Ivan,
c
*Don't pay attention to mere/ostensible/actual Jonathan.
110 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces However, intensional ADJs can appear with proper Ns as long as the semantics gives a pragmatically possible interpretation, and they are in prenominal position in French under the intensional reading. Thus, (98a) implies that the name of the person will change to Paul Tremblay at some point, so it is pragmatically odd because a name is usually assigned once and does not change. But it could, and in some instances, like the name of a Pope, it always does, in which case the intensional ADJ of time is fine (98b). Even intensional presume is possible as in (98c) if the sentence is used in a context of error on the name of the person. (98)
a
#le futur Paul Tremblay the future Paul Tremblay
b
le futur Paul VT the future Paul VI
c
Le presume Paul Tremblay etait en fait Robert Brisson. The presumed Paul Tremblay was actually Robert Brisson.
Summing up on the sequence Det+ADJ+N, the prenominal ADJ relates to a subpart of the network of the N just like it does with a common N, and a Det appears with the proper N because the presence of the ADJ has for effect that a range is defined for the N noun, so a Det is required in order for the nominal expression to denote. The second sequence to consider is Det+N+ADJ as in (99). (99)
une Helene belle a Helene fwho is] beautiful., un Shakespeare moins brillant a Shakespeare [who is] less brilliant, la Rome chretienne the Rome [which is] Christian, 1'Irlande religieuse the Ireland [which is] religious
Here again, Waugh, inspired by observations made by several scholars over many decades, provides a very accurate description of the semantics involved: "When the adjective is post-posed to the proper noun, it is interpreted as differentiating between several referents having (or viewed as having) the same name or similar characteristics" (p. 135). Her description suggests a preestablished set out of which a subset is being narrowed down by the intersection of a subsidiary set, which is of course exactly as predicted with a postnominal ADJ modifying the whole network of the N. Thus, whereas la chretienne Rome would be about Rome as an inherently Christian city, la Rome chretienne makes a distinction between a general view of Rome and a different view centering on its Christian period or sociopolitical specificity. Similarly, in contrast with la religieuse Irlande
Adjectival Modification in French 111 discussed above, I'Irlande religieuse distinguishes that part of Ireland which is religious from the part of it which is not, or from the general concept we have of it. So in Det+N+ADJ, the set defined by the postnominal ADJ intersects with the set pre-established by the N, as predicted by the analysis; a Det appears with the proper N to restrict the range as in the previous case. Consider now the third possible combination of a proper N with an ADJ, namely when the ADJ is postnominal and no Det is present. We saw an Italian example in (95a). Blinkenberg (1933:112) provides the examples in (100) and comments that this kind of combination is highly predicative (and indeed the best way to render these in English is with a typical predicative construction).
(100) a
Leurs teintes violentes ou dedicates me permettaient de faire naitre sur les levres de ma femme, le sourire d'Odile heureuse. Their violent or delicate shades allowed me to bring on the lips of my wife the smile ofOdile when she was happy/being happy.
b
Je ne m'etonne point de Beethoven sourd. I am not surprised of Beethoven's being deaf.
c
J'aime mieux Renan jeune. I prefer Renan when he was young.
Longobardi (1994:624) assumes that Italian examples like (95a), and presumably the French examples in (100), are derived by moving the proper N to Det, hence the absence of Det and the postnominal position of the ADJ. If things were that simple, we would expect that any ADJ that can appear in the sequences Det+ADJ+proper N or Det+proper N+ADJ could appear freely in the sequence proper N+ADJ. However, that is not at all the case. As Longobardi observes, this latter sequence is possible in Italian only with the few ADJs that easily receive a restrictive interpretation in all positions (vecchio 'old', giovane 'young', antico 'ancient', solo 'only', possessives, and numeral ordinal adjectives). Other ADJs are possible, but the construction is "totally incompatible with any appositive reading and can only be marginally tolerated even with a restrictive and sharply contrastive interpretation of the adjective itself; for example, Gianni sympatico 'Gianni nice' can be very marginally accepted only in a sort of D-linked reading, namely, if the speaker and hearer agree in advance to define the individual referred to that way in contrast to another, less nice, Gianni" (Longobardi 1994:624, note 18).
112 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces The restricted semantics he observes are similar to those Blinkenberg notes, and whereas it comes out as an exceptional and unexpected interpretation in the N-raising analysis, it is directly predicted in an analysis which assumes that a postnominal ADJ modifies the whole network of the N. First, no intensional interpretation will be possible for an ADJ in this position, nor any "appositive" interpretation, i.e., any inherent attribution of the property so that a single set is defined by a complex property: both of these are only possible if the ADJ relates to a subpart of N, so it must be prenominal by an Elsewhere application of the Linearization Parameter (3). Second, given that there is no Det, the proper N is not treated as having a characteristic function which defines the set of all individuals having the property of being named that way: so no range is defined and the proper name is used strictly in its usual naming function. The reason why the proper name is felt to be "sort of D-linked" is because it designates an individual directly by contextual convention. Therefore, Bethoven or Gianni are pre-established in this way as unique individuals, and the import of the ADJ can therefore only be "in contrast to" this individual, "highly predicative" in the sense that this relation with a proper N is very close to the one an ADJ holds in the usual NP BE ADJ construction: it applies to the full NP. So the ADJs appearing in the construction proper N+ADJ are restricted to those that have the semantics compatible with this kind of relation. The sequence Proper N+ADJ therefore behaves exactly as predicted by the present analysis. Finally, consider the sequence ADJ+proper N, without a Det. These are generally impossible in Romance languages. Thus, along with (94a), we also get the ungrammaticalities in (101) for French and (102) for Italian.
(101) a
*Je ne m'etonne point de sourd Beethoven. / am not surprised by deaf Beethoven..
b
*J'aime mieux jeune Renan. I prefer young Renan.
(102) a
*E'venuto vecchio Camaresi. Came old Camaresi
b
*Antica Roma fu la citta piu importante del Mediterraneo. Antique Rome was the most important city of the Mediterranean.
Longobardi attributes this ungrammaticality to the fact that, in the absence of an overt Det, a proper N must raise to Det: therefore, it will precede any ADJ on the surface. However, that cannot be the
Adjectival Modification in French 113 whole story. First, as we saw above, he must assume that this raising is obligatorily before SpellOut in Romance, but at LF in English, since the corresponding examples are grammatical in English: this is just a restatement of the facts. Second, he assumes that Italian has a phonetically empty Det in nominal expressions like castori 'beavers' which can function as bare arguments with a specific existential interpretation in lexically governed positions: so it must be stipulated that there is no such empty Det compatible with the semantics of a proper N in (102). In my analysis, a prenominal ADJ as in (101)-(102) must be related to a subelement of the network of the N. A proper N used strictly in its usual naming function cannot be modified in this way: for it to be possible, the proper N must be treated as having a characteristic function which defines the set of all individuals having the property of being named that way. However, in that case, a range is defined and a Det must therefore appear for the expression to be properly atomized since Det bears the crucial feature of Number in Romance (on atomization and Det, see chapters 4 and 5). The ungrammaticality of the sequence ADJ+proper N in French and Italian follows straightforwardly. The general analysis of adjectival modification accounts for the intricate semantic and distributional properties of adjectival modification of proper Ns without any additions or stipulations. In particular, there is always a meaning difference between prenominal and postnominal combinations, and the difference is always basically the same, regardless of the ADJ or N: a prenominal ADJ applies to a subpart of the network of the N, a postnominal ADJ bears on the whole network.
2.7. The Anaphoric Use of a Prenominal ADJ We saw in section 2.4 that the semantic difference is not easy to perceive in many pairs of ADJ+N and N+ADJ combinations, in particular in examples in which the prenominal ADJ modifies the property interpreting the N or is added to it: even though the postnominal ADJ does modify something slightly different, namely the whole set of components of the N, the most salient, discriminating component of N, is the property interpreting the N—the characteristic function. So the difference may be very subtle, but nonetheless real, since some contexts and paradigmatic variations bring it out, such as comparison, questioning in quis versus qualis, and negation. An additional reason for the difficulty to perceive the differences comes from the fact that prenominal ADJs can sometimes be used anaphorically in French. I have already presented an aspect of this in the discussion of (65), repeated here as (103):
114 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (103) Paul a engage Jo Jeanjean. Get incroyablement mauvais chef/#ce chef incroyablement mauvais va lui miner son restaurant. Paul hired Jo Jeanjean. This incredibly bad chef will ruin his restaurant
Since a new kind is created by joining the prenominal ADJ with the characteristic function of the N, the combination is presented as known by the hearer, so ADJ+N is the preferred order in a context in which the semantic association is (or should be) known by the hearer. The anaphoric use that adds to the difficulty in distinguishing the semantics of ADJ+N combinations from that of N+ADJ combinations is slightly different: it is when an ADJ+N combination is used to repeat a combination of the same elements previously mentioned in the discourse. It has long been observed that in this anaphoric use, the ADJ+N combination is strongly preferred, even when the previous mention was an N+ADJ combination. What has long puzzled scholars is that the interpretation of the ADJ+N combination then seems to be the same as in the N+ADJ combination (cf. Waugh (1977: 132-135) and references therein). This holds even for ADJs that usually exhibit a sharp interpretive contrast between the two positions. Thus, we saw in (18) that the ADJparfait in postnominal position gets a simple intersective interpretation (une fleur parfaite 'a perfect flower'), but that in prenominal position it indicates that the characteristic function suits perfectly (un parfait imbecile 'a perfect/ complete/total imbecile'). However, in an anaphoric use as in (104), parfaite rose seems to be semantically indistinguishable from the previously mentioned rose parfaite. (104) Pour Panniversaire de Marie, Jean, botaniste amateur de talent, a cree une rose parfaite, dont la forme, le parfum et la couleur sont d'une harmonic irreprochable. Marie est transportee de bonheur : cette parfaite rose restera a jamais un signe de leur amour. For Mary's birthday, John, a talented amateur botanist, has created a pefect rose, whose shape, perfume and color are irreprochably harmonious. Mary is very happy: this perfect rose will forever remain as a sign of their love. Similarly, in (105), faux piano is not interpreted as a fake piano as would normally be the case (cf. (19)), but as a piano that is out of tune.
Adjectival Modification in French 115 (105)
Au debut de sa tournee en Israel, on assigna a Glenn Gould un piano faux. Pour arriver a jouer convenablement durant les concerts, il s'imaginait qu'il etait chez lui au Canada, assis a son instrument favori et non jouant de ce faux piano qui le suivit dans un camion tout au long de sa tournee.36 At the beginning of his tour in Israel, Glenn Gould was assigned a piano that was out of tune. To be able to play correctly during the concerts, he imagined that he was at home in Canada, sitting in front of his favorite instrument and not playing this out of tune piano which followed him in a truck during the whole tour.
When the interpretive difference is tenuous between placing the ADJ in prenominal or postnominal position, it still is the case that the anaphoric use must be an ADJ+N combination. Thus a sequence N+ADJ later followed in the discourse by ADJ+N is fine in (106a), but if we reverse the order as in (106b), the result is odd. (106) a
J'ai vu un elephant enorme [...] Get enorme elephant buvait de 1'eau. I saw an enormous elephant... This enormous elephant was drinking water.
b
#J'ai vu un enorme elephant [... ] Get elephant enorme buvait de 1'eau.
It is possible for an N-ADJ combination to be used in a second mention in a discourse, as in (107a): (107) a b
J'ai vu un elephant enorme [...] Get elephant enorme buvait de 1'eau. II a rencontre differents cas de cette maladie. Ces differents cas se sont averes insolubles. He found different cases of this disease. These different cases proved to be insoluble.
However, as Roubaud (1786) observes, this modification "would present a new idea of estimation" ("presenterait une idee nouvelie d?estimation") despite the fact that the estimation itself is aot new. Indeed, (107a) is felt to be somewhat repetitious in its attributing the property 'enormous' to the elephant, but not (106a). Waugh (1977), who also assumes that prenominal and postnominal combinations always differ in meaning, says that an ADJ+N combination may receive the same interpretation as an N+ADJ combination in such anaphoric uses because a prenominal ADJ modifies not only the substantive
116 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces but also the lexical meaning of the substantive: a prenominal ADJ assumes the deictic recognition of the lexical morpheme of the substantive. Since the substantive has already been mentioned in the discourse in these anaphoric uses, prenominal ADJs can be used more freely. Note however that her analysis seems to predict that a previous mention of the substantive always allows the anaphoric ADJ+N combination to have the meaning of N+ADJ. But this is not the case: if the previous order was ADJ+N, then the anaphoric ADJ+N only has the meaning of ADJ+N. Thus, in (107b), differents
cas means 'various cases' in both instances: the second occurrence of differents
cas
cannot be interpreted as 'cases that differ, that are not the same'. The anaphoric use of ADJ+N combinations may find an explanation in the assumption that the property of a prenominal ADJ forms a complex property with the/of the N, so that it is asserted to be part of the defining features of the newly created class, hence as something known, that could not be otherwise. Once an N+ADJ or ADJ+N combination is established in discourse, the anaphoric ADJ+N combination simply reestablishes this as known: the property of the previously mentioned ADJ may now be presented as more closely linked to N in the same interpretation as its previous occurrence. This anaphoric use of the ADJ+N combination understandably makes the semantic distinction between the two orders of ADJs more difficult to perceive, in particular if pairs of examples are not put in context, so that the subtle restrictions just noted are not there to help make the differences more salient. However, once these restrictions are brought to the fore, we see that even this anaphoric use turns out to be dependent on the distinction I postulated between the ADJ+N and N+ADJ combinations. Once more, we are brought to the conclusion that there is always a difference in meaning between the two combinations, albeit a very subtle one this time.
2.8. The Scope of Double Prenominal ADJs
Next, let us turn to the "scope" of ADJs. When there are two or more ADJs in a nominal expression, there are generalizations about how they are interpreted one with respect to the other. There are three cases to look at: when the two ADJs are prenominal, when the two ADJs are postnominal, and when one ADJ appears on each side of the N. This section deals with the first case. When two ADJs are prenominal, as they can be in French, and must be generally in English, the leftmost ADJ gets wide scope, in the sense that it modifies the block formed by the substantive and
Adjectival Modification in French 117 the second ADJ (Blinkenberg 1933, Vendler 1968, Dixon 1982, Sproat & Shih 1990, and many others). So the bracketing representing the interpretive embedding is as in the following examples:
(108) a b
un [beau [petit chienj] a [nice [small dog]]
This embedding follows directly if we restrict ourselves to the minimal assumptions when a semantic relation is coded by juxtaposition. The semantic relation of adjectival modification holds between an ADJ and a nominal element. In a sequence Ai-Az-N, the adjective AI is immediately juxtaposed to the N and it can modify it directly. As for AI, the only nominal element to which it can be juxtaposed is the nominal projection [Aa N] resulting from the first juxtaposition. So the only syntactic embedding derivable is [Ai [Aj N]], since A2 must first combine with N, and then AI combines with [Ai N]. Combining AI to Aa is syntactically possible, but derives an uninterpretable structure since the semantics of an ADJ cannot apply to another ADJ. Therefore, under minimal assumptions, the only possibility is for AI to have scope over A2. In comparison, an analysis that allows movement of any of these three elements must posit specifications of a global nature that conspire to insure that whatever displacements of AI or Aa or N take place, the ADJ that holds the most narrow semantic combination with N always appears immediately next to N on the surface, and then the next closest ADJ combines with this ADJ+N complex, and so on if there are more ADJs. In short, the displacements must insure that the surface order happens to exactly track the order of semantic embedding. It has long been observed in both French and English that there is often a preferred order between the two ADJs. For example, the neutral order in English is for size ADJs to precede color ADJs as in (109):
(109) a b
my small black dogs ?my black small dogs
However, the restrictions on serialization should not be represented in the grammar in an absolute way, since variations of different sorts can be found in the order of ADJs. First, as observed by Levi (1975), two ADJs with "similar" semantics like senatorial and industrial can appear in both orders:
118 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (110) a
senatorial industrial investigations
b
industrial senatorial investigations
As predicted, these mean different things since the level of embedding of the ADJs differs: (1 lOa) refers to the senate's investigations of industry whereas (1 lOb) refers to industry's investigations of the senate. Second, ADJs with different semantics can also appear in both orders, and again with meaning differences that correspond to the level of embedding of the ADJs:
(111) a
orange Oriental ivories = Oriental ivories which are orange
b
Oriental orange ivories = orange ivories which are Oriental
Note that the relative freedom of order for prenominal ADJs, with meaning effects, holds for French just as well.
(112) a b
suppose nouveau miracle = new miracle which is alleged to have taken place nouveau suppose miracle = new type of alleged miracle
c
bon futur president = good as a candidate for the presidency
d
futur bon president = someone who will be a good president
Third, Vendler (1968: 130) mentions the "troublesome" group old, young, little, which do not appear in the expected serialization position. For example, while the size ADJ small precedes the quality ADJ in (113a), the very closely related size ADJ little follows the quality ADJ in (113b).
(113) a b
small beautiful house beautiful little house
We saw in section 2.1.2 of chapter 1 that to account for restrictions on serialization as in (108) and (109), Cinque (1994) assumes that all ADJs are generated in the Spec of different functional categories depending on the class of ADJ and that the hierarchy of the functional categories crucially derives the order of the ADJs. This approach predicts a very rigid order of adjectives in the nominal expression. However, we just saw that adjectives actually vary fairly freely in order in
Adjectival Modification in French 119 quite a lot of constructions, with corresponding meaning differences. Demonte (1999: 51) concludes that the relative freedom of order of adjectives strongly militates "against an analysis of adjectives as specifiers of a set of rigidly ordered functional categories." Note however that this kind of approach is not descriptively falsified. The rigid hierarchy of functional categories correlates with the cases in which order is rigid. As for the cases in which order varies, they can be accounted for by assuming that some ADJs are compatible with more than one of these functional categories, so they may appear in different Spec positions. The troublesome cases mentioned by Vendler are more problematic however: it has to be assumed that small is compatible with both a functional category above the one hosting beautiful and one lower (given beautiful small house}, whereas an ADJ with very closely related semantics like little can only appear in the Spec of the lower functional category. In any event, these classifications are just that: lists of elements belonging to different classes. Lists describe the facts, but they don't help us much in understanding why things are as they are. As for the relative positioning of the postulated functional categories, it just postpones the discussion of what properties determine the relative order of ADJs: without an indication of the selectional properties of these functional categories that determine this hierarchy, the structure is stipulated as bluntly as with rewriting rules. If the selectional properties of the functional categories are discussed, they will turn out to be those of the ADJ classes, so that the functional categories will be unnecessary complications of the theory playing no explanatory role. In sum, functional categories of this kind are dispensable just like labels are dispensable in phrase structure: the material present is sufficient for the computation. So Demonte is right: to postulate a set of rigidly ordered functional categories does not help our understanding of the phenomenon.37 Neither an analysis based on the interpretive embedding of the ADJs nor one based on functional categories provides an account of the restrictions on serialization that often hold as in (108)-(109). Many otherwise fairly formal analyses make a fleeting attempt to link these serializations to cognitive factors, but the results are unconvincing. For instance, Sproat & Shih (1988) consider the possibility of explaining the relative order of ADJs on the basis of the notion of 'apparentness': the more apparent an ADJ is, the closer it appears to N in the serialization. By and large, the more apparent adjectives are said to be those which require less cognitive computations, that are more intersective, such as shape and color, and the more taxonomic adjectives, such as adjectives of provenance. Less apparent adjectives, such as measure adjectives or adjectives of quality, involve more computations, are subsective. They discuss the example large red car. They say we determine that a car is red if a sufficiently large amount of its surface looks red. To determine whether a car is
120 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces large involves more computations: we must establish the type of object it is and determine by comparison if it is large for such items. So as they note, the notion of apparentness relates to the notions of 'absoluteness' (i.e., intersective) versus 'relativeness' (i.e., subsective) used since Aristotle to characterize classes of adjectives. However, the claim that some adjectives require more or less cognitive computations is based on no independent evidence (other than "intuitions" about how we do things) and seems entirely a posteriori. Moreover, I have already indicated in section 1 that intersective ADJs are also calibrated: a color ADJ like red is just as relative as to the N as a size ADJ like large. In order to determine that John is red vs the car is red, complex computations are involved since John and the car are most likely not of the same color and what proportion of them bears redness is not the same: John's face will be enough, whereas a fairly large part of the car will be required. So the notion of apparentness does not appear to be of much help in understanding the restrictions on the serialization of ADJs. Ziff (1960) also tries to relate the restrictions to cognitive factors. He notes that if two ADJs precede the N, the first one is the one with the larger classes of environments: we get the order red wooden table because red has a wider distribution than wooden, and little white house because little is more encompassing than white. However, he observes that the principle does not always work: there are probably more old men than intelligent men, yet we have the order intelligent old man; he gives pious young girl as another example where the principle fails. He suggests that in these latter examples, the notion of natural kind is at play. Exactly how is not made precise, but we can imply from his discussion that the N and the ADJ closest to it characterize a natural kind, which is then further qualified by the other ADJ. This may be on the right track. In the analysis I am presenting, prenominal ADJs that relate to the characteristic function of N create a complex/which defines a natural class, at least in French. Recall also that not all individual concepts are kinds: only those that identify classes of objects with a sufficiently regular function qualify, and this is determined by the shared knowledge of a community of speakers (Chierchia 1998 and section 2.5 above). Any collection of properties can define a class: socks that have been worn over a week, red cars with grey interior that don't work well in freezing conditions, and so on. A class of objects will be considered to form a natural kind if its function is one salient enough in the community that it is worth being stabilized, conventionalized. This may explain examples like red wooden table: it is quite likely that it is generally more relevant on cognitive grounds to identify the class of wooden tables than the class of red tables. In short, the naturalness of the order in the serialization of ADJs
Adjectival Modification in French 121 may correspond to the naturalness of the classes being formed: the more natural the class, the earlier the ADJ is merged with the N. I suspect that this kind of factor interacts with diverse factors such as phonological weight and frequency of use, and that together they are responsible for the cases showing relatively rigid order. The crucial question is then whether such a hierarchy of naturalness for kinds holds, as well as what it is based on. But this is beyond the scope of a linguistic study, so I must leave it as an open question for now (however, see section 3 for a discussion of factors such as weight and frequency favoring the prenominal or postnominal placement of ADJs). There have been many attempts to explain the serialization restrictions of ADJs on the basis of semantic criteria (see several refences in Sproat and Shin 1988, 1990). The idea behind these analyses is that if we discover that the relative order of semantically similar adjectives is the same in many unrelated languages, "one can get a very interesting insight into how mankind classifies properties attributed to entities" (Hetzron 1978:166). Though the classification of properties by mankind may interact with language, it is not a part of grammar, it does not fall under the object of study of linguistic theory. To determine the exact influence of this classification on grammatical constructs will require collaborative work with scholars of other fields. Summarizing, though the conditions that determine the serialization of ADJs remain unclear, the interpretation of prenominal ADJs with respect to one another is clear: as expected under minimal assumptions, the ADJ closest the the N forms a constituent with N and this is then modified as a whole by the next ADJ to the immediate left, and so on.
2.9. The Scope of Double Postnominal ADJs An ADJ with the semantics appropriate to modify the whole network of the N appears in postposition in French. When two such ADJs are postnominal, as is frequently the case, the rightmost ADJ gets wide scope, as represented by the interpretive bracketing in (114): blanches first composes with lignes, and this group is modified by courbes. (114) les [[lignes blanches] courbes]
the curved white lines
So if I ask someone to show me les lignes blanches courbes, the task is presented as a search among white lines for the curved ones. On the other hand, if the order of the ADJs is inverted, and I ask for
122 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces les lignes courbes blanches, then we have a different task—a search among curved lines for the white ones. This is the same effect as the one we saw when prenominal ADJs are inverted as in (110)-(111). Not all N+ADJi+ADJ2 allow the two orders of the ADJs as easily. While the ADJs in (114) can easily be inverted—with an accompanying change in the semantics—the reverse order is much less natural in (115), and almost impossible in (116).
(115) a b (116) a b
une gymnastique intellectuelle feconde des mesures techniques brutales
a fertile intellectual gymnastic
brutal technical measures
une situation financiere desastreuse a desastrous financial situation Le seul fournisseur franfais possible d'armes nucleaires, c'est 1'Etat francais.. The only possible French supplier of nuclear arms is the French state.
The restrictions appear to be pragmatic: the possibility of a certain combination depends on how easy it is to present the class determined by N+ADJi as being attributed the property of ADJ2. This is not different from the oddness of simple combinations of an N with an ADJ in which there are semantic incompatibilities, such as les barils intellectuels 'the intellectual barrels'. The semantic composition of postnominal ADJs is exactly as expected under minimal assumptions: the ADJ immediately juxtaposed to the N combines semantically with it first and this constituent is modified by the next ADJ. Given that the ADJs are on the righthand side of the N, the prediction is that the bracketing should mirror the one of prenominal ADJs, and that is indeed the case. Therefore, there is no reason internal to French to assume that anything is at play here that departs from the minimal assumptions about Juxtaposition as a means to express a semantic relation. We will see in chapter 3 that there also are no crosslinguistic motivations to add to these minimal assumptions. 2.10. Scopal Ambiguity in ADJ-N-ADJ There are cases where a prenominal ADJ in French (and other Romance languages) has scope over the postnominal ADJ and in which the linear order of the two ADJs with respect to one another is the same in English, as in (117).
Adjectival Modification in French 123 (117) a
un bon chef fran^ais
a'
a good French chef
b
un gros ballon rouge
b'
a big red ball
This has led a few linguists to propose a transformational account of the variation between the two languages (see for example Cinque 1990, 1994, Bernstein 1993, Valois 1991): the surface structure in English would be quite close to the interpreted structure, whereas French would have displacements that obscure the interpretive structure a bit. A simplified structure of (117a) requires the following minimal relations among the terminal elements to get the proper interpretive bracketing:
(118) un [bon [chef fran?ais] ] The prediction is that, in both languages, an ADJ should always be in the scope of another ADJ to its left because the latter c-commands the former. But the prediction is incorrect: a postnominal ADJ often has scope over a prenominal ADJ in French, as in the following examples:
(119) a
un jeune homme obstine
a'
an obstinate young man
b
une mauvaise reputation tenace
b'
a persistent bad reputation
So an example like (119a) seems to have minimal relations described by the interpretive bracketing in (120), which is the opposite of the bracketing in (118): jeune is in the constituent modified by obstine, so the prenominal ADJ jeune is closer to the head N than postnominal obstine.
(120) un [[jeune homme] obstine] To make matters even more complicated, it also easy to find examples with two possible interpretations, in which either ADJ may be in the scope of the other.
124 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (121) a
une nouvelle proposition interessante a new proposition interesting a new interesting proposition OR an interesting new proposition
b
les presumes professeurs chinois malhonnetes the alleged professors Chinese dishonest the alleged dishonest Chinese professors OR the dishonest alleged Chinese professors OR the dishonest Chinese alleged professors
The ambiguity is clear in (121a). In (121b), presume can have widest scope (the dishonesty is questioned), or intermediate scope (the dishonesty is established, but the nationality is questioned), or presume can have the most embedded scope (just the status of professor is questioned). Note that malhonnete always has scope over chinois however, as expected if the surface order corresponds to the interpretive bracketing for two adjectives on the same side of the head N. In fact, in most cases, including those in (117) and (119) above, the scope of a prenominal and a postnominal ADJ relative to one another is fairly free: intonation and/or pragmatic factors determine which reading is the most salient. We could simply say that the bracketing in these cases is fairly free: either the prenominal ADJ combines first with the N, so that the postnominal ADJ has scope over it as in (122a), or composition can be reversed as in (122b). (122) a b
[[ADJNJADJ]
[ADJ [N ADJ]
However, we will see in the next two sections that there are good reasons to assume that the prenominal ADJ is always structurally closer to the N than the postnominal ADJ as indicated in (120) and (122a), regardless of which ADJ takes scope over the other: some sandhi phenomena occur only with prenominal ADJs, and only these ADJs are subject to a No Complement condition. Isomorphy between syntactic and semantic scope seems to be lost if a prenominal ADJ is always more deeply embedded than a postnominal ADJ as in (122a), even when the former has scope over the latter. But in fact, we can reconcile the syntax and the semantics if we analyze the prenominal ADJ and head N as a complex functor head that behaves like a portmanteau, as suggested for Number in section 3.3 of chapter 1. So for example, the prenominal ADJ jeune in (120) could be
Adjectival Modification in French 125 under the scope of obstine under the usual understanding of the isomorphy between syntactic scope and semantic scope. However, since a prenominal ADJ applies to the inner elements of the N, it is party to the definition of the intension of the N, and so it forms a complex head with N. Since jeune is part of the complex head jeune homme, it can have scope over the postnominal ADJ obstine because the portmanteau jeune homme has scope over obstine. This is just like the fact that the prepositional features PREPa of the lexically complex head aux 'PREPa-MASC-PLUR-DEF' can have scope over its argumental complement in aux enfants 'to the children' in (123):
Under the portmanteau hypothesis, either the prenominal or the postnominal ADJ may have scope over the other: the two interpretations are associated with the same representation in the grammar and only pragmatic or contextual factors will make one interpretation more salient. A logician may want to represent these differently, but this is not distinguished in linguistic representation. The portmanteau hypothesis can also account for the fact that a prenominal ADJ may have scope over the object of the N: in (124), what could be alleged is that it is children that are being taken away, but the status of robber is not questioned (Gennaro Chierchia, personal communication). (124) les presumes voleurs d'enfants the alleged children robbers
The scopal ambiguity between the two ADJs in the sequence ADJi-N-ADJ2 is often analysed as a case of bracketing ambiguity as sketched in (122). For instance, Cinque (1994) assumes that these postnominal ADJs are predicative ADJs which are generated in a special position, adjoined high enough to the right to have wide scope (this line of analysis is also adopted by Bernstein (1993) and Sleeman (1996)).38 This proposal faces general problems that I will discuss in chapter 3. In any event, it is factually incorrect. Thus, in examples with multiple ADJs like (121b), the second postnominal ADJ malhonnetes may have scope over the prenominal ADJ presumes, or malhonnetes may be under the scope of presumes. This requires no modification to the portmanteau analysis. Assume a structure as in (125):
126 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
Let us assume furthermore as Chomsky (1995) that a head projects not only its categorial features, but all its features: this is minimal, most economical, since nothing more need be said than PROJECT. So the V label of the projection in a traditional representation like (126a) is but a convenient abbreviation of the head label as in (126b).
This means that the representation in (125) is also only a convenient abbreviation of the representation in (127), in which the projecting head is the complex formed by the prenominal ADJ and the N.
In (127), malhonnetes being under the highest projection, it may have scope over its sister constituent and the elements it contains, in particular over presumes and chinois. Moreover, the complex head presumesprofesseurs has scope over malhonnetes because it projects entirely and is thus sister to malhonnetes', since this complex head contains among others the features of presumes, presumes may have scope over malhonnetes by portmanteau effect. So again if we reduce the assumptions to their bare minimal, we obtain the correct result: presumes and malhonnetes may have scope over each other. In comparison, an analysis based on a rightmost predicative position requires yet another addition: it must allow at least two adjunction sites for these "predicative" postnominal ADJs—one position in which malhonnetes is higher than presumes and chinois to get wide scope over both of them, and
Adjectival Modification in French 127 one position in which malhonnetes is lower than presumes, but still higher than chinois, so that malhonnetes is then under the scope of presumes but has scope over chinois39 So again, this type of analysis could describe the facts, but at the cost of constant additions to the theoretical apparatus. In contrast, the data follow directly as predicted from the portmanteau analysis. Furthermore, this type of analysis itself follows on principled grounds. The portmanteau hypothesis assumes that when a head has multiple functional specifications, these may operate independently from one another with respect to other elements in the structure. This is not an aberrant behavior, but a natural option of an optimal parameter. How could a head with multiple functional specifications operate? There are two logical possibilities. Consider a simple case in which the head has the two specifications A+B. First, these may function as a unit: whatever is under the scope of A is also under the scope of B, and whatever has scope over A also has scope over B. Second, the specifications may function independently from one another: something under the scope of the head may be under the scope of A without being under the scope of B, and something with scope over the complex head may have scope over A without having scope over B. The second possibility is what is called a portmanteau. Both logical possibilities are equally efficient modes to process a head with multiple functional specifications, therefore a parametric choice arises. The portmanteau approach avoids the two major pitfalls of attempts to resolve the conflicts of semantic scope with syntactic scope: it respects lexicalist integrity and does not require "corrections" in the form of ad hoc syntactic structures and transformations. Thus, note that a crucial form of the lexicalist hypothesis is respected under this view of what is a portmanteau. The position of the head determines what element is sister to it and how its projection interacts with other elements in the syntactic structure; hence it delimits what elements can enter into what kinds of relations with the functional specifications. Moreover, the only elements internal to a head deemed accessible are functional specifications which are part of a paradigm (of affixes, clitics or complex functor formation). No access is allowed to elements inside the radical of a word in violation of lexical integrity, such as the famous derivation of kill from cause become not alive of McCawley (1968), or access to qualia (Pustejovsky 1995) or inherent sublexical semantic features (Beard
1991) for
adjectival modification. Furthermore,
it
avoids
the redundancy of
oversyntactification in which each feature heads its own projection in syntax, and then a word which bears the same features moves through these syntactic heads to check the features: this double specification of features is redundant and a form of violation of lexicalist integrity. The
128 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces checking process is a transderivational conspiracy of a global nature since the order of the syntactic composition is the same as the order of morphological composition (see Williams 1997 for similar remarks). A language therefore selects one option of the portmanteau parameter. Whether a single option applies generally in the language to all instances where a head has multiple specifications, or whether the choice is on a case by case basis is still unclear to me, but my impression is that since the choice is on a mode of processing, it probably is made once for all cases. Thus, there are numerous cases in which inflectional or clitic elements appear to have a semantic scope wider than the word they are part of. If we compare French and English, it seems to be generally the case that French opts for an independent operation of the features, whereas English opts for a unitary operation. A clear instance of these choices can be seen in the way Verb+Tense functions in these languages. The interaction of Tense marking with negation is revealing in this respect (Bouchard 1995, 1997); effects of the portmanteau parameter can also be seen at play in the distribution of adverbs (Bouchard 1995). Consider the structure proposed by Pollock (1989) and Chomsky (1991, 1995) for a sentence with negation (with AGRS and AGRO omitted since they are not directly relevant, and have been removed from the theory since then):
There are two implicit assumptions behind this structure: Condition (i): Tense is very high in the structure, it is the head of the clause. Condition (ii): Sentential negation (a) has scope over the predicative part of the sentence, but (b) not over Tense; rather, NEGP is a complement of Tense, is under the scope of Tense. As indicated in Bouchard (1997), the condition about the scope of negation may find an explanation in a suggestion made by Ladusaw (1995). Following ideas of Frege and Davidson, he considers that a predicate is a description of a class of events and that this description is the ISSUE about which
Adjectival Modification in French 129 we must make a judgement. A positive judgement can be expressed by placing the ISSUE under the immediate scope of Tense (the structure of the affirmative clause), a negative judgement by placing the ISSUE under the scope of Tense and of NEG (the structure of the negative clause). "If a judgement may only be expressed by placing the ISSUE under the scope of Tense, whether the ISSUE is marked positively or negatively, then this may give us a clue as to why NEG may not have scope over Tense" (Bouchard 1997:38). The portmanteau parameter allows us to maintain a third condition, i.e., lexicalist integrity: Condition (Hi): Verbs are composite lexical items which are inserted fully inflected in syntax. I take a strong form of condition (iii) and assume that there are no additional functional categories shadowing the component parts of inflected items. All these three conditions rest on very basic assumptions that are widely accepted. Now consider some of the data in French and English (n' is in parentheses because it is not obligatory in many dialects, and pas is the actual marker of negation, the head of NEGP).
(129) a
Jean (n')aime pas Marie,
b
*Jean pas aime Marie.
(130) a
* John likes not Mary.
b
John does not like Mary.
In the standard derivational approach, some feature is stipulated to trigger the raising of the V to T° overtly in French, but English has a different kind of feature which triggers raising only at LF (proposals vary in details that are not relevant here). Pollock (1989) tries to find some motivation for the difference between the two languages by linking it with the fact that French has a richer verbal morphology than English: such a rich morphology would be strong and have the effect that it allows a verb raising to it to continue to assign a theta role, whereas a poor morphology blocks this assignment. However, this goes counter to the feature percolation convention generally held (see Lieber (1980) for example): features of a nonhead are usually assumed to be able to percolate up in a morphological structure only if they are absent from the head. So the weaker the head, the more features from nonheads should be able to percolate according to this convention. It is also natural to correlate rich morphology with features operating independently from one another: each individual form has an overt indication that the features are present. Moreover, the three conditions above are sufficient to account for the data. In the structures I propose for the sentences in (129) and (130),
130 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces condition (iii) about lexical integrity is respected integrally. Thus, the structure of (129a) is as in (131), where V+T stands for aime which has projected, and NEGP for pas.
Since aime is a verb with T at its head, and aime heads the sentence, T heads the sentence: so condition (i) is respected. Finally, condition (ii) is also respected: pas c-commands the direct object Marie, and as its projection NEGP, it also c-commands the verbal part of its sister aime, French allowing portmanteau links with features; therefore all elements of the PREDVP are under the scope of negation (iia). Moreover, the T part of aime takes NEGP as its complement, so (iib) holds. As for the relation between aime and its object Marie, it can be assumed to hold under Relativized Minimality: pas does not count as an intervening head in the computation of predicate-argument relations. All three conditions are therefore satisfied directly, without appeal to corrective devices such as additional functional categories or movements. As for (129b), it has the following structure:
This structure crashes for two reasons. First, the projection of NEG is not a complement of Tense (iib); second, Tense is not the head of the sentence (i). Turning to the English data, the problem with sentence (130a) is that it has the same structure as the French sentence (129a), but that English is not a portmanteau language.
Adjectival Modification in French 131
Since likes is a verb with T at its head, and likes heads the sentence, the Tense bearing element heads the sentence, and that's fine: we can assume that condition (i) is respected. Condition (iia) is also respected: not c-commands Mary, and its projection NEGP c-commands its sister likes. But English does not allow features to function independently; therefore both the V and the T of likes are under the scope of negation, in violation of condition (iib). In a language such as English that does not allow features to operate independently, it is not possible to satisfy conditions (iia) and (iib) simultaneously with an inflected verb form V+T: it is not possible for NEG to have scope over the V part without it also having scope over the T part. The only solution is for the language to have a strategy that allows Tense to be expressed independently from the verbal base: this is exactly the role of do-support in (134).
Here, the Tense bearing does heads the sentence, so condition (i) is respected. Not c-commands the PREDVP, which is therefore under the scope of negation as required by condition (iia). Moreover, the T element does takes NEGP as its complement, so (iib) also holds. In short, the distribution of negation in French and English can be accounted for directly from the basic assumptions expressed in conditions (i), (ii) and (iii), without recourse to additional theoretical tool. This gives support to the portmanteau parameter, which derives from logical possibilities that arise from the nature of heads with multiple functional specifications. The
132 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces approach provides a simple and well grounded analysis of constructions in which syntactic scope appears not to correspond to semantic scope. The isomorphy between syntactic and semantic scope is often challenged on the basis of trends in the diachronic evolution of languages. "Indeed, it is often the case that items which are full words in one stage of a language are reanalized as morphological affixes, via a stage of clitic status. This shows that there is actually a diachronic tendency towards increasing the discrepancy between syntactic and semantic scope" (Miller 1992: 19).
(135) Diachronic evolution: word > clitic > affix
This increase in discrepancy between syntactic and semantic scope is rather surprising. However, there is another way to look at this evolution in the approach I am proposing in which there is no such increase in discrepancy. The categories involved in this kind of evolution are functional, minor categories, i.e., closed-class categories which express properties that hold for all phrases of a certain type. For instance, Miller is concerned with the placement of determiners, which he assumes are affixes tightly attached to a host (at least in French). A determiner expresses properties such as Number or Defmiteness which are generally present in nominal expressions, as opposed to specific properties brought in by the head N, such as the property 'dog' found in the N dog. It is natural for properties such as Number and Definiteness to tend not to be expressed by independent words, but to appear attached to the head of the phrase, since it is a usual trait of the phrase to have this feature: this is simply a reflection of the natural tendency to endocentricity. An affixal determiner is a problem only if it is represented as a certain type of operator with scope over the range of the nominal. However, if a determiner is seen as expressing a property of the nominal phrase, and hence of its nominal head since they are the same bundle of features under minimal assumptions, there is no discrepancy in the tendency of the determiner to be affixed to the head. Summing up, the scopal relations between ADJs in the sequences ADJi-ADJ2-N and N-ADJi-ADJ2 follow in a unified fashion and under minimal assumptions: the ADJ immediately juxtaposed to the N always combines semantically with N first. Moreover, prenominal ADJs always combine with N more tightly than postnominal ADJs (by the Elsewhere application of the Linearization Parameter (3)). In the next two sections, we will look at data that confirm this close link between prenominal ADJs and N.
Adjectival Modification in French 133 2.11. Sandhi Phenomena
The facts of liaison indicate that the relation between a prenominal ADJ and an N is tighter than the one between a postnominal ADJ and an N. Liaison is the overt realization of a consonant that would otherwise not be pronounced. It occurs when a word-final latent consonant is placed before a word that begins with a vowel. It has often been observed that liaison in French is not purely phonological. In addition to phonological properties such as the nature of the consonant (nasals trigger liaison only in contexts where it is obligatory, never in optional contexts), various other factors determine whether liaison can take place: morphological factors (plural affixes trigger it more easily than consonants of the stem), discourse factors (high registers allow more varied types of liaison than low registers), and syntactic factors (liaison only takes place under a certain structural condition of proximity). There is a vast literature on the subject (Delattre 1966, Schane 1968, Selkirk 1972, 1986, Encreve 1980, Plenat 1986, Valois 1991, Lamarche 1991, Miller 1992, and many more). The crucial factor for our purposes is the syntactic requirement of proximity. So let us consider how syntactic contexts affect liaison. First, liaison is obligatory for all consonants and in all registers when it involves a determiner or a clitic. (136) a
les
amis
the friends (Det-N: obligatory liaison for all registers)
b
un
arbre
a tree
c
Paul en
d
Je les envie. / envy them.
e
Us
ontcompris.
f
On
ira.
a mange.
Paul ate some. They have understood.
We will go.
However, if the clitic is in an inversion construction and what follows it is not its host, then liaison is only possible in a highly marked register (which I indicate with "%") and only for the plural marker [z], never for a nasal:
(137) a
%Iront-ils
alaville?
b
Ira-t-on / a la ville?
c
%Prenez-vous
d
Prenez-en / un.
Will they go to the city? Will we go to the city?
un bonbon. Take a candy. Take one.
134 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Specifiers such as a full subject (non-clitic ) or a Wh-phrase do not allow liaison: (138)
a
Les enfants / ont un chat. The kids have a cat.
b
Quels enfants / as-tu invites? Which kids did you invite?
Liaison takes place between a verbal head and its complement or some other element following it only in a highly marked register: (139) a b
%J'aipris une pomme. %H lit encore.
I took an apple.
He is still laughing.
Closed-class heads like AUX and prepositions allow liaison with their complements (Selkirk 1986): (140) a
%ont
avoue
have admitted
b
%dans une heure
in an hour
c
% apres un instant
after a moment
This fits in naturally with the tendency we saw in the previous section for closed-class functional categories to appear attached to more substantive elements. Note however that this is only optional liaison, as is clear from the fact that a preposition ending in a nasal does not trigger liaison:40 (141) selon / une amie
according to a friend
Moreover, matters are complicated by the fact that functional heads also show liaison with elements that are not the head of their complement: (142) a
%un livre dont un homme s'est empare a book of-which a man took possession
b
%Les hommes ont immediatement avoue. The men have immediately confessed.
Adjectival Modification in French 135 Finally, and most importantly for what concerns us, prenominal ADJs show a strong tendency for liaison, a phenomenon noted as early as Baale (1898) (cited in Waugh 1977). Some authors say it is obligatory when it involves the plural marker [z] (Morin 1992, Delattre 1966, Plenat 1986). What is interesting is that liaison of prenominal ADJs appears not just with plural [z] but with various consonants, including nasals (143d), which are normally found only in contexts of obligatory liaison.
(143) a
enormes arbres
enormous trees
b
gros
big elephant
c
grand
d
bon
elephant ami ami
ancien
great friend good friend
assistant
prochain_arret
former assistant next stop
On the other hand, liaison between an N and a postnominal ADJ is restricted to a highly marked register, and to plural [z]: it sounds terribly affected, a hypercorrection in fact with consonants other than [z], and it never takes place with a nasal. (144) a
%amis
anglais
English friends
b
un plat / allemand
a German dish
c
jambon/andaloux
andalousian ham
There are minimal pairs as in (145) in which savant and aveugle can both be either an N or an ADJ, and the construction is disambiguated by the liaison: (145) a b
un savant
aveugle a wise blind-man (ADJ-N)
un savant / aveugle
a blind scholar (N-AD J)
All authors agree that prenominal ADJ liaison is much less restricted than liaison for postnominal ADJs. Contrary to the latter, prenominal ADJ liaison is almost obligatory with the plural marker [z], in many cases it is not restricted to plural marking and involves several other consonants, including the distributionally limited nasal [n], and it is not restricted to an elevated register. Whatever the
136 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces final analysis of liaison will be, what is crucial for our discussion is that a prenominal ADJ establishes a structural relation with the N which makes it close enough to satisfy the structural condition of proximity generally imposed on liaison, but a postnominal ADJ does not.41 If we restrict ourselves to bare phrase structure, the "proximity" restriction on liaison cannot be expressed in terms of bar levels and the like: a prenominal ADJ has the bracketing in (146a) and a postnominal ADJ has the bracketing in (146b). So there is no bar-level difference between the two that would allow a structural distinction of proximity: in fact, bars levels have no status in a minimal theory, as we saw earlier. (146) a
[ N 'ADJN]
b
[N-N ADJ]
A natural way to express proximity in my analysis is in terms of complex functor domain: a relation between a and (3 counts as closer when a establishes a relation with a component internal to p, when a and |3 form a complex functor, than when p is a functor category taking a as a dependent. This immediately defines prenominal ADJs as closer to N than postnominal ADJs. This distinction is not ad hoc, since the effects of "normal" functor-dependent relations versus "elsewhere" subelement-functor relations will have to be determined in any event for other relations that may hold between two elements. See for instance the discussion of Wh-phrases in chapter 6. The alternative is to depart from the minimal structures in (146) and to augment them with various structural elements to create a structural difference between the two, such as diverse functional categories or segmentations of nodes. Current movement analyses are quite permissive in this way and provide different means to derive the closeness of prenominal ADJs. For instance, in Valois (1991), a prenominal ADJ incorporates into the N which is on its way to NUMP. However, this incorporation follows from nothing in the theory and is just a restatement of the proximity required to obtain the liaison facts. Bernstein (1993) assumes that some prenominal ADJs are functional heads. She says that the liaison between such a functional head and its N complement is expected, given the observation that functional heads trigger liaison with the head of their complement as we saw in (140). But she fails to take into account the fact that the liaison of functional heads is optional, not found in popular registers nor with nasals (141), whereas liaison of prenominal ADJs is almost obligatory, quite widespread among speakers, and includes nasals. Another problem is that she claims that the class of ADJs that are functional heads is a closed class, with very few members,
Adjectival Modification in French 137 i.e., those that are obligatorily prenominal and those which show "a more significant difference in interpretation" between the two positions than restrictive vs nonrestrictive. This is very imprecise, and we saw that all ADJs exhibit the same basic meaning difference (i.e., whole-to-whole versus part-to-whole relations). Even if we allow some loose methodology and we restrict ourselves to those ADJs that speakers perceive as showing a clear difference, the closed-class claim is clearly incorrect: a perusal of any good descriptive grammar quickly returns several dozen ADJs with a "significant difference in interpretation." Therefore, prenominal ADJs do not fall in a closed class and we would expect them to show liaison of the type found for a substantive head rather than a functional head, like the marginal liaison between a verbal head and its complement. In any event, attempts like these to augment the minimal structures in (146) with various elements to create a structural difference between the two orders have no independent motivation. In the end, they are no better than to directly stipulate a structural difference as in Giorgi & Longobardi (1991:158): "A weak position, in the relevant sense, can be defined as a prenominal position in an NP with a lexically realized head. Strong positions would be all the others a priori accessible to Ds or As" (see also Cardinaletti & Starke 1994). Recall from the discussion of adjunction in section 1, especially note 1, that making this kind of structural distinction is redundant since the different structures are proposed on the basis of how the daughters differ semantically. The justifications are always a posteriori and depend on the unwarranted encoding of the semantic properties at play into different syntactic structures: the structural notions are parasitic on the selectional notions and do not reveal any new properties about the facts. A weaker sort of argument could be made against the claim that liaison facts support a simple structure like (146a) for prenominal ADJs. For instance, Cinque (1994) offers no account of liaison, but he says that liaison facts cannot be construed as evidence for a zero-level status of prenominal ADJs, as Lamarche (1991) claims and in opposition to Cinque's multiple Spec structure, because liaison is triggered even in the presence of a specifier:
(147) les tres frequentes
invasions de Jupiter
the very frequent invasions of Jupiter
However, an NP like (147) is not a counterexample because it is a case of iteration of head-to-head relations: tres and frequentes first form a complex ADJ head, which in turn forms a complex N head with invasions. Weinreich (1966: 82-89) and Stowell (1981) offer a similar account, except that they both consider that these complex forms are morphological words. Coordinations of prenominal
138 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces ADJs as in (148) raise a problem for a morphological analysis, but not for my compositional analysis: these coordinated adjectival heads create new adjectival heads which are still equivalent to zero-level elements.42
(148) a b
bons et loyaux services
good and loyal services
belles et cruelles images
beautiful and cruel images
There is another simple argument that can be made against the claim that liaison facts support a structure like (146a) for prenominal ADJs. It is based on the morphological account that Morin (1998) gives of liaison. The standard approach to liaison is to propose a phonological account based on a latent consonant that surfaces under specific conditions. However, this analysis faces the problem that the consonant surfacing in liaison contexts is often not the same as the consonant of the feminine form of a given word, as shown in (149): (149) masculine
feminine
liaison
grand gra
grad
grat
gros
gros
groz
gro
Morin (1992) suggests that a morphological analysis offers a more precise account of these facts than a phonological account. Following a proposal by Morin & Kaye (1982) about the plural marker [z], he argues that all cases of liaison after prenominal ADJs are best interpreted as a form of adjectival declension. In a morphological analysis, the feminine markings and the liaison markings in (149) may simply belong to different paradigms. This also explains the behavior of ADJs that very rarely appear in prenominal position because of their semantics. In a phonological approach, in the absence of previous evidence to the contrary, a speaker should automatically use the latent consonant of the feminine form as a liaison (evidence for the feminine is generally frequent). Yet this is not what happens. When asked how they would pronounce rarely occurring examples like those in (150), speakers tend to hesitate a lot, most of them being reluctant to produce the examples, commenting that they would not say that (Encreve 1980, Miller 1992:166, Morin 1998). (150) a b
#monbrunami
my brown friend
#un blanc amas d'etoiles
a white cluster of stars
Adjectival Modification in French 139 This kind of reaction is not what would be expected if liaison was a productive phonological rule, but rather looks like the typical avoidance strategy used by speakers to cope with defective paradigms. Morin (1998) remarks that to analyze liaison as adjectival declension has one weakness however: it requires "ad hoc manipulations of the inflectional ending to have it surface as the initial consonant of a following noun whenever a pause would intervene between the two, as in un robuste, mais petit, t-enfanf
(p. 7). He suggests to reanalyze prenominal liaison consonants as
prefixes on the following noun. If the morphological account of Morin (1998) is correct and prenominal liaison consonants are prefixes on the following noun, then the fact that liaison consonants appear between a prenominal ADJ and an N, and not between an N and a postnominal ADJ, could be attributed to the prefix nature of these consonants. So liaison would not provide an argument for syntactic proximity. However, we can maintain the simple analysis based on structure (146a) because it allows us to make a distinction which even the morphological analysis must make. Note that a liaison consonant appears between a Det and a prenominal ADJ (151) and also between a prenominal ADJ and another prenominal ADJ (152). (151) les z-enormes z-elephants
the enormous elephants
(152) de beaux z-enormes z-elephants
beautiful enormous elephants
In the morphological analysis, this means that ADJs can also undergo z-prefixation. The question is then why this prefix occurs so easily on prenominal ADJs, but is restricted to only a very elevated level of speech for postnominal ADJs. Assuming that liaison is subject to phonological as well as morphological conditioning, an analysis based on the notion of complex functor provides an explanation for the facts in (151)-(152): prenominal ADJs form a complex functor with the N in an iterative way, thus establishing a domain of proximity in which liaison takes place. Postnominal ADJs do not form complex functors with the N. In this analysis, though there is no distinction between the syntax of prenominal and postnominal ADJs in terms of level of attachment, the functor relation is read differently in these two structures, with the consequence that a prenominal ADJ is determined to be closer to N than a postnominal ADJ. This difference in proximity, independently arrived at, correlates directly with the differences in liaison.
140 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 2.12. The No Complement Restriction
As is well known, an AP containing a complement may not appear in a pronominal position: (153) a b
*une fiere de sa fille mere
a proud of her daughter mother
une mere fiere de sa fille
a mother proud of her daughter
This holds even in English, where bare adjectives generally occur in prenominal position (154a,b): adjectives with a complement (154c,d) or a post-modifier (154e,f) must follow the head N. (154) a b
A proud / happy man. ?* A man proud / happy,
c
* A proud of his daughter man.
d
A man proud of his daughter,
e
* A happier than you man.
f
A man happier than you.
There are apparent exceptions to this generalisation, but it is usually assumed that these are either lexicalized expressions (155a) or bits of quotations (155b), so they do not constitute true exceptions (see Nanni 1978, 1980, Chomsky 1981, Sadler & Arnold 1994, Wiese 1996, Abeille & Godard 2000).43
(155) a b
an easy to pronounce name a God-is-dead philosophy
The No Complement restriction on prenominal ADJs is frequently dealt with by some kind of filter (Zwarts 1974, Emonds 1976, Williams 1982, Flynn 1983, Abney 1987, Di Sciullo & Williams 1987, Giorgi & Longobardi 1991, Sadler & Arnold 1994, Abeille & Godard 2000). This type of account is unexplanatory: the filtering mechanism and auxiliary assumptions surrounding it are ad hoc since they are proposed for the sole purpose of protecting the theory from a threatening falsification and provide no additional testable results.
Adjectival Modification in French 141 For instance, Williams (1982) proposes a head-final filter to account for the contrast illustrated in (154): the adjectival phrase must end with the adjectival head in order for the AP to precede the head. The Consistency Principle of Giorgi & Longobardi (1991:98) states the same restriction in broader terms:
(156) Consistency Principle An XP immediately expanding a lexical category on the non-recursive side is directionally consistent in every projection. They assume that the non-recursive side in French and English is the left side, so expansion on that side can only be to the left of the head, not the right.44 Flynn (1983) proposes a filter similar to Williams's, but in terms of Categorial Grammar: a functor category that contains a major category appears to the right of the phrase which is the argument category. An AP with a complement contains a major category, therefore it appears to the right of the N (which is its argument in this approach). Abney (1987) accounts for the No Complement restriction on prenominal ADJs by attributing a filtering function to an abstract notion off-selection. He assumes structures as in (157), in which prenominal ADJs are heads that f-select AP or NP complements.
He makes the auxiliary statement that f-selection and normal complementation are incompatible. This has the filtering effect that an ADJ which f-selects an NP as in (157) cannot take a normal complement. But f-selection is an ad hoc notion and the incompatibility of f-selection and normal complementation is stipulatory since it derives from nothing.45 In Sadler & Arnold (1994), a filter is elaborated on the basis of a syntactic feature [LEX]: [LEX+] adjectives precede, while [LEX-] adjectives follow the head N; APs with complements are [LEX-], so they follow the N. We saw in section 2.7 that Abeille & Godard (2000) retain the basic idea of Sadler & Arnold, but embed it in a
142 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces more general theory of word-order based on [light], which they allow to be underspecified; only ADJs marked as [+light] or are underspecified may be prenominal. They account for the No Complement restriction by stipulating that ADJs with complements are [-light], whereas some bare ADJs are [+light] and remain so when modified by [+light] adverbs like tres. In contrast to these accounts based on ad hoc filtering devices, the No Complement restriction on prenominal ADJs follows directly from the architecture of the theory in an analysis of NP-internal ADJs based on the Linearization Parameter (3) and in particular on the Elsewhere application of it (the parameter itself deriving from fundamental properties of asymmetry that arise in the CI and SM interfaces, as we saw). In this analysis, an ADJ appears in prenominal position under an Elsewhere application of the Linearization Parameter on functor-dependent relations: such an ADJ must then be related to a subelement of the network of the N. These subelements, such as the characteristic function/ the time interval /, the possible world w, the variable assignment function g, are inherent elements of the category N: they define the category and are present in any common noun. Being associated with an inherent element of the N, the ADJ is presented as expressing an inherent property of N, as we saw repeatedly above. It is natural to assume that such an inherent attribution of a property is decontextualized, in the sense that it cannot depend on an open position in the AP modifier which would require contextual information to evaluate it. Hence, fier 'proud' may be attributed as an inherent property, but not fier de XP, in which the XP ranges over contextually determined values. Similarly, consider the difference between (158a) and (158b). (158) a b
un amusant spectacle
an amusing show
un spectacle amusant a voir a show amusing to see
As Waugh (1977:131) observes, un amusant spectacle is amusing as a show, whereas un spectacle amusant a voir is amusing "in the sense of 'seeing it' (a voir) as any other substantivity would be." The open position implied by the interpretation "any other substantivity" is not compatible with the inherent, decontextualized attribution of a property. In other words, the fact that a transitive ADJ has an open position forces the AP to modify an element that is argument-like, i.e., forces the AP to be predicative.46 This excludes a transitive AP from prenominal position as it must then relate to a subelement of the network of the N, and these subelements do not have the properties required for argumenthood, such as intension and atomization. In postnominal position on the other hand, the AP may relate to the whole nominal
Adjectival Modification in French 143 constituent that precedes it, such as Det+N, which has the required properties (We will see in chapter 4 that Det is actually cliticized to N, or to ADJ+N if a prenominal ADJ is present). We therefore expect transitive APs to pattern like other phrases that establish a predication relation inside the NP. This is exactly what Ronat (1974, 1977) observed: she showed that transitive APs behave like restrictive relative clauses. A first test she provides is that les seuls 'the only' preceding an N forces a restrictive reading: so only predicative XPs providing a restriction can appear in such an NP, such as a relative clause (159a), a transitive AP (159b), a certain class of predicative ADJs (159c), and a sequence de+ADJ (159d), which is predicative (see Hulk & Verheudg 1992, 1994, among many others); but a simple intransitive ADJ is prohibited (159e).
(159) a
les seuls livres que je connaisse the only books I know
b
les seuls livres susceptibles de te plaire the only books likely to please you
c
les seuls livres disponibles the only books available
d
les seules pizzas de chaudes the only pizzas which are hot
e
*les seules pizzas chaudes the only pizzas hot
A second observation made by Ronat concerns possessive pronouns: they are possible with simple ADJs (160a), but not with relative clauses (160b) or transitive ADJs (160c)
(160) a
Je te donnerai mes livres rouges. /'// give you my red books
b
* Je te donnerai mes livres qui sont rouges. / 'II give you my books that are red.
c
*Je te donnerai mes livres susceptibles de te plaire. I'll give you my books likely to please you.
Ronat also noted that demonstrative pronouns may be followed by a transitive ADJ (161 a) or a restrictive relative clause (161b), but not by a simple ADJ (161c); she did not realize that a certain class of predicative intransitive ADJs does occur with a demonstrative (16Id) (I discuss this latter case in more detail in chapter 3, section 2.1):
144 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (161) a
Je t'ai envoye ceux susceptibles de te plaire. I sent you those likely to please you.
b
Je t' ai envoye ceux que j 'ai vus. I sent you those that I saw.
c
*Je t'ai envoye ceux rouges. I sent you those red.
d
Je t'ai envoye ceux presents. I sent you those present.
So the distinction between predicative ADJs that have an open position which would require contextual information to evaluate it, and ADJs that do not have such a position, is independently motivated. Crucially, ADJs of the first class can only be postnominal in order to fulfill this requirement, so that only ADJs of the second class may be prenominal. Further support for my analysis comes from apparent exceptions like those in (155). It is well known that the morphosyntactic status of compound-like constructs like these renders their internal elements inaccessible for interpretability that links them with a discourse entity, such as coreference (see Ward, Sproat & McKoon 1991 and references therein). For instance, the pronouns cannot access elements internal to the compounds in (162). (162) a b
Yesterday, I met this really odd truck; driver. #He lives in it;. *Animal; hunters tend to like them;.
This means that compound-like expressions do not have an open position relating to an external entity, so they are not forced to be predicative. As expected, they do not exhibit No Complement effects. There is an additional set of facts which corroborates my analysis. Stowell (1981) observes that in English, definite descriptions used anaphorically may contain prenominal ADJs, but not postnominal ADJs. He illustrates this with the following examples: (163) a
*I tried to visit the mayor last week, but the man angry at his constituents refused to see me.
b
I tried to visit the mayor last week, but the angry old man refused to see me.
Adjectival Modification in French 145 The distinction should not be expressed in terms of prenominal vs postnominal position however, but in terms of open position in the AP: the AP with a complement in (163a) has an open position which may vary contextually and this conflicts with the inherent, stable attribution of a property required to use a definite description anaphorically. In English, a postnominal ADJ generally has a complement or post-modifier, so it also has an open position making it incompatible with the epithet use. However, in French, a postnominal ADJ may be bare, so without an open position, and the definite description may then be used as an epithet: (164a) can be used epithetically like the English (163b), though the form in (164b) would be more likely in this use: (164) a
Le vieil homme colerique a refuse de me voir. The old angry man refused to see me.
b
Ce vieux colerique d'homme a refuse de me voir.
Not surprisingly, the prenominal position is usually preferred in the epithetic use, given the inherent attribution of the property that both the construct and the use exhibit; this ties in with the observations made about the anaphoric use of a prenominal ADJs in section 2.7. Cinque (1994) questions the use of the No Complement restriction as an argument that the relation between prenominal ADJs and N is closer than the one between postnominal ADJs and N. He offers no explanation for the No Complement restriction. However, he says that this restriction also holds for postnominal attributive ADJs. If true, this would support his claim that a postnominal attributive ADJ is in a position similar to the position of a prenominal ADJ, i.e., on the left branch of the projection of a functional category, and that N raises past it. It would be a problem for my analysis which predicts that all postnominal APs can be fully phrasal, i.e., have a complement. Cinque assumes that thematic and manner attributive APs appear between the N and its complement. It follows that a sequence [N AP Compl] should be impossible if the AP itself contains a complement, because the attributive AP is on the left branch of a functional category in his analysis. He offers (165a) as a case where the restriction holds on a postnominal attributive AP. (165) a
*I sostenitori fedeli alia causa di Gianni sono pochi. The supporters faithful to the cause of Gianni are few.
b
I sostenitori di Gianni fedeli alia causa sono pochi. The supporters of Gianni faithful to the cause arefe\v.
146 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces However, this is not a very good example to illustrate this property even under his own terms. He assumes that N moves over thematic or manner APs in event nominals. The N sostenitori in (165) is not an event N, and the AP is not a thematic or manner AP. Though not a true compound, this example seems to be closer to a nominal like macchina da corsa 'racing car' in which da corsa is not really a complement of macchina (see the discussion in chapter 3, section 2.2) than to an event nominal. For instance, at least in the French equivalent expression, even a bare ADJ is not fully natural if it appears between the N and the PP:
(166) a
*les partisans fideles a la cause de Jean the supporters faithful to the cause of Jean
b
?les partisans fideles de Jean the supporters faithful of Jean
c
les fideles partisans de Jean the faithful supporters of Jean
The example in (166b) requires an intonation break between the ADJ and the PP. Example (166a) is quite bad, but can be made almost acceptable if a very strong break occurs between cause and de Jean: this can be due to the heaviness of what separates the N from the PP, and also from a parsing interference, since minimal attachment strongly gives a bias to attach de Jean as a genitive complement of cause. Moreover, if we construct an example that better tests the prediction of Cinque's analysis, with an event nominal and a thematic or manner postnominal AP, the results are quite different. For example, (167) is fine: (167) votre invasion brutale a vomir de 1'Albanie your invasion brutal (to the point) of vomiting of Albania The No Complement restriction does not seem to hold for any postnominal APs, attributive or not. We may therefore conclude that the No Complement restriction on prenominal ADJs provides a basis to distinguish prenominal from postnominal ADJs in a crucial way. Moreover, given the nature of some exceptions as in (155), an account based on a semantic property seems more likely than one based on a structural property. The Elsewhere analysis of prenominal ADJs leads us to believe that the semantic property involved has to do with an open position dependent on contextual information. Some data on the epithetic use of definite descriptions confirm this hypothesis.
Adjectival Modification in French 147
3. FACTORS FAVORING PRE-N OR Posx-N PLACEMENT OF AD is A clear generalization emerges from the data presented in section 2: the placement of ADJs inside the NP crucially depends on the semantic relation that holds between the ADJ and the N. Postnominal ADJs assign properties to the whole network of the N, whereas prenominal ADJs modify components internal to N, such as the characteristic function / the variable assignment function g, the time interval /, possible world w, or may be added to the characteristic function, or may quantify over one of these subcomponents of N. This derives from fundamental properties of the CI and SM systems which determine the mapping between form and meaning, properties which are logically anterior to linguistic theory. Other factors have an effect on ADJ placement: the No Complement restriction (section 2.12), the anaphoric use of the ADJ (section 2.7), the fact that the ADJ is intensional (section 2.2) or assigns a concrete property (section 2.5). We saw that these are not independent factors, but that they all derive from the central factor—the homomorphy between semantic composition and composition of perceptual forms. In a long tradition of descriptive linguistics concerned with the placement of ADJs, several scholars have produced detailed studies in which they have noted that there are many apparently unrelated factors governing this distribution. I will now show that it is possible to make sense of these heterogeneous factors, that they actually all derive from the compatibility of the ADJ with the whole network of the N or just a subelement of it.
3.1. Semantic Factors
From Roubaud (1786) to Diez (1844) to Wilmet (1986), and scores of other scholars, we find the observation that prenominal ADJs express inherent properties, which belong naturally to the N. This is expressed succinctly by Lafaye (1858: 101):47 "The preposed adjective expresses a qualification which is already established, known, undisputed; it is analytic. Postposed, it expresses a qualification which is new, a union of ideas made at that very moment; it is synthetic." As Forsgren (1978) puts it, prenominal ADJs are presented analytically, a la Wundt, forming a complex idea, whereas postnominal ADJs enter a synthetic association, a la Herman Paul,
148 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces expressing two successive ideas. We saw that this difference between prenominal and postnominal ADJs follows from the different semantic combinations that they express. Also frequent is the observation that prenominal ADJs assign less concrete properties, that they take on a more abstract meaning, a meaning with broader application, whereas postnominal ADJs typically assign more concrete properties. We have seen that this follows from the analysis: a concrete property is typically assigned to intended referents, which are determined by the whole network of components of N, so the ADJ must be postnominal, whereas prenominal ADJs have "broader" meanings, such as intensional notions for example, because elements in that position modify elements internal to N which these ADJs target. It is also more likely for a broad meaning to be presented as an inherent property than it is for a highly specific property. Directly related to this observation is the fact that the complexity of the semantics of the N is also a crucial factor. As Forsgren (1978:32) observes, the more the semantics of the N is complex, the easier it is to have a prenominal ADJ; conversely, the simpler and more general the semantics of the N, the more likely the ADJ will be postnominal. Thus, the ADJ incroyable is odd in prenominal position with the Ns in (168a), which have very general semantics, whereas incroyable appears on either side of Ns with more complex semantics as in (168c-d) (with the expected semantic nuance).
(168) a
#l'incroyable true, chose, maniere, fafon, objet, sujet, etat, fait
b
le true, chose, maniere, fa9on, objet, sujet, etat, fait incroyable
c
1'incroyable querelle, trahison, prevention
the incredible thing, manner, way, object, subject, state, fact
the incredible quarrel, betrayal, pretension d
la querelle, trahison, prevention incroyable
This contrast is expected in the present analysis: an N with more complex semantics has a more restricted intension, so it is easy to associate an inherent property with it, hence a prenominal ADJ, whereas Ns with vague semantics have a very broad intension, so they are not associated with inherent properties. The analysis explains why there should be semantic contrasts like these, and why they correlate with the order of ADJs in this way rather than with the opposite order. Given the semantic basis of the analysis that I propose, it is not surprising that it should have something to say about the semantic factors that affect the distribution of ADJs. Much more surprising is the fact that the
Adjectival Modification in French 149 phonological, syntactic, morphological and even nongrammatical factors that have been reported over the years can also be explained by this semantically based analysis, as we will now see.
3.2. Phonological Factors
Almost every scholar who has looked into the factors that govern the placement of ADJs has observed that prenominal ADJs tend to be of smaller dimension than postnominal ADJs. This cannot be for strictly phonological reasons: some long ADJs may be prenominal in French, and English ADJs are prenominal, whether they are long or not. However, it is very likely that the most frequent ADJs of a language have shorter forms (cf. Ziff 1960), and that these ADJs are also those with the broadest meanings, more specialized meanings necessarily being used less frequently and being associated with longer forms. Thus, ban 'good' is more frequent than surexpose 'overexposed'. My analysis makes some sense out of this fact: as we saw in section 3.1, the broader the meaning, the more likely it is to be presented as an inherent property, hence to be prenominal. 3.3. Syntactic Factors
A first syntactic factor that influences the placement of ADJs is the nature of the Det. Forsgren (1978:156) reports from a statistical study that the presence of a Det showing definiteness (definite, possessive or demonstrative Det) allows prenominal ADJs more easily than an indefinite Det. He relates this to the fact that prenominal ADJs express a property as being inherent, and notes that it is more natural for a quality presented as inherent to be associated with a substantive presented as known. This definiteness factor therefore correlates directly with my analysis. Another syntactic factor concerns the presence of an adverbial. Forsgren (1978:159) observes that ADJs modified by an adverb are significantly less frequent in prenominal position. Abeille & Godard (2000) note that the nature of the premodifier applying to a prenominal ADJ is also restricted. Degree modifiers are generally fine, whereas manner or point of view adverbs are not: (169) a b
une (tres) importante decision
a (very) important decision
*une politiquement importante decision/ une decision politiquement importante a politically important decision
150 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces They simply specify that tres is a light Adverb, so its combination with the light ADJ importante forms a light constituent and may appear prenominally. On the other hand, politiquement is heavy, so the AP as a whole is heavy and must be postnominal. Which adverb is light or heavy is purely accidental in this approach. More revealing is the semantics of these adverbs. A degree adverb like tres has a meaning that is much broader in application than an adverb like politiquement. many more elements can receive the modifier tres and in many more contexts than politiquement. So this factor also derives from the central semantic property associated with prenominal ADJs: if the ADJ has itself a fairly broad meaning, the broad meaning of the tres+ADJ combination is compatible with its being presented as an inherent property, hence fres+AD3 may be prenominal in French. On the other hand, the same ADJ modified by politiquement results in a much more restricted meaning which is not likely to be inherent, so it is postnominal. Another important syntactic factor is when the ADJs are comparative or superlative. When they have a complement, they cannot be prenominal, as expected given the No Complement restriction. But comparatives and superlatives strongly tend to be postnominal even when they do not have a complement: (170) a
II a choisi une photo plus belle./#Il a choisi une plus belle photo. He chose a nicer photo.
b
II se retrouve a une place plus juste./#Il se retrouve a une plus juste place. He ends up at a fairer place.
This is what happens when the comparative and superlative forms actually express some evaluation that is relative to some other element, that depends on an open position in the AP modifier which would require contextual information. As we saw, such a dependency does not accord with an inherent attribution of a property that is decontextualized, so it is not compatible with the prenominal position. Interestingly, Forsgren (1978:175) notes that these ADJs can also receive an elative, absolute interpretation, indicating a high degree of the quality expressed by the ADJ. The difference is quite clear in the minimal pair in (171): in (b), the property is not relative to something else, so there is no open position to accomodate this other element; the ADJ then behaves like other simple cases of degree modification as in (169a), and may appear in prenominal position.
Adjectival Modification in French 151 (171) a
les representants les plus brillants (relative interpretation) the representatives who are the most brilliant
b
les plus brillants representants (absolute interpretation) the most brilliant representatives
This is just a glimpse into these complex syntactic constructions. But the analysis offers a promising account of these properties on the basis of the central semantic factor that distinguishes the relations that prenominal and postnominal ADJs establish with the N.
3.4. Morphological Factors As noted by Waugh (1977), Delbecque (1990), Abeille & Godard (1999), participial ADJs appear mostly in postnominal position (172). The generalisation is not strictly morphological, since participial ADJs which are intensional either must be prenominal (173a) or can alternate (173b) (though with a meaning difference as we saw in (31)). Moreover, participial ADJs with an affective value such as charmant, etonnant, epoustouflant, assommant, may precede or follow the N (again with a difference in meaning as we saw in (75)-(77).48 (172) a
une decision attendue/*attendue decision an expected decision desjeux interdits/*interdits jeux forbidden games
b
des circonstances attenuantes/*attenuantes circonstances mitigating circumstances des propositions concurrentes/*concurrentes propositions rival propositions
(173) a b
un soi-disant medecin a so-called doctor un suppose chef-cuisinier, un chef-cuisinier suppose an alleged chef
There is a semantic generalisation that emerges and it is exactly as predicted by my analysis. The reason why most participial ADJs must be postnominal is that most participles in French, being derived from verbs, are construed as processual (Delbecque 1990). A process is only assignable to an element with a potential reference, which is determined by the full network of the N, not a subpart of it. Conversely, a process, being highly contextualized, cannot be presented as an inherent property. Therefore, by the linearization setting (4) for French, a processual participle must follow
152 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces the head with which it establishes a relation. Participial ADJs with an affective value may be prenominal since the affinity with a verb has been lost and they are no longer processual. The analysis also accounts for an interesting difference between two closely related languages: participles have a greater possibility to appear in prenominal position in Spanish than in French. This derives from another difference between the two languages: Spanish has evolved two participial forms. Weak past participles and -nte present participles are nonprocessual: as expected, they may appear prenominally. Strong past participles and -ndo present participles are processual: they must appear postnominally.
3.5. Nongrammatical Factors Most descriptive linguists mention frequency as a significant factor favoring a prenominal placement of an ADJ: the more frequently a given ADJ is used in the language, the more often it is prenominal (see Forsgren 1978 and references therein). I have already indicated in section 3.2 why this is expected in my analysis. Frequency of use is inversely proportional to specialization of meaning: the more particular a meaning is, the less frequently an occasion will arise to use it, and the broader a meaning is, the more frequently it will fit a situation. The link between broader meaning and prenominal position comes from the fact that a broad meaning is more likely to be presented as an inherent property since broad meanings correspond to a level of categorization in which properties are less contingent. If we look at the number of different ADJs that may appear in prenominal position, rather than at the frequency of use of each particular ADJ, there are less different ADJs that appear in prenominal position than in postnominal position. The smaller class of prenominal ADJs is due to the simple fact that there are less broad categories by which we can classify elements than there are specific ones. In fact, we can invent almost at will new particular categorizations, whereas broad categories must be based on properties of such generality that they do not come by that easily. As a result, ADJs that may appear prenominally tend to be regularly the same small class of ADJs with broad meanings, whereas all the other ADJs that express the numerous distinctive meanings tend to be postnominal. A particular prenominal ADJ will generally have a higher frequency than any particular postnominal ADJ, but since there are many more individual ADJs that are postnominal, on the whole, occurrences of postnominal ADJs outnumber occurrences of prenominal ADJs by a
Adjectival Modification in French 153 margin of about two to one, as can be seen in Forsgren (1978), Grammaire Larousse du Franfais Contemporain (1964) and Wilmet (1986). For instance, out of 29016 occurrences of epithets, consisting in 3835 different ADJs, Wilmet found one ADJ out of 20 that preferred prenominal placement, but their much greater individual frequency accounts for the fact that one third of the occurrences are prenominal. The higher percentage of occurrences of ADJs in postnominal position and the greater diversity of ADJs appearing postnominally are probably the reason why postnominal placement of ADJs is often assumed to be the "normal" surface position for ADJs in Romance languages. The foregoing discussion should make it clear that this assumption of a "normal" position does not reflect a linguistically valid property. Another nongrammatical factor favoring a prenominal placement of an ADJ is mentioned in Glatigny (1967): prenominal ADJs typically belong to the old stock of words of French. This is expected. Properties of broad generality are very stable and have been established long ago, whereas new narrow meanings are constantly being created. New ADJs being less likely to be presented as an inherent property, they are generally used in postnominal position. This probably adds to the impression that this is the "normal" position. Summing up, there are many heterogeneous factors related to the placement of ADJs. Most analyses have nothing to say about these factors, or see them as oddities unrelated to each other or to central properties of adjectival modification. We saw that these factors are actually consequences of the different ways in which prenominal and postnominal ADJs combine with the N: prenominal ADJs apply semantically to a subelement of the network of the N and typically assign properties presented as being inherent, whereas postnominal ADJs combine with the whole network of N and assign properties presented as contingent.
4. CONCLUSION As scholars have observed over the centuries, adjectival modification exhibits a wealth of complex and apparently unrelated properties. I have proposed a unified account of adjectival modification based on foundational notions concerning the workings of linear combination, the semantic contribution of various ADJs and the semantic contribution of the elements of meaning of Ns. The axiomatic notions have their sources in properties of external systems which are logically anterior to language. In particular, the Linearization Parameter (3) derives from the fundamental asymmetry in
154 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces temporal Juxtaposition induced by physiological properties of the SM system and its match-up with the fundamental asymmetry between functor and dependent present in the CI system. The analysis provides a principled and unified solution to longstanding problems for compositionality raised by adjectival modification. Under this analysis, adjectival modification is always compositional. First, the combination of an ADJ and an N actually always results in an intersective interpretation: in specifically determined cases, the meaning of the ADJ intersects with the whole network of the meaning components of the N; in other cases, it intersects with only one of these components. What modification relation can be defined crucially depends on the meaning of the adjective (what kind of feature it can modify), and the meaning of the N (what features it has). By studying several ADJ-N pairs and cross-referencing between pairs, we can determine what kinds of features a particular N has, and what kinds of features a particular ADJ can modify. Second, when a noun phrase built from the same ADJ and the same N can receive more than one interpretation, it is because the ADJ is in a position to combine with different components of N. A third problem that adjectival modification raises for compositionality concerns the variation found across languages, such as the difference in order between French homme pauvre and English poor man. In the next chapter, I show that this variation derives mainly from the different choices these languages have made about the realization of Number, these choices ultimately deriving from from the CI property of atomization and the fact that the SM system provides equally valid means of realization of Number. Notes 1
Adjunction goes against good design since it is an additional operation that functions differently
from Merge: it does not simply associate two elements, but creates a special split-node structure (May 1985, Chomsky 1985). In Chomsky (2001: 15-16), adjunction is the result of the new operation pair-Merge. Pair-Merge is said to differ from regular set-Merge in three ways. First, an adjunction construction is asymmetric: if a is adjoined to p, the construction behaves strictly as a P, as if a isn't there. Second, an adjunction construction is not the projection of a head: since there is no selectional relation between p and a, determination of label relies on the asymmetry. Third, the semantic interpretation is not that of standard X-bar-theoretic constructions. Though it is a priori an imperfection since it is an additional tool, Chomsky (2001: 15-16) suggests that pairMerge may be motivated on semantic grounds. "Possibly richness of expressive power requires an
Adjectival Modification in French 155
operation of predicate composition: that is not provided by set-Merge [...] But it is the essential semantic contribution of pair-Merge." Note that all the claimed differences involve semantic properties, including the two operations themselves. So it is not clear that there needs to be a syntactic distinction since it is already made between the two cases on semantic grounds. Moreover, the three differences are not real. Thus, both instances of Merge are asymmetric: in both cases, an a is added to a (3, and the result remains a (3 and behaves as one. Second, there aren't two ways to determine the label of a construction, but only one: in both cases, the label of the construction is determined by the element to which an addition is made (the one saturated or modified), not by the added element; so in both cases, the construction is a projection of the element that determines its label. Third, the semantic contribution of Merge is the same in both cases and this provides a fully compositional semantic interpretation of the construction. Recall that compositionality states that the meaning of a complex expression is a function of the meaning of its parts and of their mode of combination. It is important to take into account all the elements involved. For instance, if we keep constant the mode of combination but change one of the parts, the resulting interpretation will of course be different. Thus, A+B is different from A+C. Bearing this in mind, we can easily see that the addition of adjunction to the theory is unmotivated since its effects are entirely derivable. For instance, consider the case in which adjunction is used to encode structurally the distinction between a complement, which is attached to an unsegmented node by set-Merge, and a modifier, which is an adjunct attached to a segmented node by pairMerge. Such an adjunction structure is used to distinguish the non-argument in her shower from the argument the blues in sentences like (i) and (ii):
(i)
Mary sings the blues.
(ii)
Mary sings in her shower.
However, this diacritic means to indicate that the semantic relations are different is redundant. Combining the verb sings with the locative in her shower does not result in the same semantic interpretation as combining sings with the blues. But there is no reason to distinguish these cases structurally: these could be two instances of the same sisterhood relation. The fact that the resulting semantic interpretation is different independently comes from the fact that the nature of
156 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
the elements being combined is different: a locative prepositional part does not make the same contribution as a nominal part, so the resulting interpretation is different even if everything else is kept constant. Making a structural distinction is redundant since the difference is already determinable by the semantics of the parts. In fact, the different structures are proposed on the basis of how the parts differ semantically. Similarly, to state that regular Merge provides only argument structure and edge properties, but not predicate composition, is a stipulation that attributes to the mode of combination what is actually a property of a part. Therefore, to introduce an additional tool such as pair-Merge is unnecessary: Merge always contributes 'composition' to the derivation, and the fact that 'predicate' is composed in some cases is a property of one of the parts, not of the operation It is often argued that a structural distinction should be made between arguments and adjuncts on empirical grounds: island properties and binding properties differ in the two types of constructions. However, this is an a posteriori justification based on the premiss that extraction conditions and binding conditions depend uniquely on structural properties. But the structural notions are parasitic on the selectional notions, as can be seen in the use of notions such as barrier in Chomsky (1985) and the concurrent notion of L-marking. I return to the empirical arguments in section 4.2 of chapter 6 and show that the distinction between the two types of relations—argument and adjunct— being a semantic one, a semantic account of extractability and binding differences provides an optimal account. 2
The asymmetric relation between these two elements has been present in more formalized
systems of the generative type from early on; see for example Venneman 1974, Keenan 1978. 3
For instance, Mohanan (1991: 314) discusses homorganic assimilation of nasal and oral stops
across words in English. The coronal assimilates to the following labial and velar plosives in colloquial speech, but in the same style of speech the noncoronal does not assimilate. (i)
a
ten [ten]; ten pounds [tempawndz]; ten kings [ter]kiT]z]
b
some [sdm]; some time *[ sdntaym]; some kings *[ sdr]kir|z]
c
king [kill]; king Tom *[kintam]; king Baber *[kimbabar]
d
hot cakes [hakkeyks]; cup cakes *[kAkkeyks]
Crucially for our discussion, the segment is not affected in all of its features.
Adjectival Modification in French 157 4
It may be possible to add a fourth case that falls under the head parameter (4). If morphological
heads rum out not to be functor heads, then the fact that they must be final rather than initial in French and English follows in an Elsewhere fashion from the parameter, just like it does for the N head in a ADJ+N combination. 5
Of course, many well-studied languages clearly have both the specifier and complement on the
same side of the head: this is the case in general in Japanese and in embedded clauses in German, for example. This does not argue for a movement analysis of these cases, whereby the object would move in a pre-head position, for instance. In a theory based on the Linearization Principle (3), these facts indicate that the principle applies generally, without the whole-to-whole vs wholeto-subpart distinction: so the head is in absolute final position. The theory therefore predicts that something else in the grammar must be making the distinction between the two types of dependencies. For Japanese and German, this appears to be case marking, resulting among other things in a relatively free order of the pre-head case-marked constituents (Bouchard 200la) and the absence of superiority effects (Haider 1993, Takahashi 1993, Fanselow 2001). 6
This could be an indication that the core elements of lexical items, such as the characteristic
function of Ns, do not decompose at all, or at least that lexical complexity is not in terms of primitives similar to other lexical items, but in terms of much more abstract primitives. See for example the decomposition in Bouchard (1995) of the so-called verbs of movement in French. Decomposition in terms of other lexical items, i.e., paraphrase, is based on the presumption that expressions perceived as being semantically related may inform us on each others structures. One of the crucial factors in determining whether there is a relationship between two sentences is their relatively similar conditions of use: two elements with the same use tend to receive the same semantic representation. Great care must be taken not to be too hasty in our conclusions in this kind of argumentation. Chomsky (1954: 39) says about notions such as synonymy "that while these relations are formal in the sense that they hold between linguistic expressions, they do not have the further property, as far as we know, that systematic investigation of linguistic expressions alone will suffice to determine the linguistic expressions of which they hold." Moreover, true synonymy almost never holds. Synonymy in the form of translations and paraphrases in general, even translations into artificial languages of logic, may give expressions that are equivalent in some of their uses, but they are not conceptually equivalent: "most relations of synonymy do not involve the same meaning—the two expressions only provide similar
158 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
information about a given situation and involve a relation of knowledge rather than meaning" (Bouchard 1995:5). 7
Depending on the N, ADJs like presume may simply be straightforward indications that an
allegation has been made, with no negative implication by the speaker. The allegation may also be attributed to a specific (contextully salient) individual. For instance, an alleged proposition is a proposition alleged by some x (Higginbotham 1985). Note that the expression could be interpreted as an x alleged to be a proposition, but this is pragmatically odd since there is usually not much debate on whether something is a proposition or not (whether it is considered valid or not is another question). Similarly, it could be a proposition alleged to exist, but this is also pragmatically odd (you can't really discuss it if it does not exist), though there could be a historical twist, the speaker intending to convey that the proposition is claimed to have already been made. 8
In addition, Pierre Cadiot (personal communication) pointed out to me that the color ADJ in (i)
does not have the function of describing the N but rather of categorizing it. Note that in this function, the color ADJ cannot be modified by the degree adverb tres and cannot appear in the predicative construction NP-BE-ADJ, as shown by the examples in (ii) (though both examples are fine if the ADJ is used in a descriptive function).
(i)
une classe verte a green class (a class that takes place in nature, outside)
(ii)
a
*une classe tres verte a very green class
b
*Cette classe est verte.
9
This class is green.
Bolinger (1967) observed that many ADJs that do not appear in a predicative context may be
used attributively, and some ADJs are never attributive, but may be predicative. 10
(i)
This holds for English as well: The rest was a cargo of two thousand containers and a very Italian crew of eighteen men (Tiziano Terzani, A Fortune-Teller told me)
11
My translation of: "Malgre les hesitations de certains, il est clair qu'on doit dans certains cas
distinguer entre deux lexemes: meme si Ton a le sentiment que la relation semantique denotee par 1'adjectif a quelque chose de commun dans les deux occurrences, 1'argument de 1'adjectif n'est pas
Adjectival Modification in French 159
le meme selon que 1'adjectif est intensionnel ou non. Ainsi, un ancien coffrz n'est pas un coffre ancien, ce n'est pas meme un coffre dans la situation de reference, mais quelque chose qui a ete un coffre dans une autre situation ou monde; on distingue done ancien 1, intensionnel et prepose de ancien 2 intersectif classifiant et postpose." 12
A reviewer of Bouchard (1998a) remarked that in other pairs, such as uneparfaite connaissance
de I'anglais — une connaissance parfaite de I'anglais 'a perfect knowledge of English' there doesn't appear to be any difference in meaning. It is true that the difference in meaning is hard to see in some cases, in particular in examples in which the prenominal ADJ applies to the property interpreting the N, like parfait. Even though the postnominal ADJ does modify something slightly different, namely the whole set of components of the N, the most salient, discriminating component of N is the property interpreting the N. So the difference may be very subtle. It is nonetheless real, since some contexts and paradigmatic variations bring it out. For instance, a context in which negation has scope over the ADJ helps to bring out the contrast with the N connaissance. to speaker A, speaker B may only reply with a "qualifying" ADJ applying to the extension of connaissance in the postnominal use (i), and only with a "quantifying" ADJ changing the intension of connaissance in the prenominal use (ii); a similar contrast is found in the scope of personne 'no one' in (iii).
(i)
A: Jean n'a pas une connaissance parfaite de I'anglais. Jean does not have a perfect knowledge of English. B:
Qu'est-ce
qui
te
fait
croire
que
sa
connaissance
de
I'anglais
est
imparfaite/?#incomplete? What makes you believe that his knowledge of English is imperfect/incomplete? (ii)
A: Jean n'a pas une parfaite connaissance de I'anglais. B:
Qu'est-ce
qui
te
fait
croire
que
sa
connaissance
de
1'anglais
incomplete/?#imparfaite? (iii)
a
Personne n'a une connaissance parfaite de ses actes. No one has a perfect knowledge of his/her actions, (a knowledge -without flaws)
b
Personne n'a une parfaite connaissance de ses actes. (complete knowledge)
est
160 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces In an example like une fausse impression 'a false impression' faux, does not apply to the possible world indicator: if you give a fausse impression, you are giving some impression in the "real" world. However, it is an impression that is not "true" to that reality: faux applies to the variable assignment function and indicates that the value IMPRESSION 1 has been assigned when it should have been the value IMPRESSION 2. 14
Thanks to Paul Hirschbiihler and Marie Labelle for bringing this pair to my attention.
15
It should be clear that the label 'intensional adjectives' as well as those of the following sections
are purely for descriptive and expository purposes and have no theoretical status in the present analysis. 16
Thanks to Michel DeGraff for bringing the data in (22b-b') to my attention.
17
What counts as relevant raises several interesting questions which I cannot address here. For
instance, it is clear that the immediate hyperonym of femme counts as relevant: (14a) is appropriately used if there is no other human being present. However, cultural factors play a role: there could be several women present (desfemmes seules), but none with a partner. 18
A similar constraint holds for prenominal rare:
(i)
#un jardin avec une rare fleur a garden with a rare flower
(ii)
un jardin avec une rare fleur ici et la a garden with a rare flower here and there
Note that the relevant notion is semantic number, not morphological number: if there is some indication of number of tokens as in (ii), then prenominal rare can combine with a singular N. 19
Meme also appears before the Det as in (i) and has adverbial uses as in (ii). I believe that these
uses are related to the adjectival uses in the text, but their analysis goes beyond the scope of this study. (i)
Meme les enfants sont venus. Even the children came.
(ii)
Je vous dirai meme que c'est indispensable. /'// even tell you that it's essential.
20
For many speakers, the first three examples in (44) are not acceptable. This may be due to the
pragmatics of the situations to which the expressions could apply. Thus, once given more context
Adjectival Modification in French 161 for pleine tasse and plein verre, many speakers which had refused the examples at first came to accept them marginally. The case of pleine rue is much more difficult to accept since streets are almost never used to measure quantities of people (except maybe in artificial circumstances such as movie sets). 21
Whether such a minimal account extends to all the properties of these ADJs can only be
determined by extensive studies which are beyond the scope of this book. 22
Note that in un ban trois kilometres, the plural trois kilometres functions as a singularity
expressing a certain measure of distance and agrees in the singular with both the ADJ and the Det. The same phenomenon is found in English, which also has an argumentative use of ADJs, as in the following examples from Ziff (1960: 247). (i)
a
It is a good two miles off.
b
He played a good hour on the cello.
The use of a plural as a singularity is not restricted to the argumentative use in either language, however: in (ii), the plural refers to a particular stretch of a race or road construction or trip. (ii)
23
a
Ce trois kilometres a ete particulierement difficile,
b
That three kilometres was particularly difficult.
Conversely, the fact that the interpretation of a word or expression differs depending on what it
combines with or the context does not mean that it has several meanings. Bouchard (1995) makes this point on the basis of French "movement" verbs, which are used to refer to many other situations than movement situations. If the meaning of lexical items was based on concrete notions pertaining to the referents, language would be practically unusable, because it would require an enormous, if not infinite, amount of lexical items. Moreover, it would be terribly redundant, since it would ignore the fact that it is always used in a context of background knowledge shared by speakers. This background allows for language to be underdetermining situationally, since the meaning of a sentence combined with the context of use generally permits the computation of the situation being referred to.
162 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 24
It is quite difficult to convey in English the difference between prenominal and postnominal
placement of the ADJ in French. The N+ADJ combination can be translated by using a relative clause as in (66a). However, no English construction corresponds exclusively to the prenominal placement in French: thus, big smoker can mean 'someone who smokes a lot' but also 'a smoker who is fat'. The reader should bear in mind in all the examples that the French prenominal ADJ only has the reading other than that of the relative clause (except under special conditions discussed below). Why English ADJ+N easily allows the two readings will be discussed in chapters. 25
My translation of the following: "II est possible que le A postpose en (4c) [un gros fumeurlun
fumeur gros] soit en fait accentue, ou que la postposition ne paraisse naturelle que dans la mesure ou 1'on construit un contraste avec 1'autre interpretation, qui ne semble disponible, pour cet A, que dans 1'anteposition." 26
Wilmet (1997) makes similar observations (However, the explanation proposed here, which is
based on logically anterior properties, is very different from Wilmet's analysis). The intuition is already remarkably well described in the following passage from Roubaud (1786:152): "Lorsque vous dites un savant homme. vous supposez que cet homme est savant; & lorsque vous dites un homme savant, vous assurez qu'il Test. Dans le premier cas, vous lui donnez la qualification par laquelle il est distingue; dans le second, celle par laquelle vous voulez le faire distinguer. La, la science est hors de doute; ici, vous voulez la faire connoltre." My translation: "When you say a savant homme 'a learned man' you suppose that this man is learned; and when you say a homme savant 'a man who is learned' you assure that he is. In the first case, you give him the qualification by which he is distinguished; in the second, the one by which you want him to be distinguished. There, science is beyond doubt; here, you want to make it known." 27
This goes contra Siegel (1980), who says that subsective ADJs like skillful occur with as-
phrases, whereas it is context-dependent intersective ADJs that occur with/or-phrases to indicate a comparison class. 28
Interestingly, a nontrained person who has a good feeling for language can detect this effect that
a natural class has been created, as we can see in the following comment by Balzac (quoted in Blinkenberg 1933): "Reprochez a un Anglais la perfidie de cette politique, le loyal Anglais — 1'Anglais est toujours loyal ~ vous repond de bonne foi: "Oh! c'est le parlement"."
Adjectival Modification in French 163 29
This goes against the view of Siegel (1980) that in order to understand the meaning of good in
(i), we must know the meaning of car, what is expected of it. She contrasts this v/ithfast in (ii), which she says we can understand without having to know much about cars. (i)
a good car
(ii)
a fast car
But we do understand the meaning of (i) even if we don't the meaning of car. The same holds for (ii): whatever a car is, if (ii) is true, we know that this is an instance of a fast one. However, depending on how much we know about cars, what counts as fast will be judged differently. If I don't know cars and see one go by at 50KM/h, I might consider that fast. On the other hand, if I know a lot about cars and see an Fl car go at the speed of a fast tourist car, I will judge that the Fl is slow, that there is something wrong with it. Similarly, comparing bad library and tall library, Siegel (1980: 111) says that the interpretation of tall in tall library has nothing to do with the meaning of library, that it is just tall for a building. This predicts that this library is too tall could only mean tall for a building. But in fact, this is also contextualized: as an architect, I could know that there is a certain ideal ratio for libraries between height (so that the users are not always in stairs or elevators) and width (so that the users don't walk miles in the aisles); a building may then be too tall for a library, not as a building per se. It is true that 'fastness' and 'tallness' are more physical properties than 'goodness' and 'badness' and so they are more apparent properties. However, all these properties, concrete or not, are evaluated on the basis of contextual criteria which should not be grammaticalized as qualia or sublexical semantic features (like BUILDING): not taking into account the CI system of speakers in this way results in bad design of the theory since the faculty of language redundantly incorporates properties that are independent of language. See also the discussion on apparentness in section 2.8. 30
The scare quotes are justified here since these ADJs do not have two central properties of
referential expressions: they cannot bind an anaphor nor a pronoun.
(i)
a
*the American destruction of itself/themselves
b
America's destruction of itself
164 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (ii) 31
a
*The American! invasion of Panama was unjustified. It; should be ashamed.
b
Americans invasion of Panama was unjustified. It, should be ashamed.
It is often assumed that some ADJs can express a 9-role, based on the intuition that they are
"essentially synonymous" with Genitive phrases, as in Higginbotham (1985). However, this correspondence is not exact, at least in French. As noted by Stati (1979:26, note 46) the relational ADJ indicates that the N belongs to a certain class in an essential, nonaccidental manner; if the relation is not essential, the corresponding de+NP is used: la dignite imperials 'the imperial dignity' vs lesgants de I'empereur 'the emperor's gloves'. Kayne (1984) and Giorgi & Longobardi (1991), who also analyze these as 9-ADJs, claim that they never express an internal role and propose a trace-theory account. But several authors have presented examples with what appear to be relational ADJs bearing internal roles (Brunot (1922:229, 304), Frei 1929:194, Schmidt 1972:28): (i)
production charbonniere production of coal, extraction charbonniere extraction of coal, enseignement musical teaching of music, election presidentielle presidential election, culture betteraviere culture of beets
32
My translation of "On pourrait dire en general que 1'esprit place 1'epithete apres le substantif, et
que Tame la place plus volontiers devant." 33
"D'ailleurs, bien loin que les Figures soient des manieres de parler eloignees de celles qui sont
naturelles et ordinaires, il n'y a rien de si naturel, de si ordinaire, et de si commun que les Figures dans le langage des hommes" (Du Marsais 1801:30-31). My translation: "Besides, Figures are far from being manners of speaking that are distant from those which are natural and ordinary, there is nothing as natural, as ordinary, and as common as Figures in the language of men." 34
Though Longobardi's attribution of these features is fairly formalized, the looseness with which
they are defined weakens their appeal even as descriptive tools. Thus, while the feature +R should evoke thoughts of referentiality, an N with this feature is only used referentially in combination with a Det in this analysis. Conversely, though -R suggests non referentiality, the feature is "abstract", i.e., not really about non referentiality, since the combination of an N with -R and a Det with -R like the dog may be referential.
Adjectival Modification in French 165 35
In many varieties of Romance, this way of treating proper nouns as denotational is very general
and holds even when the proper noun is not modified: masculine and feminine definite determiners are regularly used with proper Ns, with a connotation of affection or familiarity. 36
Historical note: Gould's piano was not really out of tune, but it had an action that he abhored.
37
Jackendoff (1972: 60) notes that ADJs and adverbs combine with a gerund head in similar ways.
(i)
John's rapid reading of the letter/John's rapidly reading the letter
In an analysis that intimately links surface concatenation and semantic composition, this similarity follows directly from fact that the ADJ and the adverb modify the head in the same way, except that it is nominal in one case and verbal in the other. In contrast, an approch based on functional categories fails to capture this observation in a natural way. It must be assumed that the functional categories involved in the nominal and verbal gerunds are the same, though this follows from nothing (unless we discuss their selectional properties, but again this is begging the question since those are actually properties of the adjectives and adverbs). Moreover, whatever uninterpretable features are checked must also be the same, which is rather surprising since this cannot be due to the semantic similarities between the constructions since these features are asemantic by definition: so these uninterpretable features fortuitously have the same effect on order. 38
Alternatively, we could assume that the scope of adjectives is an LF property. The wide scope
of an adjective might be obtained by raising at LF. Adding this corrective device to the grammar could describe the optional scope of Ai-N-Aj combinations; but it follows from nothing, and additional stipulations would be required to account for the optionality, as well as for the fact that only ADJi has wide scope in ADJi-ADJ2-N, and only ADJa in N-ADJi-ADJi. 39
Since the prenominal ADJs don't change meaning here, presumably they would be generated in
the Spec of the same functional category (or adjoined to the same projection) under the two readings; so in this kind of analysis, it has to be the position of the postnominal ADJ that is responsible for the scope differences. 40
The preposition en 'in' is exceptional in this respect since it triggers obligatory liaison:
en Amerique. This preposition is exceptional in other respects. For instance, proper names that normally require a Det in French, such as la France, appear without a Det when they are the complement of en. Moreover, en differs from selon in being monosyllabic.
166 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 41
Other types of sandhi also show that prenominal ADJs are closer to N than postnominal ADJs.
For instance, ADJs ending orthographically in -eau when they precede a masculine N that has an initial consonant undergo a mutation in -el when they precede a noun that has an initial vowel: (i)
le beau principe the nice principle, le bel ideal the nice ideal le nouveau directeur the new director, le nouvel administrates the new administrator
Some of these forms can also be used as nouns. However, as Tesniere (1959) observed, when followed by a vowel-initial ADJ, these nouns do not mutate: (ii) 42
le beau ideal the ideal beauty
Louise Lavoie pointed out to me a restriction on the modification of prenominal ADJs: a degree
adverb can only appear on the first ADJ. Thus, (c) requires a comma pause between beau and tres. (i)
43
a
un beau grand garcon a nice tall boy
b
un tres beau grand garcon a very nice tall boy
c
??un beau tres grand garcon a nice very tall boy
Abeille & Godard (2000) analyse measure adjectival phrases like a two-meter long table as
compounds, along the lines of the examples in (155). This is not an exception to the No Complement restriction since two-meter appears before the ADJ. In my analysis, two-meter must be a head in order to merge with long, since a string of prenominal elements is an iteration of head-to-head relations (cf. the discussion of (147)). So two-meter cannot have its usual phrasal structure but must be a compound, a head. The fact that the measure noun meter does not bear a morphological marker of plural despite the presence of two is confirmation of the compound nature of the expression. 44
It is a bit confusing and may seem contradictory to say that there is expansion on the non-
recursive side: Giorgi & Longobardi define the "recursive side" as the side on which complements appear in the base.
Adjectival Modification in French 167 45
It also appears to hold only when the complement of the ADJ is to the left of the N, but not
when the order is ADJ-N-COMPL(ADJ) as in (i), in which to convince and at politics are arguably the complement or post-modifier of the ADJ. (i)
a
a hard man to convince
b
a good man at politics
So yet more mechanisms will be required to account for these data. Note that in the complex functor analysis of prenominal ADJs, the data in (i) follow directly: hard man and good man are portmanteaux that allow the ADJ to combine with the complement or postmodifier. 46
See Sleeman & Verheugd (1996) who also assume that the predicative use of transitive
adjectives is caused by their having syntactic arguments. I do not think it necessary to share their assumption that one of these arguments is an empty operator, however. 47
My translation of: "L'adjectif prepose exprime une qualification deja etablie, connue,
incontestee; il est analytique. Postpose, il exprime une qualification nouvelle, une union d'idees faites a 1'instant meme; il est synthetique." 48
Blinkenberg (1933) notes that a few past participles appear preferably in prenominal position in
a use which he refers to as composes oratoires 'oratorial compounds'. These are frozen expressions and they also have an affective value: (i)
mon venere collegue my revered colleague notre regrette collaborates our regretted collaborator
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Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 169
3
CROSSLINGUISTIC VARIATION IN ADJECTIVAL MODIFICATION "If all that is put forward as a theory is that there exist relations between some kind of representations of meaning and of form, then it is difficult to argue against that." Noam Chomsky, Language andResponsability, p. 150.
1. THE CAUSES OF VARIATION Much work has been devoted to the way languages vary in their expression of adjectival modification, particularly with respect to order. The detailed analysis of French in chapter 2 provides us with a good understanding of the semantics of adjectival modification in a nominal, and of the functioning of order. Concerning the semantics, an ADJ may modify the whole network of an N, or just a subpart of it. As for order, a parametric choice arising from SM properties determines whether a head precedes or follows its dependent. In French, the head precedes its dependent in the "normal" case where the relation being encoded is between a full functor head and a dependent, whereas the head follows the dependent otherwise under an Elsewhere application of the parameter (in particular, if the relation involves only a subpart of N in adjectival modification). This being established, we can now approach the question of how and why variation takes place across languages with respect to adjectival modification. Consider French and English. These two languages are similar in their core use of order: they have the same setting whereby a full functor head precedes its dependent. Yet a casual inspection of surface strings reveals that complementless ADJs may appear on either side of N in French, but
170 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces only in prenominal position in English. However, this statement is incorrect for both languages. First, nominal elements of the celui class in French never take prenominal ADJs and only accept bare ADJs under a very restricted interpretation as stage-level in postnominal position. Second, English does allow some bare postnominal ADJs, and interestingly, they must also have this stagelevel interpretation. We will see that what is common to these two cases is the encoding of Number: in both cases, the nominal element being modified bears semantic Number, and only a stage-level ADJ can appropriately modify such an atomized element. This gives us the key to understand all the other cases in which there is variation between the two languages. More generally, I will show that the variations can be traced to the different choice made by each language among the equally valid means of realization of Number that the SM system provides. Whether Number is realized on N, on Det or as an independent word has an effect on adjectival modification. An ADJ does not establish the same relation with an N+NUM as it does with a numberless N because the semantics of these elements is not the same. This simple difference has profound effects on the way adjectival modification works in a language. I will illustrate these effects first with a detailed analysis of English since this is the language with which French is most often compared in recent studies. A first difference that we must account for is that bare ADJs are almost exclusively prenominal in English (section 2.1). A related difference is that sequences of prenominal ADJs Aj-Az-N in English have the reverse order of the corresponding postnominal sequences N-A2-Ai in French (section 2.2). Then there is the problem for compositionality raised by nominals like old friend, we must determine how the same order gets two readings in English, whereas each reading is associated with a different prenominal vs postnominal order in French (section 3). We will also look at the means English uses to express the distinction which it cannot make by order (section 2.4). m section 3,1 take a brief look at three other languages whose peculiar properties have been discussed in recent derivational analyses of adjectival modification—Celtic languages, Walloon and Rumanian. The discussion is restricted to general distributional properties of these languages, but shows that, even at a preliminary level, my analysis fares as well or better than a derivational approach. Finally, section 4 presents some evidence from codeswitching that supports my approach to variation.
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 171
2. A COMPARISON WITH ENGLISH
2.1. Why English has mostly Prenominal ADJs
All indication are that French and English have the same setting for the linearization parameter: in both languages, the full functor head precedes its dependent. Thus, phrasal complements follow the head in all categories in both languages (I return to the placement of clitics in chapter 4). I have argued that this setting accounts for the placement of ADJs inside the NP in French: the French setting of the parameter determines that bare ADJs that apply to the whole network of the N and ADJs with a complement must be postnominal, whereas an Elsewhere application of the parameter determines that ADJs that apply to a subelement of the network of N are prenominal. All things being equal, ADJs should have the same distribution in both French and English. But they do not: as is well known, bare ADJs generally cannot appear postnominally in English. We would like to explain why two languages that are otherwise fairly similar in their use of word order can differ in this way. Ideally, the difference should derive from an independently motivated choice, such as a choice arising from the fact that there is more than one optimal solution to some legibility conditions of the CI or SM interfaces. The relevant legibility condition would affect the distribution of ADJs and would happen to have a different setting in the two languages. Since we are looking at a relation established inside a nominal expression, the first place to look is at properties of the expression as a whole: these may interact with the properties of the ADJ and impose conditions on it. Therefore, we must take into account the semantic contribution that a nominal expression makes to a sentence, and what semantic elements are required for the expression to be able to make that contribution. We have already seen in section 3 of chapter 1 that French and English do indeed differ with respect to such a fundamental property: Number is realized differently. In French, Number is on the Det, whereas in English, Number is on the N. Lamarche (1990, 1991) made the observation that this difference in the position where semantically relevant Number is realized correlates with the difference in ADJ placement between French and English. Assuming that a bare ADJ must be in the scope of Number, he proposes that the possibility for ADJs to appear postnominally may be attributed to the wider scope of Number in French than in English. His proposal is summarized in (1).
172 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (1)
In French, Number is part of the Det (N gets it by agreement); since the Det is high in the structure of the NP and is an independent head, Number on Det may have scope over elements to its right, including both prenominal and postnominal ADJs. In English, Number is expressed on the N: since Number is an inflection on N and a wordfinal morphological head only has scope over elements to its left (Williams 1981), Number has scope over an ADJ only when the ADJ is prenominal.
Lamarche's observation is on the right track and is an important first step, but to get a complete explanation of the distribution of ADJs, we must answer two fundamental questions: 1° How is it that the realization of Number is parameterized in this way?; 2° Why are bare ADJs dependent on the scope of Number? My discussion in chapter 1 of the way the realization of Number becomes parameterized provides an answer to the first question: the way that French and English differ in how Number is realized comes from logically anterior properties of external systems that interact with language (as pointed out in Bouchard 1998a). From a CI perspective, Number is a minimal means to atomize a set and provide access to individuals, i.e., to determine the extensity of the nominal expression. Number must appear in the nominal expression, but from an SM and CI perspective, it may do so equally felicitously as a marker on N, as a marker on Det, or as an independent word. We therefore have an explanation of the parameterization. There remains to explain why Number plays a role in the distribution of ADJs, i.e., why a bare ADJ must be in the scope of Number inside a nominal expression. In Bouchard (1998a), I propose that, given the relation between Number and extensity (=atomization), it may be natural to assume that what determines the extensity of the nominal expression falls under the scope of Number, and I provide data concerning demonstratives to argue that complementless ADJs are part of what determines the extensity of a nominal expression, whereas ADJs with complements are not. It would follow that complementless ADJs must be under the scope of Number. However, though there may be some "naturalness" to the assumption, it was not shown to clearly derive from legibility conditions of the CI or SM interfaces.1 But a closer look at the demonstrative data provides a key for a proper explanation. As shown by Sandfeld (1928), Rothenberg (1985) and Miller (1992), the pronouns celui, ceux, 'the one, the ones/those' (FEM: celle, celles; I henceforth use celui to refer to all four) may be followed by various types of modifiers: a genitive complement (2a), a PP complement (2b), a relative clause (2c).
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 173 (2)
a
Le livrede Marie n'est pas beau, mais celui de Pierre est beau. The book of Mary is not nice, but that-him of Pierre is nice Mary's book is not nice, but Pierre's is nice,
b
les suffixes servant a designer des instruments, et ceux a sens collectif the suffixes used to designate instruments and those with a collective meaning
c
Le livre que Marie m'a donne ne m'a pas plu, mais celui que Pierre m'a donne m'a beaucoup plu. The book that Mary gave me didn 't please me, but the one that Pierre gave me pleased me a lot.
However, as we saw in chapter 2, when celui is followed by an adjectival expression, there is a sharp contrast depending on whether or not the ADJ has a complement.
(3)
a
*Celui fier regardait Paul. The one proud looked at Paul.
b
Celui fier de son fils regardait Paul. The one proud of his son looked at Paul.
Therefore, it is an oversimplification to say that ADJs can fairly freely appear postnominally in French: as shown in (3a), the class of celui nominals does not allow complement!ess ADJs, even the numerous ADJs that generally can appear freely after an N. Similarly, it is an oversimplification to say that ADJs cannot appear postnominally in English: as noted by Bolinger (1967), there is a class of complementless ADJs that may follow a head N. (4)
a
Who are the people guilty?
b
The materials ready will be shipped,
c
The students present (in class today)...
d
The man responsible (for the crime)...
Bolinger observes that postnominal bare adjectives become possible if they receive a particular interpretation, as transitory, stage-level adjectives. Thus, in the stolen jewels, the ADJ describes a characteristic property of the N, whereas in the jewels stolen, an action is described. These ADJs when postnominal receive a processual reading: they assign a noninherent property. Such a
174 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces property cannot be assigned to an internal, inherent part of N, nor to the N itself: the processual reading obtains only if the property is assigned to an atomized nominal. That is why these processual ADJs have the same distribution as transitive ADJs, which have an open position that forces them to modify an element that is argument-like, i.e., atomized, hence to be postnominal.2 Interestingly, the same class of transitory, stage-level adjectives ADJs may appear with celui:
(5)
a
Ceux presents auront droit a un rabais. Those present will have the right to a rebate.
b
Ceux coupables/responsables seront punis. Those guilty/responsable will be punished.
c
Ceux prets doivent etre envoyes immediatement. Those ready must be sent immediately.
French celui and English common nouns seem to share some property that prevents them from being modified by bare postnominal ADJs, except for this special class of stage-level adjectives. A closer look at celui may therefore help us understand the restriction on English nominals. First, note that celui is not a demonstrative, in the sense that it is not deictic, it does not require pragmatic information in order for the listener to make a referential connection and understand it. It is only when celui is accompanied by a deictic marker as in celui-ci, celui-la that the expression is demonstrative, that it allows a speaker to directly designate an element of the text-external world by "pointing" to it. Rather, as indicated by Miller (1992: 98), constituency tests show that celui has the same distribution as initial subsequences of NPs: celui corresponds to the subsequence Det+(ADJ)+N that precedes a phrasal complement or modifier (see (2) above). This is strongly corroborated by the fact that celui may be followed by a relative clause (2c): a relative clause requires not only a nominal head, but a determined nominal head. The term 'determined' is not used here in the restricted sense of 'bearing a Det' but in the general sense of identification—the"atomization" of the set defined by a common noun discussed in chapter 1. This is a long-standing observation about relative clauses. For instance, Arnauld & Lancelot (1676:81) had already observed that "we must not put a qui after a common noun, unless it is determined by an article, or by something else which determines it no less than an article would. To understand this properly, we must bear in mind that we can distinguish two things in the common noun, the signification which is fixed [...] and the extent of this signification which is subject to change [...] It is only regarding this extent that we say that a common noun is
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification
175
undetermined [or] determined^ In other words, a relative clause, having an open position, must modify something that is atomized. The morphological composition of these words also points to their being determined. They are all formed by the determiner element ce (reduced to c when followed by a vowel) and a nominal element:
ce+lui
'CE+him',
c+eux
'CE+them.MASC',
c+elle
'CE+her',
and
c+elles
'CE+them.FEM'. The initial subsequences of NPs that it corresponds to and its morphological makeup indicate that celui is an atomized nominal, an argument-like element. We saw that the English N is also atomized due to the semantic Number marking that it bears. This atomization is what celui shares with the English N, and this is what makes them both compatible with postnominal ADJs with complements and those which are stage-level: they both can fill the open position of these APs because they are argument-like. This atomization is also what makes both of them incompatible with "regular" bare postnominal ADJs which are not stage-level: such a bare ADJ modifies an N or a subpart of N, not an argument or atomized N.4 We now see why the different ways in which French and English realize Number in a nominal plays a crucial role in the distribution of ADJs. In French, Number is on Det. Therefore, by an Elsewhere application of the Linearization Parameter, a bare ADJ in prenominal position may relate to a subpart of the network of the N it combines with; conversely, a bare postnominal ADJ may relate to the whole network of the N. On the other hand, in English, Number is on the N. Therefore, a bare postnominal ADJ cannot relate to the N alone, but only to the atomized N+Number: so only a special kind of argument-taking ADJ can appear in this position, because only such an ADJ has the semantics to appropriately modify an element with the semantics of an atomized N. Other "regular" bare ADJs must to relate to the N alone. In order for such an ADJ to modify just the N, i.e., a subpart of the N+Number element, an Elsewhere application of the Linearization Parameter is required: the ADJ must appear in prenominal position. A similar Elsewhere application will also allow a prenominal "intensional" ADJ to access a subpart of N, such as when the time interval indication / is modified by a temporal ADJ. In sum, French and English differ in the extent to which they allow postnominal ADJs because these ADJs do not combine with the same thing in these two languages: in French, the ADJ combines with N, whereas it combines with an atomized N+Number in English. The difference between the two languages is not bluntly stipulated by means of some N-attracting feature or the like, but derives from an independently motivated choice arising from legibility conditions of the CI and SM interfaces.
176 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces If ADJs must be prenominal in English for the independent reasons just seen, this raises the question of how this language deals with what is expressed by putting the ADJs in postnominal position in French. I will look at three major cases: first, how English expresses the meaning corresponding to two French postnominal ADJs (section 2.2); second, how a prenominal ADJ in English gets the reading of a prenominal or a postnominal ADJ in French, i.e., the old friend problem (section 2.3); finally, how English expresses some distinctions that French conveys by placing the ADJ alternatively in prenominal and postnominal position (section 2.4).
2.2. The mirror Order of French Postnominal ADJs and English Prenominal ADJs
In French, the fact that Number is realized on Det has for effect that ADJs can appear either before or after the N, as long as their semantics is compatible with the semantics required for the different relations established in these positions. When two (or more) ADJs appear on either side of the N, their interpretation one with respect to the other is as indicated by the following bracketings (see chapter 2, sections 2.8 and 2.9): (6)
Prenominal:
(7)
Postnominal: les [[lignes blanches] courbes]
un [beau [petit chien]]
a nice small dog the curved white lines
Nothing special needs to be added to the theory to obtain these interpretive embeddings: they follow directly from the elementary combination expressed by Juxtaposition. An ADJ modifies what it merges with. The ADJ immediately juxtaposed to the N combines semantically with it first and this constituent is modified by the next ADJ. The mirror order of the bracketings in (6) and (7) follow from this "boxed" modification. In English on the other hand, the realization of Number on N generally proscribes the appearance of bare ADJs after the N. If two ADJs equivalent to two French ADJs that are postnominal as in (8a) are combined with N, they must appear prenominally in English since they cannot be postnominal. In order to express the same relative scope of interpretation as in the French example, the order of combination must mirror the French order as in (8b).
(8)
a
un tissu anglais cher
b
an expensive English fabric
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 111 This is exactly as predicted: to match the immediate combination of anglais with tissu, the ADJ English immediately combines -with fabric, so it is immediately juxtaposed to it; expensive is then juxtaposed to the left of the resulting constituent in order to match the combination of cher with tissu anglais. In this analysis, the mirror orders of French and English ADJs in (8) are explained without
postulating
any construction-specific
theoretical
tool. The
difference
in the
prenominal/postnominal placement of ADJs rests on the independently motivated difference in the realization of Number in nominal expressions in these two languages. The rest of the theoretical apparatus is of the most elementary combinatorial type.5 This simple analysis is in sharp contrast with derivational analyses which assume the same underlying order for the two languages based on functional categories that host the ADJs, with movement operations to account for the surface differences between French and English. This kind of analysis requires three major construction-specific theoretical tools: N-movement is triggered in French by a feature which has a different value in English, there is a rightmost position for "predicative" ADJs in French but not in English, there is a leftmost position for "predicative" ADJs in English but not in French. So in the end, the proposal is not very unifying since there are at least three differences between French and English with respect to adjectival modification. Consider first N-movement. To account for the fact that N appears before some ADJs in French examples like (9), it is assumed that N moves across the ADJ in French but not in English (Valois 1990, 1991, Bernstein 1993, Cinque 1994, among others). (9)
les grands vases chinois
the tall Chinese vases
This movement actually requires the interaction of several theoretical tools, most of which are specific to the construction at hand. To illustrate, I discuss the proposal of Cinque (1994). (i) Different kinds of functional categories are assumed which correspond to world knowledge notions such as Size, Color, Nationality, (ii) These functional categories are embedded in a specific hierarchy, (iii) This hierarchy is determined by (yet to be identified) selectional properties of the functional categories, (iv) An ADJ appears in the Spec of such a category because it agrees in some semantic feature with the head, (v) An interpretive rule (yet to be identified) indicates how the properties of the ADJs in these Spec positions come to modify the meaning of the N. (vi) The N has some particular feature which is also present in the functional category hosting grands. (vii) There is a second order feature [+strong] on this feature of N in French, but not in English.
178 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (viii) This [+strong] specification has the property of forcing the feature to be checked overtly, (ix) Movement of N somewhere in the vicinity of the functional category is assumed to be the only way to check the feature. In addition to N-movement, a second construction-specific theoretical tool is assumed: a special position to the right of the NP, adjoined high enough to have wide scope over ADJs to its left. This is the position of a second postnominal ADJ like cher in (8a). Bernstein (1993), Cinque (1994), Sleeman (1996) assume that this is a position in which an ADJ receives a predicative interpretation. We have already seen in section 2.10 of chapter 2 that the proposal is factually incorrect: this rightmost ADJ does not necessarily have wide scope. For instance, malhonnetes in an example like (10) may be under the scope of the prenominal ADJ presumes.
(10)
les presumes professeurs chinois malhonnetes the alleged professors Chinese dishonest the alleged dishonest Chinese professors
In any event, this kind of derivational analysis does not generalize a uniform underlying structure for the two languages since it must postulate a second major difference between the two: French adjectival constructions have this rightmost position for predicative ADJs, but English adjectival constructions do not. It is not clear how the presence vs absence of such a position can even be stated in a restrictive framework with bare phrase structure. Moreover, things are complicated by the fact that in English, transitive ADJs can appear after the PP complement of N, as in (11). (11)
a
a contribution to the conference impressive by its quality
b
an invasion of Albania plagued by errors
According to Cinque, an AP that follows the PP complement of N is not attributive, but predicative. So English does have a predicative rightmost position, but for some unknown reason, it cannot host a bare ADJ, whereas it can in French. The fact that the postnominal AP has scope over the prenominal ADJ in (12) also points to such a high rightmost position in English in this analysis:6
(12)
a fake antique rotten with neglect (Sadler & Arnold 1994)
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification
179
The rightmost position for predicative ADJs in French was proposed in part as an answer to some problems raised by Lamarche (1991) for an N-movement analysis of French postnominal ADJs. Lamarche points out that the distribution of multiple postnominal ADJs in French and other Romance languages does not fit well with the many derivational analyses that assume an underlying order that reflects the surface order of English. If all the ADJs are generated like English prenominal ADJs as schematically represented in (13), the N-movement analysis predicts that an ADJ should never have scope over an ADJ to its left.
This derives the wrong scope when there are two postnominal ADJs in French. For example, it incorrectly predicts that blanche has scope over rouillee in (14), the structure being as in (15). (14)
une voiture blanche rouillee a rusted white car
But this objection is not valid, according to Cinque (1994), because the data are deceiving. He says that the second postnominal adjective in Romance is not attributive, but predicative, "as such outside of the ordering restrictions holding of attributive APs". So rouillee in (14) would be in a
180 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces position high and to the right in the nominal expression, which hosts predicative ADJs; this position is available in Romance languages and it allows the ADJ to have scope over another ADJ to its left. Cinque says we can distinguish between the two analyses as follows: "Given that postnominal attributive APs precede the N's complement and postnominal predicative APs follow it, the N-movement analysis predicts that in [N-Adj l-Adj2] at least Adj2 has to follow the N's complement, while Adjl may precede or follow it depending on its nature. What is excluded under this hypothesis, but not under the alternative of free generation of APs to the right of N, is that both Adj 1 and Adj2 precede the complement, as that is the wrong relative ordering for attributive APs" (Cinque 1994:102). Regarding the nature of the ADJ, Cinque assumes that an attributive ADJ will follow the N if it is a thematic or a manner ADJ, i.e., these are the attributive adjectives that he assumes the N raises over. The test makes the following predictions: (i) in the sequence [N ADJi Compl ADJi], ADJi can only be a thematic or manner ADJ, whereas ADJ2 should be a predicative ADJ; (ii) if ever two ADJs were generated between the N and its complement, producing a sequence [N ADJi ADJ2 Compl], ADJi should have scope over ADJa. Cinque gives the paradigm in (16) (his (45)) as confirmation of the first prediction. According to him, the order N ADJi ADJ2 PP is unacceptable with normal intonation (16a), but the other orders of postnominal ADJs are fine: (16)
a
*una macchina rossa bellissima da corsa a machine red nice of race a nice red racing car
b
una macchina rossa da corsa (,) bellissima
c
una macchina da corsa (,) rossa (,) bellissima
d
una macchina da corsa (,) bellissima (,) rossa
However, this example is not a very good test because it is not at all clear that da corsa is a complement. It looks more like a compound with the N macchina, as shown by standard tests of compounding: there is no determiner with corsa, the interpretation is similar to that of compounds (i.e., not straightforwardly compositional), and a member of the compound cannot be modified on its own (at least in French: *une auto de courte course 'a car of short race' i.e., meaning something like a dragster). The compound nature of this kind of expression explains why the French equivalent of (16b), une auto rouge de course, must receive a very particular intonation in order to be acceptable: it is very unnatural to have an ADJ modifying only the auto part of the
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compound, and odd to separate de course from auto1 On the other hand, if we look at Ns that are clearly event nominals with complements, the results are problematic for both predictions made by Cinque's analysis. (17)
a
1'invasion brutale de 1'Albanie (manner) the brutal invasion of Albania
b
la production de petrole americaine (compound) the american production of oil
c
la production americaine de petrole (thematic) the american production of oil
(18)
a
la production limitee de petrole (manner?) the limited production of oil
b
la reponse intelligente de Jean a Marie (manner?) the intelligent answer of Jean to Marie
c
les exportations massives de voitures (manner?) the massive exportations of cars
The examples in (17) conform to prediction (i): the ADJ in the sequence [N ADJi Compl] is either a thematic or a manner ADJ. However, in (18), the ADJ does not appear to be of the right type: it is not a thematic or a manner ADJ. Moreover, intelligente in (18b) could very well be getting a predicative reading, though it appears before the complement (Valois 1991:150). So both aspects of prediction (i) are questionable. As for the second prediction, on the face of it, as long they are thematic and manner adjectives, it should be possible for two ADJs to appear between between N and its complement. But Cinque (1994:90) claims that it is not possible to get one of each because thematic APs "compete with manner APs for one and the same position." This cannot be literally the case in an X-bar system, since positions in this Phrase structure sense do not exist. In his analysis, it would rather have to be the case that the two classes of adjectives appear in the Spec of the same functional category because they hold the same type of selectional relationship. To say that thematic and manner adjectives have the same selectional properties is not founded independently and is just begging the question. Moreover, it predicts that they should never cooccur inside a nominal expression in any language: this is incorrect, as can be seen in the following examples:8
182 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (19)
a
?!'invasion martienne brutale de Jupiter (Valois 1991) the brutal Martian invasion of Jupiter
(20) (21)
b
la brutale invasion martienne de Jupiter
a
the brutal martian invasion of Jupiter
b
*the martian brutal invasion of Jupiter
a
La participation franfaise impressionnante a la conference (Abeille & Godard) The impressive French participation to the conference
b
??La participation impressionnante fran9aise a la conference
c
Cette declaration a provoque une reaction violente immediate aux actions des USA. That declaration triggered a violent immediate reaction to the actions of the USA.
Not only can two ADJs appear between the N and its complement in French, but when they do, the second one has scope over the first one. This directly contradicts the prediction: given their position, these two ADJs are supposed to be attributive and hence to appear in a structure such as (15), since attributive ADJs are generated in the Spec of functional categories uniformly, with the same serialization constraints across languages. But then their actual scope is the reverse of what is predicted. In his note 8, Cinque suggests that (19a) "is acceptable to the extent to which a compound reading of invasion martienne is possible in French." But nothing warrants such an analysis: in particular, the interpretation is fully compositional, a point already made in Lamarche (1991).9 Therefore, it is just begging the question. We could assume that the second ADJ is predicative here, and that it appears before the complement either because the complement has been extraposed to the right, or because everything else has been raised to the left of the complement in a kind of remnant movement (cf. note 6). In addition, note that it is possible to have three ADJs following the N, and that each ADJ takes what precedes it in its scope. To account for this, the N-raising analysis must assume that there are two predicative positions to the right, hierarchically organized to derive the proper scopes. (22)
a
le metro aerien suspendu fran^ais (Forsgren 1978)
b
the French suspended aerial metro
The appeal to the predicative interpretation of some of the adjectives raises the problem of making precise the notion of predication being used. As noticed by Lamarche (1991), the notion seems to
Cross linguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 183 differ from the usual one found in NP-BE-AP contexts. Thus, some post-complement ADJs receive an interpretation which is different from the one they get in the predication construction:
(23)
a
le ministre de la defense francais the French minister of defense
b
le ministre de la defense est fran9ais the minister of defense is French
A different account for (19a) is presented in Valois (1991). He assumes that invasion has moved to a NUMP and that NUM takes an intermediate projection NP* as its complement, N* in turn taking an NP complement which contains the trace of invasion as well as the complement de Jupiter; martienne is adjoined to NP* and brutale to the lower NP. Though this provides means to describe the distribution of the ADJs, we are given no independent motivation for this NP*. More to the point, brutale is incorrectly predicted to be under the scope of martienne. Of course, with some technical adjustments to the mechanisms adopted by Cinque, Bernstein, Valois, it is possible to maintain that a structure such as (15) underlies the nominal expressions of all languages: various movements to various categories, triggered by various features, will eventually correctly describe the surface order of two ADJs appearing between the N and its complement in French, and provide a structure that has some part of it in which the c-command relations between the ADJs are correlated with the semantic scope. The mechanisms are certainly powerful enough to derive the correct surface order, but without a suggestion as to why they operate as they do in those particular cases, the analysis is not very revealing. It leaves as a mystery this transderivational conspiracy to arrive at the same surface order as the one that is obtained by base generation in an isomorphic fashion. The goal is not just to propose a way to derive the correct order. How it is arrived at is as important. If the correct order and interpretation can be accounted for in a simple, direct, and clearly motivated fashion as in the strictly compositional analysis I propose, this should be favored over a much convoluted way. As Chomsky (1970, 1979) remarks, it is difficult to argue against the claim that there exist relations between some kind of representations of meaning and of form, and that such an open theory makes it possible to simulate rules of semantic interpretation in the syntax, by generating constituents of arbitrary structure in the base, claim that they are associated with the desired semantic property, then use a filtering transformation at the desired point in the derivation to match these arbitrary structures with the surface structure.
184 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Moreover, N-movement and the rightmost position for predicative ADJs is not the end of the story in a derivational analysis. A third construction-specific theoretical tool is required to account for the mirror order in examples like les lignes blanches courbes and the curved white lines. In order to account for the fact that leftmost curved apparently receives the same interpretation as rightmost courbes, it must be assumed that English has a high leftmost predicative position to host curved, but that this position is not available in French, given he ungrammaticality of *les courbes lignes blanches. Examples with three ADJs as in (24) get even more problematic: (24)
a
une importante delegation economique americaine
b
an important American economic delegation
If americaine is predicative in (24a), its English equivalent American should not be below attributive important in (24b). And if American is attributive in (24b), we have no explanation for the fact that its French equivalent cannot be attributive as in (25) (if (25b) is possible at all, it does not have the same interpretation as (24b), the scope of the ADJs being reversed). (25)
a
*une importante americaine delegation economique
b
?*une importante delegation americaine economique
In short, this is a costly analysis in terms of the type and number of construction-specific theoretical tools it requires. Moreover, the tools boil down to three technical lists which are no more informative than descriptive lists of the most elementary type. The first list concerns the (universal?) order of ADJs with respect to one another: Descriptive list 1: Serialization of adjectives in object-denoting nominals. poss> cardinal> ordinal> quality> size> shape> color> nation Technical list 1: functional categories hosting the different classes of ADJs in Spec The second list indicates where N appears among the serialized ADJs: Descriptive list 2: lists of positions for ADJs and N for each language: English [quality, size, color, Noun], French [quality, size, Noun, color] Technical list 2: lists of features that attract N overtly for each language English [no such feature], French [feature on Color Phrase (?)] The third list is to describe the mirror order between two postnominal ADJs in French and two prenominal ADJs in English:
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185
Descriptive list 3: subparts of descriptive list 2 Technical list 3: list of positions for "predicative interpretation" English [high position to the left], French [high position to the right] Even with such costly apparatus, the analysis provides a labored account of only the distributional properties and says almost nothing about the interpretion of ADJs in nominal expressions. Moreover, in the end, all these tools conspire to arrive at the same surface order as the one obtained by simple base generation in an isomorphic fashion.
2.3. The old friend Problem
We saw at the very outset that a nominal like old friend is problematic for any analysis that attempts to be minimally compositional: the same two elements, apparently syntactically combined in the same way, result in a complex expression with different meanings. (26)
a
old friend (=friend who is aged)
b
old friend (^friend for a long time)
According to the present analysis, under the reading 'friend who is aged', old modifies the whole network of the N, whereas under the reading 'friend for a long time', old modifies only the time interval /. In the compositionality accounts that augment syntax, compositionality is preserved by assuming that each reading is associated with a different underlying syntactic structure. This structure is neutralized on the surface in the account of Siegel (1980), so its only effect is traceable to interpretation. In the analyses of Bernstein (1993) and Degraff & Mandelbaum (1995), the surface structures are different: under the reading 'friend who is aged', old heads an AP which is left adjoined to some XP; under the reading 'friend for a long time', old is a head that takes the NP as a complement. In Cinque's analysis, old is in the Spec of different functional categories for each interpretation. However, these major syntactic differences correlate with none of the surface effects we might expect. There is no syntactic effect: for instance, the ADJ cannot take a complement in either case, even when it is in a left-adjoined AP or Specifier. There is no phonological effect: we get the a/an alternation whether the following ADJ is a left-adjunct of the complement of the Det, or this ADJ is the head of the AP complement of the Det.
186 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces There does not seem to be any independent reason to assume that the structures for (26a) and (26b) are different. A comparative analysis with French leads us to the same conclusion. Recall that differences like these often correspond to order differences in French: an ADJ that modifies the whole network of the N appears in postnominal position, whereas an ADJ that modifies only a subelement of the network of the N is prenominal. Yet the syntactic hierarchy is the same: in both sequences ADJ+N and N+ADJ, the ADJ is a sister of the head N, and N projects. The difference is not in the hierarchical structure, but only in the order and its import to interpretation via the Linearization Parameter: order indicates how to interpret the functor-dependent relation, i.e., as a whole-to-whole relation, or as a whole-to-part relation in an Elsewhere application. In English however, this distinction in the way to interpret the functor-dependent relation cannot be expressed by order because Number is realized on the N. A postnominal ADJ does not relate to the N alone, but to N+Number. Yet a relation with just N is required to express the interpretation 'friend who is aged'. In order to get this interpretation, the ADJ must be prenominal, in an Elsewhere application of the Linearization Parameter: this indicates that the relation between the ADJ old and the N+Nuraber friend is a whole-to-part relation. One of the parts of N+Number is the N alone, and this provides the interpretation in which old applies to the network of the N, i.e., the aged friend interpretation. The Elsewhere application of the Linearization Parameter also provides another interpretive possibility for the same structure: another part of the N+Number friend is the time interval /, and applying old to i provides the interpretation of a long-time friend. Thus, there are two possible interpretations for old friend. In French on the other hand, a prenominal ADJ combines with N, not with N+Number. So it cannot hold a relation with the whole network of N: by the Elsewhere convention, it must hold a relation with a subpart of what it combines with, i.e., a subpart of N. Therefore, un vieilami has only the interpretation 'friend for a long time', in which vieil modifies only the time interval i.w The possibility of having two interpretations for nominals like old friend does not require technical tricks and is not a problem for compositionality. The two interpretations derive from the effects of the interaction of two deeply rooted parameters: the Number Parameter, which has Number realized on N in English, and the Linearization Parameter. Both have their sources in properties of external systems which are logically anterior to language: the Number Parameter derives from the CI property of atomization and the fact that the SM system provides equally valid means of realization of Number, whereas the Linearization Parameter derives from the fundamental asymmetry in temporal Juxtaposition induced by physiological properties of the SM system and its match-up with the fundamental asymmetry between functor and dependent present
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in the CI system. The two interpretations of old friend therefore find the strongest possible explanation.
2.4. Intonation and Functional Covariation We have seen ample evidence that order plays a crucial role in encoding the modification relations of ADJs in both French and English. Moreover, the placement of ADJs falls under two major conditions: (i) the possibility of having prenominal or postnominal ADJs depends on where Number is realized in the nominal expressions of the language, and (ii) when two or more ADJs are on the same side of N, there is a preferred order which is subject to a still unclear cognitive condition (see section 2.8 of chapter 2). Because order is restricted by these conditions, it sometimes reaches an upper bound of perceptual complexity: additional semantic distinctions cannot be carried by this form of coding. In a typical situation of functional covariation (to which I return in chapter 6, section 3.2.3), the language then resorts to another mode of coding. For instance, English is forced to have all its bare ADJs before N because of its setting of the Number Parameter. In order to express some distinctions that French codes in terms of prenominal vs postnominal placement, English therefore resorts to intonation. For example, the ADJ simple means 'not-complex'. In postnominal position as in (27a), it expresses overall non-complexity of the N: it conveys the ideas of simple-minded, credulous, modest, open, frank, innocent. In prenominal position as in (27b), non-complexity is keyed more narrowly on the property that interprets the N, on the "servanthood": un simple domestique does nothing which would cause one to think of him as other than a servant or as extraordinary in comparison with other servants. (27)
a
un domestique simple
a servant \vho is simple
b
un simple domestique
a simple servant
Armstrong (1911), cited in Waugh (1977), shows that this difference in meaning is expressed by different intonation patterns on the prenominal ADJ in English:11 (28)
a
a simple servant
(= un domestique simple)
b
a simple servant
(= un simple domestique)
188 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces The less intonational autonomy the ADJ has, the more closely linked it appears to be with the N, the more proximate. Armstrong comments (p. 272): "the shifts in the French adjective position are presumably not due to any basal connection between post-position and the making of a logical distinction, but arise from the exigencies of French accent, which cannot, as in English, be shifted at will to any element in the phrase, regardless of its location." In sum, this is a nice case of covariation. English is forced to have all its ADJs on the same side of the N for independent reasons, so another means of the SM system is used to make the distinctions, namely intonation. On the other hand, intonation in French is quite rigid, so it cannot be used to make the distinctions and order is the means used instead. It remains to be seen how general these correspondences between English stress patterns and French order patterns actually are. A second instance in which coding by order reaches an upper bound of what it can express is when the meaning to be expressed goes against the order set by the cognitive condition. Thus, the regular serialization of adjectives in object-denoting nominals is poss> cardinal> ordinal> quality> size> shape> color> nation, as shown in (29): (29)
a
He drove out in his new yellow car.
b
She took her long Italian dress.
c
I have several small black dogs.
But as Vendler (1968:130), Sproat & Shih (1988:8) and many others have noted, the unmarked order of ADJs can be reversed: (30)
a
He drove out in his YELLOW new car.
b
She took her ITALIAN long dress.
c
I've shown you my BLACK small dogs; now, these are my BROWN small dogs.
The first ADJ gets a contrastive intonation. The function of this intonation seems to be to indicate that the cognitive condition on serialization is being bypassed. However, even though the ADJs are not in the usual order determined by the cognitive condition, we do get the interpretive embedding expected from the surface order. Thus, in (30a), the set of new cars is established, and the yellow one is picked out of that set. In Vendler's terms, his yellow new car is interpreted as 'the yellow one of his new cars'.
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 189 The cognitive condition on serialization is also at play when two or more ADJs appear in postnominal position in French. Here too the unmarked order of ADJs can be reversed under contrastive stress. For example, the normal order of (31) is very odd if it is reversed under normal intonation as in (32a), but becomes acceptable with contrastive stress on the last ADJ as in (32b). (31)
une situation financiere desastreuse a desastrous financial situation
(32)
a
*une situation desastreuse financiere.
b
une situation desastreuse FINANCIERE (...et non pas POLITIQUE).
A different kind of upper bound of expressability for Juxtaposition is reached in French nominals in which one of the ADJs is prenominal and the other postnominal. For instance, (33) corresponds to (30c). (33)
Je t'ai montre mes petits chiens noirs; maintenant, voici mes petits chiens bruns. / have shown you my small black dogs, now here are my small brown dogs.
Recall from section 2.10 of chapter 2 that either ADJ may have scope over the other. Thus, the postnominal color ADJ noirs may have scope over the prenominal size ADJ petits without constrastive stress. In an example like (33), contrastive stress may be used, not to indicate a departure from normal serialization, but to take over where linearization reaches another upper bound of what it can express: the scope of the ADJs being ambiguous as far as order is concerned, contrastive stress indicates which interpretation is intended by making the wide scope ADJ stand out. Thus, either ADJ may have contrastive stress, and the relative scope of the ADJs is then unambiguous. (34)
a
Voici mes PETITS chiens bruns. (= small ones of my brown dogs) Here are my SMALL brown dogs.
b
Voici mes petits chiens BRUNS. (= brown ones of my small dogs) Here are my small BRO WN dogs.
English has a similar use of contrastive stress, in which it does not indicate a departure from orthodox serialization, but stress rather affects the relative scope of the ADJs. Jackendoff (1972: 120) notes that contrastive intonation on an ADJ interacts with other components of grammar,
190 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces such as negation and presupposition. For instance, (35) presupposes that John bought a big ball, but conveys that it wasn't brown. (35)
John didn't buy a big BROWN ball.
In my terms, brown is attributed scope over big, despite the fact that the order of ADJs would normally derive a bracketing in which big has scope over brown. This is again a simple case of functional covariation. There is an upper bound of expressability reached by Juxtaposition: the cognitive condition imposes a serialization which produces a bracketing, but the intended interpretation requires the opposite bracketing. Since Juxtaposition cannot express opposite bracketings, the language resorts to another mode of coding—intonation: instead of order, contrastive stress is used to indicate which ADJ has wide scope.12 Contrastive stress is not the only intonation pattern used to solve bracketing clashes between serialization and interpretation: the pause noted by commas between two ADJs also has for effect that the interpretive embedding is the reverse of the one expected from the surface order. For instance, when two ADJs are prenominal as in (36), the leftmost ADJ gets wide scope, since the bracketing induced by Juxtaposition derives this interpretive embedding. (36)
a
un [beau [petit chien]]
b
a [nice [small dog]]
However, the same order as in (36), but with a comma intonation, is interpreted as in (37), with small and petit having wide scope; the effect is also shown in (38), where small may, but need not, have a contrastive stress.13 (37)
(38)
a
a nice, small dog
[small [nice dog]] a nice dog who is small
b
un beau, petit chien
[petit [beau chien]]
un beau chien qui est petit
You've shown me many big green vases; now I'd like to see some green, small vases.
Summarizing, all these uses of intonation are typical cases of functional covariation: when Juxtaposition reaches an upper bound of expressivity, the language resorts to another mode of coding. Of course, it is technically possible to recode all of the intonational information in terms of Juxtaposition. So we could claim that particular intonations are associated with particular
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191
functional categories to which an ADJ is attracted at LF, deriving the scopal properties. But as I have indicated repeatedly, receding is a costly mechanism with no explanatory value: it just begs the question of why intonation is at play in these particular cases. It is much more fruitful to consider the possibility that intonation may encode semantic information like scope just as well as phrase structure and independently from it (see for example Williams (1988) on the relevance of intonation for the scope of quantifiers and Wh-phrases). This becomes even more obvious when embedded in an approach that fully takes into account the import of the logically anterior properties of the external systems: this kind of functional covariation between equally valid modes of coding is exactly what is predicted.
3. A BRIEF LOOK AT OTHER LANGUAGES Movement analyses have been used to account for the distribution of ADJs in several languages, and the reader may have some scepticism about how the present analysis extends to these other languages. My claim is that the basic data to be accounted for goes far beyond linear placement of the ADJs, and in particular, that many very subtle semantic properties are at play. The discussion of the details of French examples should show quite clearly the extent of the difficulty of even perceiving and describing the whole range of properties involved. Therefore, I cannot go into such a level of detail for each language that has received a movement analysis, not just for lack of space, but most crucially for lack of the linguistic competence required to perceive the subtleties that must be studied in each language in order to give it an appropriate account.14 I will refrain from looking at partial data. However, I will allow myself to discuss general distributional properties of three languages, with the modest goal of showing that, even at a preliminary level, my analysis is at an advantage over a distributional analysis based on movement. Ultimately, native speakers of these languages will evaluate the competing proposals.
3.1. Celtic Languages The first case is the less definite of the three. Celtic languages appear to be a challenge for my analysis of ADJs.15 On numerous occasions when I presented my analysis of ADJs, colleagues
192 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces pointed out the following facts. In Celtic languages, Number is realized on the N, so that they look like English in this respect. As predicted by my analysis, Celtic languages easily allow bare NPs, and do not allow nounless constructions like French les vertes. However, the distribution of ADJs appears to be problematic for my analysis. First, Number being realized on N, all things being equal, we would expect ADJs to be prenominal, as in English; however, ADJs are overwhelmingly postnominal, as in French. There are a few ADJs that may appear in prenominal position, corresponding to English second, wrong, false, real, old, long, short, poor. Note that their French correspondents also tend to be prenominal. ADJs that may appear in either position show a meaning difference between their prenominal and postnominal uses, and it is essentially similar to the differences observed in French. Thus, in Breton, when the ADJ kozh 'old' appears before the noun (which is soft mutated), it means "old, dilapidated, worthless", whereas after the noun it has the less subjective meaning of "old = not young or new": ur c'hozh ti "a worthless, miserable old house", un ti kozh "an old house" (examples provided by Steve Hewitt). The second problem for my analysis is the allegation that the preferred ordering for Celtic postnominal ADJs is the order of English prenominal adjectives, not the mirror order found in French. This is shown in the following examples from Welsh and Breton: (39)
Welsh: merch fach welw girl small pale a small pale girl
(40)
Breton: ur vuoc'h vras wenn a cow
big
white
a big white cow (Cf. French: une vache blanche enorme) A simple account of this order is to say that the N moves to the left of the ADJs in Celtic languages. As Sproat & Shih (1990:587) indicate, "[t]his is consistent with the extensive arguments for Celtic VSO languages that initiality across categories — in particular the sentence initial placement of V and the noun phrase-initial placement of the nominal head — is derived by movement." However, cross-categorial head fronting is not straightforward in a theory based on triggers: each category must happen to be assigned a trigger with a similar effect, so the regularity is accidental in this approach. Moreover, there are empirical details that require a more complicated apparatus in a movement analysis. First, the prenominal ADJs mentioned above do
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 193 not accord with " the noun phrase-initial placement of the nominal head." Also, Genitive phrases and demonstratives follow all ADJs, rather than precede them as they do in English: (41)
a
leabhar uaine Sheain (Irish; from Sproat & Shih 1990:586) book green Sean-GEN Sean's green book
b (42)
*leabhar Sheain uaine
y llyfr newydd hwn
(Welsh; from Rouveret 1994:214)
the book new this this new book So in (41) for instance, two movements are required, as indicated by Sproat & Shih (1990:587): starting with the underlying order Sheain uaine leabhar, a first movement places the N leabhar before the ADJ uaine, and the resulting constituent leabhar uaine is then fronted before the Genitive Sheain. The fact that the the postnominal ADJs are subject to mutation is also different from French, in which sandhi generally does not occur with postnominal ADJs as we saw in chapter 2. Moreover, there is an ambiguity in the way the term 'basic' is used in describing the order of ADJs. When we say that the basic order for Celtic postnominal ADJs is the same as the order of English prenominal adjectives because the N moves across the ADJs in Celtic, 'basic' refers to the same positions in the base that the ADJs are assumed to occupy. However, when we are given a description of the basic serialization of the ADJs, 'basic' does not refer to the technical term 'base' but is rather used more loosely to indicate a preference or naturalness determined by pragmatic/cognitive considerations. For instance, Sproat & Shih (1990:565) say about these serializations (which they term 'hierarchies'): "While it has been noted that such hierarchies are not absolutely rigid, speakers of English have a strong intuition that the above orders are basic." Obviously, speakers do not have intuitions about the syntactic base. In a footnote, Sproat & Shih go on: "We do not include under the rubric of adjective ordering restrictions, the semantically motivated orderings analyzed by Levi (1975). senatorial industrial investigations, industrial senatorial investigations. In these cases, there is no basic ordering; rather the ordering chosen depends upon the intended interpretation. In contrast, the ordering preferences we discuss are basic in the sense that one uses the prescribed orders unless one intends a special interpretation." (ibidem, 592). The first notion of 'basic' (as in Deep Structure) implies a syntactic embedding.
194 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces The second notion of 'basic' states an ordering tendency due to cognitive factors, but with no necessary implication of a syntactic embedding. In this latter case, the similarities in serialization between Celtic and English ADJs may be of no help to understand the syntax of these languages. It could be that, despite the same serialization imposed by cognitive factors, the composition of the ADJs with the N is quite different in the two types of languages. For instance, a series of two ADJs in Breton does not seem to combine with the N in the same way as it does in English. Thus, Steve Hewitt tells me that, for him, in Breton examples like urplac 'h vihan vraw 'a fine/beautiful little girl' and ur vuoc'h vras venn 'a big white cow', in both cases, the two postnominal adjectives apply together to the noun, as if they were coordinated ADJs, instead of one ADJ applyingto the noun and the other applying to a N+ADJ combination. This interpretation is corroborated by Melanie Jouitteau (personal communication). Therefore, the serialization in the "coordination" of Breton ADJs could be the same as for English ADJs due to cognitive factors, but without having any direct correlation with syntactic embedding: this serialization may not even be part of grammar per se16 In sum, we will need to know more about subtleties of interpretation and other properties of Celtic ADJs before we can make a call. In the next two cases however, I believe we already have enough information to make a proposal that substantiates my claims about ADJs.
3.2. Walloon Wallon is intriguing since, though it is a Romance language, in some respects it behaves like English. Thus, Walloon ADJs have a strong tendency to appear in prenominal position (only some borrowings, ethnic ADJs and a few others appear postnominally; my sources for the Walloon data are Remade (1952), Warnant (1969), Morin (1986) and Bernstein (1993)). (43)
a
des streutes cotes
some narrow dresses (cf. French: des robes etroites)
b
on neur tchape
a black hat
c
du 1'corante ewe
of the running water (cf. French: de 1'eau courante)
d
les cuts pans
the cooked breads
(cf. French: un chapeau noir) (cf. French: les pains (bien) cuits)
This makes Walloon look somewhat like English. However, other properties make it look more like French. Thus, like French and contrary to English, Walloon shows no Number inflection on
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 195 N. In addition, N omission is productive in Walloon, like in French. Finally, Walloon does not allow bare plurals freely as in English, but only in certain restricted environments like French (Remacle 1952: 102-103). I am claiming that, in French, these three properties follow from the fact that Number is marked on Det, not on N. If the same analysis holds for these properties in Walloon, my analysis is apparently in trouble since we would expect a distribution of ADJs in Walloon similar to the one found in French. But we just saw in (43) that Walloon ADJs are mainly prenominal, as in English. However, it turns out that Walloon has a -way of expressing Number that differs from both the English and the French way. As we will see, its way of coding Number accounts for its French-like behaviour, while at the same time it forces its ADJs to be prenominal. As all my sources indicate, Number does not seem to be an inflectional morpheme in Walloon, but an independent word that appears to the left of N. So Walloon seems to show yet another possibility allowed by the SM system to code Number inside a nominal expression: whereas Number is an inflection on N in English and an inflection on Det in French, in Walloon, it appears not to be inflectional at all, but to head its own projection. This hypothesis is based on the following facts. First, the plural [s] on the N is purely orthographic, never pronounced, even in a context of potential liaison as in (45) (where _/_ indicates that there is no liaison): here, it is the marking orthographically written on Det which is pronounced and indicates the Number value. (44) (45)
a
one cote a dress
des cotes some dresses
b
lu pan the bread
les pans the breads
des efants _/_ abituwes a 1'vile children used to the city
Additionally, the -all-aux alternations that mark singular/plural on nouns in French have disappeared in Walloon: (46)
a
on ma (French: un mal) an evil
b
ke: dzva: (French: quel cheval) which horse
des mas (French: des maux) some evils ke: dzva: (French: quels chevaux) which horses c
on rotche ouy (French: un oeil rouge) a red eye des rodje-z-ouy (French: des yeux rouges) redeyes
196 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Yet, there are Number markings in Walloon. They show up between the Det and the N, as we just saw. They also show up between a prenominal ADJ and N in the following forms: when the ADJ and N are feminine, as an unstressed vowel e before an initial consonant word (47a,b), and as an unstressed e-z before a vowel initial word (47c, d) (Remacle 1952: 139-140; Morin 1986; Bernstein 1993: 212-213); when the ADJ and N are masculine, no overt marking appears before an initial consonant word (48a), but the liaison context before a vowel initial word makes the morpheme z appear (48b, c) (Remacle 1952: 37; Morin 1986; Bernstein 1993: 222).
(47)
(48)
a
les grosse pires
the big stones
b
des bele mahons
some nice houses
c
des vete-z-ouhs
some green windows
d
des neure-z-amonnes some black berries
a
des neur tchives
some black hairs
b
des neur-z-ouy
some black eyes
c
des grand-z-abes [de gra :z a :p]
some tall trees
However, these are not markings on the ADJ, as the orthography would suggest. Rather, the plural marker seems to be a proclitic on the N that follows the ADJ. Morin gives three arguments for this assumption. First, there is no plural marking with predicative adjectives: (49)
a
(II est, i sont, elle est, ele sont} neur {He is, they are, she is, theyFEM} are black
b
ele sont totes pitites They are all small. (Compare: des tote p'tite crompir some all small potatoes}
Second, only the last of coordinated adjectives is followed by the plural marker e: (50)
des bele et boune biess
some nice and good animals
Third, the marking e shows up after elements which are never marked for number in French:
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification (51)
quantifier:
pluzieure poy many PLUR hens
cardinal:
traze piceur
adverb:
des fwere brave djin some very PLUR brave PLUR people
Wh word:
qwante fey?
197
thirteen PLUR shots
how-many PLUR times
Bernstein adds a fourth argument: those ADJs which may be postnominal do not have e. (52)
des aferes pareyes
some things similar some similar things
There are also phonological reasons to believe that the plural marker is a proclitic on the N. Morin (1986) argues that ife were attached at the end of the adjective, it would bear the word-final stress which is characteristic of Walloon. But e is always unstressed. He also provides an argument based on sandhi phenomena. Final consonant devoicing applies word-finally in (53b), but not word-internally (53a). If e is a plural marker morphologically attached to the ADJ, it should display internal sandhi, i.e., no devoicing as in (54a). But the pattern we find actually matches the external sandhi, with final consonant devoicing applying as in (54b). (53) (54)
a
grandeur tallness
b
grande amice [grat amis] tall friends
a
*grande feye big leaves
b
grante feye
big leaves
Vowel harmony also supports the proclitic status of e. In Gondecourt Picard (described in Cochet 1933), vowel harmony occurs strictly word-internally. The plural marker e triggers this harmony in the N following it, not in the ADJ that precedes e. Further support for the proclitic nature of the number marking comes from an observation by Warnant (1969: 630): free standing pronouns, i.e. pronouns under intonation, as complements of prepositions, or used predicatively with the copula, appear with a word initial [z] marking of plural. Thus, free standing [el] 'she' pluralizes as [zel] 'they.FEM'. There are two apparent problems for the status of the plural marker as an independent word. First, in an example like (55), the Det and each ADJ is associated with a plural marker: (55)
des bele groze biess some.PLUR nice.PLUR big.PLUR animals
198 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces It appears as if Number is realized three times in the nominal expression. However, I assume that, just as in French, semantic Number is realized only once and the other surface realizations are obtained by agreement; see the discussion in section 3.2 of chapter 1. The second apparent problem concerns plural noun phrases that contain only a Det and an N: what surfaces is not a three-element sequence as in (56a), but a two-element sequence as in (56b). (56)
a
*lesefey
the PLUR leaves
b
les fey
the leaves
However, this is not surprising at all if the Det cliticizes to the following word in Walloon, as it does in French.17 In the sequence DET+NUM+N, NUM first cliticizes to N, and then DET cliticizes to [NUM+N]. Given the clash created by the Juxtaposition of les+es in this closely knit structure, the sequence is subject to haplology and reduces to les. I believe that haplology is not simply a case where "a language tends to reduce phonological redundancy," as Bernstein assumes, but that it also crucially involves the function: it takes place in cases in which two elements of the same form with the same function are juxtaposed. This is along the lines of Zwicky (1987) (discussed in Miller 1992: 112ff and 143ff). For instance, the Genitive 's of English appears only once, even though it is functionally present twice, when a phrase ending in a Genitive such as the people at Harry's is further embedded in a context of Genitive marking as in (57). (57)
a
the people at Harry's ideas
b
*the people at Harry's's ideas
There is good reason to believe that haplology is not just a phonological process but depends on functional identity as well. In a purely phonological clash involving two instances of s, without functional identity, English does not resolve the clash by deletion, but by another process: (58)
a
the little miss+PLUR
==> the little misses
b
the little miss+GEN dress
==> the little miss's dress
c
the boy+PLUR+GEN toys
=> the boys' s toys
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 199 Returning to (56), it has all the factors to trigger haplology: two sequences of es, with the same function of marking plural, are juxtaposed, and the clash is resolved by deletion (or maybe rather fusion).18 Haplology also allows us to explain the lack of plural marker when there is noun omission, as shown in (59a)-(60a) (Morin 1986: 213) and (56-58) in Bernstein (1993: 214):
(59)
a
C'edebel. This is nice [ones]
b
*C'edesbele.
a
Des quel volez-ve djaser?
This is nice PLUR [ones] (60)
Of which [ones] do you want to talk? b
Quele bele poye what PLUR nice PLUR hens
Bernstein (1993: 238) attributes the absence of the e marker to a deletion rule that removes the e (or blocks its realization) because there is no N on which the marker could be a proclitic. However, this is more a description than an explanation. We could also just as well expect the lack of host for the proclitic to cause ungrammaticality. Moreover, there are additional data from Remacle (1952: 117) that indicate that haplology may be a better avenue to explore for an explanation of the apparent lack of plural marker in (59a)-(60a). He notes that when the N is ellipted and two adjectives are involved, e appears between the two adjectives.
(61)
a
(En) vola des grante djon. Here are some tall PLUR yellow [ones].
b
(En) vola des belle fwet. Here are some nice PLUR strong [ones].
Here, e is a. proclitic to the rightmost head of the expression (assuming as I do that there is no underlying N here, the referent!ality of the expression coming from the Number marking, not the N; see chapter 4). We can assume that the same plural marking takes place in (59a)-(60a): the e marker is before the rightmost ADJ, i.e., between the Det, and the ADJs bel and quel, respectively.
200 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces The plural marker does not surface because haplology is triggered in the context of des, as we saw in the discussion of (56). Summarizing the description of the data, Walloon exhibits the following properties: (i) adjectives are mainly prenominal, (ii) there is no number inflection on N, (iii) N omission is productive, (iv) bare plurals are not productive, (v) Number is realized as a word which is a proclitic on N. Bernstein (1993:31) takes the fact that ADJs are "overwhelmingly prenominal" to falsify the hypothesis that Romance allows base-generation of adjectives both pre- and postnominally.19 To account for the prenominal position of ADJs, she proposes that ADJs in Walloon have the same base positions as in English, and that N simply does not move in Walloon, as in English and contrary to other Romance languages such as French.20 However, this does not account for any of the four other properties of the language. Thus, the fact that (ii) there is no Number inflection on N is not derivable from the absence of long-N-movement (or vice versa), since the minimalist theory (which she adopts) allows overt movement without overt realization of a feature, and overt realisation of a feature without overt movement (see Williams (1997: 36) for general remarks to this effect). The correlations with (iii) productivity of N omission and (iv) unproductivity of bare plurals are not made in a movement analysis. Nor can the absence of long-N-movement be attributed to the assumption that (v) the head of the Number projection is filled by a word, blocking the head movement of N: such movement through a functional head position is part of analyses of verb movement through the head of NegP which are central to the framework (cf. Pollock 1989, Chomsky 1995). Bernstein (1993: 217-218) actually states that the plural marker of Walloon is similar to exactly this kind of functional head. The movement analysis also fails on the same empirical grounds as it does with English. Among other things, it fails to predict that the order of ADJ1 ADJ2 N sequences of Walloon (62a) correspond to mirror sequences N ADJ2 ADJ1 in French (62b): (62)
a
one nete grise camisole a clean grey nightshirt
b
une camisole grise propre a nightshirt grey clean a clean grey nightshirt
Turning now to my analysis, it is in trouble if Walloon expresses Number like French, but has a distribution of ADJs similar to the one found in English. However, as we saw, Walloon expresses
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 201 Number in a way that differs from these two languages: Number is not an inflectional morpheme on N or Det in Walloon, but a head which is a proclitic on N (or the rightmost head of the nominal expression if N is absent, as in (61)). This mode selected by Walloon to encode Number inside a nominal expression is the central property from which all the others derive. Crucially, it arises from logically anterior properties of the SM system: it is an optimal parametric choice, in the sense of chapter 1. Consider each of the properties of Walloon summarized above, (i) Adjectives are mainly prenominal: Recall from section 2.1 that a bare adjective can modify either a subpart of N or a nonatomized N (i.e., one without Number). Since Number is a proclitic on N in Walloon, a bare postnominal ADJ cannot relate to the N alone, but only to the atomized Number+N. This is why the distribution of bare ADJs in Walloon looks a lot like English. A bare ADJ can relate to the N alone, i.e., to a subpart of the Number+N, only under an Elsewhere application of the Linearization Parameter: the ADJ must appear in prenominal position. A similar Elsewhere application will also allow a prenominal ADJ to access a subpart of N. The analysis predicts that a bare ADJ could appear in postnominal position, but only if it is of the class of ADJs that allow a particular predicative interpretation, i.e., the transitory, stage-level ADJs of Bolinger (1967) such as the English ADJs guilty, present, responsible. The prediction appears to be borne out: Remacle (1952:154) says that a predicative ADJ ("veritable attribut") appears postnominally. He gives the example in (63 a); note that alerte, a French equivalent to Walloon suti, may appear as a postnominal modifier ofcelui (63b), indicating that it allows a stage-level interpretation. (63)
a
in ome suti a man alerted
b
Celui alerte a reussi a nous avertir. The one alerted managed to warn us.
In this analysis, it follows from the proclitic placement of Number on N not only that bare ADJs in Walloon are prenominal as in English, but also that the same exceptional ADJs may appear postnominally. (ii) There is no number inflection on N: this derives from the parametric choice of Walloon: there is no semantic Number expressed by suffixation on N; Number is rather expressed as a proclitic. (iii) N omission is productive: Just as in French, this derives from the fact that Number is not an inflection on N. As we will see in chapter 4, N omission is possible if Number may appear
202 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces elsewhere than on N, thus still providing atomization. Since the host of the clitic head Number need not be the N in Walloon, the N can be absent. (v) Bare plurals are not productive: Bare plurals are productive in English because an NP without a Det can still refer minimally since N is inflected for the crucial feature of semantic Number and so the nominal is atomized. In French, Det generally cannot be absent because it is the bearer of semantic Number (see chapter 5). In Walloon, Number is not an inflection on N, but a proclitic on the rightmost head of the expression (N, or ADJ if N is absent). This Number head cannot be absent (haplology not counting as "absence"). Ye, we could expect Det not to have to be present, contrary to what is observed in French, since an NP without a Det could still refer minimally via its Number clitic. However, this is not the case: Det must be present. Moreover, not only is there a proclitic marking of Number in NP, but in addition, Det is always inflected for Number. There are two possible analyses of this double marking of Number. First, this could be a simple case of superficial agreement between Det and the Number head, with no deep effect. The lack of productive bare NPs argues against this hypothesis. Second, it may be that Walloon has two markings of semantically different Number, one appearing on the Det and the other as a proclitic on N or ADJ. This would be similar to Italian, which appears to mark the extensity Number on Det, and marks on N the Number indicating the type of individual involved in the class delimited by the N (see chapter 5, section 5). The only difference would be that Walloon marks this second kind of Number as a proclitic, not as an inflection on N. Since Det bears some Number, we expect determinerless NPs not to occur as freely in Walloon as in English, but more freely than in French, and with subtle effects similar to those exhibited by Italian bare NPs. Only a detailed study will be able to determine if this is correct. I must leave this further study to scholars who have access to the subtle native judgements about meaning required to make a proper analysis. Summarizing, Walloon behaves like English in some respects and like French in others (or maybe more accurately like Italian). This follows from its peculiar way of marking Number as a proclitic on N. Moreover, this parametric choice is deeply rooted in properties of the interfaces, thus providing an explanation of the phenomena rather than a simple description.
3.3. Rumanian
I must say a few words about the distribution of ADJs in Rumanian since it is frequently presented as a case where movement would simply change the order of elements. In Rumanian, the definite
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 203 article is enclitic to the initial word of a nominal expression: this initial word can be the N as in (64a), or an ADJ as in (64b). (64)
a
poetul mare poet-masc.sing.def. tall the tall poet
b
marele poet tall-masc. sing. def. poet the great poet
To account for the placement of the ADJ and N in (64), several movement analyses have been proposed which all have in common that the Det position is initial in the base, and the N or ADJ move to its left. Grosu (1988) and Taraldsen (1990) assume that either N or ADJ raises to D and left-adjoins to the Det. Dobrovie-Sorin (1987) assumes that N or ADJ move to the Spec of D. Cinque (1994:96-7) assumes that an AP may move to Spec of DP; alternatively, the N may also move to the front, but Cinque does not say clearly where the N lands. A movement analysis looks very simple here, but this is deceptive. First, it is not enough to say that the N or ADJ move to the left of the Det. As indicated by Lombard (1974), the morphophonological realization of definite articles shows numerous idiosyncrasies. This suggests that they are lexically attached (cf. Miller 1992:268), so it must be said that after the movement of N or ADJ, a morphophonological operation takes place, namely the encliticization of the Det to these forms, as acknowledged by most transformationalists above. Second, the change of order also involves semantic properties: the two orders always exhibit a meaning difference, as can be seen by the translations. Lombard (1974) and Pop (1948) both illustrate with several examples that the distinction is the same as the one found in French. Thus, (64a) corresponds to le poete grand, and (64b) to le grand poete. So a "simple" movement analysis must actually assume that three operations take place simultaneously: in addition to the movement itself, the analysis must be augmented with a morphophonological operation that happens to be triggered whenever this raising takes place, and with some meaning changing process operating in conjunction with the movement—something which current movement theories rightfully do not provide the means to formulate. There are two distributional facts to account for. First, there is the prenominal vs postnominal placement of ADJs. In this respect, Rumanian seems to function very much like French, as
204 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces indicated by the change of meaning related to the change of position. Note that this holds just as well when the Det is not an enclitic, as can be seen in (65) (from Lombard 1974).
(65)
a
un singur om a single man (compare French un seul homme)
b
un om singur a man alone
(compare French un homme seul)
Nothing special need be said about Rumanian in this respect. Thus, mare appears postnominally or prenominally in (64) for the same reasons that singur does in (65), and the same reasons that similar ADJs do in French. The second distributional fact concerns the placement of some forms of the Det. In French, the Det is a proclitic on the first head of the nominal (see Miller (1992) and chapter 4 below). Rumanian is minimally different: Det is also a clitic on the first head of the nominal, but it is an enclitic instead of a proclitic. Note that this must be said in any event in a movement analysis. In the present analysis, that is all that has to be said.21 The only difference between French and Rumanian with respect to the placement of Det and ADJ appears to be that whereas the Det is a proclitic to the initial word of a nominal expression in French, it is an enclitic in Rumanian (I leave the finer details of analysis to linguists with native competence in Rumanian). For reasons of parsimony, this cliticization should be done directly by Merge, without Move, since it is motivated by selectional properties: a Det bears features indicating Number, definiteness, specificity, demonstrativity, etc., which must be expressed in the nominal expression; these being properties of the expression, there isn't of necessity one "basic" position in which they must appear for all languages. In both French and Rumanian, the marker of definiteness seems to be cliticized onto the first element in the nominal functor category.
4. EVIDENCE FROM CODESWITCHING The approach to variation presented here throws a different an interesting light on some aspects of codeswitching. On the basis of an extensive survey of codeswitching in various language pairs, Mahootian (1993) arrives at the following generalization:22
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 205 (66) The language of a head determines the phrase structure position of its complements in codeswitching just as in monolingual contexts. Santorini & Mahootian (1995) discuss an apparent exception to the generalization: ADJs appear to conform to the generalization in some cases (67) (assuming N is the head), but not in others (68). (67)
a
I got a lotta blanquito ('whitey') friends. (English-Spanish)
b
Tenian patas flacas, pechos flat. (Spanish-English) They-had legs skinny, chests flat They had skinny legs, flat chests,
c
Ta carr light green aige. (Irish-English) be car
at-him
He has a light green car. (68)
a
Ma ci stanno dei smart italiani. (Italian-English) but there are of-the
Italians
But there are smart Italians, b
He presented a paper exceptionnel. (English-French)
In (67a), the N head is from English and a normally postnominal Spanish ADJ appears before this N, following the English format for the placement of ADJs. In (67b), an ADJ which is always prenominal in English appears after a Spanish N, and in (67c), an English ADJ appears after an Irish N. In (68a), the N is from Italian, and ADJs generally follow the N in this language; but an English ADJ appears before the Italian N. In (68b), a normally postnominal French ADJ follows an English head N. So sometimes it seems that the language of the head N determines the position of the ADJ; in other cases, it seems to be the language of the ADJ that prevails.23 Santorini & Mahootian (1995) suggest that the placement of ADJs does not fall under (66) because ADJs are neither heads nor complements, but adjuncts. Assuming a Tree Adjoining Grammar format, they say that when codeswitching takes place between languages with pre- and postnominal adjectives, speakers have access to either of the auxiliary trees for adjuncts in (69).
206 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces This predicts that either tree can be picked since both are accessible, hence the prenominal or postnominal positioning of the ADJs as in (67)-(68). Even more striking, it predicts that "codeswitching between languages with pre- and postnominal adjectives should on occasion give rise to adjectives and nouns from one language appearing in an order unique to the other" (Santorini & Mahootian 1995:13). They have found afew examples of this sort (cf. their (21)). (70)
a
he house red 6. (Adanme-English) (s)he past tone buy
art.
S/he bought the red house. b
ar nos dha chat ar roof galvanized. (Irish-English) like
two cats on-a roof galvanized
like two cats on a galvanized roof
Thus, in (70a), the initial tree for determiner (7la) and the auxiliary tree for adjective (71b) are both from Adanme, yet the lexical material comes from English.
Similarly, in (70b), the Irish P+Det portmanteau ar precedes the NP, and the ADJ galvanized follows the N, both therefore appearing in the Irish order, yet again the lexical material roof galvanized inside the NP is strictly English. In the approach I propose, the ordering of heads and complements is determined by the Linearization Parameter, which matches the asymmetry in temporal Juxtaposition with the asymmetry in the semantic relation. The asymmetry in the meaning component crucially involves determining which element is the functor category. Therefore, the fact that ordering of the head and its complements depends on the nature of the functor category in head position, hence on its language, as expressed by (66), follows directly from the way order comes to play a role in language and need not be expressly stated in the grammar. As for ADJs, Santorini & Mahootian predict that the auxiliary trees for adjuncts of both languages involved are available to the speakers in codeswitching contexts. My analysis diverges from their proposal in two major aspects. First, as we saw in the discussion of French and other Romance
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 207 languages, we cannot simply say that a language allows prenominal or postnominal ADJs: the semantics of each particular ADJ determines whether the ADJ is compatiblke with a prenominal or postnominal placement. Second, and more crucial for (66), the ordering of bare ADJs in a particular language does depend on a head-like property, namely the position of Number in the nominal expression. This predicts that the distribution of ADJs in codeswitching should fall under the principles from which (66) derives, and that the placement of ADJ should not be quite as free as predicted by the auxiliary trees hypothesis. For instance, the auxiliary trees hypothesis links the placement of the ADJ only to the auxiliary tree in (71b) and not to the initial tree for determiner (7la). Therefore, the ordering of an ADJ and an N could be determined by the auxiliary tree for adjuncts of a LI, while the lexical content of a whole nominal expression, i.e., the Det, the N and the ADJ, could all come from a L2. So for instance, according to the auxiliary trees hypothesis, it should be possible to have an example like (70b), but with even the Det (and the P) in English, yet with an Irish order for the ADJ as in (72); on the other hand, my analysis predicts that this should not be possible. (72)
(reconstructed) ar nos dha chat on the roof galvanized
Furthermore, my analysis predicts that the coding of Number in the nominal expression determines the placement of ADJs. If all the lexical material is from English as in (72), then the ADJ must be positioned according to English rule. Interestingly, the prediction appears to be borne out in all the examples that Santorini & Mahootian give in which adjectives and nouns from one language appear in an order unique to the other: the Det involved always comes from the language which licenses the order of the ADJ. Given the link, positive or negative, between Number and Det, this is expected.24
5. CONCLUSION The crosslinguistic variations found in adjectival modification can all be traced to external properties that are logically anterior. When these properties allow equally valid means to grammaticalize a notion, in particular Number in this case, languages may vary in which option they pick. One simple difference has multiple effects. Thus, whether Number is realized on N, on
208 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Det or as an independent word determines where different ADJs may appear with respect to N, how they will be interpreted, whether they may take a phrasal complement, whether they undergo sandhi rules, whether means other than order will be required to express some meanings, etc. As we will now see in the next two chapters, this same simple difference in how Number is grammaticalized also extends to variations between French and English with respect to the possibility to omit the N (chapter 4) and the possibility to omit the Det (chapter 5). We will see that the differences between the two languages follow directly, without any additions to the theory. Notes 1
There may also be a technical problem with the proposal as it stands. In French, Number is an
inflectional morpheme on Det, so as a word-final morphological head, it should only have scope over elements to its left. A solution could maybe be found in an analysis along the lines of Miller (1992), who assumes that Det is a prefix on the word that follows it. For a sequence Det+ADJ+N+ADJ, it is possible to devise a structural condition on scope that would allow the Number feature of a prefixed Det to have scope over both ADJs. But this is a technical solution which does not derive from interface legibility conditions, and could therefore be easily modified to allow the Number in Det to have just as easily scope only on the prenominal ADJ, or just on the postnominal ADJ, or on neither ADJ. So it is not very informative. 2
Delbecque (1990: 413) observes that modifying an ADJ with an adverbial intensifier that implies
an idea of comparison also forces the ADJ to be postnominal: (i)
a
*Employees unreliable should be fired.
b
Employees that unreliable should be fired.
This is expected. As we saw in chapter 2, a comparative or a superlative expresses an evaluation relative to some other element. This "otherness" implies an access to individuals instantiating the property of the Noun, and this is directly dependent on atomization as we will see in detail in chapter 5. As indicated in the text, in order for an ADJ to modify an atomized Noun, it must appear in the canonical postnominal position in English. 3
"...on ne doit point mettre de qui apres vn nom commun, s'il n'eft determine par vn article, ou
par quelque autre chofe qui ne le determine pas moins que feroit vn article. Pour bien entendre cecy, il faut fe fouvenir qu'on peut diftinguer deux chofes dans le nom commun, la fignification
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 209
qui eft fixe [...] & 1'etendue de cette fignification qui eft fujette a varier [. .] Ce n'eft qu'au regard de cette etendue que nous difons qu'vn nom commun eft indetermine [... ou... ] determine'' 4
The fact that celui is not compatible with prenominal ADJs follows from its pronominal nature:
pronouns have no internal network like common nouns have, they have no range, no denotation, so there is nothing that a prenominal ADJ could apply to inside a pronoun. 5
The well-known semantic embedding found in examples with two or more prenominal ADJs or
postnominal ADJs is a problem for any analysis based on a coordination of ADJs rather than embedding them (one of the latest being Higginbotham (1985)). In this kind of analysis, the order of two intersective ADJs should have no effect on the interpretation since each ADJ is assumed to be semantically coordinated with the N. Thus, (i) and (ii) are erroneously predicted to be synonymous since they both involve logically equivalent conjunctions of properties ([drunk &executive] & [nude & executive]). (i)
drunk nude executive
(ii)
nude drunk executive
Additionally, by conjunction reduction, (iii) and (iv) are wrongly predicted to have the same meaning: (iii)
She was wearing a white and blue dress,
(iv)
#She was wearing a white blue dress.
Cinque (1994:100) suggests an alternative analysis based on a proposal made by Richard Kayne at the 1992 GLOW Colloquium. The mirror order of postnominal ADJs would be obtained by "successive adjunctions of lower XPs to higher ones." The basic order would be the same as in English (i); then tissu raises before anglais (ii); then the phrase containing tissu anglais in turn raises before cher (iii). Step 1: un cher anglais tissu Step 2: un cher tissu anglais Step 3: un tissu anglais cher As I indicated in Bouchard (200Ib), such a 'remnant movement' is subject to a criticism very similar to one leveled against Skinner's approach:
210 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces "Borrowing from the terminology of Chomsky (1959), we could say that a typical example of 'trigger control' for checking theory would be the response to a W trigger in position P by a movement of an X. Suppose instead of an X we had a Y move to P in another language. We could only say that each of these responses is under the control of some other triggering property of a functional category. This device is as simple as it is empty. Since properties are free for the asking, we can account for a wide class of responses in terms of functional category analysis by identifying the 'controlling triggers'. But the word 'trigger' has lost all objectivity in this usage. Triggers are no longer part of the independent properties of the construction; they are driven back into the construction. We identify the trigger when we hear the response." In the light of presently available evidence, it is difficult to see how anyone can be willing to claim that functional category triggering is necessary for deriving word order, if triggering is taken seriously as something identifiable independently of the resulting change in word order. If triggering theory really requires the assumption that there be such components of the theory as covert functional categories, covert movement and a covert level of application of some principles, it seems best to regard this simply as a reductio ad absurdum argument against this approach since any basic order will derive all the others as "economically". 7
The absence of Det on N2 in a sequence NI de N2 is a good indication that there is a closer bond
between NI and N2 than when a Det is present (see section 2.4 of chapter 5). As can be seen in the following examples from Hirschbuhler & Labelle (1992), this closeness correlates directly with the presence of an intervening ADJ: with no Det, the ADJ cannot intervene, but with a Det it can. (i)
une verification d'huile frequente a check of oil frequent a frequent oil check
(ii)
*une verification frequente d'huile
(iii)
une verification frequente de 1'huile
(iv)
?*une verification de 1'huile frequente
8
In his note 8, Cinque says that in (20a), it may be that brutal is not a manner ADJ but a subject-
oriented ADJ, or that "it simply occurs, as a manner AP, with the thematic AP, given the absence in English of combinatorial restrictions on APs of equal degree of "absoluteness"" [in the sense of Sproat & Shih 1988]. For the first proposal to make testable predictions, we will need some criteria to distinguish the two types of ADJs. To make sense out of the second proposal, it seems
Cross linguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 211
that we must assume that a certain functional category may be repeated in English, providing two positions to host the ADJs, or that it may host more than one Spec. Why English should differ from Romance in this way remains a mystery. 9
Cinque (1994:103) discusses the differences between Romance and Germanic in how ordering
takes place in ADJ-N compounds and says this difference may be amenable to a similar Nmovement analysis as the one he proposes for ADJ placement in syntax. He assumes that modifiers precede the head in Germanic but follow it in Romance. He gives the following examples to illustrate this claim: (i)
a
Common Market vs Mercato Comune
b
European Common Market vs Mercato Comune Europeo
The N Mercato would raise to the left of the ADJ in (ia), but Market remains in its basic position. Note that to get Europeo to follow Comune in (ib), the analysis requires a special rightward position for predicative ADJs in compounds as well as in syntax. This N-raising analysis of compounds has several problems. First, it is not sure that the examples in (i) are compounds, in the sense of being derived by word formation rules, since their interpretation is fully compositional. They seem to be conventionalized expressions, akin to proper names (note the use of capital letters) rather than compounds. Second, if we turn to clear instances of ADJ-N compounding, the claim that modifiers follow the head in Romance is simply false. A brief survey of studies on French compounds quickly reveals that both ADJ-N and N-ADJ are very frequent, as shown by the following examples from Blinkenberg (1933) and Barbaud (1993): (ii)
ADJ-N: court-circuit short-circuit, basse-cour low-yard = farmyard, chauve-souris bald-mouse = bat, blanc bee white beak - tenderfoot, franc-tireur frank-shooter = freelance, pla.ie-ba.nde flat-band = flower bed, haute couture high sewing, grand-oncle tall uncle = great-uncle, rouge-gorge red throat = robin, libre echangefree trade, Proche Orient Near East, sagefemme wise woman = midwife, gentilhomme gentleman, beau-pere nice father = father-inlaw, bonhomme good man — chap, bon sens good sense = common sense
(iii)
N-ADJ: sang-froid blood-cold = composure, coffre fort chest strong = safe, saindouxfat soft = melted pork fat, parti prisparty taken = bias
212 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
The ADJ-N forms are still productively created (libre echange) and even proper names can have that order (Proche Orient). Note also that many of the ADJs appearing before the N in (ii) would generally be postnominal in syntax, further indicating that a parallel between syntactic combination and combination by word formation rules cannot simply be stated in terms of Nraising. Additionally, as Williams (1997:23) observed, whereas Germanic allows multiple compounding, as in (iv), Romance has no complex compounds with more than two elements, rightward expanding or otherwise (v):
(iv)
English [N [N N]]: a university history instructor, the 4:00 Times Square speech, our Paris house boat
(v)
French *[[N N] N]: un bateau-mouche, *un bateau-mouche Paris, *un Paris bateau-mouche
Finally, there is also a problem with the general claim that modifiers precede the head in Germanic in both syntax and morphology, but follow it in Romance. This is supposed to account for contrasts like can-opener vs ouvre-boite, but we saw in chapter 1 that there isn't just a different order here: English compounds like these are [N+N] compounds, whereas they are [V+N] compounds in French. Moreover, in the raising analysis, in order to account for the fact that both the V in ouvre-boite and the N in Marche Commun raise, they must be attracted by a feature of some functional category. To have a true generalization rather than a stipulation, it must be explained why the same feature happens to attract these elements of different categories, or alternatively, if the triggering features are different, why they happen to function in such a parallel fashion. 10
However, as discussed in section 2.4 of chapter 2, great care must be taken not to confuse the
interpretation in which an ADJ combines with the whole network of N, and the interpretation in which a French prenominal ADJ combines with the characteristic function and they form a complex/which defines a newly created natural class. The two interpretations are often hard to distinguish, but as we saw, the difference can be made more obvious in a context of comparison, in a context of negation, or with 'qualis' and 'quis' questions. 11
These interpretations of the examples in (27) and (28) may not be obvious to some because of
their slightly dated content. The contrast in interpretation between prenominal and postnominal simple should be clear in the following: in the (a) examples, the content of the question is not
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 213 complex; in (b), nothing but a question was uttered, there was no extraneous comment (but the question could be complex in itself). (i) (ii)
12
a
II a pose une question simple.
b
II a pose une simple question,
a
He asked a simple question (= une question simple)
b
He asked a simple question (= une simple question)
Alternatively, we could say that contrastive intonation singles out an element as the one being
negated. Reversal effects due to intonation are not restricted to ADJs. For instance, the process affects the choice of referent for the pronoun in (i). Under normal intonation, a condition of parallel interpretation compels the pronoun in object position to corefer with the NP in object position of the first conjunct; but with contrastive stress on him, we get a reversed, "sloppy" link with the subject of the first conjunct (cf. Jackendoff 1972: 120). (i)
13
a
John hit Bill and then Max hit him (him= Bill)
b
John hit Bill and then Max hit HIM. (him= John)
Sproat & Shih (1988:17) and (1991:578) discuss (i) and say the ADJs get a parallel
interpretation, as in a coordination like (ii). But that is not correct: (i) is interpreted as in (iii). (i)
She loves all those Oriental, orange, wonderful ivories.
(ii)
They gave watermelons, oranges, and berries.
(iii)
She loves all those wonderful orange Oriental ivories.
They give as evidence for the coordinate parallel interpretation the fact that (iv) is as odd as the coordination in (v): (iv)
??Reagan is an unwise, ignorant, former, president.
(v)
??Reagan is an unwise president, an ignorant president and a former president.
214 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
We may think that the oddness of (iv) could also be linked to the well-known fact that there are restrictions on the coordination of ADJs, that they must be of similar classes. Thus, all the examples in (vi) are odd because the ADJs are too "different". (vi)
a
#an ignorant and former president
a'
an ignorant former president
b
#smiling and American officers
b'
smiling American officers
However, the problem with (iv) does not seem to come from a coordinate interpretation of ADJs with comma intonation, since (vib) is odd, but not the comma constructions in (vii): (vii)
a
smiling, American officers
b
American, smiling officers
What's wrong with (iv) is that intensional ADJs are not as easily affected by intonation as others. But even this does not hold for all intensional ADJs: (viii) a b
This is a beautiful fake gun. ?This is a fake, beautiful gun.
c
This is a fake and beautiful gun.
d
?This is a beautiful and, by the way, fake gun.
I therefore maintain my claim in the text: comma intonation reverses the interpretive embedding of the ADJs (though some intensional ADJs resist the process). 14
I also obviously cannot go into the details of every construction and every language for which
movement has been claimed to simply change the order of elements. But see Bouchard (1995) and Williams (1997) for observations on checking theory with respect to a phenomenon closely related to ADJs—the placement of adverbs in French and English. 15
I would like to thank Antony Green, Steve Hewitt, Melanie Jouitteau, Yves-Charles Morin,
Richard Sproat and Maggie Tallerman for their help with the data and valuable suggestions. Melanie Jouitteau also very kindly translated for me relevant passages from the Breton grammar
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 215 Yezhadur Bras ar Brezhoneg by Fransez Kervella and gave me excerpts from the Grammaire bretonne of Pierre Trepas. 16
Moreover, in a discussion of adjective order on Celtling, a list devoted to Celtic languages
(
[email protected]), it is reported that it is possible, although not common, to change the order of the adjectives to reflect different interpretations, in which case the adjective closest to the noun combines with it first: (i)
a
Beachd ur inntinneach proposition new interesting an interesting new proposition
b
Beachd inntinneach ur proposition interesting new a new interesting proposition
In this case, a Celtic language appears to follow the same direct concatenation as the one found for French postnominal ADJs. Until the data are clarified and relevant factors are better understood, we don't even know if we have a factual problem for the analysis. One particular aspect of the data that must be acertained before we can be too confident in our claims is the effect of mutation. Is it simply a rather superficial morphophonological process, or does it have a functional role along the lines discussed by Tallerman (1999)? She argues that mutation is an indication of a marked order. It could be therefore that mutation plays a role similar to comma intonation in English examples like (37)-(38) above. However, mutation is only triggered in precise morphophonological contexts and this raises the question of the serialization when the context does not trigger mutation. 17
Morin (1986: 218) discusses effects of vowel harmony which support the attachment of the Det
to N. As indicated in the text, vowel harmony occurs strictly word-internally. There are two allomorphs of/i/ in Walloon: [i] is triggered by a preceding front vowel, and [1] by a preceding back vowel. As the following examples show, a Det triggers vowel harmony, indicating that it forms a phonological word with the N: (i)
a
[loe fil]
their daughter
(cf. French: leurfille)
b
[vufll]
your.PLUR daughter (cf. French: vosfilles)
216 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 18
Bernstein (1993: 228) gives two examples of haplology in French from Grevisse (1986: 313)
"where two identical consecutive sounds will only be pronounced once" (her (54)): (i)
a
Je le lui dirai. ->Je lui dirai. / // to-him tell-FUT I will tell it to him.
b
J'y irai. -^ J'irai. I there go-FUT I will go there.
In (a), after reduction of the schwa between the two [1], they are adjacent. This is the same functional element [1]: it indicates in a paradigm that the element is third person definite. So the conditions for haplology are all present and one [1] deletes. Note that the process is not purely phonological, but functionally conditioned. Reduction of the schwa occurs in other contexts such as Marie le lave -> Marie I'lave, but reduction of the two [1] to one does not take place in this case since they are not functionally related: the result is gemination, not deletion. Miller (1992: 143, note 36) gives two examples of this type to show that haplology is not purely phonological: en en prenant ('in of-some taking') does not reduce to enprenant even though there is a sequence [aa], and>" illustrer ('LOG illustrate') does not reduce to illustrer even though there is a sequence [ii]. As for example (b), it is not good case of haplology, in my terms, since the two [i] are not functionally related. This is not a counterexample to my claim: rather, it seems to be an elliptical use of aller without a locative, as an answer to a question, for example. See Lamarche (1998) about the conditions on ellipsis of the locative for aller. We can further see that the process is not purely phonological, contra Bernstein, in an example such as Je suis deja alle 'I've already been (there)', in which the appropriate phonological context is not present, yet 7 may be absent. 19
We saw that French ADJs are often claimed to be predominantly postnominal, but that this
assertion is doubtful: though the semantics of many ADJs makes it more likely for them to hold the semantic relation expressed by postnominal positioning in French, this is because the resulting meaning is pragmatically more likely to correspond to some world situation. However, prenominal placement and the semantics it derives are just as well-formed in a large number of cases. Pragmatic likeliness is not a measure of grammaticality. I will assume for the sake of the argument that Walloon ADJs are indeed predominantly prenominal, but bearing in mind that a caveat is
Crosslinguistic Variation in Adjectival Modification 217
warranted and that only a detailed study will reveal how the claim that ADJs are mostly prenominal should be understood. The main source for Walloon data warns: "To claim today that, in Walloon, the attributive adjective precedes the noun is to note under a general form a usage which is not totally so" ["Affirmer qu'aujourd'hui, en wallon, 1'epithete precede le substantif, c'est noter sous une forme generate un usage qui ne Test pas tout a fait"] (Remacle 1952:146). 20
Bernstein's analysis is actually a bit more complicated. In order to account for the postnominal
position of ethnic ADJs as in (i), she assumes that they are adjoined to NP and skipped over by a short N-movement to a functional node labelled Word Marker: (i)
lu peupe italyin
the Italian people
This makes Walloon different both from other Romance languages—which have "long" Nmovement—and from English, which does not have short N-movement. However, the order of ethnic ADJs may just be an apparent problem. As indicated by Remacle (1952:154-5) and by Bernstein (1993:244-5), informants feel that these ADJs are borrowings from French and are reluctant to use them. Remacle says that postnominal ADJs also appear in expressions borrowed whole from French such as conseil communal 'communal council'. Therefore, it could be that examples like (i) are instances of codeswitching. Given the lack of clarity of the facts and the peculiar behavior of these ADJs in the language, I will assume as a working hypothesis that these adjectivalconstructions are not truly part of the core grammar of Walloon. 21
A Det encliticizing to a sequence ADV-ADJ as ADV-ADJ+Det shows that the sequence ADV-
ADJ forms a complex head, as I suggested in the discussion of example (147) in chapter 2. This generalization raises a problem for approaches that derive surface order by several applications of Move triggered by features to be checked with functional categories. In (66), the head and the complement are actual surface elements. But in a checking approach, what determines surface order is in functional categories that do not surface. Thus, the surface position of a verb with respect to its complement may depend on the position of several functional categories attracting either of these elements. For instance, the surface order object-verb may be obtained by raising the V through several inflectional heads, and the object in the Spec of the last one reached by the verb. In order to respect (66) in a case of codeswitching involving a verbal head from such an O-V language LI and an NP object from some other language L2, LI must be the language of the feature that attracts the verb to a certain functional category, and also the
218 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces language of the feature that attracts the complement to the Spec of this functional category; moreover, even if the complement is from another language, it must have the appropriate feature to check the feature of the functional category. This is technically feasible, but is of a global, transderivational nature. 23
(68a) is unclear in this respect, since there are ADJs of the same semantic nature as smart that
can be prenominal in Italian. 24
The correlation between the language in which Number is realized and the language of the order
of the ADJ holds in almost all the instances of switching in various languages that Santorini & Mahootian present. There are only two examples that do not conform to the correlation. First, English expletive ADJs used in Irish sentences appear in prenominal position: (i)
Ca bhfuil mo fucking sheaicead? Where be my fucking jacket Where's my fucking jacket?
Santorini & Mahootian relate this to Bernstein's claim that these ADJs are heads taking nominal complements, not adjuncts to a nominal projection: so they would fall under (66), and the English fucking is followed by its nominal complement sheaicead, as it would be by English jacket. However, we saw that there are problems with this head analysis. Moreover, there is no need to look that far for the prenominal placement of this kind of ADJ: though most types of ADJs are postnominal in Irish, this particular class of ADJs, as well as some other "intensional" ADJs, may appear prenominally in Irish. Additionally, as is well known, these English expletives are not truly ADJs, and can appear infixed between two morphemes of a word (7 can't unfuckingwrap this thing}: this could also affect how they are borrowed. The second case is presented in (68b), in which the Det and N are English, but a French ADJ is placed after the N. We are not told what kind of speaker produced this codeswitching. If the codeswitching was made by a French speaker speaking English, it could be that English words are attributed the Number feature of native French.
The Omission ofN 219
4
THE OMISSION OF N
In the pursuit of grounding the theory on logically anterior properties, I showed that a difference in the way French and English realize Number explains why ADJs function differently in these languages. I argued in 3.3 of chapter 1 that a nominal expression is the canonical realization of an actant in grammar, and there are a few equally valid modes to identify an actant. In particular, Number is a frequently grammaticalized feature because it is a minimal means to atomize a set and provide access to individuals: Number indicates that the set has a cardinality, that it contains a certain number of elements, hence that there is an actant in the event. Number can be grammaticalized in different ways in a nominal expression because, whether Number is realized on the N, on the Det, or as an independent word, these different ways to encode Number in a nominal expression are equally satisfactory with respect to the interpretive requirement. As we saw, French codes Number on Det, whereas English codes it on N. This makes a direct prediction about the presence of Ns in these languages. Given the role of Number in atomization, it should be fairly easy to omit N from syntactic entities that identify an actant in French, since the Number on Det allows the entity to satisfy the interpretive requirement. On the other hand, omitting N from these syntactic entities should be highly restricted in English, since the absence of N implies an absence of Number: only entities which contain other means of identifying actants should be licit. This is indeed the case as we will see in this chapter. In the next sections, I look at three types of expressions with "missing" Ns, and assess whether they are acceptable or not, and why. In section 1, a first class of expressions is presented which contain partitivity: these are licit
220 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces in both French and English since partitivity makes it possible to recover the content of the missing N. Section 2 introduces expressions which combine a Det with "classifying" ADJs: these are licit in French since Number is realized on the Det (la verte) and the atomization recovers the identity of the missing N, but they require the presence of an N in English to express Number (the green one). Section 3 presents an analysis of expressions consisting of only a Det: these are possible in French (clitic pronouns), but impossible in English, again because Number is on Det in French but not in English.
1. EXPRESSIONS INCLUDING PARTITIVITY Typically, in both French and English, a common N expresses a property which defines a superset, and a subset is defined by atomization through the means of Number, and sometimes other features such as defmiteness (on the relation between superset and subset in nominal expressions, see En? (1991) and references therein). For instance, in le chien 'the dog', the superset of all sets of individuals having the property DOG is defined and a subset is further defined which comprises a referent identifiable to the addressee (i.e., a definite referent). In this section, we will examine expressions in which the N is missing, but the superset/subset relation is expressed through a partitive element, so the content of the N is recoverable. Sleeman (1996: 34-36) remarks that an N can be omitted quite freely if the expression contains an element that implies the inclusion of a subset in a superset, such as an ordinal or a numeral. This holds in both English and French. (1) (2)
a
Ordinal:
This author has written three books. Joey prefers the second (one),
b
Numeral:
Two/The three were published by John.
a
Ordinal:
Get auteur a ecrit trois livres. Joey prefere le deuxieme.
b
Numeral:
Deux ont etc publics par Jean.
b'
Les trois ont etc publics par Jean.
The N can be omitted in these cases because the elements present are sufficient for the identification of the actants to take place. I have argued that a common N expresses a property which defines a superset, and Number defines a subset out of this superset. In an expression that
The Omission of N 221 contains both an N and Number, this partitive relation is fully expressed. If only Number is overtly expressed, without an N to identify the superset, something else must provide the means to identify the superset to complete the partitive relation, something else must play the role normally fulfilled by the content of the N. An ordinal implies a superset in the domain of discourse from which a particular item (or items) are selected and ranked. An ordinal always implies such a partitive meaning, so neither the N nor Number needs to be expressed. Both the superset and relevant subset are implicit in the ordinal itself, and can be recovered. A similar kind of recoverability of the partitive relation is the reason expressions that involve comparison are acceptable with a missing N. The comparison implies a reference set, so the N is not needed to explicity denote it. This holds in both English and French, since it does not depend on how Number is realized. (3) (4)
a
Mary was always fascinated by those manuscripts. Her favourite is the oldest,
b
You take this end. I'll take the other.
a
Marie a toujours ete fascinee par ces manuscrits. Son prefere est le plus ancien.
b
Prends ce bout. Je prendrai 1'autre.
The behaviour of numeral expressions is somewhat more complex. When in subject position, a Nounless numeral is grammatical in both English and French, as shown in (Ib) and (2b) above. In object position, a Nounless numeral is always acceptable in English (5), but in French, some overt indicator of partitivity is required (6). (5)
(6)
a
I read two of his books,
b
Bill also read two.
c
Mary read (all) three.
a
J'ai lu deux de ses livres.
b
Bill *(en) a lu deux.
c
Marie a lu les trois.
In order for a Nounless numeral to be acceptable, both elements of the subset/superset relation must be recoverable. One way to recover the superset information lacking because of the absence of the N is through an overt indication of partitivity, as is the case in object position in French. The
222 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces partitivity can be expressed directly by a PP partitive such as de ses livres (6a) or by the partitive pronoun en (6b). Another way to identify a superset is through a specific determiner, as in les trois (6c). I assume with En9 (1991) that the specificity of the DP constrains the set of the referent of the DP to a subset of a superset of a referent that is already in the domain of discourse prior to the utterance of the DP. In the terms of Lambrecht (1994), the definite specific determiner defines a contextual superset consisting of the referents identifiable to the speaker (specific) and to the hearer (definite). In subject position as in (Ib) and (2b), a numeral may appear alone because subjects tend to have a specific interpretation: a contextual superset is therefore determined, completing the partitive relation and enabling the recovery and interpretation of the missing N. Summarizing what we have seen so far, bare numerals are possible in subject position in English and French because subject position is inherently specific: a superset is determined contextually, so the N is not required to complete the subset/superset relation. In object position in French, the subset/superset relation is established through a partitive element or a definite specific determiner, which supplies the missing superset out of which the numeral defines a subset. It remains to explain why, in English, partitivity is apparently not required for the recovery of the missing N information in object position. Descriptive analyses can easily be constructed. For instance, Cardinaletti & Giusti (1992) suggest that the difference in grammaticality between a Nounless numeral in subject position (2b) and in object position (6b) in Romance languages is due to the fact that an empty category fills the N position and that it can be identified by AGR via the quantifier when in subject position, but AGR cannot identify the empty category in object position.1 To account for the occurrence of Nounless numerals in object position in English, we could simply say that V or some postulated covert functional category can license an empty category via the quantifier in English. But this explains nothing and is extremely construction-specific. There is no independent motivation for the claim, nor any principled reason why it couldn't go any other way. As things stand, this theory just as easily allows French to be exactly the same with respect to every other property it has, except that it would allow Nounless numerals in object position, and the converse would be allowed in English. Similarly, nothing prevents the difference in grammaticality between a Nounless numeral in subject position (2b) and in object position (6b) in Romance from being reversed, with AGRO being the licenser instead of AGRS. Interestingly, the independently motivated difference between French and English that we have observed so far—namely, the difference in the realization of Number between the two languages—may explain why partitivity is required for recoverability of missing Ns in object
The Omission ofN 223 position in French (6b), but not in English (5b). In French, Number, which defines the subset of the partitive relation, is realized on Det, so that the subset of the partitive relation is expressed independently of the superset defined by the N. In English however, Number is realized on the N. Therefore, whenever an N is used, both parts of the partitive relation are expressed because the N part of N+NUM identifies the superset, and the Number part of N+NUM identifies the subset. So English grammaticalizes that the expression of the subset and the expression of the superset of the partitive relation are necessarily linked. This could have the interpretive effect that when only one element of the relation is overtly expressed, the other is implied. Under this view, when a numeral defines a subset, a superset is implied to be contextually active. In French on the other hand, no such implication holds, so some more explicit means is required to recover the missing element in the partitive relation when only a numeral is present. The possessive construction is another instance in which the expression contains an element that implies the inclusion of a subset in a superset. This partitive relation should license the omission of N. However, some possessive constructions are ungrammatical without the N for independent reasons. There are four different possessive constructions: weak possessive pronouns (7a-a'); strong possessive pronouns (7b-b'), prenominal phrasal possessives (7c-c'), and postnominal phrasal possessives (7d-d'). (7)
a
He read my *(books).
a'
II a lu mes *(livres).
b
Ke read mine,
b'
II a lu *(les) miens,
c
He read Noam's (books),
c'
*I1 a lu Noam (livres).
d
He read *(those) of Noam('s).
d'
II a lu *(ceux) de Noam.
Weak possessive pronouns are determiners, bound elements cliticized to a head. These possessives being determiners, in French, they realize the Number of the nominal expression in addition to the Number of their own referent. For instance, ma expresses that the whole nominal is singular, and the possessor also singular, first person; mes expresses that the whole nominal is plural, and the possessor singular, first person. If we turn to a plural referent, notre expresses that the whole nominal is singular, and the possessor plural, first person, whereas nos expresses that the whole
224 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces nominal is plural, and the possessor is also plural. Moreover, these forms being bound elements, they obligatorily undergo sandhi, just like other determiners in French (cf. section 2.11 of chapter 2): liaison is obligatory between a plural possessive and a following vowel initial N (mes
amis
'my friends'), and feminine singular forms end in -a before a consonant (tafille 'your daughter') and in -on before a vowel (ton arrivee 'your arrival'). In English, however, weak possessive pronouns do not realize the Number of the whole possessive construction of which they are the Det since Number is on N, not on Det in English. In both languages, these weak possessives cannot appear in isolation because they are bound elements: they need a head to their right in the nominal to attach to it (on the clitic nature of Det, see section 3 below). Strong possessive pronouns do not have this dependency on a head. Moreover, since a possessor always implies a contextually active superset which the possessed object is picked out of, the missing N is recoverable as in the partitive cases. So strong possessive pronouns license the omission of N. However, there is an important difference between English and French. In English, no Number needs to be expressed since English grammaticalizes a necessary link between set and superset, Number and N: so the Number may be implied (7b). In French however, there is no such implication, and these possessive pronouns must be accompanied by a Det that expresses the Number of the whole possessive construction (7b'), because Number is not recoverable otherwise. Prenominal phrasal possessives, like Noam 's in Noam's book, also have a partitive meaning, the possessor Noam picks out an object in the superset defined by book. If the N is missing, it is recoverable in the same way as with strong possessive pronouns (7c). Prenominal phrasal possessives do not exist at all in French, whether the N is present or omitted (7c'). This could be due to the fact that the Number of the whole nominal expression is not marked on the N but on the Det in French. In a putative French possessive construction like *le gars POSS livres 'the guy's books', this creates a problem in the expression of Number: whereas a weak possessive like ma~mes can express at the same time its own Number and that of the whole possessive nominal, a fully phrasal possessor like le gars cannot do this in French. So in the putative *le gars POSS livres, the only Number expressed is that of le gars and the Number of the whole nominal is missing, hence the ungrammaticality. Finally, postnominal phrasal possessives do not license the omission of N in English nor French: a proform is required such as those or ceux. This is due to the fact that these possessives do not establish an obligatory link between set and superset, in constrast with the cases involving N and the Det system. Since the link is only contingent, a missing N is not recoverable.
The Omission ofN 225 Constructions including ordinals, numerals, and possessives may identify an actant even if the N is omitted because they involve a partitive relation that allows recoverability of the referential import normally expressed by the N. This means of identification of an actant is generally licit in both French and English because the partitive relation is an integral part of these constructions in both languages. But there are a few contrasts in grammaticality due to independent differences between these languages in the way Number is expressed. In the next two sections, I will consider Nounless nominal expressions in which the recovery of the omitted N crucially depends on the realization of Number on Det. Consequently, they are licit in French, but not in English.
2. CLASSIFYING ADJs In French, the combination Det+ADJ (with the N omitted) occurs fairly freely, whereas this combination must generally be completed by the dummy N one in English: (8)
(9)
a
les bleus
b
le gros
c
les nouveaux
d
la rouillee
a
the blue ones
b
the big one
c
the new ones
d
the rusted one
There are two contexts in which the requirement of a dummy one is relaxed in English. First, when a sharp contrast is presented, one may be omitted (examples from Halliday & Hassan (1976)):
(10)
I like strong tea. I suppose weak is better for you.
(11)
Which last longer, the curved rods or the straight rods? The straight are less likely to break.
226 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (12)
The green (one) suits you very well.
A similar observation is made by Bernstein (1993) regarding the following: (13)
salesperson:
Would you prefer the red umbrella or the blue?
customer:
I'll take the red, please.
These seem to be cases of ellipsis rather than omission, i.e., discursively rather than grammatically licensed. As in ellipsis, a very salient context allows recoverability of the content of the N. The other context in which the N may be omitted in English is in expressions like the following: (14)
the rich; the poor; the lonely; the sick and the elderly; the blind
In all these cases, the reference of the expression is limited by convention to human beings. So the missing N is not recovered by a discursive or grammatical process, but determined by a convention. Moreover, as Croft (1990) observes, these expressions are grammatically "defective": they must be definite (15a) and they must be interpreted as generic pluralities (15b). (15)
a
?A white/*A poor/*A blind sat on the porch.
b
*The rich/The blind/The bad says that he is right.
Note that this contrasts with French, in which the equivalent ADJs show a perfectly productive grammatical behavior: the expressions do not have to be definite nor generic when the N is omitted, and they can take any determiner or quantifier. (16)
a
Leriche/L'aveugle/Lemechant s'est assis sur le balcon.
b
Un mediant s'est assis sur le balcon.
c
Des mechants se sont assis sur le balcon.
d
Trois mechants se sont assis sur le balcon.
Summarizing, Nounless classifying ADJs in English are restricted to the discursive contexts in (10)-(13) and the conventionalized expressions in (14), with concomitant limitations on the grammatical contexts in which they may be used (15).2 In contrast, French Nounless ADJs as in
The Omission ofN Til (8) are not restricted in this way and are fully productive in various grammatical contexts (16). This productivity implies that a grammatical process is involved in French which somehow allows the N to be absent, whereas the lack of productivity in English implies that something generally prevents N from being omitted.3 Some previous analyses have attempted to account for the omission of N by postulating an empty N in the syntax in these constructions and by defining a licensing condition for this empty category, with French, but not English, having the means to properly satisfy this licensing condition. I will discuss one such analysis here in some detail, showing that this kind of analysis just stipulates the solution. Bernstein (1993) assumes that ADJs may be generated in three different positions inside a nominal: (i) as a head taking an NP or NumP complement (prenominal "intensional" ADJs), (ii) as the head of an AP adjoined to NumP (prenominal nonrestrictive ADJs), or (iii) as the head of an AP adjoined to NP (postnominal restrictive ADJs). The crucial distinction for N omission is between head ADJs (class (i)), and adjoined APs (classes (ii) and (iii)). Her account also depends on crucial assumptions concerning the determiner system in Romance languages. She claims that indefinite determiners are simplex when combined with a head N, but a complex Det+WM (Word Marker) when the N is not expressed. She motivates this claim based on the following contrast in Spanish (pages 112-113): (17)
a
Un libro grande esta encima de la mesa. (cf. *uno) A big book is on the table.
b
Uno grande esta encima de la mesa. (cf. *un) A big [one] is on the table.
She considers French to be like Spanish in this respect, except that the WM is not overtly realized. When an indefinite Det combines with an adjoined AP as in (18), the WM° (zero-level Word Marker) is inserted low in the structure. It head-governs the empty-headed NP and raises to Det without difficulty, so the construction is fine. (18)
un grand a big/tall [one]
228 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces But when an indefinite Det combines with a head ADJ as in (19), the WM° is prevented from raising to Det because the intervening head ADJ makes the head movement nonlocal, and the construction crashes. (19)
Spanish:
*uno mero
French:
*un simple
a mere [one]
For definite determiners, Bernstein assumes N omission is fine with ADJs other than those which are heads that select an NP complement because French (and Spanish) definite determiners can take an AP complement, and an AP can have apro specifier, as in the following structure:
The/vo is bound by the definite determiner, so the predicate is turned into an argument even if no N is present to bind the pro. Consider now a case in which the definite Det is combined with a head ADJ. Bernstein argues that such constructions, as in (21), are ungrammatical (page 144):
(21)
*le futur, *le pauvre (meaning the pitiful one)
o She says that omission is not well-formed here "because the A 's selectional requirement for an
overt N has not been met" (p. 62). Note that this proposal is not consistent with general assumptions of the Chomskyan framework in which selection is not assumed to be affected by overtness (cf. pro and PRO arguments). To summarize Bernstein's position, she claims that a null N may be licensed either by being headgoverned by a Word Marker if the Det is indefinite, or by being head-governed by a definite Det. A head ADJ is not compatible with a null N because it blocks the head movement of WM° when the Det is indefinite, and it lacks an appropriate complement when the Det is definite.
The Omission ofN 229 Bernstein's proposal suffers from the same weakness that generally plagues this kind of engineering solution removed from interface properties: it stipulates the solutions. Thus, the reason why English does not generally omit an N after Det+ADJ is that English indefinite determiners do not have a Word Marker, not even an abstract one like French: so there is no proper head-governor for the empty-headed NP. As for definite determiners, they only select an NP or CP in English, not an AP as shown for French in (20). This is just a list of stipulations and it suffers from the same explanatory weakness as the proposal of Cardinaletti & Giusti (1992) discussed in the previous section. Moreover, the proposal is empirically incorrect, both concerning ADJs which are claimed to be heads and those said to be adjoined. Though some head ADJs are indeed incompatible with N omission, others are fine: (22)
a
Un seul est venu. Only one came. (^Someone who was alone came.)
b
Curieusement, je prefere le faux. Oddly, I prefer the fake one.
c
La prochaine (toile) est tres belle. The next (painting) is very nive.
d
Le directeur va enfm prendre sa retraite. Esperons que le nouveau sera plus competent que 1'ancien. The director will finally retire. Lets hope that the new one -will be more competent than the old one.
e
Jean est malade. Le pauvre ne pourra pas venir a la fete. John is sick. The poor thing/man won't be able to come to the party.
Conversely, though some "adjoined APs" as in (18) and (20) are fine with an omitted N, many others are ungrammatical in this context: (23)
a
*Je n'ai pas vul'interessante. / didn 't see the interesting one.
b
*Les magnifiques ne sont pas a vendre. The magnificent ones are not for sale.
c
?*Le transport fluvial est plus important que le ferroviere. Fluvial transport is more important than rail transport.
230 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces The relevant factor in omitting the N in the Det+ADJ construction is not whether the ADJ is normally in prenominal or postnominal position, nor whether it is restrictive or not. Rather, as has been extensively studied by Barbaud (1976), Ronat (1977), Huot (1981), Jones (1993), the crucial factor is whether the ADJ is a "classifying" ADJ, i.e., "the adjective must denote some fairly concrete property which the addressee can easily recognise as distinguishing the intended referent from other potential referents" (Jones 1993:73-4). Following this idea, Sleeman (1996:31) says that, because they express cognitively salient notions, classifying ADJs have discriminating properties that serve to create a subset at a cognitive level: adjectives that allow N omission are partitive, and they mean, roughly, the one or the ones from a given set.4 Jones and Sleeman are correct in pointing out that partitivity is a factor in the omission of N with classifying ADJs. However, the partitive relation they consider is not quite exact. There are two levels of partitivity involved. In an example like la verte 'the green [one]', the property of the ADJ does not distinguish the intended referent from other potential referents: the Det does this. Rather, the ADJ distinguishes a set of potential referents from the hyperset of all possible referents, and the Det picks a subset from the superset of the ADJ. This double partitivity is also found in nominals like le chien. the property DOG of chien defines a set out of the hyperset of all possible referents, and le picks out a subset out of the superset defined by DOG. This is schematized in (24). (24)
Level 1: set of all possible referents Level 2: set of GREEN or DOG: Level 3: set from atomization by def. sing. Det:
{a, b, c, d.. .x, y, z} {b, d, ... m, r} {d}
In la verte, the partitive relation between GREEN of level 2 and the atomization set of la of level 3 makes it possible to recover the reference set, i.e., to identify the actant: atomization of a subset by Number sufficiently narrows the referent of the expresion for the actant to be identified. A non-classifying ADJ such as interessante also defines an intermediate set. In contrast with classifying ADJs, the set defined by this ADJ does not seem to be
sufficiently
salient—recognizable on cognitive ground— to discriminate among all possible referents (anything can be interesting from some point of view, but only some things can be green). Consequently, a non-classifying ADJ cannot be used in isolation (23), and it usually appears with an N (la toile interessante 'the interesting painting') to properly identify the required intermediate set. However, if the hyperset is contextually narrowed to a limited set, a non-classifying ADJ may
The Omission ofN 231 be nounless, since the set defined by the ADJ is more easily discriminating and recognizable in this confined context. We see this in the example (25) provided by Anne Zribi-Hertz to Sleeman: (25)
Parmi les tableaux exposes dans ce musee, je distinguerai trois categories: les magnifiques, les bizarres et les affreux. Among the paintings exhibited in this museum, I will distinguish three categories: the magnificent [ones], the strange [ones], and the awful [ones].
The schema for this example is as in (26): (26)
Level 1: set of all possible referents
(a, b, c, d.. .x, y, z}
Level 1': paintings in museum M:
{a, b, f, ... m, r... w}
Level 2: set of MAGNIFICENT: Level 3: set from atomization by def. plur. Det:
{b, f, ... m, r} {f, m}
Here, the partitive relation between the added level 1' and level 2 makes it possible to recover the identity of the referent: some magnificent paintings in a particular museum. As Jennifer Ormston pointed out to me, the same non-classifying adjectives that are "rescued" by context in French are acceptable without the dummy one in context in English. The English translation of (25) is fully grammatical without the dummy pronouns, and so are the following examples. (27)
a Most guys you meet in bars fit into one of two categories—the pathetic and the boring, b All the novels I've read this year can be divided into two classes—the romantic and the educational.
This shows that English can use the partitive strategy schematized in (26) to recover the identity of the referent when N is missing just as well as French does. The similarity of the two languages in this respect is not surprising since the strategy is grounded on a cognitive and contextual basis. On the other hand, English differs radically from French with respect to the partitive strategy schematized in (24): the partitive relation between the superset defined by a classifying ADJ (level 2) and the set defined by atomization from the Det (level 3) is not available in English to recover the identity of a referent if N is omitted (9), but this strategy is highly productive in French (8).
232 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Why should recoverability by the partitive relation between the clasifying ADJ and the atomization set of the Det fail in English but succeed in French? It is doubtful that this difference is due to a cognitively based notion, since we would not expect such a notion to differ across languages. Sleeman (1996:152) has no answer to this question: she simply gives an ordered list of elements that can license empty NPs and stipulates which ones are acceptable in a given language. The corrective strategy of using one/ones in English clearly indicates what is going on. Without the N, a crucial element is missing in the partitive relation in English: the Number feature minimally required to define the subset is missing, since Number is realized on the N in English. Moreover, ADJs, unlike Ns, never express Number in English. Thus, the set that an ADJ defines is never obligatorily linked to a subset by a partitive relation. Therefore, even if a set is defined by a quality ADJ, no partitive relation is implied, hence no subset which leads to the identification of an actant. To obtain that subset, an N bearing Number is required. In French on the other hand, the Det realizes Number, so that in combination with a classifying ADJ, both elements of a partitive relation may be recovered: the superset by the classifying ADJ and the subset by Number. Therefore, these two elements are sufficient to properly identify an actant and an N is not required. So again we see the effect of the Number parameter in differences between French and English. Again, this parameter, deeply rooted in properties logically anterior to linguistic theory, provides an explanatory account of these differences. Some confirmation of the effects of this parameter can be found in the behavior of nounless nominals in German and Dutch. In these Germanic languages, both the N and the Det are overtly inflected for Number. We must therefore determine from other properties which element realizes semantic Number and which one simply expresses number because of superficial agreement. ADJs are overwhelming prenominal, as in English, so it appears that semantic Number is on the N. Yet N omission is much more productive than in English. Crucially, however, N omission depends on whether the ADJ agrees with the Det. For instance, in Dutch, attributive ADJs are marked with a schwa agreement morpheme, but not all forms are: for example, an ADJ modifying a neuter singular N and preceded by an indefinite determiner does not have an agreement marking. All inflected ADJs allow omission of N. On the other hand, the uninflected ADJs do not allow N omission (Sleeman (1996:17-18) and references therein), as illustrated in the following Dutch examples: the inflected ADJ in (28) licenses N omission, but the uniflected ADJ in (29) does not. (28)
Zij heeft een zwarte auto, maar ik heb een groene. She has a black car, but I have a green [one].
The Omission ofN 233 (29)
a b
een oud huis an old house *Ik heb liever een oud. / have preferably an old I prefer an old one.
Muysken (1983) and Muysken & van Riemsdijk (1986) assume that this inflection is Case. If the N is absent, some other element must bear it. Normally, Case goes on the lowest head in the extended nominal projection, i.e., the N. As the following examples from Sleeman (1996:18) show, if the N is absent, the next lowest element, i.e., the rightmost ADJ, must bear the inflection: gratis is an exception and never gets inflected, so it cannot be the rightmost element in a nominal. (30)
a
*de gratis
the free [ones]
b
*de mooie gratis
the beautiful free [ones]
c
de gratis groene
the free green [ones]
Muysken & van Riemsdijk present an interesting fact in support of the idea that ADJ inflection is the crucial factor for N omission. In German, the ADJ lila 'lilac' normally remains uninflected (31); however, in informal speech, lila can be inflected (32): (31)
einlilaKleid a lilac dress
(32)
ein lilanes Kleid
The N can be omitted with this ADJ, but only when the ADJ is inflected: so if asked what color dress a woman was wearing, (33b) is a possible answer, but not (33a). (33)
a
*ein lila
b
ein lilanes
Though Muysken & van Riemsdijk assume that the inflection on the ADJ which licenses N omission is Case, this does not seem to be correct. In a comparative study of several Germanic languages, Barbiers & Greijmans (2002) argue that the relevant features on the ADJ are [count], [gender] and [definite], with variations across languages about which one is crucial. Whatever the final outcome is on the nature of these adjectival inflections, the role of inflection ties in nicely
234 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces with my analysis: a feature on the ADJ must crucially allow the identification of the missing N. So there is no conflict between the fact that ADJs are overwhelmingly prenominal in these Germanic languages and the fact that they quite freely allow N omission. We can assume that Number is on N as in English, which accounts for the placement of the ADJs. N omission is licensed in these languages because they differ from English in an important way: ADJs may bear one of the nominal features, thus allowing the recovery of the set of the missing N.
3. LONE DETERMINERS If a definite specific determiner defines a contextual superset consisting of the referents identifiable to the speaker and to the hearer, and if Number may define a subset of this superset, then a partitive relation may be recovered and an actant may be properly identified. This predicts that in a language which realizes Number on Det such as French, a Det should be able to stand alone as an argument. This is indeed the case: the definite determiners le, la, les may appear alone as arguments of a verb. (34)
a
Paul mange le radis/la pomme/les pommes. Paul eats the radish.MASC.SING/the apple.FEM.SING/the
b
Paul le/la/les mange,
c
*Paul mange le/la/les.
apples.PLUR.
Whether the determiners le/la/les are the same elements when used alone in this way and when used in a more "complete" Noun Phrase is a long-standing debate, with arguments on both sides as far back as the Stoics in the 3rd century BC. Some scholars consider them to be "pronominal clitics", focussing on the fact that (i) when used as in (34b), Lone Dets function as arguments, they replace an argument, as a comparison with (34a) shows; hence the term 'pronominal'; and (ii) Lone Dets appear in a position other than where full arguments are usually found, as the ungrammaticality of (34c) indicates. In fact, Lone Dets are morphologically bound to a verbal head, hence the term 'clitic'. Modem adherents to this position include Perlmutter (1971), Kayne (1975), and numerous studies in Generative Grammar following these seminal studies.
The Omission ofN 235 Others,
noting
that
in
many
languages,
some
pronominal clitics
have
the
same
morphophonological form as determiners, have proposed that they are the same elements. By calling the elements in (34) 'Lone Determiners', I am in keeping with this long-standing hypothesis in the study of language. Whatever one's position on these elements, there are three questions that must be answered. 1. How are Lone Dets interpreted as direct object arguments even though they are not in the position in which full arguments appear? 2. What exactly is the host to which Lone Dets are morphophonologically attached, and why? (A concomitant question is whether French Dets are always bound morphemes, even inside a nominal like le chat 'the cat'.) 3. Why does the behaviour of comparable elements vary across languages? (In comparing English and French, why can a definite Det appear alone in French, but not in English, even as a nonclitic?) (35)
a
Paul eats the apple,
b
*Paul the eats,
c
*Paul eats the.
There are currently two broad types of accounts of the facts. The clitic solution takes the property of argumenthood as dominant: lella/les in (34b) are syntactic objects generated under their own syntactic node in the "normal" position for full arguments to which they correspond. They appear in a special leftward position as the result of a displacement operation. Postsyntactic morphophonological rules account for the attachment of these clitics to verbal forms. Kayne (1975) was very influential in promoting this approach and has had countless followers (see also Perlmutter
1971). The second type of account is the affix
solution. It takes the
morphophonological attachment as the dominant property: all inflectional morphology takes place at a presyntactic level and verbs hosting lellalles are inserted in the syntax already inflected by these forms. The argumenthood of the Lone Dets is established either through a relationship with an empty category such as pro in the appropriate syntactic position (Borer 1984, Roberge 1986), or by slash features which record a "path" in nodes between the Lone Det and its predicate (Miller & Sag 1995). Jaeggli (1982) argued that an affixal approach provides a natural account of doubling constructions in which both a Lone Det and a full argument appear on the surface: the affix is simply an agreement marker of the full argument.
236 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces These two approaches, although focussing on different properties of these elements, agree on many of their attributes. Both types of analysis assume that the argumenthood of Lone Dets (and the adjuncthood of other "clitics") is established through "position", i.e., through a trace, a pro, or a slash feature, and both agree that the host is the Verb bearing the Tense feature (although they may express this in different terms). Interestingly, the question of why the Verb bearing the Tense feature is the host has not been raised in either type of analysis. Moreover, French Dets appear to be bound morphemes not only when they are attached to a Verb form, but also when they are inside a Noun projection (Miller 1992 and references therein), which raises the question of what is common to the Noun and Tensed Verb hosts in these two constructions. Finally, the question of what allows a Det to appear alone has not been satisfactorily answered. Crosslinguistic variation in cliticization is often addressed, but the usual answer is that this is simply a parametric choice, which must be marked in some way by a diacritic feature on the French forms that essentially says that le/la/les surface in a position other than the "normal" argumental position: they are marked as [+move] or [+weak form]. In this section, I will propose an analysis that not only answers how Lone Dets are interpreted and why they are attached to the Tensed Verb, but also explains why some languages (like French) allow this while others (like English) do not. I will argue that le, la, les are the same elements whether they are hosted by a Tensed Verb or a Noun, and that they have the same function with respect to these two hosts, namely they provide indications to identify an actant of a proposition dependent on a particular Tense. The Number that a Det bears in French allows it to fulfill this function alone, without an N. First, however, I will illustrate the syntactic and affixal accounts, and show that they are, at best, incomplete. In the next two sections, I present the key features of these two types of accounts. In section 3.1, I will use Chomsky's (1995) proposal to illustrate the clitic account based on movement because it attempts to derive cliticization from independent properties, and because it illustrates some weaknesses common in transformational accounts. I will also consider a related proposal by Cardinaletti & Starke (1994) and show that, though it addresses some of these weaknesses, it does not correct them and fails to explain why and where clitics move. In section 3.2, I presents the proposal of Miller & Sag (1995) because it is a very strongly affixal account. We will see that both the syntactic and the affixal approaches end up being highly stipulative. Section 3.3 shows that this weakness in explanatory value comes from the assumption, shared by these two types of accounts, that Lone Dets are out of position. I will argue on the contrary that Lone Dets directly relate semantically to their hosts Tensed Verb and Noun for their interpretation,
The Omission ofN 237 i.e., that they are Markings on these hosts in the full sense of codings of semantic relations. This will explain how Lone Dets are interpreted, why they appear where they do, and what independent property a language must have in order to have Lone Dets. The central topic of this section is Lone Dets. However, Lone Dets are part of a broader class of "clitic" items and we cannot understand the behaviour of Lone Dets without looking at the larger picture of the behaviour of clitics. I will therefore extend the discussion to this larger class.
3.1. Syntactic accounts I will examine both Chomsky (1995) and Cardinaletti & Starke (1994), showing that although they describe the distribution of Lone Dets, they both fail to explain why their host is a Tensed Verb, and why languages vary in allowing Dets to stand alone. 3.1.1. Chomsky's analysis. Chomsky (1995:336-340) proposes that elements like le/la/les must appear in a position other than the one where full NPs appear due to properties of phrase structure and Kayne's (1994) Linear Correspondence Axiom (LCA). He assumes a theory of phrase structure in which a head projects only if necessary; that is, only if it combines with something. Under the assumption that lellalles are Dets and are generated in the same position as full NPs, the structure for the VP mange le (as in *Paul mange le from (34c) above) would be as in (36), where the clitic le is simply a Det, both an X° and an Xmax at the same time, and K is a projection of the head mange.
The LCA is an attempt to derive properties of the syntactic hierarchical structure from the SM interface requirement that words must be linearized. The effect of the LCA is that a phrase marker (such as K) will be licensed only if a linear ordering of all the terminal nodes of this phrase marker can be derived. Linear ordering is determined by asymmetric c-command: terminal A precedes terminal B if A asymmetrically c-commands B. I will refer henceforth to this analysis as the Bare LCA (or BLCA). The structure in (36) does not conform to the BLCA because mange and le
238 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces c-command each other (all nodes dominating one dominate the other), so no ordering is determined between them. Since some terminal nodes are unordered, the derivation will "crash" at the level of phonetic form if the structure remains as in (36). To achieve a linear ordering, and thus allow the structure to "converge" instead of "crash" there must be asymmetry of structure. Convergence can be obtained by adjoining le to mange, as in (37):
Adjunction splits the node mangel into two segments. In (37), the le adjoined to mangel asymmetrically c-commands mangel since the two-segment category [mangel, mange2] dominates mangel but not le. Therefore, le precedes mange. As for the trace of le, it is exempted from the BLCA since it is phonetically empty. In short, French determiners le/la/les cliticize when they do not have a complement because otherwise they could not be ordered at SM in a structure like (36). This follows from the consequence of the LCA that "every right-branching structure must end in a trace, on these assumptions" (Chomsky 1995: 338).6 Chomsky's analysis is interesting because it aims to keep the theoretical apparatus to a strict minimum and because it relies crucially on Kayne's LCA which is a step in the direction of linking the analytical apparatus to interface elements. Unfortunately, in making the analysis work, both of these goals are compromised. Violations of bare phrase structure are admitted in several cases. Moreover, as we will see in chapter 6, what actually makes the LCA work are stipulations about precedence, c-command and triggers for movement that are far removed from interface properties. In the end, it is the stipulations that do most of the work, and the expressed goals of restricting the theoretical apparatus and relying on properties of the interface are not achieved. In addition to being stipulative, the analysis has no account of other "clitic" elements such as en and y, which are not direct objects, nor does it offer any account of the differences in behaviour of determiners in different languages. I will consider each of these problems in turn. To see how the analysis is stipulative, consider how the analysis works generally. The branching structure (38), where J and L are both terminals, does not conform to the BLCA: J and L c-command each other, so no ordering is determined between these terminals, and this crashes if it carries over intact to SM.
The Omission ofN 239
There are two sets of assumptions in the BLCA under which the structure may be rendered legitimate with respect to ordering. First, one of the terms J or L may be more complex than appears, in which case the simplex term asymmetrically c-commands the subelements of the complex term and an ordering is determined. Second, one of the terminals is moved into a position from which it asymmetrically c-commands the other, and J or L is replaced by a phonetically empty trace exempted from the BLCA. This gives us four possibilities altogether for terminal sister nodes as in (38), cliticization as in (37) being an example of case (39c): (39)
a
the complement L is complex
b
the head J is complex
c
the complement L moves
d
the head J moves
Each case requires stipulative statements to derive the correct placement of the elements. (a) The complement L is complex. As an instance of morphosyntactic complexity, Chomsky gives the example of the English determiners this and that, "with the initial consonant representing Det (as in the, there, etc.) and the residue a kind of adjective, perhaps" (p. 338). If the complex element [th + is] is the complement of a verb as in eat this for example, both th- and -is may be assumed to be asymmetrically c-commanded by eat, so that eat can be ordered with respect to this.
However, the proposal is problematic on two important counts. First, if lexical integrity may be violated and the internal structure of words is visible for the BLCA in syntax to establish their complexity with respect to order, this raises the problem of the order of the morphemes word internally. How do we get th- and -is to be ordered in this! Is there cliticization inside this, and if so, should the word still count as complex with respect to its ordering with other words? If there is
240 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces no cliticization, then one of th- or -is must be complex to derive an ordering, but then we are facing infinite regression, or blunt stipulation. Chomsky seems to be aware of the difficulty raised by ordering within words, but leaves the question open, apparently relegating it to the status of 'mystery' rather than 'problem': "Whether order should be fixed here depends on questions about inflectional morphology and word formation that seem rather obscure and may have no general answer" (p. 340). We seem to be faced with the contradictory assumptions that word-internal structure of morphemes is accessible to syntax to determine the order of the word with respect to other terminals, but that the same morphemes are not accessible to the BLCA to determine their word-internal order. Second, a criterion for complexity seems to be that if the word is made up of morphemes that are part of a paradigmatic variation, then the form is complex. However, French clitics also exhibit a paradigmatic constant. As can be seen in (41), the initial /- is found in all three Lone Dets, and alternates with other morphemic consonants:
(41)
1-e
1-a
1-es
1-ui
me
m-a
m-es
m-oi
te
t-a
t-es
t-oi
se
s-a
s-es
s-oi
On the face of it, there is no reason why these French forms should count as less complex than English the, this and that. The French paradigm even involves more values than the English one. Since there does not appear to be an independent criterion to distinguish between what counts as complex and what counts as simplex with respect to accessibility to word-internal structure, cliticization does not derive from ordering requiments of the BLCA: rather, it must be stipulated for each form whether it is affixal or not, regardless of its actual morphological make-up. This stipulative aspect of the analysis must actually extend to every single form of the lexicon that may appear in a phrase-final position. Given the assumption that every right-branching structure must end in a trace, the last word in all the following examples must have cliticized in some overt or covert way, yet no independent evidence seems to corroborate this (particularly troublesome is (42e), in which the pronoun le corresponding to the predicative ADJ heureux must cliticize, but there is no indication that heureux itself does):
The Omission o/N 241 (42)
a
le chat
the cat
b
Jean pleure.
John cries.
c
avant lui
before him
d
Paul aime ?a. Paul likes that.
e
Jean est heureux (et je le suis aussi). Jean is happy (and I it be too) Jean is happy, and so am I.
The only way to avoid widespread unmotivated cliticization is to stipulate that these forms are lexically marked as [+complex]. This leaves the BLCA without any real deductive content.7 (b) The head J is complex. Though not discussed by Chomsky, this is a logical possibility. The order le mange could come directly from the BLCA rather than by moving the complement. If mange is complex and le is simplex, then le should precede mange since le asymmetrically c-commands the morphemes mang- and -e internal to mange that render it complex.
However, an analysis based on the complexity of the head faces the same problems as one based on the complexity of the complement, i.e., contradictory assumptions about the accessibility of word-internal structure and circularity of the criterion that determines what counts as complex, i.e., a head is deemed complex if it follows its complement. (c) The complement L moves. This is the case of cliticization. This account requires the reverse of the stipulation about complexity given in case (a): a complement is deemed simplex if it precedes the head.8 As indicated in the discussion of (41), there is no clear morphological basis to make a complexity distinction between French and English Det forms. Moreover, if the structure for the relation between a verb and a direct object is not the simple one given in (36) but rather that the object appears in a specifier position in a Larsonian shell, then, as Chomsky (1995: 338) recognizes, being in final position simply plays no role in the analysis: a "simplex" pronominal form not in final position still must cliticize since "the affixal property is lexical," and a pronominal form in final position that does not cliticized will be deemed to be "complex".
242 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces In addition, the question of the host of the clitic is not accounted for in this analysis: le/la/les do not always cliticize in the simple manner described in (37) and very often raise one or two steps up to an auxiliary verb, which appears to violate locality conditions:
(44)
a
Jean les a manges. Jean THEM has eaten Jean has eaten them,
b c
*Jean a les manges, (Apres que) Jean (les) a (*les) eu (*les) manges. After that Jean (THEM) has (*THEM) had (*THEM) eaten
Since the Det can be ordered as long as it adjoins to some other head, it would seem that the most local one should do the job. Some form of relativized minimality will have to be invoked to ensure that the clitic only attaches to a Verb that bears a T- feature (assuming tensed verbs and infinitival verbs, but not participles, to have some form of T-feature). But why le/la/les should attach only to a Verb bearing a T-feature remains a stipulation. (d) The head J moves. Chomsky, following Emonds (1978) and Pollock (1989), assumes that the distribution of adverbs in French is evidence that V overtly raises to INTFL (or some similar functional head), as shown in (45).
Chomsky says that "V-raising (as in French) does not affect the conclusion that the clitic must raise overtly. If Det remains in situ, then whether the trace of V is ignored or deleted by the LCA, Det will still be a terminal complement, either to V itself or to some intervening element, and the derivation will crash." (p. 391, note 111). He seems to tie his assumption that traces are invisible for the BLCA to the assumption that the structure induced by the trace is also invisible for the BLCA. For instance, K in (45) would not count as being complex for the BLCA after movement of the verb mange leaves a trace tv in the head position, so that le and mange+l still count as simplex elements that c-command each other and le must move to obtain asymmetric c-command.
The Omission ofN 243 This requires pruning conventions, a powerful tool that should not be introduced lightly. Moreover, if le moves, the whole of K is invisible for the BLCA and mange+l is now a terminal on a right branch. If mange+l is forced to move by the BLCA, it creates a new structure with a terminal on a right-branch, and movement is again triggered, possibly resulting in infinite regression. To prevent this, we could assume that mange+l counts as complex, so that it can be ordered by the BLCA (though word-internal order remains a problem, as we saw above): the pronoun in (45) would then be directly ordered before the complex form mange+l, and this now falls under case (b) The head J is complex. Summing up, there are four possible treatments of terminal sister nodes in a BLCA analysis (cf (39)), and each of them requires stipulations that are costly, because they leave the BLCA without any real deductive content: order is not deduced from the simplex or complex nature of terminals established on independent grounds, so it ends up being stipulated bluntly by features equivalent to [+/- affixal] that derive the same results whether there is an LCA in Universal Grammar or not. A syntactic analysis such as Chomsky's also fails to provide an account of the crosslinguistic variation in the behaviour of Dets. There is no principled reason in this analysis why le/la/les can be without a complement but the cannot. The analysis also does not extend naturally to other clitics that are not direct objects, such as genitive/partitive en, locativey, and various dative forms (including nonargumental "ethical" or affective datives as in (46c); on this use of datives, see Leclere (1976), Authier & Reed (1992)). (46)
a
Paul en a vu une de Marie, (cf. une photo de Marie) Paul EN has seen one of Marie Paul saw one of Marie,
b
Jean y range ses outils. Jean LOC stores his tools. Jean stores his tool there/here/in it.
c
Je te lui ai foutu une de ces baffes. / to-you to-him have flung one of those slaps I gave him such a slap!
In (46a), en is in complementary distribution with an N like photo in tine photo de Marie; so in a movement analysis, en is presumably the head of the NP at some underlying level and it takes de Marie as its complement. Moreover, the determiner un is present. So there doesn't appear to be
244 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces anything like the triggering mechanism described in (36) and (37) to force the cliticization of en here. In (46b), the locative adjunct^ is not sister to V or any other head in most analyses (unless one reverts to Larson's (1988) analysis, but then we are back to the problem of the direct object in Specifier position noted above). So the BLCA does not force y to cliticize. In (46c), te is neither an argument nor a modifier of the verb, but a rhetorical element that does not alternate with any strong form: it is unlikely that it symmetrically c-commands any head at some underlying level. The BLCA analysis requires highly stipulative statements. This is not an accident. Core elements of the theory do not rest on interface conditions, so their relation to the data is only very indirect, so much so in the present case that no significant relation is left at all.9 In the end, the BCLA analysis fails to explain why clitics move and why they end up attached to their particular hosts. 3.7.2 Cardinaletti & Starke's analysis. Cardinaletti & Starke (1994) (henceforth C&S) claim to have a movement analysis that answers both of these questions. They start off by making a tripartite distinction rather than the usual bipartite one: in UG, pronouns come in strong form, weak form and clitic form. Weak form pronouns are intermediate between strong form and clitic form. They say this is often reflected in three levels of morphological complexity. Moreover, only deficient pronouns may prosodically restructure (liaison, elision), strong pronouns may not. In syntax, these classes of pronouns behave differently under coordination. Thus the examples in (47) show that the strong pronoun lui and the weak pronoun // can be the subject of coordinated VPs, but clitic // (the pronoun appearing in inversion constructions) cannot. In (48), we see that only the strong pronoun lui can be coordinated with a full NP; the weak pronoun // and clitic /'/ cannot. (47)
Strong:V Lui aime les choux mais
ne les mange que cuits.
He likes cabbage but only eats it cooked. Weak: V II aime les choux mais
ne les mange que cuits.
Clitic: * Aime-t-il les choux mais (48)
ne les mange que cuits?
Strong: V Lui et son frere ont accepte. He and his brother have accepted. Weak: * II et son frere ont accepte. Clitic: * Ont il et son frere ont accepte.
They also claim that strong pronouns bear their own range-restriction, whereas the two other classes of pronouns are deficient and do not. They argue that this distinction explains why strong
The Omission ofN 245 pronouns may be used ostensively (as in pointing at something) and may bear contrastive focus, but deficient pronouns may not. It would also correlate with a default range-restriction [-t-human] that strong pronouns apparently have. Thus, the pronoun elles in (49a) may be either a strong or weak form, and it may refer to both human and non-human entities; in (49b) however, elles being coordinated with a phrase, it can only be a strong pronoun and correlatively, C&S say that it can only refer to human entities.10 (49)
a
Elles sont trop grandes. They are too tall. [+/-human]
b
Elles et celles d'a cote sont trop grandes. They and the ones next door are too tall [+human]
Assuming that each morpheme heads a syntactic projection, C&S say that the three levels of morphological complexity of pronouns correlate with correspondingly complex syntactic structures. In the lexicon, strong pronouns have a complex structure with a CP containing a functional case-feature, a £P which contains both polarity features (assertion/negation) and focus features (cf. Laka 1990), and a LP (Lexical Projection).11 Weak pronouns are "mildly" deficient because they do not contain the topmost CP expansion. Clitics are severely deficient since they contain neither a CP nor a £P, but only a LP. As C&S put it, "Weak elements are "peeled" strong elements, and clitics are "peeled" weak elements" (p. 37). Under this hypothesis, weak and clitic pronouns move in order to compensate for their deficiencies. "Assuming that every N phrase must be associated with a functional case-feature [...] it follows that deficient, but not strong, elements must undergo some process allowing them to be associated with the functional case-feature [...] If, as is often assumed, AgrO is necessary for case-assignment, deficient elements now need to occur in a local structural configuration with AgrO" (p. 31). This is sufficient to compensate for the case deficiency of a weak pronoun. A clitic must further move and adjoin to "a head associated with the adequate (prosodic) features missing in clitic pronouns" (p. 39). C&S assume that there are two such heads: £° and the head hosting V°. This analysis rests on the assumption that deficient pronouns must recover features that are lacking with respect to a corresponding strong pronoun. As C&S note, nothing requires recoverability to apply since nothing is lost in the first place. They suggest a particular implementation of a general principle Minimise a to account for this recoverability: only strong elements are ever generated in the base. Consequently, deficient elements are obtained through
246 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces deletion. But this is begging the question: recoverability takes place because it is stipulated that there is something to be recovered. There is also an inconsistency in assuming that some features are generated, then deleted, and then recovered: why then are deficient pronouns different from strong pronouns in their interpretation, since they have the features of strong pronouns at least at two levels of representation (at the beginning and the end of the derivation)? Do they happen to be interpreted during their deficient state? Is there any principled reason why this should be? As it stands, if there actually is an interpretive difference between strong and deficient pronouns, this actually argues against generating the deficient pronouns as strong and against them recovering the content of a strong pronoun.12 What is recovered is also problematic. Abstract case is just a diacritic feature used as a tool to govern the positioning of NPs. It presupposes a complicated system to derive a rather simple distributional fact, and the system ends up bluntly stipulating the result in a now too familiar way. Why does a weak pronoun appear where it does? Because that is where AGRO is. And why is AGRO in that position? Because that is where the weak pronoun shows up. The position of AGRO is not tied to any independent property: we identify the trigger when we hear the response. The problem of explaining why a weak pronoun appears where it does is not solved, but just transposed onto AGRO, a construct whose properties are much more difficult to determine.13 The same holds for clitics and the also elusive £. In short, the analysis of C&S is just as stipulative as one which dictates a hierarchy of Clitic Phrases like Sportiche (1992) and just as underdetermined by the data: a clitic appears in a certain position because a certain functional projection appears in that position and attracts it there. The functional projection is assumed to appear in that position because the presence of the clitic signals that it is there. 3.1.3 Why syntactic accounts fail. Movement analyses like the BLCA and C&S, as well as all their predecessors such as Kayne (1975, 1991), fail to account for the placement of Lone Dets and other elements attached to Tense. Movement analyses look simple: X is interpreted as the argument of P because it is generated in a local position in which an argument of P often appears on the surface; but X is in another position because it moved there. However, if we take into account the additional theoretical tools required to determine what moves, where, and in which languages, the analyses are much less simple. Moreover, the tools describe this in an uninformative and explanatorily weak manner. We saw that, in the end, the analyses just provide lists of which elements cliticize, which position each one appears in, and which languages have clitics. Each of these properties appears to be fortuitous, unrelated to any other independent property.
The Omission ofN 247 3.2. An Affixal Account Clitics exhibit various morphophonological idiosyncracies that have lead some scholars to suggest that the morphophonological attachment is the key property of these elements. This other major type of analysis argues that they are affixes in the base. Syntax is a system of rules which apply very generally: "within syntax, there are no rules for particular languages and no construction-specific principles" (Chomsky 1991:417). In comparison, morphology is the repository of idiosyncracies such as odd plurals (ox, oxen) and verbal roots (/>for the future of French aller): "much of what goes on in morphology is exquisitely boring, since it is just here that most of what is idiosyncratic and unsystematic about languages is concentratred" (Anderson 1977:41). Under a syntactic movement analysis as in the preceding section, we would expect clitics to exhibit a systematic behavior with respect to their hosts. As Miller (1992) and Auger (1995) show however, they do not. Auger discusses four sets of idiosyncracies that suggest an affixal analysis of clitics in French. I will henceforth use the term ActAff, short for 'actant affix', for clitics in French, to avoid confusion since 'clitic' is assumed to be a syntactic object; I do not adopt 'pronominal affix' as in Miller & Sag (1995) because there is no "pro" in these (they don't stand for or replace anything) and nothing nominal either. Lone Dets are a subtype of ActAff, namely those that are direct objects. First, quite a few combinations of ActAff+V have an idiosyncratic form that cannot result from phonological or syntactic rules. For instance, in standard French, suis in the sequence ye suis can be a lst-person-singular form of the verb etre 'to be' or of the verb suivre 'to follow'. Yet in Quebec French, they are not realized in the same way: (50)
j e suis / am
=j 'suis or more frequently chus
j e suis I follow
=j 'suis/* chus
The verb aller 'to go' takes the form m 'as as an equivalent ofje vais, but only when this verb is used as an auxiliary for future: (51)
a
M'as lire. / 'II read.
b
*M'as plus a la messe. / don't go to mass anymore.
248 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Second, combinations among ActAffs are also highly idiosyncratic. For example, the order of ActAffs is very difficult to account for in a syntactic analysis (to wit, the templates of Perlmutter (1971) and the multiple rules of Kayne (1975, 2000)). The order is [dative+accusative] for 1st and 2nd person datives, but [accusative+dative] for 3rd person datives.14 (52)
a
Ell eme/teP adit. She told it to me/you.
b
Elle le lui a dit. She told it to him (or her).
Similarly, with affirmative imperative verbs, all ActAffs follow the verb. But their relative order is variable with 1st and 2nd person datives, yet rigid for 3rd person datives (This is as reported by Auger; things are even more erratic in my speech, where Dis-le-toi is impossible): (53)
a
Dis-le-moi/Dis-moi-le. Tell it to me.
b
Dis-le-toi/Dis-toi-le. Tell it to your self.
c
Dis-le-lui/*Dis-lui-le. Tell it to him/her.
ActAff sequences are also often subject to haplology, whereby le lui, la lui and les lui are realized as [i], and le leur, la leur and les lew are realized as leur. Yet there is no change in subcategorization and no reason to believe that (54a) is syntactically different from (54b): (54)
a
Vous le lui direz. You -will tell it to him.
b
Vous y direz.
There are also some ActAff combinations which are not possible in French, though there are no syntactic reasons for this gap: (55)
a
Ellemel'apresente. [V dative Isg+accusative3sg] She introduced him/her to me.
The Omission ofN 249 b
*Elle lui m'a presente. [*dative 3sg+accusative Isg] She introduced me to him/her.
c
*Elle me lui a presente. [*accusativelsg+dative 3sg] She introduced me to him/her.
Third, ActAffs must be repeated on coordinated elements, which also suggests an affixal analysis. (56)
Je 1'aime bien et *(le) considere tres intelligent. I like him a lot and consider him very intelligent.
Fourth, though inversion of ActAffs in interrogatives and in imperatives could be taken as an argument for a syntactic analysis, both exhibit idiosyncracies that suggest an affixal account. For instance, in all varieties of French, inversion of a lst.sg person subject is extremely marked in questions. In Quebec French, only second person subjects may invert: so (57c), which is grammatical in standard French, is not in Quebec French. (57)
a
L'aimes-tu? Do you like him?
b
L'aimez-vous? DoyouPLUR like him?
c
L'aime-t-il? [compare // /'aime-TUin Quebec French (TU= interrogative particle)] Does he like him?
As for postverbal ActAffs in imperatives, they cannot simply be the result of an inversion since many preverbal and postverbal forms differ in a way that cannot be derived by phonological rules. (58)
preverbal forms:
me
te
y [i]
en [a], [na], [nn]
postverbal forms:
moi
toi
[zi]
[a], [za]
These are only a few examples of the pervasive idiosyncracies found in ActAff constructions; see Auger (1995) and references therein for many more. The extent of the erratic behavior of ActAffs suggests an affixal treatment. It is not impossible to maintain a syntactic account of cliticization, with adjustments taking place after syntax has operated as in distributed morphology for example.
250 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces However, given the idiosyncracies of form and distribution of ActAffs, a "syntax" account of them loses all its generality, as Auger (1995) and Miller & Sag (1995) conclude. If ActAffs are true affixes, something must account for the fact that they are argumental affixes. Miller & Sag (1995) show how this can be done by appealing to a SLASH feature, which records informations about the missing elements in a phrase. Thus, a typical rule is the Complement Extraction Lexical Rule, which reduces the valence of a lexical item by one argument, and adds a SLASH feature which contains local information about the missing argument. To account for the fact that ActAffs are both argumental and affixal, Miller & Sag extend the coverage of the Complement Extraction Lexical Rule: they assume that this rule operates not only in the derivation of the lexical entries of verbs whose complements have been extracted, but also in the derivation of verbs whose complements are affixed. Rule (58) operates on a verb bearing a SLASH feature and licenses an affix by removing an element of the SLASH value of a verb and adding it to the value of the feature PRAFS (Pronominal affixes). (59)
Complement Affixation Lexical Rule: HEAD verb
HEAD verb
SLASH S2
SLASH S2/{ [ 1 ]}
PRAFS Si
PRAFS Si U {[!]}
Where [1] e S2
In other words, "slashed" verbs may undergo this rule, deriving verbs with affixes. However, since subcategorization is assumed to be local, rule (59) cannot account for ActAffs that appear on auxiliary verbs with which they do not bear any subcategorization relation: in Marie les a vus lit. 'Marie them has seen', the affix les on the AUX a forces the absence of a complement of the embedded predicate aime. To solve this "displacement" problem, Miller & Sag, following Abeille & Godard (1994a,b), assign to the AUX verbs avoir and etre lexical entries which are underspecified in a way such that the list COMPS L of their unsaturated participial complement is identified with their own list of COMPS: (60)
avoir, etre: [COMPS< V[prtl] > 0 L] [COMPS L]
The Omission ofN 251 In such a composition of arguments, the AUX inherits the COMPS required by its participial complement. Combined with the Complement Extraction Lexical Rule and rule (59), this allows an AUX verb to bear an affix corresponding to an argument of its participial complement. This provides an answer to question 1 on Lone Dets (and ActAffs in general): they are interpreted with respect to an element other than their host through a SLASH relation and composition of arguments. However, it requires the construction-specific rule just for ActAffs. Moreover, this analysis does not fare better than the movement analysis with respect to question 2: it also just stipulates what are possible hosts for ActAffs. For instance, nothing in the analysis prevents such an affix from appearing on a participle as in *Mahe a les vus. To rule this out, Miller & Sag (1995:153) assume a morphological constraint that specifically states that there are no wellformed verbs bearing simultaneously the features [participial] and [PRAFS], i.e., that the paradigm is defective. The answer to question 3 concerning crosslinguistic variation is also not very enlightening: the fact that a definite Det may appear alone in French, but not in English, is not related to other properties of these languages and just results from the fact that French has the Complement Affixation Lexical Rule in its list of rules, but English does not. However, an affixal account at least has the advantage of accounting for the fact that ActAffs exhibit so many idiosyncracies. It also crucially puts us in a position to ask if these affixes appear on these hosts for reasons similar to those that govern other instances of affixation, rather than obfuscating the affix+host relation by functional projections like Clitic Projection, AgrP or £P.
3.3. Determiners, Tense, and Number
I will now present an analysis in which ActAffs—and in particular Lone Dets—appear on Tensed V because they are interpreted in relation to Tense, not in a "displaced" manner with a remote predicate. A language like French has Lone Dets because French Dets bear the crucial feature of Number that allows them to establish the appropriate relation with Tense on their own. The analysis is explanatory because this trait of French Dets is causally connected to logically anterior interface properties. 3.3.1 ActAffs
as Regular Affixes.
The reason for the lack of explanatory power of both the
movement analysis and the argument composition analysis comes from the way the argumenthood of ActAffs is computed, as essentially a "displacement" property. In terms of the modes of giving a form to semantic relations discussed in chapter 1, these approaches analyze ActAffs as instances
252 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces of Juxtaposition, but in a somewhat distorted fashion since they are displaced, i.e., the Juxtaposition holds in some abstract way by means of an empty category or a slash feature. Yet at the same time, ActAffs are analyzed as Markings, since they are morphophonologically attached to particular hosts, but in a nonsignificant way since no semantic relevance is attributed to the fact that they appear on the particular hosts that they do. This double anomaly—that ActAffs involve Juxtaposion for their interpretation, but only in an abstract way, and that they are Markings, but in a nonsignificant way—arises from the assumption that "there are many cases in which the clitic appears on a verb with which it bears no lexical relation" (Sportiche 1992:7). I will argue that this assumption is based on a misimpression; it is only partly true, and once corrected, the behaviour of ActAffs becomes that of normal affixes that bear a lexical relation with their host. ActAffs do not attach to just any verb, but to verbs that bear Tense (Tense here includes the irrealis of infinitives). This is the key to the solution: if we take them at face value, ActAffs are markings on Tense. Though they may not bear a lexical relation with an AUX verb, they may bear a relation with the Tense of this AUX. The next step is to figure out what relation ActAffs bear with Tense. As for Lone Dets, a subtype of ActAff, in this line of reasoning they are not out of position in either the sentence or the NP: they directly relate semantically to their hosts Tensed V and N for their interpretation, i.e., they are Markings on these hosts in the full sense of codings of semantic relations. This explains why they appear on these hosts rather than on some disjointed predicate. The analysis is in line with the old observation that there is a functional similarity between the verbal suffixes of pro drop languages like Latin and Italian, and the subject clitics of French: both of these appear to be markers of agreement between the verb and the subject (cf. Diez 1844; Darmesteter 1877; Bally 1932; von Wartburg 1943; Tesniere 1959; Hirschbuhler 1971, Roberge 1990, Miller 1992; Auger 1993, 1995; and many others). A first reason for making the assumption is that these elements exhibit many idiosyncracies typical of affixes, as we saw in the previous section. More strikingly, in informal spoken French, it is now the general rule to have "subject clitics" present in all sentences, including when lexical subjects are present. (61)
a
Marie elle vient a 6 heures. Marie she comes at 6 o 'clock.
b
Quelqu'un il dansait. (Sankoff/Cedergren corpus 118-71:534) Someone he was dancing.
c
Je me souviens quand la petite fille du voisin elle s'est noyee. (Roberge 1990:94) / remember when the little girl of the neighbour she drowned.
The Omission ofN 253 Some instances of clitic doubling show prosodic and pragmatic properties of dislocation: there is a pause between the full NP and the rest of the sentence, and the full NP gets a contrastive interpretation. However, most cases of doubling are not dislocations. As numerous authors have shown (Bally 1932, Moignet 1965, Hirschbiihler 1971, Sankoff 1982, Campion 1984, Hulk 1986, Huot 1987, Roberge 1990, Auger 1995), doublings as in (61) show no pause after the lexical subject, are extremely frequent (up to 96% in some samples), involve quantifiers (61b), and appear to the right of WH-phrases (61c). It therefore seems well established that "subject clitics" in informal spoken French are affixal markings on Tense. However, rather than agreement, which is epiphenomenal, I will dwell more on the ability for these affixes to identify the subject-actant of the clause. At the time when French was pro-drop, morphological markings of Number and Person on Tense were sufficiently rich to identify the external argument of the clause. But these markings have been neutralized by phonological rules in French. In particular, many final consonants that were crucially distinctive markers have dropped, so that the verbal paradigms are now very impoverished with respect to these two features. Though there still is a weak presence of these features, their function has been taken over by subject clitics which have gradually become affixal markings on Tense. Recall from the discussion in section 2.10 of chapter 2 that a sentence is a proposition, i.e., a statement of a judgement (positive, negative, interrogative, etc.) about a relation between an event and a point in time. An event is a network of relations between various actants. If this network is expressed by the structural mode (Juxtaposition), this is not directly compatible with the time indication: the relation with a point in time can only be established by other points, and a structurally expressed network is not a point. The identification provided by a subject ActAff is the means to get around this incompatibility. In this case, one of the actants—the "external" argument— is identified as the one which establishes a relation with the temporal point. It is put in a point-to-point relation with a point in time by an affix marker on Tense that directly identifies this privileged actant involved in the network of relations of the event (see Bouchard 1995 and chapter 6 below). The core notion is the proposition, and all the constitutive elements of a sentence contribute to the determination of the content of the proposition. The point of time is a central element of the proposition, and this is reflected in the fact that T is the head of the phrase that expresses the proposition. The event part of the proposition is distributed over several elements. Some provide indications to identify actants: this is typically the case of NPs. Others help identify the relations involved between the actants in the event: this is the case of predicates and adjunct-modifier
254 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces relations. These different pieces of information can all be expressed by structural material as in (62), i.e., by Juxtaposition. (62)
Marie a parle de Paul dans un article. Mary talked about Paul in a paper.
Here, three phrases—Marie, de Paul, dans un article—identify actants, and their positions in the structure tell us how the actants participate in the event by indicating whether they combine with a predicate and in what way, or whether they have an adjunct-modifier relation and with what part of the event. However, the constitutive elements of a proposition can be identified equally well by Markings instead of Juxtaposition, This is the case for the subject ActAff in (63):
(63)
Elle a parle de Paul dans un article. She talked about Paul in a paper.
The ActAff elle directly marks Tense and its particular form indicates that the actant it identifies is the point of the event through which the whole event is related to time and the speaker i.e., it is the subject, the perspective from which the speaker presents the event. There is no need to assume that this is also coded structurally by some empty category: as discussed in chapter 1, such an analysis requires a costly duplication of coding mechanisms. A marking on T can also identify an adjunct actant: (64)
Elle y a parle de Paul. She talked about Paul in it.
The y marking on T indicates that the proposition involves a location identifiable by a particular discourse or pragmatic referent. This ActAff must be on T, not on V, because it pertains to the proposition and bears no direct link with the predicate. Markings also extend to actants related by a predicate. Thus, the le marking T in (65) indicates that the proposition involves an actant which is singular, named by a masculine N, identifiable by the hearer, and that it holds a particular relation ("direct object") with a predicate of that clause.
The Omission ofN 255 The marking lui indicates that yet another actant is involved in the proposition, with a different kind of relation ("indirect object"). (65)
Marie le lui a donne. Marie gave it to him.
Again, there is no need to redundantly code this information with an empty category in a structure (or a SLASH in a lexical entry). For instance, we could link le with a position sister of donne in a structural representation to indicate that le has a direct object relation with that verb. But we would associate le with that position and not some other position because we already know that le is interpreted in this way. We know this because the morphological attachment of le tells us that it is related to some element in the clause of a particular T, and the form of the marking le tells us it is a direct object. So the empty category tells us nothing that we do not already know. Even the information expressed by a phrase with a predicative content in the structural mode can be expressed by a marking, as in the following examples in which the marking le on T indicates that the proposition involves a predicative relation indentifiable by the hearer (hence the definiteness). (66)
a
Marie estheureuse, et nous le sommes aussi. Marie is happy, and so are we.
b
Marie parle d'adjectifs, et je le fais aussi. Marie talks about adjectives, and so do I.
All these markings appear on T because they provide information about the proposition, and they do it directly in this way. The nature of their contribution is indicated by their various forms, rather than a position as in the structural mode. When the structural mode is exclusively chosen as in (62), the very nature of Juxtaposition prevents elements that identify actants from being related to Tense: only one element can be directly adjacent to T under the unmarked application of the Linearization Parameter, and another under an Elsewhere application. As indicated above, this structural mode of coding forces an indirect relation with a point of time since the resulting structure is not a point. So the two central elements occupy the positions adjacent to Tense. The predicate, which expresses the semantic core of the event, is in the unmarked position for a dependent of the head T in French: it is to its right. The subject holds a semantic relation with
256 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Tense since it is the point linking the network of the event to Tense, and it also holds a relation with the predicate: because the subject is in a split relation with Tense, it appears in the Elsewhere position to the left (cf. chapter 2, section 1). On the other hand, if Marking is chosen instead of Juxtaposition, each ActAff brings in a 'point' information that is directly compatible with the time point expressed by Tense. Consequently, many ActAffs may appear on Tense at the same time: (67)
a
Elle le lui a donne, She gave it to him.
b
Elle lui en a parle. She talked to him about it.
The fact that an ActAff contributes directly to the proposition by marking Tense also explains why ActAffs can be nonargumental as the locative in (64) above or the affective dative in (46c), repeated here as (68a). (68)
a
Je te lui ai foutu une de ces baffes. I to-you to-him have flung one of those slaps I gave him such a slap!
b
* Je lui ai foutu une de ces baffes a toi.
These ActAffs could not appear on V since they bear no argumental relation with a predicate. But they do contribute to the proposition, so are compatible with T. In fact, for datives like these that indicate how the proposition is to be evaluated rhetorically, only a direct marking on Tense is acceptable. A structural equivalent as in (68b) is ungrammatical under the intended reading, because the structural configuration does not allow a. toi to relate directly and exclusively to T. In sum, the various ActAffs are Marking equivalents of elements of Juxtaposition used to express constitutive elements of a proposition. Being equivalent means, there is no need to recede them into structural notions. On the contrary, this is a costly move that complicates the theory and loses the explanation for the markings on ActAffs: if pronominal clitics were displaced from a position that expresses their grammatical function, there would be no reason for them to bear a distinctive marking indicating whether they are a direct object, an indirect object, a locative, and so on, since the information would be recoverable from theses displacements. As for the particular case of the
The Omission ofN 257 Lone Dets lellalles, just as Heger (1966) and Bossong (1981) have extended the agreement analysis of French subject clitics to object clitics, I assume that these Lone Dets are markings that identify actants that fulfill a particular role in the sentence.15 There is however an important difference between subject markers and object markers in informal spoken French: only subject markers allow the cooccurrence of a lexical argument. As indicated by Auger (1995), object clitic doubling shows prosodic and pragmatic properties of dislocation: there is a pause before the lexical object, doubling without dislocation is rare, it almost never involves quantified phrases, and the doubled complement is in a position outside of the VP: (69)
a
Elle l'a donne a Jean, mon diplome. She gave it to Jean, my diploma.
b
*Elle Pa donne mon diplome a Jean.
This has lead researchers to assume that only subject markers are true agreement markers (cf. Roberge 1990). The distinction is often presented as one between argumental status (for object markers) and nonargumental status (for subject markers); cf. Auger (1995:40). If we further assume that an argument must be somewhat represented in the grammatical description, this forces nonargumental subject markers to be doubled by some element, like an empty category. But neither assumption is warranted. In many cases, it may be that "agreement" simply means redundancy. So just as there is gender redundancy in la petite chalte (the-FEM-SING small-FEMSING cat-FEM-SING), in which the Det, the ADJ and the N all bear morphological indications of gender and number, a doubling subject marker may provide redundant argumental information. Admitting the possibility of redundancy in argument marking clashes with the standard assumption about a one-to-one relationship between arguments and selectional requirements as expressed in the Theta Criterion, but this assumption is based on a very positional view of selection and should be reassessed if Juxtaposition is but one mode of expressing relations among those allowed by our SM system.16 Moreover, though it is natural to prevent a conflict of specifications with respect to gender or argumenthood as in (70), there is no obvious reason why redundancy shouldn't occur as in (71), given the biological basis of language: an occasional bit of redundancy supplies the flexibility that evolution requires to initiate small incremental changes that eventually result in major reorganizations.17
258 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (70)
a
*le petit chatte the.MASC smalLMASC cat.FEM
b
*Paul a rencontre le professeur 1'etudiant. Paul met the professor the student.
(71)
a
la petite chatte
b
Paul il a rien compris.
the-FEM-SING small-FEM-SING
cat-FEM-SING
Paul he understood nothing. In addition, markers of prepositional arguments and of adjuncts seem to have an intermediate status between subject and object markers, and to be progressively undergoing a shift towards becoming agreement markers. As Auger (1995:42) observes, this is a frequent state of affairs in Romance languages: for instance, it holds in Spanish (Jaeggli 1986a, Sufier 1988) and in Rumanian (Dobrovie-Sorin 1990). Such an intermediate status does not fit well with an absolute distinction between agreement marker and argumental marker. Whatever the argumental status of subject and object markers, the question is why they should differ in their doubling of lexical phrases.18 We could say that a subject marker has a [+Ref] feature whereas an object marker has a [-Ref] feature, but this or any similar mechanism is just restating the facts. One promising avenue to explore is elements of information expressed by subjects and objects in addition to the information they provide about the proposition, that is, in addition to predicate-argument relations. Subject and objects also express different types of discourse information. Subjects, under normal intonation, are said to provide "thematic" information, that is, they are the thing which the sentence is about. The information provided by the subject is therefore preestablished, "old" information. This explains why subjects are generally specific, that is, their referent is already in the domain of discourse (cf. the analysis of specificity in Enc 1991, Lambrecht 1994). Objects, on the other hand, provide "rhematic" information, that is, they are part of the comment on the subject and introduce information as being new. This distinction is traceable to the traditional notion of 'subject' (going back to Aristotle). It is adopted by various contemporary linguists (Kuno 1972, Chomsky 1977, Dijk 1978, Reinhart 1982, Lambrecht 1994). In metaphorical terms, a topical subject is the "hitching post for the new knowledge" (Chafe 1976), "the peg on which the message is hung" (Halliday 1970). The thematic/rhematic distinction holds between lexical phrasal subjects and objects. However, as Bossong (1981) argues, object markings thematize the object which is normally rhematic.19 This
The Omission ofN 259 means that there is a conflict in thematicity between object markers and positional objects: the former are thematic, the latter rhematic. Thus, they are not compatible and cannot cooccur. On the other hand, dislocated object phrases are compatible with object markers since they characteristically express "old information", hence are thematic. As for subjects, whether they are markers or phrases in a specified position, they are thematic, not rhematic: so no conflict arises between a thematic and a rhematic element, and doubling can occur freely. Summarizing, ActAffs are not out of position. They are markings on Tense because they bear a semantic relation with Tense: they identify an actant which is situated in time by Tense because it participates in the event situated in time by Tense. What role this participant fulfills is indicated by the particular form of the marking. 3.3.2 Accounting for the data. At the outset of section 3, three questions were raised about Lone Dets: how Lone Dets are interpreted as arguments though they are not in the position in which full arguments appear, why Lone Dets are affixed to Tensed V, and why a definite Det may appear alone in some languages but not in others. We are now in a position to answer these three questions. Answer to question 1. A Lone Det is interpreted as the direct object argument of a particular predicate even though it is not in the structural position in which full arguments appear because the morphological attachment of the Lone Det tells us that it provides indications to identify an actant of a proposition dependent on a particular T; the form of the Lone Det tells us that it is a direct object, so it relates in a specific manner to the main predicate forming the event part of the proposition. So both the clause-boundedness and the nature of the relation held by a Lone Det are accounted for directly by the fact that a Lone Det is affixed to a T head that relates it to a particular proposition. More generally, there is nothing exceptional about ActAffs that have an argumental status. They do not require a weakening of the lexicalist hypothesis as proposed in Miller (1992), Pollard & Sag (1994), Auger (1995), who allow the features of this affix to percolate to the word level in order to make them accessible to syntax: this is required only under the assumption that linking with semantics can only be done through syntax. The problem does not arise in an approach that puts Marking on the same footing as Juxtaposition in the linking with semantics, an approach that must be preferred on principled grounds of optimal design. Answer to question 2. If we turn to the question of the host of ActAffs, we have seen that it is Tense because that is what the ActAffs relate to semantically. However, if lellalles are the same elements whether they appear as ActAffs on a verb bearing Tense as in Paul le/la/les voit 'Paul
260 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces sees him/her/them' or whether they are Dets internal to a nominal as in le chat/la chattes/les chats, we must determine what their host is in this latter case. It is generally accepted that Det+Y combinations in French always form a very tight constituent because typical constituency tests show this to be the case (see Miller (1992) and references therein). Miller submits the Det inside an NP to these tests and concludes that it too is tightly attached to a host (though he warns that great care should be taken about the strength of the conclusions that can be drawn from these tests). For instance, the syntactic criteria of pronominalization (72) and coordination (73), and the phonological criteria of elision and liaison (74), all seem to indicate that Det+N form a constituent in French: (72)
a
Le livre de Pierre est beau. The book of Pierre is nice.
b
Celui de Pierre est beau.
a
Les gar9ons et les filles de Paris etaient presents.
The one of Pierre is nice. (73)
The boys and the girls of Paris were present. b
*Les garcons de Paris et filles de Milan etaient presents. The boys of Paris and girls of Milan were present.
(74)
a
*la amie
I'amie
the friendFEM b
les
amis_%_anglais (obligatory and % liaison)
the English friends In some cases, the Det does not seem to have a specific host in the NP, as it may attach to N, ADJ or ADV.
(75)
N:
lechat
the cat
ADJ: le gros chat
the big cat
ADV: le tres gros chat
the very big cat
We saw in chapter 2 that there is semantic, syntactic and phonological evidence that a prenominal ADJ forms a complex head with the N. Therefore in (75), the Det does have the same host in all cases, namely an N, simplex or complex: the Det is cliticized to the nominal head chat, to the
The Omission ofN 261 complex nominal head gros chat, and to the complex head ires gros chat, respectively. In this last case, there is iteration of the complex head formation: ires and gros first form a complex head, and this is in turn combined with chat to further form a complex head. The potential hosts for le/la/les are now reduced to two: the N, simplex or complex, which bears the characteristic function that defines a superset which the Det atomizes by the Number which it bears, and the Tense-bearing verb of the clause containing Det. Det attaches to a host T or N to complete information about the proposition described by a clause. In both cases, Det provides to its host the essential property of Number to identify one of the actants of the event. Det provides Number either directly by minimally signaling on the anchor of the proposition, the T node, that an actant with certain properties of Person and Number is part of the event and holds a direct object relation with the verb, or indirectly by providing Number that atomizes a nominal expression and allows it to identify one of the actants of the event.20 The clitic pronouns le/la/les and the determiners le/la/les are the same elements, because they fulfill the same function in the clause for different hosts. Contrary to analyses that simply lexically stipulate that these are clitic forms and stipulate what the hosts are, in the present analysis, it is not an accident that le/la/les are dependent morphemes, and it is not an accident that they attach to these two particular hosts. The Dets le/la/les are affixed to the heads T and N because they provide a core property to the clause or nominal expression, hence this property is realized on the core element, i.e., the head. The analysis makes the specific prediction that "clitics" should always hold such a semantic relation with their hosts, and that they can only be elements bearing core features of hosts. This contrasts sharply with stipulative analyses which make no predictions about which elements may be clitics or what their particular hosts may be. Answer to question 3. As for the crosslinguistic variation between French and English concerning Lone Dets, it derives from an independently motivated parametric difference in the way these languages encode Number. Det can appear alone in French, it can be a Marking identifying an actant, because it bears Number, which provides it with the minimum required for atomization, hence for identification of an actant. By using the Number bearing element alone, without an N range, as in Paul le/la/les voit, the speaker indicates that the referent of the direct object actant is part of the shared background of the speaker and addressee: the Number bearing element functions anaphorically. In English, Det does not bear Number, but rather the N does, so Det does not have the minimum required to function anaphorically.21 French and English differ not only with respect to Lone Dets, but to all ActAffs. However, the correlation with how Number is expressed only holds for ActAffs for which Number is relevant.
262 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces So we may wonder why English does not have ActAffs corresponding to y and en, for example. Why should the coding of Number have an effect on the whole ActAff paradigm, including cases in which Number is not directly involved? I believe the answer is in the inner organization of a paradigm: some elements may be more central than others. For instance, some ActAffs are more crucial than others: they fill functions that are always required (subject) or required if a transitive predicate is present (object). These ActAffs are central to the paradigm. In comparison, adjunct ActAffs fill functions that are almost never obligatory: they are peripheral in the paradigm. I assume that the hierarchical organization of a paradigm is such that peripheral elements may arise only if the language allows the central elements. French allows the central cases of ActAffs because it has the necessary coding of Number, so it can also have peripheral ActAffs. English does not allow the central cases because of its Number marking on N, therefore the whole paradigm is ruled out. The prediction is that a language should not have they/en type of ActAff if it does not also have the les/lalles type. This appears to hold, at least in Romance languages. Cardinaletti & Starke (1994:37) say that the claim that clitics are determiners "is in fact undermined by the observation that some languages manifest one paradigm but not the other: Slavic languages have clitics but not determiners, Brazilian Portuguese has determiners but no corresponding clitics." But a simple observation of data is not sufficient to test the claim. Suppose I am correct in claiming that identity between clitics and determiners is premissed on a correlation with a realization of Number on Det, i.e., that a (core) clitic is a Det with Number. If semantic Number is not realized on Det in some language, then it will not have clitics, as we saw for English, though it may have determiners. Moreover, even if the coding of Number is appropriate in a language, these being affixes and as such ground for idiosyncracies, it may be that they accidentally do not attach to one or the other type of host for quite superficial reasons. What would be a remarkable coincidence under the present analysis is a language in which some clitics and determiners are identical, but Number was realized on N as in English. In a similar vein, we may wonder why internally to French some clitics cannot function as Dets, and some Dets cannot function as clitics. In all cases, it seems that the elements have additional features that prevents them from holding the other function. Thus, the clitic en is partitive and y is locative, so they cannot be a Det because their semantics does not define a function that could operate on the range of a Noun. The clitics lui, leur, etc. bear Dative case, and this makes them compatible only with a Tense host, not an N host, because they provide a particular information about how the actants participate in the event. The clitics me, te, lui, nous, vous, leur bear person, and only corresponding genitive pronouns can appear in a nominal phrase: so there is a more
The Omission ofN 263 specific paradigm that has this function. Conversely, mon, ma, mes, etc. bear Genitive case, so they can only be hosted by an N head (simplex or complex). As for un and des, they can be determiners, but they require a partitive over which they can range and so cannot appear as clitics on Tense. In closing, note that analyzing ActAffs as regular affixes helps solve a problem for a positional approach to the isomorphy between syntactic and semantic scope: isomorphy seems to be lost if the Det is as low in the NP as the data in (72-74) suggests (cf Miller 1992: 15-21). In the present analysis, there is no discrepancy: in NP, the Det is affixed to a head which requires Number as described above, and its semantic scope need not be any higher. The same can be said about portmanteau cases of French. A word like aux expresses both the features of a preposition that takes a DP argument and the features of the Det. If we see the Number, Defmiteness and Dative properties of aux as features of the phrase participating in the identification of an actant and its role in the event, there is much less reason to think that such a portmanteau case raises "scopal" difficulties. Note that this featural approach immediately explains why the "reduction" of de le to du, de les to des, a le to an and a les to aux does not take place in (76): the Number and Defmiteness of le and les are not features of the PP here, but of the embedded clause. (76)
a
Tu n'as pas fini de le voir/de les voir/*du voir/*des voir 22 You haven '(finished to see him/to see them
b
Je n'arrive pas a le voir/a les voir/*au voir/*aux voir. / can't, get to see him/them.
Moreover, under this view of semantic scope of formatives like affixes, the trend in the diachronic evolution of languages to move from a word to a clitic to an affix raises no particular problem of scope (cf. section 2.10 of chapter 2).23
4. CONCLUSION The assumption that French codes Number on Det, whereas English codes it on N, is conceptually appealing because it is grounded on self-evident observational propositions from the SM and CI
264 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces interfaces. We have seen in this chapter that the assumption is also empirically interesting because it is corroborated by the facts: since Number is on Det in French, atomization and identification of an actant may take place in French even if N is absent, in English, the absence of N implies the absence of Number, so that this requires very restricted conditions in order to be grammatical. Furthermore, the analysis is not piecemeal, but makes a general prediction about clitics: they should always hold a semantic relation with their hosts. It is thus possible to explain why French le, la, les are hosted by T and N, and other clitics by T. Furthermore, we have seen that the omission of N is not to be interpreted as a superficial phenomenon here: absence of N means that the entity has no N whatsover, neither at a superficial or more abstract level. In particular, there is no empty category head, since nothing would prevent such an empty category from bearing a Number feature: the correlation between overt realization of Number on Det or N and omission of N would then be lost. As I indicated in chapter 1, what is universal is not c-selection in syntax, but the s-selection that underlies it. This is to be coherent with a theory based on logically anterior properties: s-selection can be derived from such CI properties concerning identification of actants. Notes They follow the spirit of Rizzi (1986), who proposes that pro is subjected to formal licensing by a designated head: (i)
pro is Case-marked by X°y (where y is the category of the head)
He assumes that Italian has INFL and V as possible values for y, so that it has pro subjects and objects of V; in French, V is a licenser, so it has pro objects; no X° is a licenser in English, so no position can be filled by pro. This would explain why a null object is active in Italian and French: it can control, bind an anaphor, bind the subject of an adjunct small clause and bind the subject of an argument small clause in a causative construction. A null object in English is not projected in the syntax but only lexically implicit, so it is not active in this way. However, Bouchard (1989) shows that null objects are active in all three languages with respect to other phenomena, like Condition B and Condition C. Null objects appear to be inactive in English in some constructions due to independently motivated structural differences between English and Italian/French in these constructions. Therefore, we can dispense with an essentially descriptive syntactic condition on recoverability like (i).
The Omission ofN 265 2
As a consequence of these restrictions, English Nounless ADJs are also limited in terms of which
ADJs can be used and the frequency of occurrence of the construction. However, there are quite a number of ADJs which can be used in this way if they satisfy the contextual restrictions. For instance, all the ADJs in (i) can apply to people, so they may be used in the same conventional way as the ones in (14): (i)
the faithless, the greedy, the loyal, the true, the just, the dispossessed, the unhappy, the well-read, the ignorant
The important difference between French and English remains in the contextual restrictions imposed on the English forms, both discursive and syntactic, in comparison with the lack of such limitations in French. Sentences like those in (ii) to (iv) appear to be counterexamples to these restrictions (examples provided by Jennifer Ormston). (ii) (iii) (iv)
We bought tickets in the reds for the big game, a
An Oriental/An Italian got on the bus.
b
Orientals/Three Italians/Some Orientals/Most Italians got on the bus.
a
It's a fake, the appraiser said. A good fake, but a fake nonetheless.
b
These are fakes/two fakes.
In (ii), the reds is not about people, but seats. In (iii), we see that Oriental and Italian need not be in a definite or generic phrase, and may take a broad range of determiners and quantifiers. In (iv), fake is not about people, and can be variously determined. However, these examples do not refute the analysis, since the crucial elements are not ADJs but Ns, as tests indicate. First, they have the morphology of Ns: when plural, they bear an audible marking like Ns (ii), (iiib), (ivb), whereas ADJs do not bear plural marking (11), ( 14). They also have the syntactic behaviour of Ns, not of ADJs: they are not modified by adverbs as ADJs are (v), but by ADJs as Ns are (iva), (vi); also, whereas ADJs can appear in comparative or superlative constructions, these Ns cannot (vii). (v) (vi)
a
I like strong tea. I suppose very weak is better for you.
b
the very rich; the extremely poor; the abnormally lonely
a
We bought tickets in the new reds/*the newly reds/*the very reds.
b
It's a total fake/*a totally fake.
266 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
(vii)
We bought tickets in the reds/*the redder(s)/the reddest(s)
This contrasts with French classifying ADJs. The morphological test cannot be used in French because it does not discriminate between Ns and ADJs, since both agree with the Det which bears semantic Number. However, the syntactic tests clearly show that the French forms are ADJs: they can be modified by adverbs (viii), and they can appear as comparatives or superlatives (ix). (viii) les tres bleus the very blue fonesj, un immensement gros an immensely big [one], une affreusement rouillee an awfully rusted [one] (ix)
a
Une aussi grosse que celle de Marie ne sera pas facile a trouver. An as big as this of Marie will not be easy to find One as big as Marie's won't be easy to find,
b
Les plus verts sont mes favoris. The most green are my favorite The greener ones are my favorite.
Though some French adjectival forms may be used as Ns in a way similar to the English forms in (ii)-(iv) (J'ai achete des billets dans les rouges. Trois Italiens sont entres.\ the forms in (8) are clearly ADJs, and they fairly freely allow the omission of the N in the combination Det+ADJ. On the other hand, in English, Nounless ADJs are only possible in particular discursive or conventional contexts. 3
A few Det+ADJ combinations are productively nounless in both French and English:
(i)
a
the former, the latter, the following
b
le precedent, le dernier, le suivant
These are clearly deictic, so that the recoverability of the N depends on this lexical property. These cases are like the ones just discussed, since they also depend on a discursive context by their deixis. Therefore, the omission of N here is not due to the grammatical process which I will argue is involved in the other productive cases of French. 4
In addition to this semantic condition on recoverability, Sleeman, following Loebeck (1993) and
Rizzi (1986), assumes the syntactic condition on recoverability (i) to account for cases like (ii):
The Omission ofN 267
(i) PROPER GOVERNMENT OF ELLIPTED NS IN FRENCH [e] must be canonically governed by a functional head (or its specifier) specified as [+partitive]. (ii)
*C'est la troisieme interessante/;ro. // is the third interesting [one].
She claims that the ungrammaticality of (ii) is due to the fact that the licensing element troisieme is not adjacent to pro. But this syntactic condition is redundant with the semantic condition of partitivity: the presence of interessante impedes the partitive interpretation of troisieme, hence the marginality of the sentence. 5
According to Priscian (6th century), the Stoics considered determiners and pronouns to be the
same part of speech in Greek (see Stephanini 1973). Apollonius Dyscolus (2nd century) assumed that a determiner and a pronoun refer in the same way, as the following quotation indicates (translated by Householder 1981): ".[...] referential pronouns are equivalent to nouns combined with articles. For nouns by themselves are not referential, but only when they are accompanied by the article. Incidentally, the article itself, when it lacks its normal association with a noun, changes to the next lower ranking part of speech, the pronoun [...]" (Householder 1981:25). Apollonius noted that the morphophonological similarity between determiners and pronouns is even more remarkable given the heterogeneity of the pronominal paradigm. The single-category hypothesis is clearly extended to French in the Port-Royal tradition: "L'article est une sorte de pronom lorsqu'il precede un verbe, et par consequent lorsqu'il precede un nom: Avez-vous lu la Grammaire nouvelle ? Non, je la lirai bientot. Pourquoi voudrait-on que la ne fut pas de meme nature dans les deux endroits?" (Arnauld & Lancelot 1660) The hypothesis has continued to be held in the 20th century in various schools of thought for various languages: Guillaume (1973), Moignet (1965), Postal (1966), Stowell (1989), Miller (1992). See Curat (1999:37-42) for a nice summary and additional references. Note that here, movement does not occur to check a formal feature of a functional category as is usually the case in the Minimalist Program, but to satisfy a constraint on linearization: it is not obvious how this can be implemented as a formal trigger for the operation Move. Attempts have been made to motivate lexical complexity on a semantic basis, and we may want to follow that avenue to shore up the analysis. For instance, the distinction between unaccusatives
268 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
such as arrive, die, be born and unergatives such as sleep, laugh, jump, live cannot be made in bare phrase structure: if these two classes of verbs have a single argument, then the head projects once in both cases and is sister to the single argument. Chomsky assumes that the distinction between the two classes is necessary in syntax (but see Ruwet 1990) and he adopts the proposal of Hale & Keyser (1993) that unergatives are transitives. The idea is that unergatives are complex forms because they allow for paraphrases with an internal object, such as have a sleep, have a laugh, take a jump, have a life. However, this form of argumentation is very weak. It relies on vague paraphrases based on impressions. For instance, unaccusative verbs are just as subject to paraphrasing (make an arrival, meet one's death or drop dead, prendre naissance (for some uses of French naitre). Why then aren't these paraphrases as significant as the ones given for unergative verbs? See Bouchard (1995), section 1.5.2.2.3, for a discussion of this loose notion of paraphrase that underlies many analyses in various frameworks. See also Arnauld & Lancelot (1660:124), who already argued against analyzing some intransitives as underlying transitives because this gives rise to unbridled lexical decomposition. 8
Matters are complicated by Chomsky's suggestion (p. 338) that cliticization does not always
have for effect that the simple pronoun precedes the verb on the surface: thus, simple pronominals like English // may cliticize, "though locally, not raising to I as in Romance (perhaps as a reflex of lack of overt V-raising." 9
This criticism applies mutatis mutandis to Kayne's LCA analysis.
10
1 find the contrast in (49) exceedingly weak, if there is one at all. Moreover, the strong pronoun
lui in a sentence like Lui me plait 'He/it pleases me' can very naturally refer to a non-human entity. Similarly, the contrast in (47) does not necessarily reflect a distinction between weak and clitic forms of il since there is an independent explanation for the contrast even if // is the same type of pronoun in both cases. If// is adjoined to a projection of T, then a coordination of TPs still allows weak pronoun il in (47) to adjoin properly to the resulting complex phrase [T T' mais T']. However, if the inversion in interrogatives is due to the verb being outside of the T projection and in C, then Aime-t-il les choux mais
ne les mange que cults? is a coordination of CPs, not of TPs:
therefore, // must be repeated in each TP. I cannot judge whether alternative explanations are also possible for the purported contrasts in other languages, but the French facts do not clearly establish that a tripartite distinction is required: in particular, the two deficient classes weakmd clitic may be one and the same class. In
The Omission ofN 269
any case, the tripartite/bipartite distinction does not affect the point I want to make about explanatory value. 11
C&S assumed that £P is "the locus of prosody-related features of L°" and is essentially
equivalent to a FocusP. There are problems inherent to functional categories that extend to discourse notions: I return to them in chapter 6. Furthermore, syntactic projections derive from discrete linearization properties of the SM interface; to assume that some of these express some prosody-related features is incoherent: it confuses Juxtaposition and Superimposition. 12
C&S acknowledge in their note 42 that their principle Minimise is transderivational. They say
that this extends to all principles of the economy type, by definition, since "these principles allow a derivation only if the "next most economical one" is not possible. In more intuitive terms, we know whether to minimise alpha, or stop there, only by knowing that further minimalisation will trigger ungrammaticality. This is inherently transderivational." Note that this weakness holds for models that have a comparative evaluation of derivations, i.e., for functional economy which constrains how operations of the theory function. However, it does not hold of principles of economy arising from general simplicity which operates at the level of reducing the vocabulary of the theory to limit what processes can be formulated. See the discussion of simplicity in chapter 6. 13
To a point that the properties of AGRO can be seen in opposite ways. For instance, in standard
minimalism (before AGR was rejected altogether), it is NPs fully specified for abstract case that move to the vicinity of AGRO to check their case, not the deficient elements that lack case. 14
As Auger remarks, someone could claim that this is due to a syntactic difference between 1st
and 2nd person datives and 3rd person datives (Uriagereka (1995) does just that), but it correlates with no other difference between these datives. 15
The fact that these forms are identical to Dets may indicate that simple internal argument (i.e.,
direct object) is the unmarked role for an actant. Even within an analysis based on Juxtaposition, problems arise with respect to this one-to-one correspondance; cf. Jackendoff (1990), Williams (1997), and references therein. It could also be that the redundancy is only apparent and that the agreement expresses some property yet not understood. Another tack is the explanation given in introductory textbooks, which typically attribute this redundancy to perceptual factors: given the extremely rapid rate of speech, the multiple encoding would help insure that the information about gender and number clearly gets across to the hearer. Such communicative pressure may be the reason for this redundancy, in which case its origin is external to the language faculty and we could assume it
270 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
does not count as an internal imperfection. But we must identify the exact delimitations and effects of this kind of functional explanation. For instance, is there a precise perceptual threshold which cannot be exceeded and which triggers this kind of overspecification? Only once we fully understand the effects of the external systems will we be able to answer such questions. 18
There is another difference between the two types of markers: subject markers are obligatory in
all tensed clauses, whereas object markers appear only in clauses with certain predicates. Thus, a tensed verb may appear without an object clitic if it is intransitive or if a phrasal object is present, but no tensed verb may appear without a subject marker. Intuitively, it is clear why the object markers are not always present: they appear only when they are required. The same actually holds for subject markers: it happens that they are required in French. The obligatoriness of the subject markers is an epiphenomenon that derives from the fact that a structural coding of the event network has only this means to relate the event to Tense. 19
This effect is likely due to the fact that the Lone Dets lella/les restrict the actant to a definite
specific element and provide no N range for it. Such an actant is therefore "old information" by definition, a referent that is already in the domain of discourse. Clitics sometimes appear on COMP (see examples in Cardinaletti & Roberts 1991, Ackema & Neeleman 2002). The fact that COMP may also host clitics is not surprising given the wellknown relation in temporal features between COMP and Tense. Some languages even mark the relation by an agreement affix on COMP, as in the following examples from Irish (Cottell 1995): (i)
a
Deir
se go dtogfaidh se an peann.
•soypREs ne that take^ji he the pen He says that he will take the pen. b
Deir
se gu-r
thog se an peann.
•soypREs he thatpAST /^PAST he the pen He says that he took the pen. 1
(i)
The demonstratives this/these, that/those are an exception and may appear alone as in (i): I like this/that/these/those.
They happen to be marked for Number. This may be the reason why they can appear alone. We would be forced to weaken the hypothesis about the semantic encoding of Number in English:
The Omission ofN 271
some determiners would bear semantic Number, i.e., the demonstratives, but not others, i.e., the. However, we must be careful to distinguish between semantic encoding of Number and morphological marking of Number due to agreement. At first glance, it may seem that Number must be semantic in (i), since there is no N for the demonstratives to agree with in the sentence. However, as shown by Tasmovski-De Rijk & Verluyten (1981) and Bouchard (1984a), pragmatic anaphora is subject to agreement. For instance, if someone is trying to force a table into the trunk of a car and it will obviously not fit, a perfect stranger who has never spoken a word to that person before must use a pronoun with the proper gender: so in (ii), the pronoun must be feminine la because table has feminine gender in French. (ii)
Tu ne reussiras jamais a la/*le mettre la-dedans. You will never succeed in putting it(fem/*masc) in there.
Given that there is agreement in pragmatic anaphora, there is no need to revert to a weaker mixed system for the semantic encoding of Number in English: the Number on demonstratives could be the result of agreement. An indication that this is the case and that they do not have semantic Number like the French Dets is the fact that a demonstrative combined with a classifying ADJ requires the presence of an overt N in English:
(iii)
a
*this red/*these red
b
this red one/these red ones
The fact that demonstratives may appear alone as in (i) is due to the property that distinguishes them from other pronouns: they are deictic, i.e., they are used appropriately if a referent is identifiable because it is salient in the speech setting. This property of demonstratives provides them with a sufficient degree of identifiability to function anaphorically. The reduction of de les to /de/ in this context is actually found in Quebec French and colloquial French in general. But the reductions of de le, a le and a les are impossible, which suggests that when de les reduces to /de/ in (76), this is purely phonological, and not morphophonological as in the portmanteau cases. 23
Incorporation as discussed by Baker (1988) seems to be restricted to general classifiers that
encode a restriction on an actant of the clause, as can be seen by the discussion in Di Sciullo &
272 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
Williams (1987). It may therefore be subject to a non-movement analysis similar to the one proposed here for cliticization and other constructions that involve closed-class categories.
The Omission of Del 273
5
THE OMISSION OF DET
1. NUMBER AND THE DET The fact that French codes Number on Det whereas English codes it on N not only predicts that N should be generally obligatory in English but fairly freely omitted in French, as discussed in chapter 4, it also makes the prediction that the opposite situation should hold for the Det. Given the role of Number in atomization, we expect English to allow the Det to be absent from syntactic entities that identify an actant, since the Number on N allows the entity to satisfy the interpretive requirement, whereas French should omit the Det only in restricted contexts, since the absence of the French Det implies an absence of Number, hence no atomization. This is indeed the case. English allows the absence of a determiner in common NPs, plural (1) or singular (2), whereas this is generally impossible in French (3)-(4).
(1)
a
Beavers build dams everywhere.
b
I hate beavers.
(2)
a
Lion tastes awful.
b
I ate lion yesterday.
(3)
a
*Castors construisent barrages.
a'
Les castors construisent des barrages,
b
*Je deteste castors.
b'
Je deteste les castors.
a
Le/*0 lion, c'est delicieux.
b
J'ai mange du/*0 lion hier.
(4)
More precisely, the prediction is that, since the N bears semantic Number in English, a nominal expression without a Det such as beavers can be atomized: it potentially refers to any plurality of beavers, and contextual information—including nonlinguistic information—will determine which
274 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces plurality is actually being referred to: all beavers, some specific beavers, nonspecific beavers, etc. See section 4 on the interpretive possibilities for bare NPs in English. On the other hand, since Number is expressed on the Det in French, a determinerless nominal has to be interpreted intensionally, with no atomization: the property of the N defines a category, but there is no access to individuals instantiating this property, i.e., a determinerless NP cannot function as a fully referential argument. This very particular interpretation explains the restricted distribution of determinerless NPs in French: contexts that admit such a reading are rare. As we will see, this prediction is corroborated by the facts. French determinerless NPs are generally intensional, without atomization (section 2). There are a few rare cases in which they are atomized, i.e., extensional, but only under particular conditions in which the atomization is determined by other factors—thus the cases actually support the analysis (section 3). The absence of Det, like the omission of N discussed in the previous chapter, is not to be interpreted as a superficial phenomenon: in this analysis, there is no Det in the syntactic representation at any level, overt or covert. Crucially, there is no empty category Det, since nothing would prevent this category from bearing a Number feature, thus eliminating the correlation between where Number is realized and whether Det may be omitted. This assumption is coherent with the generally accepted hypothesis that semantic-selection is the relevant notion for grammar, constituent-selection being only derivative (Grimshaw 1979, Pesetsky 1982, Rochette 1988). Moreover, semantic-selection is consistent with a theory based on interface properties, since this selection may be determined by CI properties. What is common to the various nominal constructions is not a uniform syntax—not constituent-selection—but a uniform ability to identify an actant at CI—semantic-selection. Under this view, different constructions may be equally suited to identify an actant, as long as the elements they combine can fulfill the semantic-selection. This contrasts sharply with proposals like Szabolcsi (1983), Stowell (1989), Longobardi (1994), which assume that a nominal expression can be an argument only if it is introduced by a Det.1 As a consequence, it must be assumed that an argument NP with no surface Det has a Det in its structure which is filled by a phonetically empty 0-Det, or that something is moved to fill the Det position at an abstract level. Moreover, this approach makes it possible to posit that a Det which is actually pronounced need not be "real" and make a semantic contribution, but could be expletive, as proposed by Longobardi (1994) for proper names like /'/ Gianni 'the John' and some generics as in (5).
The Omission of Del 275 (5)
a
I cani gross! sono (spesso) difficili da allevare. The large dogs are (often) hard to raise.
b
The lion has four legs.
In these analyses, features like ±R (referential) and ±Strong may be correlated with the surface presence or absence of Det. But as we saw in section 2.6 of chapter 2, such features are merely descriptive, allowing us to name the different distributional properties, but not improving our understanding of them. Moreover, the differences in the presence of Det between French and English shown in (l)-(4) are simply listed, giving the impression that the properties of the distribution of Det are isolated. But it is not the case: I am arguing that the distribution of Det correlates with the realization of Number, the presence/absence of N, and with properties of ADJ placement discussed in the previous chapters.2 Covert Dets and operations have been used in proposed accounts of the various interpretations of Bare Plurals in English, and also of variation among languages in the distribution of Bare NPs (henceforth BNPs) (Longobardi 1994, among many). That is why, after the discussion of the French intensional determinerless NPs in section 2 and the exceptionally extensional ones in section 3, I will briefly present in section 4 the alternative analyses of Chierchia (1998) and Dobrovie-Sorin and Laca (1996), which assume that BNPs are truly determinerless in English, that there are no covert Dets. We will see that the approach proposed here allows us to explain some otherwise stipulative aspects of their analyses. Finally, section 5 will indicate how the variation facts can be tackled: we will see that Italian exhibits another option for realizing Number allowed by the analysis, different altogether from the options of French and English.
2. INTENSIONAL DETERMINERLESS NPs IN FRENCH Curat (1999) gives a very complete inventory of nominal constructions without determiners in French. He also describes their semantic behaviour in detail. I rely extensively on his excellent descriptions of the data and apply my analysis to them.
276 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 2.1. Predicative N
One productive case where the Det may be absent is the Predicative N. The determinerless plombier 'plumber' in (6) is not atomized and cannot refer: rather, it recategorizes homme 'man', indicating that the referent of cet homme belongs to the category PLUMBER, that it has defining properties of the type PLUMBER. In contrast, cet homme and un plombier are coreferent in (7).3
(6)
Cet homme est plombier +#qui s'y connait/que tu connais. This man is [a] plumber who knows about plumbing/that you know.
(7)
Cet homme est un plombier +qui s'y connait/que tu connais. This man is a plumber who knows about plumbing /that you know.
Similarly, as Bolinger (1980b) and Croft (1990) pointed out, voleur 'thief is classifying in (8) and indicates that Jean is a thief by nature, whereas un voleur is individualizing in (9), indicating that Jean has characteristics of a thief but is not necessarily a thief in the professional sense (it could be metaphorical). "With the article, the predicate is characterizing the subject as a particular individual possessing a collection of qualities belonging to the stereotypical thief, though not necessarily being a thief (Croft 1990:102). In other words, (8) is equivalent to Jean steals, whereas (9) asserts that Jean is an actual thief or that he behaves like one. (8)
Jean est voleur.
(9)
Jean est un voleur.
Curat (1999:227-230) remarks that the recategorization done by BNPs explains why some Ns cannot be a determinerless predicative N. Nouns that describe functions appear naturally without a Det (10), but those that describe the nature of beings, their sort (Curat uses the term especes), are normally not very good (11): recategorization at the level of the sort is generally not possible. (10)
Paul est devin, envouteur, magicien, prestigiditateur... Paul is a diviner, worker of spells, magician, conjurer
(11)
#Paul est demon, monstre, ange, genie... Paul is devil, monster, angel, genius
The Omission ofDet 111 However, recategorization is made possible if there is a shift in meaning as in (12a).4 This shift is facilitated by modification as in (12b). Recategorization of a sort is also possible in the context of mythical stories in which characters change their shape at will (13):
(12)
a
II est rat/chien/vache/chameau. He is rat/dog/camel.
b
Marie est vraiment fee, fee a faire cela (#fee qui fait cela). Marie is really a fairy, a fairy that could do that (#fairy that does that).
(13)
la fillette qui devint chienne... the little girl who became [a] bitch
Furthermore, we saw in note 17 of chapter 1 that the very same NP can be used to refer to individuals (pronominalized by //) or to a type (pronominalized by ce). As expected, when the NP refers to an individual, recategorization is possible (14a). When the NP refers to a type (14b), recategorization is impossible, since this latter use corresponds to a presentation as a sort.
(14)
a
Mon fils, il est musicien/?il est un musicien/?il est le musicien. My son, he is musician/he is a musician/he is the musician
b
Mon fils, *c'est musicien/c'est un musicien/c'est le musicien. My son, it is musician/it is a musician/it is the musician
There is another indication that a bare predicative N in French does not involve atomization but only categorization of the argument of the predicative N by the property of the N. When used predicatively, bare Ns agree in Number and Gender just like an adjective (15a). Moreover, the pronoun that replaces them is invariably the unmarked masculine singular le (15b). This same pronoun replaces other elements that express a property, such as ADJs (15c).
(15)
a
La fillette devint chienne et ses soeurs devinrent chiennes aussi.
b
La fillette devint chienne et ses soeurs le devinrent aussi.
The little girl became a bitch and her sisters became bitches too. The little girl became a bitch and her sisters became one too. c
Sophie est heureuse et ses soeurs le sont aussi. Sophie is happy and her sisters are [it] too.
278 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Summarizing, an NP without a Det in French is not atomized and does not refer, but only expresses the property of the N; when used predicatively, it categorizes the subject according to this property. This follows if Det bears Number and Number plays a crucial role in atomization. In English, absence of Det does not mean absence of Number, since it is the N that bears Number. Thus, a BNP is capable of atomization and cannot play the recategorization role of a BNP in French. Therefore, there are no expressions with a bare N corresponding to (6), (8) or (12). The closest we can get is examples with an indefinite Det as in (16) and (17a), which are really more like referential uses as in (7) and (9), or metaphorical as in (17b). (16)
That man is a plumber.
(17)
a
He is a rat/a dog.
b
Get homme-la, c'est un rat. That man, it's a rat.
Though pragmatically odd, something like John is rat is not impossible, but rat does not recategorize as in French; rather, it bears singular Number, and like all bare singulars in English, it gets a universal grinder interpretation (Pelletier & Schubert 1989): John is presented as being made of "rat stuff' as in There was tomato all over the place. See the discussion in section 4.
2.2. Attributive N Following Damourette & Pichon (1911-1950), Noailly (1990) and Curat (1999), I adopt a strictly syntactic definition of "attributive" here: any nominal relating directly to a common N or a proper N, i.e., without a preposition, is attributive. In the construction Det-Ni-Nz, the attribute N? is used to characterize as in (18), to name as in (19), to identify as in (20). (18)
a
un livre evenement a book that is an event, du Kirsch fantaisie fantaisie Kirsch, son cousin dentiste his cousin who is a dentist
b
#mon pere ingenieur (odd because I only have one, not distinctive) my father who is an engineer
c
mon grand-pere ingenieur my grandfather who is an engineer
d
un steak frites a steak with fries
The Omission of Del 279 (19)
le projet Delors the Delorsproject, cette idee tres Guermante that very Guermante idea, le gouvernement Clinton the Clinton goverment
(20)
le mot "chien" the word "dog", le mot "chiens" the word "dogs", 1'espece chien the dog species
The attributive NI can be modified by an adjective, as the Nspapaye, technologie, gris in (21).
(21)
des robes papaye mure ripe papaya dresses, une bicyclette haute technologie a high tech bike, des robes gris sale dirty-grey dresses
As indicated by Kleiber (1985), Forsgren (1991a, 1991b), Curat (1999), this attributive N does not refer, even when it is a proper name. Kleiber shows that in la camarade Catherine 'comrade Catherine' or le projet Delors 'the Delors project', the proper name does not refer, but rather has the semantic import of a denomination predicate like chien in 1'espece chien. This attributive also never can be pronominalized (*Marie la/en veut une robe 'Marie it/of-it wants a dress').5 The fact that a nominal attribute without a Det may not refer, i.e., is not atomized, is expected since Number is required for atomization, and the Number-bearing Det is absent here. The English N itself bears Number, so it cannot characterize directly like an N used attributively as in French (18). English must resort to appositive NPs with a Det as in (22a), or relative clauses in which the NP with a Det is used predicatively as in (22b), or an NP used as a classifier with the preposition of as in (22c). The only case in which a bare N does characterize another N is in an NiNj compound as in (22d), in which N2 characterizes NI. Here, compounding has the effect of shielding N2 from Number marking, so Numberless Na may characterize NI. A proper name used as a characterizing attribute must also appear before the N, forming an N2Ni compound as in (23 a). However, if a proper name is used strictly in its naming function, it appears after the N as in (23b) (compare the Desert Storm operation [=characterizing] with the operation Desert Storm [=naming]); presumably, the proper name does not bear semantic Number in its naming function—it is like a label (see section 3.1 below). As for the use of an N epithet to identify as in French (20), English distinguishes two cases. In the metalinguistic use, atomization by Number is not relevant, so as in French, the N comes after the substantive and bears quotation marks in the writing system (24a). In the nonmetalinguistic use, the N precedes the substantive, contrary to French, with the attribute and the substantive forming an NjNi compound (24b) for the same reason as in (22d): so the Numberless NI may characterize NI.
280 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (22)
(23) (24)
a
my cousin the dentist
b
my cousin who is a dentist
c
an event of a book (= a hell of a book)
d
my dentist cousin, my hero father, the Desert Storm Operation
a
the Delors project, the Clinton government
b
Operation Desert Storm, the Starship Enterprise
a
the word "dog"
b
the dog species
Complex Ns of the form NN are very productive in English. This follows from the fact that the N bears Number in English, so English cannot obtain non-atomization by simply not inserting a Det as in French. To express only the property of the N as an attribute, English embeds the N in a complex N: this renders the N inaccessible for Number marking and referentially opaque. Only then can an N only express its property and be "predicative", as Croft (1990:281) puts it.
2.3. Verbal Expressions There are a number of verbal expressions in French in which an N without a Det immediately follows a verb. Many are fixed expressions and are a bit archaic, but Curat (1999) shows that we cannot dismiss them, because the phenomenon of determinerless direct objects is quite productive with some verbs: faire N 'make', former N 'form', parler N 'talk', ily a N lit. It there has 'there is'. He found 1201 such verbal expressions in volumes 7-9 of Le Tresor de la Langue Francaise, and 48 more from three novels. (25)
a
II y a eu manque certain de coordination. There has been a definite lack of coordination
b
II y aurait violation des traites internationaux sur la liberte des marches. There would be a violation of international treaties on freedom of markets.
c
Paul a fait preuve d'intelligence. Paul gave proof of intelligence.
d
II a fixe une natte formant ecran. He put up a mat forming a screen.
The Omission of Del 281 In these expressions, the bare N does not refer to an extralinguistic object. As Wilmet (1986) observes (following Martin 1983), there is no extensivity—in my terms, no atomization—in expressions likeperdre pied 'to be at a loss', rendre gorge 'to cough up', fairs tapisserie 'to be a wallflower': these are "intensional" uses. More precisely, in an example like (25d), there is an object classified as a screen, but it is the mat which acts temporarily as a screen, there is no independent object being referred to which is a screen and remains independent of the referent of the mat. This is clear in a contrastive pair as in (26).
(26)
a
Jean forme un ecran devant Paul. John forms a screen in front of Paul.
b
Jean forme ecran devant Paul. John screens/shields Paul.
With a Det, the object referred to by un ecran has an existence independent of the process, either before, after, or during it: in (26a), there is an object which is acting as a screen. It could be anything, including Jean. But if there is no Det as in (26b), the object characterized as a screen by ecran is not an independent object: Jean must be acting as a screen and ecran has no reference. So once again, we see that the effect of the absence of a Number-bearing Det is that there is no atomization, hence no reference. It is also clear from the examples in (25)-(26) that a nominal expression without a Det can be an argument: thus, the verb forme has the same relation with ecran in (26b) as it does with un ecran in (26a). A Det is a requirement for extensional referentiality but not for argumenthood, which are different matters and must be clearly distinguished. A verbal expression of this type is not particularly exceptional, given the way Number is realized in French. The semantics of these expressions restricts their use to particular contexts, but they are fairly productive, as indeed the figures provided by Curat indicate. These expressions should not be confused with fixed verbal expressions as in (27), which are said to be noncompositional (though I doubt this is really the case in most of these: figurative does not necessarily mean noncompositional):
(27)
a
II est sans le sou. He is penniless.
b
Iln'apas Iatetea9a. He's not into it.
282 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Nominals in expressions like these often have a Det in French. This is compatible with my analysis. I am not saying that nominals in all verbal expressions must not have a Det. Rather, if no Det is present, the nominal is not atomized and its referentiality is affected as indicated above. What takes place in noncompositional fixed expressions—if they exist at all—is another matter. As for English, it has few verbal expressions similar to (25)-(26), with a categorizing nominal.
(28) take care, take advantage, give birth, do no evil (*don't do evil), play ball (play *(some) music), have no fear (*don't have fear), lose faith Expressions like these are not productive, due to the fact that bare Ns bear Number in English: they are atomized and as such are excluded from verbal expressions with a categorization effect.
2.4. N de N
In the French construction Nj de N2, it is very common for the N2 to appear without a Det. (29)
a
un uniforme de general a general's uniform
b
un uniforme du general/d'un general a uniform of the general/of a general
c
une montre de dame a ladie 's watch
d
une montre de la dame/d'une dame a watch of the ladie 's/ofa ladie
The category of the N2 does not define a referential class, but characterizes the object named by NI. This is clear in examples like (30), in which our knowledge of the world is such that it would be an absudity to have a referent for cheval, as noted by Guillaume 1939 (1992: 290). (30)
a
b
les dents de cheval de Juliette
#Quel cheval?
Juliette's horse teeth
What horse?
la queue de cheval de Juliette Juliette'sponey tail (lit. horse tail)
c
#Quel cheval? Whatponey?
une fievre de cheval
#Quel cheval?
A horse fever
What horse?
The Omission ofDet 283 In (29)-(30), general, dame and cheval are morphologically singular, but nonspecified for semantic Number. This singular is not opposed to plural, but is the unmarked form in French.6 My hypothesis is that Number on N is never semantically active in French. However, there are some cases in which NI is plural and it refers.
(31)
des uniformes de generaux
generals' uniforms
In contrast with instances of nonreferential Nj, which do not allow relative clauses (32a), the N2 as in (31) can be relativized. There are even cases in which a singular N without a Det accepts a relative clause, as in (32d).
(32)
a
des uniformes de general #qui passe les troupes en revue
b
des uniformes de generaux qu'on a fusilles
uniforms of a general who reviews troops
uniforms of generals that were shot c
des photos de chevaux qui courent photos of horses that run
d
un uniforme de general qu'on a fusille a uniform of a general that was shot
These examples appear to be "false" determinerless Ns because they result from a rule discussed by Arnaud & Lancelot and extended by Gross (1967): de+de(s) is rewritten as de, i.e., when we expect a sequence with the preposition de followed by an indefinite determiner de or des, we get the simple form de. The rule is just descriptive, as Bonnard (1978) and Curat (1999) remark. It is not clear whether it has a phonetic or a semantic origin, though the semantic thesis is supported by the fact that a referential indefinite N which has a Det cannot be embedded as the complement of another indefinite, even in the singular:
(33)
a
*des queues de des chevaux noirs-^ des queues de chevaux noirs tails of black horses
b
*un cri d'un animal qu'on egorge.^ un cri d'animal qu'on egorge. a shout of an animal this is being slaughtered.
284 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces So the fact that N2 refers in (31) and (32b-d) could be due to this Regie de Port-Royal which is responsible for the superficial absence of Det. The role of indefiniteness is confirmed by the fact that the rule is not triggered if the first Det is definite: the second Det does not drop in (34).
(34)
a
lesuniformes des generaux/?degenerauxqu'on a fusilles the uniforms of generals that were shot
b
II poussa le cri d'un animal/*d'animal qu'on egorge. He let out the shout of an animal this is being slaughtered.
Whatever the fine details of the rule, the absence of Det on the surface in some NI de N2 sequences seems to come from a form of ellipsis rather than from the strict absence of the Det. The ellipsis rule allows us to recover the information carried by a Det bearing Number. In contrast, a "truly" determinerless N2—one not resulting from the Regie de Port-Royal—does not refer in the NI de N2 construction, as predicted. In comparison, the English construction NI o/Ni requires a Det for the N2, or it is replaced by a Genitive phrase with a Det: (35)
a
He bought the uniform of a general/ a general's uniform,
b
?He bought a uniform of a general.
Note that the nominal with two indefinites in (35b) is odd in English as it is in French. Because of the Det, the uses in (35a) do not correspond to a characterization of NI by N2 as in the NI de N2 sequences in (29), but rather to French constructions with a Det in which the NP is referential but generic. English can express a plain characterization with a bare N, but as we saw in section 2.2, it then appears embedded as the first element of an NN compound: (36)
a pony tail, a dog house
2.5. N a N In the construction NI a N2, N2 is generally without a Det. This N2 can be a singular count Noun (37a), a plural count noun (37b), or a mass noun (37c):
The Omission ofDet 285 (37)
a b
bolte a clapet clack box, bolte a soupape box with a valve bolte a ordures garbage can, boite a compartiments box with compartments, boite a dominos domino box, boite a motifs jaunes box with yellow patterns
c
boite a chocolat chocolate box, boite a sable sand box, boite a sel salt box
Other nouns that appear productively as NI are cage 'cage', cuiller 'spoon', couteau 'knife', fourchette 'fork',pelle 'shovel' (Curat 1999:215-216). N2 provides information about the type of object that NI designates. For instance, in the case of a box, we can indicate a mechanism which is specific to it, or its potential content, shape, color, etc. The Na does not refer to some object but is intensional: it indicates a virtuality. Thus, as Curat notes (ibidem), une boite a ordures could be empty and could never have had a content, have never been used, as in J'ai achete une nouvelle bolte a ordures 'I bought a new garbage can'. Moreover, though the shape, pattern, mechanism, are usually effective, not just virtual, they are nevertheless presented as virtual because the N? is without a Det. Thus, we could describe an assembly line in a factory as in (38) even though the boxes do not yet have the attributes of the N2. In fact, the boxes may not yet exist at all. (38)
Ici, nous fabriquons les boites a compartiments/a motifs jaunes/a valve... Here, we make the boxes with compartments/with yellow patterns/with a valve...
When the Na is marked for plural as in boite a compartiments 'box with compartments' and fourchettes a huitres 'oyster fork', it does not express that there is more than one object to which compartiments or huitres refer, but rather indicates that the virtual reference of N2, the set from which it would take its referent, is not a set of individual objects but a set of pluralities, of groups of objects: thus, each box is assigned an array of compartments. (Curat 1999. 217; see also Kamp 1981, Heim 1989, En9 1991, Chierchia 1998, among many others; on pluralities (plural individuals), see Link 1983, Landman 1991, Chierchia 1998, and the discussion of (83) below). The absence of Det on Na is not due to some extension of the Regie de Port-Royal which would proscribe the presence of an indefinite after a as it does after de in the sequence NI de N2. As the following examples show, embedding an indefinite as a complement of a is generally possible when it does not involve the construction NI a A^: here, a sequence a des or a une is fine. (39)
Les protestataires se sont enchatnes a un arbre centenaire/a des arbres centenaires. The protestors chained themselves to a centenarian tree I to centenarian trees.
286 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces Moreover, if there was an implicit Det, we would expect relativization to be possible; but this is not the case:
(40)
a
la boite a compartments #qui ferment a cle the box with compartments that close with a key
b
la boite avec des compartiments qui ferment a cle the box with some compartments that close with a key
(41)
a
la boite a ordures #qui sont biodegradables the can for trashes that are biodegradable
b
la boite pour les ordures qui sont biodegradables the can for the trashes that are biodegradable
The fact that Na is interpreted as being virtual in Nj a N2 is due to the absence of Det because it implies the absence of Number. This interpretation is not possible if a Det is present in French, because Det bears Number and there is atomization, and so Det+N2 is interpreted as extensional rather than virtual. In English, since the N bears Number, such an intensional use is expressed through an N2Ni compound, because this compounding has the effect of shielding Na from Number marking. We therefore get N2Ni compounds with N2 bearing no Number even in the case of plural individuals being interpreted as virtual.
(42)
garbage can, cartridge box, oyster fork
2.6. Negation and Privative Elements It has long been observed that Det can easily be omitted in the context of negation (43) or with a privative element such as sans (44)Jamais, and plus, or the quantifier aucun (45).7
(43)
a
Paul a des/*de dettes. Paul has debts.
b
Paul n'a pas de dettes. Paul doesn 't have any debts.
The Omission of Del 287 (44)
a
II est revenu sans argent. Re came back without (any) money.
b
Sans pleurs, que sait-on de la vie? Without cries, what do we know about life?
c
* Avec pleurs, que sait-on de la vie? With cries, what do we know about life?
(45)
a
Je n'ai jamais pose de questions a son sujet. / never asked any questions about him.
a'
*J'ai souvent pose des/*de questions a son sujet. I often asked questions about him.
b
Je ne veux plus d'enfant. I don't want children anymore.
b'
Je veux des/*d'enfants. I want children.
c
Aucun ouvrier ne possedait de revolver. No worker owned a gun.
These constructions with negation/privation have two different interpretations. First, the negation/privation may be interpreted as involving no referent. As Curat (1999:237) points out, due to the negative/privative nature of the construction, at the end of the process described by the sentence, there may be no referent of the category of the N in the reference situation. As predicted by the present analysis, this correlates with the absence of a Det bearing Number. The sentences in (43)-(45) are examples of this first interpretation. The other possibility is for the negation/privation to be interpreted as bearing on a referent that exists prior to the process, as in (46), in which the utterance orders one to make the referent disappear. As predicted, the referential interpretation of the expression correlates with the presence of a Det bearing Number.
(46)
Ne faites pas cette tete! (Lit.: Do not make that head!) Don't look so glum\
The following pairs of sentences bring out the contrast very clearly (examples from Curat 1999:236). With no Det bearing Number, there is absence of thorns and of stones in (47a), whereas thorns and stones are present but not perceived in (47b). In (48a), no money at all is
288 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces present, whereas there is a specific amount or bills of money missing in (48b). There is no wind or rain in (49a), so I carry on, whereas there is wind and rain in (49b), but I don't feel them.
(47)
a
Nous ne sentons pas d'epines ni de pierres. We do not feel thorns or stones.
b
La plante de nos pieds durcit, nous ne sentons plus les epines ni les pierres. The sole of our feet hardens, we no more feel the thorns nor the stones.
(48)
a
Sans argent, que pouvait-il faire? Without money, what could he do?
b
Sans 1'argent, que pouvait-il faire? Without the money, what could he do?
(49)
a
Ne sentant ni pluie ni vent, je poursuivais ma route. Feeling neither rain nor wind, I went my way.
b
Ne sentant ni la pluie ni le vent, je poursuivais ma route. Feeling neither the rain nor the wind, I went my way.
In the English translations in (47)-(49), the absence of referent in a negative or privative sentence appears to be expressed by simply removing the Det, just as in French. However, BNPs in English can easily get a Kind interpretation, as we will see in section 4. Therefore, I assume that the English BNPs in (47)-(49) actually refer, but to Kinds. English also resorts to other strategies: it uses the negative polarity item any or the negative Det no. (50)
(51)
(52)
a
Paul doesn't have any debts,
b
Paul has no debts.
a
He came back without any money,
b
He came back with no money.
a
I never asked any questions about him.
b
I don't want any children/I don't want children anymore,
c
No worker owned a gun.
Summarizing these sections on nonreferring Determinerless NPs, we saw that in the absence of a Det, there is no atomization in French. Because there is lack of atomization, the expression cannot be used to refer, though it retains its denotation.8 In other words, in order to refer (i.e., to
The Omission ofDet 289 pick out a particular entity in the class of entities denoted by the N), an N must be atomized. So an N with a Det may be used to refer, but an N without a Det may not. This has some effects on pronominalization. When a nominal has a Det, even in the context of negation, a pronoun may be interpreted as coreferential with this nominal: thus, the pronoun elk may refer to the same individual as the nominal so/la voiture in (53). (53)
Jean n'a pas sa/la voiture parce qu'elle est en panne. Jean does not have his/the car because it is out of order.
On the other hand, when there is no Det and therefore no atomization, the pronoun elle is inappropriate: in (54a), voiture denotes but does not refer, so there is no individual to which elle could refer and the sentence is odd.9 However, a pronoun may be linked with voiture if the pronoun relates to the denotation of voiture, that is, to the Kind that voiture defines. Thus, a generically used plural pronoun such as les in (54b), or a pronoun lexically specified as Kindoriented, such as ca in (54c), is acceptable.
(54)
a
#Jean n'a pas de voiture parce qu'elle est en panne. Jean does not have a car because it is out of order.
b
Jean n'a pas de voiture parce qu'il les trouve polluantes. Jean does not have a car because he finds them too polluting.
c
Jean n'a pas de voiture parce qu'il trouve ?a trop polluant. Jean does not have a car because he finds that too polluting.
3. REFERENTIAL DETERMINERLESS NPs IN FRENCH Determinerless NPs are not atomized in French because, when Det is absent, semantic Number is absent, so the capacity of these NPs to refer is affected. However, determinerless NPs can refer in French in some cases. I maintain that these NPs are without a Det, even covertly. The referential potential of these NPs arises not from atomization but from some restricted semantic/pragmatic conditions. The fact that these conditions are necessary for these NPs to refer confirms that they are truly determinerless. I present six notable cases in which a nominal refers despite the absence
290 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces of Det: words in contact with the referent, deictic NPs, proper names, a single Det with several coordinated Ns, determinerless coordinated Ns, and Ns preceded by de+AD]. Again, most of the examples are taken from Curat (1999), and I rely extensively on his discussions.
3.1. Contact of the Word with the Referent
When the N is in direct contact with the referent or its representation, there is no need to have a Det with Number to induce atomization in order to pick a particular referent from the class of the N: the direct contact already identifies a referent. This direct contact can be established through the graphic representation of the N. For instance, when the N is an actual label on an object, its graphic representation is stuck onto the referent or its container: this is found on products to identify their content as in (55a) or their ingredients as in (55b), and also in visual dictionaries, on geographical maps, etc. Curat even puts in this group an N which "labels" what precedes it in the sentence as in (56).
(55)
a
quinine quinine., lessive soap, lait milk, confitures de fraises strawberry jam, jus de raisin grape juice
b
eau, graines de moutarde, vin blanc, sel, epices water, mustard seeds, white wine, slat, spices
(56)
"Dans le sixieme arrondissement, la rue Ferou, venelle tranquille reliant le jardin du Luxembourg a 1'eglise Saint-Sulpice, semblait intouchable. Erreur" (Le Monde 2348:11) In the sixth arrondissement, Ferou street, [a] quiet alley linking the jardin du Luxembourg to the church of Saint-Sulpice, seemed untouchable. [What a] mistake...
Similarly, an N which indicates the destination of a bus, a train or an envelope identifies a referent which is in direct relation with the object on which the N is placed. (Our knowledge of the world tells us that aeroport written on a bus identifies the destination of the bus and does not name the bus.) (57)
a
aeroport airport, centre-ville downtown
b
Professeur Tournesol, Chateau de Moulinsart, France Professor Tournesol, Chateau of Moulinsart, France
The Omission of Dei 291 Titles of books, films, etc, name the work with a classifier (58a) or a label of content (58b).
(58)
a
Mmanach Almanac, Atlas Atlas, Bibliographic Bibliography, Dictionnaire Dictionary, Precis Summary
b
Guide d'identification des oiseaux de 1'Amerique du Nord (Scott) Guide for the Identification of Birds of North America Annuaire telephonique de la ville de Quebec (Bell Canada) Telephone Directory of the City of Quebec Histoire de la sexualite (Foucault) History of Sexuality Contes et legendes d'Anjou (Levron) Tales and Legends ofAnjou
Curat (1999:200) notes the subtle difference between a title without a Det, which names the content of the work, and a title with a Det, which introduces its subject matter. Thus, the titles in (59) announce that the works contain a collection of the electoral laws or of photos and descriptions of Mayan costumes, whereas the titles in (60) announce a commentary on these laws, such as their foundations and their history, and a commentary on these costumes, such as their origins, their uses. (59)
a
Legislation electorale federale Federal Electoral Legislation
b
Costumes mayas d'aujourd'hui (Lehmann) Mayan Costumes of Today
(60)
a
La legislation electorale federale The Federal Electoral Legislation
b
Le costume paysan dans la region de Quebec au XVIIs siecle (Audet) The Peasant Costume in the Region of Quebec in the XVIfh Century
Not only can the N be in contact with its referent through its graphic representation, it can also establish a contact by invectives and interpellations which are directed at a referent present in the discourse situation, i.e., the hearer, as in (61). As Curat (1999:203) remarks, if the insult is aimed
292 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces at a person who is not present, the Det shows up as in (62): thus, all the insults with a Det studied by Ruwet (1982) are directed at a third person.10
(61)
a
Pignoufs! Egoi'stes! Moules agaufres! Troglodytes! Polygraphes! Boors! Egoists! Waffle irons! Troglodytes! Polygraphs!
b
Ami, viens la. Cousin, ou est la beche? Gar9on! Taxi! [My]friend,
(62)
come here. Cousin, where is the spade? Waiter! Taxi!
Vingt mille Sabords!... Une cigarette allumee!... Ah! Les malappris! (Herge) Twenty thousand portholes!... A lighted cigarette!... Ah! The louts!
Determinerless nominals are also used as exclamations that describe a person positively (63a) or "label" a situation (63b): (63)
a
jovial gargon! jovial boy!
b
Je croyais avoir compris ce qui se passait. Grave erreur! / thought I understood what was going on. Big mistake!
These examples in which an N without a Det may be used to refer to a particular object do not contradict the double hypothesis that Number is crucial for atomization, hence reference to an object, and that Number is realized on Det in French. On the contrary, they support the analysis: reference without a Det is only possible if it is determined by extralinguistic factors, such as when the graphic representation of the N is stuck on the referent, or when the N is addressed to the hearer. Since the referent is present, there is no need to make it explicit through language, i.e., no need to identify the referent through the process of atomization induced by Number.11
3.2. Deictic NPs The reference of some NPs is not free, but is deictic: it is established in relation to the deictic center ME/HERE/NOW defined by the speaker. Thus, aujourd'hui 'today' names the day of the speech act, hier 'yesterday' names the day that precedes it, and demain 'tomorrow' names the one that follows. These Ns can be used without a Det bearing Number since their reference is established on independent grounds. The same holds for the determinerless use of the names of
The Omission ofDet 293 weekdays: their referent is determined with respect to the day the utterance is made. Thus, in (64a), lundi refers to a Monday that precedes or follows the moment of speech depending on the tense of the verb, which is also determined on the basis of the moment of speech (Reichenbach 1947). On the other hand, the name of a weekday occurring with a Det as in (64b,c) is not deictic, it is not situated with respect to the moment of speech: its referent is determined by an atomization process triggered by the Number of the Det.12
(64)
a
Lundi etait/sera un j our tri ste. Monday was/will be a sad day.
b
Le lundi etait un jour triste. The Monday was a sad day. Mondays were sad days,
c
Les lundis etaient des jours tristes. Mondays were sad days.
This confirms the analysis: reference established on the basis of extralinguistic factors like deixis does not require a Det. However, a Det with Number is required when there are no extralinguistic factors to identify the referent directly. In English, as seen in the translation of (64c), cases that require Number in this way trigger the appearance of Number on N, as predicted.
3.3. Proper Names
Many proper names are apparently not subject to the requirement that Number must minimally be present for a nominal expression to refer to a particular individual. Thus, even though Number is realized on Det in French, no Det is needed for proper names like Jean or Marie to refer. (65)
Jean aime Marie. Jean loves Marie.
As we saw in chapter 2, proper names differ significantly from common nouns. A proper name does not denote a class of objects on the basis of a common property, but usually names a referent directly (as shown among others by Kripke 1972, Kleiber 1981, Lyons 1977).13 Since a
294 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces proper name directly designates a particular individual, somewhat like a label as in section 3.1 above, Number is not required to trigger atomization: the direct designation is sufficient to identify the actant involved in the event described by the sentence. Consequently, many proper names are without a Det in both French and English. However, there are important classes of proper names that have a Det in French:
(66)
la France France, le Pacifique the Pacific, la Seine the Seine
Guillaume (1919: 290) made the following observations (Longobardi (1987) makes similar observations about Italian):
(67)
Bare proper names: cities, villages, boroughs, islands, humans, animals. Proper names with Det states, provinces, countries, seas, deserts, oceans, rivers.
The generalization, which is very old according to Curat (1999:255), seems to be that if the referent is conceptualized as a point, no Det is needed. But if the referent is conceptualized as a surface, then a Det is required. According to Noailly (1994), in this latter case, the referent is not clearly defined, its borders are vague and the proper name cannot be directly linked with the referent: a Det is required to capture its totality and its singularity. This requirement is explained under my hypothesis that Det bears Number and that the grammaticalization of Number has an atomization effect, hence an identification effect for the referent. Note that the same proper names of surfaces appear without a Det when they are used as labels on maps. They are then words in direct contact with a representation of their referent, so that the referent is directly identified as we saw in section 3.1.14 In English, in contrast with French, proper names associated with a referent which is conceptualized as a surface do not take a Det.
(68)
France, Egypt, Texas, Wyoming, Ontario, Provence
It is likely that surfaces are conceptualized in the same way by speakers of both languages, so that English proper names of surfaces also require Number for the appropriate identification of the referent. But since Number is on the N in English, no Det is required.15
The Omission ofDet 295 Summarizing, proper names that directly name a referent do not define a referential category the way common nouns do. Therefore, there is no need to identify an individual out of a set, either through atomization by Number or a definiteness feature, so these proper names do not have a Det. On the other hand, proper names which are not conceptualized as a point do not directly name a referent since the referent is not clearly defined. A process of atomization is required, i.e., grammaticalization of Number. This forces the presence of Det in French since Det bears Number, but not in English since N bears Number.
3.4. A Single Det and Coordinated Ns It is possible to coordinate several Ns which are dependents of a single Det. If the Det is singular, there is a co-classification of a single referent (69a). Similarly, as indicated by Grevisse (1986: §668), a single plural Det can combine with several coordinated plural Ns only if the set is seen as forming a whole (69b). A plural Det with singular Ns expresses a complementary classification in a particular field (70). (69)
a
[un [collegue, ami et voisin]] a colleague, friend and neighbour
b
[les [officiers, sous-officiers et soldats]] the officers, petty officers and soldiers
(70)
Trouvez-moi [[les [nom, prenom, age et adresse] de ce monsieur]]. Find me the name, first name, age and address of that man.
The structure of these coordinations raises no particular problem, since they can be analysed syntactically as indicated by the brackets. The fact that it is the Number expressed by the Det which matches with the number of referents in French, not the actual number of coordinated Ns, is expected under my analysis. 3.5. Determinerless Coordinated Ns French allows the coordination of NPs without any Det.
296 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (71)
a
Officiers et soldats repugnaient a cette besogne. Officers and soldiers hated that task.
b
*Officiers et autres soldats y repugnaient. Officers and other soldiers hated that task.
c
Les officiers et autres soldats y repugnaient. The officers and other soldiers hated that task.
d
*Officiers ou soldats y repugnaient. Officers or soldiers hated that task.
e
*Officiers et soldats y repugnaient, les autres non. Officers and soldiers hated it, the others didn 't.
Curat (1999:315-320) summarizes the main properties of this construction. The coordinate bare Ns define classes which are complementary and exclusive. These classes are understood as forming a system which saturates the class of the whole. If we assume with Curat that there is a COMMUNITY which unites the elements of a system, as well as a COMPLEMENTARITY, which supposes an OPPOSITION, then it is not possible to have a Det when there is reference to such a system: "a single determiner combines the referents and crushes the features of COMPLEMENTARITY and of OPPOSITION, with two [determiners] we lose the feature of COMMUNITY."16 In addition, note that this construction is only possible with the conjunction et 'and', not with ou 'or' (71d): enumeration is therefore a key factor. In my terms, given that it is necessary to express Number in order to atomize a set—in this case the set formed by the system of coordinated substantives—we can suppose that the Number is provided by this enumeration itself. In short, whereas the extension of a nominal expression is usually defined by the properties of the N, and its extensity (the quantity of individuals to which it is applied) by the atomization induced by the Number on Det, in this construction of determinerless coordinated Ns, the extension of the expression is defined by the saturated system formed by the coordinated bare Ns, and its extensity is determined by the enumeration itself. Thus, (7la) fulfills all these conditions, as long as soldats is interpreted as "simple soldiers" and not as a hyperonym of which officiers would be a subcategory, as in (71b), which does not satisfy the condition of complementarity. With a Det, complementarity is not necessary (71c). In (71d), no enumeration provides an extensity, nor a Det bearing Number, hence the ungrammaticality.17 In (71e), les autres indicates that officiers et soldats does not constitute a saturated system: there is no extension on which to apply the extensity of the enumeration, hence the ungrammaticality.
The Omission ofDet 297 3.6. de + prenominal Adjective When an ADJ is prenominal and is preceded by partitive de, the Det may be absent: so we get either de, or de+les (which reduces to des).ls With a postnominal ADJ, the partitive must obligatorily be accompanied by a Det bearing Number, resulting in the portmanteau form des.
(72)
a
Je n'ecoute que de vieux disques. / only listen to old records.
b
Je n'ecoute que des vieux disques.
c
*Je n'ecoute que de disques vieux.
d
Je n'ecoute que des disques vieux. / only listen to records that are old.
(73)
a
Je ne mange que dejeunes epinards. / only eat young spinach.
(74)
b
Je ne mange que des jeunes epinards.
a
II n'y pousse que de mauvaises herbes. There only grows bad grasses [=\veeds] there.
b
II n'y a que des mauvaises herbes, pas de croix. There are only bad grasses [=weeds], no cross.
(75)
a
Paul ne vend que de faux diamants. Paul only sells fake diamonds.
b
Paul ne vend que des faux diamants. Paul only sells diamonds that are fake.
(76)
a
II ne consulte que de sages femmes. He only consults wise women.
b
II ne consulte que des sages femmes. He only consults midwives.
Curat notes that the alternation between [de Adj N] and [des Adj N] always gives rise to a meaning difference. Thus, (72a) contrasts records which are old with other records, whereas (72b) contrasts old records with any other thing we can listen to. Similarly, (73a) excludes old spinach, whereas (73b) excludes all other food. In (74a), mauvaises herbes 'weeds' is opposed to good plants; on the other hand, in (74b), mauvaises herbes is only opposed to croix, and de would
298 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces be inappropriate here since it would indicate an opposition to good plants, which would not be coherent with the opposition signaled by pas de croix. Faux diamants is opposed to other diamonds in (75a), but to any other merchandise in (75b). The sentences in (76) show that this contrast in meaning is only possible if the ADJ is not lexicalized with the N: whereas in (76b) sages femmes is understood as 'midwife', in (76a) the expression can only be understood in its nonlexicalized meaning as 'wise women'. In order to explain this alternation, we must have a good understanding of what distinguishes prenominal and postnominal adjectives. As we saw in chapter 2, the combination N+ADJ defines two sets, each with its own property, and a fortuitous, nonnecessary intersection of these sets. On the other hand, the combination ADJ+N defines a single set of individuals exhibiting two properties presented as necessarily linked, forming a natural class or Kind. With this in mind, we see that the alternation between de and des in (72)-(76) can be explained by this characteristic of prenominal ADJs—together with the N they define a single class of individuals. The partitive de defines a subclass of a set. Applied to a set defined by a complex of properties such as ADJ+N, de can partition the set into subclasses related to these properties: thus, de vieux disques isolates the subclass vieux in the class named by disques. This quantifies the referent by isolating a certain portion of the extension of the class defined by the combination ADJ+N, an effect similar to the atomization of the set induced by Number. Therefore, Number is not required, and neither is the Det. When Number is present, in the form des (de+les), the class defined by ADJ+N is not partitioned: des vieux disques is therefore a part of a contextually defined broad set (things we can listen to because of the verb ecoute) inside of which des vieux disques is opposed to "something else." As for the ungrammaticality of *Je n 'ecoute que de disques vieux, it follows from the impossibility of partitioning either disques vieux, which already is partitioned, or disques alone, which does not present a double property that could serve as the basis for a partition.
4. THE INTERPRETATION OF DETERMINERLESS NPs IN ENGLISH We have seen that, in French, the absence of a Det generally implies the absence of atomization (section 2), except when some very restricted semantic/pragmatic factors allow a determinerless nominal to function as a fully referential argument (section 3). This follows directly from the fact
The Omission ofDet 299 that Number is expressed on the Det in French: if no Det is present, Number is not expressed and hence atomization is not induced. If we turn to English, the fact that the N bears semantic Number predicts that a nominal expression without a Det can be atomized. This is indeed the case: English allows referring bare NPs (BNPs) much more easily than French. However, matters are complicated by the fact that English BNPs can get three different readings: BNPs can be interpreted as a Kind, since they can be arguments of Kind-denoting predicates (77a), as a generic as in (77b), or as a weak indefinite with an episodic predicate (77c) (also referred to as the existential reading): (77)
a
Beavers are on the verge of extinction. (Kind)
b
Cats are mammals, (generic)
c
Dogs are barking outside, (weak indefinite)
No agreement has been reached on how to account for the fact that BNPs can receive three different interpretations. There are two main approaches. First, in his seminal work, Carlson (1980) argues that a BNP is the name of a Kind: as a name, it functions as an individual, which accounts directly for the Kind interpretation as in (77a). Carlson (1980:65) assumes that the generic interpretation in (77b) is obtained inferentially: "We deny that there is either a quantifier associated with the bare plural NP itself, or with the predicates of the various generic sentences. Our semantics will essentially tell us that Dogs bark is true iff the individual Kind denoted by dogs is in the set of things that bark. From this statement we may infer quantification over particular dogs, or events in which a dog is barking, but we do not represent in the semantic interpretation of the sentence how we go about determining the evidence of the claim." Finally, he assumes that the weak indefinite interpretation (77c) also does not arise from any quantification in the semantic representations, but is inferred from the use of a BNP to make a claim about one or more of the stages of the Kind: so in (77c), the claim is about some stages of the scattered entity that comprises all dogs. This analysis has been challenged by many authors who assume that BNPs are ambiguous (see for instance Farkas & Sugioka 1983, Diesing 1992, Kratzer 1995, Wilkinson 1995). Under this type of analysis, BNPs denote Kinds when used with Kind-denoting predicates. In most cases, under this approach, BNPs function as indefinites: they are interpreted as expressions that introduce a variable that is bound either by existential closure or by a default generic quantifier. The three different interpretations for a BNP illustrated in (77) thus each correspond to a different
300 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces semantic representation. This kind of analysis has lead some authors to propose syntactic correlates for these different semantic representations. For instance, Longobardi (1994) assumes that the existential interpretation as in (77c) is the result of the default existential interpretation of an empty Det. An analysis is too permissive and not sufficiently explanatory if it allows us to postulate both overt and covert Dets that are semantically active or inert. Moreover, the distribution of Det is not an isolated property, but depends on how Number is realized in a language. We would like an account to reflect that Number is a key factor: ideally, the independently motivated differences in Number realization should account for the crosslinguistic variations in the presence of Det as well as the interpretive properties of BNPs. I cannot go into all the details of the highly complex topic of BNPs: the theoretical issues are profound, and the range of facts is wide, with variation across languages that seems to involve very different strategies (see for instance Cheng & Sybesma (1999) on Chinese and Ghomeshi (1997) on Persian). However, it may be useful to give some brief indication of the general direction of inquiry my approach suggests. Consider first the recent revivals of the Carlsonian approach in Chierchia (1998) and DobrovieSorin & Laca (1996). They assume, as I do, that English BNPs are determinerless and thus offer a line of argumentation that is more compatible with the' one I am adopting. Both assume that, in English, an N can denote either a property (it's a predicate) or a Kind (it's an argument). It is generally assumed that a Kind is the collective entity made up of all the individuals having the property denoted by an N. Both proposals follow Chierchia (1984) and present a Kind as a "nominalization" of such a property/predicate. A nominalized property may come to denote the collective entity made up of all the individuals verifying the property: this "nominalization" directly accounts for the Kind reading (77a). Their approach to the generic reading is based on the observation that predication on collective NPs can apply distributively to the singular entities of which the collectivity is made; Kinds can be generic, they claim, because they are a particular type of collective entity. No Gen operator is required to obtain the generic interpretation. As for the existential reading, Chierchia assumes that "whenever an object-level argument slot in a predicate is filled by a Kind (in an episodic frame), the type of the predicate is automatically adjusted by introducing a (local) existential quantification over instances of the kind." DobrovieSorin & Laca have a similar account: "On their property denotation, BNPs function as predicates that restrict an existentially-bound variable that is independently introduced via the argument structure of the main predicate."
The Omission of Dei 301 Chierchia's and Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca's analyses are therefore "neocarlsonian," in that they follow Carlson's proposal that genericity is inferred by looking distributively at the individuals instantiating a Kind for evidence for the claim made by the sentence. The idea is fairly common in studies on French. For instance, Guillaume (1919) (cited by Wilmet 1986) assumes that genericity has no linguistic status, but is only an upper limit of logical order on general reference. See also Kleiber (1981,1985), who assumes that without a situational anchoring, reference tends to be as wide as possible. In French, many different Dets can express genericity, which is likely one reason why the idea that the generic reading is created by the presence of a Gen operator has not been widely accepted by French scholars. It is perceived as unlikely that such a device is common to all these Det elements. For example, Kleiber (1981) says that when the Det is plural definite les as in les castors in (78), the referent of the NP can be the totality of what can be named by the substantive. Assuming that a definite Det corresponds to the iota operator of Russell (1905), the largest member of the set defined by BEAVER, if there is no particular situational anchoring, is the whole set of individuals.
(78)
Les castors construisent des barrages. Beavers build dams.
Genericity can also be obtained by singular le: the NP then names the Kind—it is taxonomic rather than individualizing. (79)
Le castor construit des barrages. The beaver builds dams.
It is also possible for singular indefinite un to express genericity—a common property is then distributed to each individual of the class.
(80)
Un castor construit des barrages. A beaver builds of the dams.
302 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces When plural indefinite des expresses genericity, a common property is distributed not to individuals but to subsets of varying sizes: so (81) suggests that beavers don't act alone, or that only subspecies of beavers build dams, not all of them. (81)
Des castors construisent des barrages. [Some] beavers build dams.
Even cardinal numbers can be generic (Corblin 1987): in (82), there are pairs of beavers distributed over the whole referential class. (82)
Deux castors s'accouplent au printemps. Two beavers mate in Spring.
These different ways of obtaining a generic reading are explained naturally in the model for the domain of quantification which is now fairly standardly assumed (Link 1983, Landman 1991, Chierchia 1998): besides ordinary singular individuals, the domain also contains plural individuals (represented here as sets), including the superset. Singular individuals are at the bottom of the representation, plural individuals are in curly brackets. (83)
(a, b, c, d)
{a, b} {a, c} (a, d} {a, b, c} {a, b, d} (a, c, d) {b, c} {b, d} {b, c, d} {c, d} a
b
e
d
The plural definite les castors in its largest extension as in (78) corresponds to the set on the top line. So does le castor in (79), but it names the Kind corresponding to this plurality. Un castor in (80) corresponds to any of the single individuals on the bottom line, taken as a representative sample of the Kind. Des castors in (81) corresponds to any of the pluralities on the middle line, also taken as a representative sample. Finally, deux castors in (82) picks out sets of two among the pluralities on the middle line and presents them as representative samples. As Chierchia (1998) notes, the property of being an instance of a Kind does not differentiate between singular and plural instances. Fido is as good an instance of the dog-Kind as Fido and Barky are. With this in mind, consider again the three English examples in (77). We can now explain why in English BNPs can be "nominalizations" of the property of the N, that is, why they can be Kinds
The Omission of Del 303 as in (77a), but in French they cannot: it follows from the independently motivated difference in how Number is expressed in these languages. Generally, a common noun expresses a property which defines a superset, and a subset is defined by atomization through the means of Number. To obtain a Kind reading for an NP, the NP must refer to the totality of instances denoted by the N. For example, in the model in (83), this means that the atomization by the plural Number bears on the individuals a, b, c and d. This corresponds to the superset {a, b, c, d}. Therefore, the subset determined by atomization and the superset coincide: the atomization corresponds to the whole collectivity. That is why we have the effect that the set is presented as an individual concept. In French, the N defines a superset and the semantic Number on Det "individualizes" the class. In English however, Number is realized on the N. This lack of independence in the grammatical expression of the subset and superset is what lies behind the "nominalization" effect in English, the noun itself both delimits the class and individualizes it. I assume along with Chierchia (1998), Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca (1996), and their predecessors, that the generic reading in (77b) comes from applying a predication distributively to the singular entities of which a collective entitity is made, a Kind being a type of collective entity. Thus, a generic interpretation is not obtained by a Gen operator, but is infered from the property of being a collective entity. As for the weak indefinite reading of a bare plural as in (77c), it comes from an ambiguity in the plural marking on the N. The most typical case is for Number to atomize the superset defined by the property of the N and to provide access to ordinary singular individuals such as those represented by a, 6, c and d on the bottom line of (83): this indicates that the set has a cardinality, that it contains a certain number of elements, hence that there is an actant involved in the event. In other words, plural may indicate that there is more than one singular individual instantiating the Kind. This is what I have assumed so far. However, the model in (83) predicts that plural Number specified directly on N may indicate something else: rather than expressing how many singular individuals are involved, plural Number may indicate that the sort of individual involved is a plural individual. In this case, plural Number does not provide access to ordinary singular individuals, but rather to individuals that are pluralities. The interpretation of (77c) confirms this possibility. (We will see in section 5 that there is also evidence for this property of Number in Italian BNPs.) The plural in (77c) indicates that the relevant members of the superset are exclusively elements such as those in the curly brackets of the middle line in (83), with no atomization to singular individuals of the bottom line. In other words, the instance of the Kind DOG in (77c) is a plural individual. This is the only reading possible for (77c) because its
304 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces episodic predicate does not allow a collective reading, so that both the Kind interpretation and the generic interpretation are excluded: the only reading available is the one bearing on individuals that are pluralities. To determine whether a sentence like (77c) is true, the evidence we look at involves individuals. This may give the impression that the semantic representation of (77c) should contain symbols for ordinary singular individuals. However, what constitutes evidence is not something we abstract from the semantic representation of the sentence. Just as it is possible to infer quantification in generic sentences that have no explicit indication of quantification in their semantic representation (Carlson 1980), we may infer that individuals are part of the relevant evidence for (77c): as Schwarzchild (1996) indicates, predicating something of a plurality involves a relativization to a contextually supplied partition of the plurality that determines how the predicate distributes to singularities or subgroups (see also Chierchia 1998). So although the evidence relevant to evaluating the truth-value of a sentence with a weak indefinite may involve singular individuals, a weak indefinite does not refer to such entities since no atomization is involved.19 This lack of atomization in sentences like (77c) is the reason why a reading bearing on singular individuals can only be obtained by inserting a quantifier with this specific effect, as in (84a), and why weak indefinites cannot be opposed to other singular individuals as shown in (84b) (see Chierchia 1998, note 2).
(84)
a
Some dogs were barking in the courtyard. Others were not. [strong indefinite]
b
*Dogs were barking in the courtyard. Others were not. [weak indefinite]
Since the episodic predicate were barking in (84b) does not allow a collective reading, it forces the weak indefinite reading, hence no atomization to singular individuals. But by adding Others were not, we force a reading involving singular individuals: so the two parts of the utterance are incompatible. The distribution of BNPs that bear a marking for singular Number is much more restricted than the distribution of plural BNPs. (85)
a
*Beaver is on the verge of extinction. (Kind)
b
*Cat is a mammal, (generic)
c
*Dog is barking outside, (weak indefinite)
The Omission ofDet 305 Atomization by a BNP with singular Number can only bear on one of the individuals a, b, c, d of the model in (83) at a time. Therefore, the subset determined by the atomization and the superset determined by the property of the N do not coincide: the former can only have singular individuals whereas the latter is a plurality. Since the atomization does not correspond to the whole collectivity, the Kind interpretation does not obtain, so that (85a) is not possible. The same holds for (85b): a generic interpretation results from the distribution of a predication over entities that form a collectivity; but we just saw that a BNP with singular Number does not define a Kind, so that there is no collective entity for a distribution. On the other hand, a singular BNP can be interpreted as a weak indefinite, but with a particular twist. (86)
a
There was dog all over the place,
b
I ate lion yesterday.
As in the case of plural Number, singular Number may express something which is not about the quantity of individuals involved, but rather about the sort of individual involved. This reading of a singular BNP does not involve an atomization to ordinary singular individuals like those represented by a, b, c and d on the bottom line of (83). Instead, the singular BNP corresponds to an unatomized singularity. The referent of the singular BNP is presented as an object having the property of the N, but not instantiated in an individual, i.e., as a non-individuated mass. This is what triggers the universal grinder effect (Pelletier & Schubert 1989): in (86), matter relating to DOG and matter relating to LION are involved, but no individuals instantiating these properties. To get a reading bearing on an ordinary singular individual, a determiner must be introduced that specifically expresses this quantification, as in (87). (87)
a
There was a dog in front of the door,
b
I saw a lion yesterday.
To conclude, I must comment on a well-known fact about BNPs in English. A generic interpretation is generally harder to obtain in object position. Yet for one class of predicates—the Psych verbs—this is the only reading possible since they disallow the weak indefinite reading. Thus, the BNP objects of Psych predicates as in (88) only have the Kind or generic reading (Lawler 1973, Declerck 1987, Laca 1990, Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca 1996).
306 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (88)
a
John loves girls.
b
John respects professors,
c
John hates politicians.
Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca relate this to another property of these predicates: they say that the following examples show that Psych predicates are not compatible with Space-localization.
(89)
a
*John loves Mary in Paris,
b
*Where do you love Mary?
They propose the following constraint concerning the binding of argument variables (their (41)):
(90)
Argument-variables can be existentially bound iff their location in Space is specified by a (possibly implicit) Space Localizer.
Since the predicates in (88) cannot satisfy this constraint, the BNP objects cannot be interpreted as weak indefinites: "these predicates can only translate as unsaturated expressions, and therefore both of their argument positions must be filled by entity-denoting expressions. Predicates of this kind express relations between objects, i.e., they denote sets of ordered pairs of objects. Indeed, hatred, contempt, etc. are not states or events that take place in space, but can be naturally characterized as relations that hold between individuals" (Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca 1990:21).20 Bouchard (1995) reaches a similar conclusion about Psych predicates being relations that hold between individuals, but from a different perspective.21 What sets Psych constructions apart from other constructions is that one of their arguments is a "psy-chose"—a psychological object, found only in mental space, such as an emotion—and that another argument is "affected" by the psychose. This second argument must be an entity capable of hosting the emotion or feeling that the psy-chose refers to, i.e., it must be an Intentional Individual. Intentionality is necessarily a property of singular individuals (though it can be shared by more than one). Moreover, the element that affects singular individuals in mental space must also be a singular individual, because events taking place in mental space do not provide perceptual evidence to infer anything: since no inference to individuals is possible, reference to the individuals must be explicitly supplied. The BNP arguments of Psych predicates as in (88) must be singular individuals, so there must be atomization of the BNPs. The weak indefinite interpretation is not a possible
The Omission ofDet 307 interpretation for these BNPs because it results from the lack of atomization, as we saw above. The analysis is confirmed by some Psych predicates that have a typical external manifestation associated with the mental state they describe (Kenny 1963, Higgins 1979, Pesetsky 1990, Bouchard 1995): (91) describes a physical activity of Bill's—an event that takes place in space.
(91)
Bill admires body-builders for hours on end.
As Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca observe, the BNP object may then receive a weak indefinite interpretation. We may assume that this is possible because this "concrete" use of the predicate makes inference to individuals possible, so that reference to the individuals need not be explicitly supplied by atomization. Summarizing, English BNPs refer under much more relaxed conditions than French BNPs because the N itself bears Number. This way of realizing Number allows English BNPs to have three different interpretations. Under a Kind interpretation, the atomization induced by Number corresponds to the whole collectivity, so that the NP refers to the totality of instances denoted by the N. The generic interpretation comes from the fact that a Kind is a type of collective entity, so that a predication can be applied distributively to the singular entities of which this collective entitity is made. The weak indefinite interpretation arises when Number on N does not atomize the superset but rather characterizes the nature of the members of the superset (as pluralities or singularities). The various differences between French and English in the interpretation of determinerless NPs therefore follow from a parameter set on general interface conditions: Number may be coded in a nominal expression in an equally valid manner on Det or on N.
5. DETERMINERLESS NPs IN ITALIAN Italian BNPs differ in an interesting way from their French and English counterparts: they are allowed in some contexts in which they are not possible in French, but have a more restricted distribution than in English. BNPs in Italian only allow a weak indefinite reading, not a Kind or generic reading. Thus, according to Chierchia (1998), a BNP is fine as the object of an episodic verb such as 'eat' (92), but impossible as the object of an individual-level verb such as 'hate' which requires a Kind/generic object (93); BNPs are ungrammatical in subject position (94).22
308 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (92)
a
Leo ha mangiato patate. Leo ate potatoes.
b
Leo stermina ratti. Leo exterminates rats.
(93)
*Leo odia gatti. Leo hates cats.
(94)
* Student! hanno telephonato. Students have phoned.
Chierchia (1998) accounts for this by assuming that in Italian, an N can only be mapped onto a property (it's a predicate), just as in French, so it cannot function as an argument on its own. He argues that the few cases in which Italian differs from French involve the presence of a phonologically null determiner. Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca (1996) assume that the nominalisation of bare NPs is determined cross-linguistically by a parameter—Italian is set to "no". Both analyses are rather stipulative. I suggest that Italian differs from both French and English in the way it marks Number. In French and English, the "extra" Number marking in a nominal is a case of redundancy and agreement: thus, the Number marking on N in French makes no contribution to the semantics, and the Number marking on Det in English is not semantically significant. However, we have seen that the model in (83) admits two types of contributions that Number can make to semantics: Number can atomize the superset defined by the property of the N and provide access to ordinary singular individuals, and Number can indicate that the sort of individual involved is a plural or a singular individual. Therefore, a Number marking can contribute to semantic interpretation in two different ways, and a language may encode these two imports in distinct markings of Number. I suggest that this is what takes place in Italian: the Number marking on Det and the Number marking on N are both semantically relevant. Italian marks the atomization Number on Det and marks on N the Number indicating the type of individual involved in the class delimited by the N (pluralities or singularities).23 Therefore, when N is determinerless in Italian, it cannot have the Kind reading nor the generic reading because the "nominalization" effect is not induced, since the atomization Number required for this effect is absent. On the other hand, a weak indefinite reading is possible since plural Number on N indicates that the individuals in the superset are pluralities, with no atomization to singular individuals. The weak indefinite interpretation is compatible with episodic predicates as in (92).24 As we saw in the discussion of the English
The Omission of Del 309 examples in (88), this interpretation is not compatible with Psych predicates: sentence (93) is therefore ungrammatical since the BNP can only be interpreted as a weak indefinite in Italian, and the predicate odia is not compatible with this interpretation. As for the inappropriateness of Italian BNPs in subject position as in (94), it is most likely related to the fact that indefinites with a weak reading are generally difficult to obtain in subject position. Thus, according to Chafe (1987) and Lambrecht (1994), subjects tend to be linked to an active mental representation of a referent, one that is currently in the speaker's focus of consciousness. Such active elements correspond more readily to atomized elements than to nonatomized ones. Italian therefore seems to illustrate a case that is altogether different from French and English: it has two different markings of semantic Number. Number on the Det marks the atomization, Number on the N indicates the type of individual involved in the class delimited by the N.
6. CONCLUSION We have seen in this chapter yet another effect deriving from the way Number is realized: it crucially affects the distribution and interpretation of BNPs. The realization of Number has an important effect on reference since it may trigger atomization. Since the SM interface allows this Number to be coded in a nominal expression in more than one valid manner, a parameter arises. We saw that Number is coded on Det in French: therefore, a BNP in French generally does not get the interpretation derived from atomization, except when other special factors induce a similar effect. In English, Number is on N and so an atomization effect shows up quite freely with BNPs: this results in BNPs having a Kind or generic interpretation. Finally, we saw that Italian seems to represent another possibility in which two different Numbers may be expressed: a Number marking on Det expresses atomization of the superset of the N and a Number marking on N characterizes the members of the superset as being pluralities or singularities. Therefore, a BNP in Italian only has the latter type of Number: such a BNP can only be interpreted as a weak indefinite. The weak indefinite interpretation is also possible for English BNPs since Number on N may be ambiguously interpreted as atomizing or as characterizing. The importance of these facts for our general claim is that the parameterization and its effects all arise from independently motivated interface properties: rather than being descriptive correlations
310 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces with postulated representational artefacts, the analysis attains an explanatory level that reveals deep properties underlying several constructions in various languages.
APPENDIX Delfitto & Schroten (1991) also propose an account in which different expressions of Number correlate with different distributions of BNPs. But instead of an account based on semantics as I suggest, their analysis is based on syntactic representations and operations. Their starting point is the constraint in (95) and they assume that existential Bare Plurals have the D-structure in (96). (95)Restricted Quantification Constraint: The existential interpretation of DPs is only available if two "logically" different elements are present, filling distinct syntactic positions and respectively providing the domain of quantification and the "quantifying in" operator.
The lexical noun is incorporated into NUM by a process of "selected" incorporation (the affix morphologically selects the incorporee), leaving the trace tj. Following Roberts (1991) and Guasti (1991), they assume that this property of selection is syntactically expressed by treating the
The Omission ofDet 311 number affix as a X"1 element. Furthermore, to satisfy (95), Delfitto & Schroten assume that the NUM affix is then excorporated and moved into D. This results in the structure (97), in which the NUM in D acts as a "plural" quantifier and the N provides the domain of quantification.
In Germanic, they assume that the Number affix is attached to an N°, so that the derivation proceeds as just indicated. In Italian and Spanish however, Number attaches to an N"1 element. This triggers a Relativized Minimality effect (Rizzi 1990): the Number affix cannot govern its trace in (97) since NI counts as a more local potential governor for the trace of NUM"1 and therefore prevents the trace from being properly licensed. This predicts that BNPs are not licit at all in Italian and Spanish. However, BNPs may appear as objects of certain verbs (see (92) above for instance). In order to account for this fact, they build on the hypothesis of Lois (1989) and assume that a complex N+NUM may incorporate to a higher governing lexical head. So BNPs in sentences like those in (92) are rescued by incorporating into V and forming a complex predicate with it. As for French, the fact that there is no number affix on N has the effect that "bare nouns cannot be interpreted since there is no number affix which can be raised to the D-position at LF" (Delfitto & Schroten (1991:157). French BNPs also cannot incorporate to a higher governing head because only a complex N+NUM may do so, and French nouns do not bear a NUM affix. Though I agree with the basic correlation that Delfitto & Schroten see between the way Number is expressed and the distribution of BNPs, the way they implement the correlation raises a few problems. At a general level, they assume that the interpretation of BNPs arises from some quantification in the semantic representations. This requires augmenting the descriptive tools in a
312 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces way that may not be warranted if the interpretive effects can be inferred from independent properties of use (as is done in a Carlsonian approach, for example). Thus, Delfitto & Schroten are led to postulate several instances of abstract movement taking place at LF in a mechanical, essentially corrective way not warranted by interface properties. There are also technical problems with the analysis. For example, the distinction between X° and X"1 elements is crucial for their analysis, yet it is doubtful that bar levels have any theoretical status in bare phrase structure (cf. the discussion in section 1 of chapter 2). More importantly, the constraint in (95) stipulates that the theory must be augmented to comprise two "logically" different elements to obtain the existential interpretation, and that these elements must fill two distinct syntactic positions. Yet even these stipulative additions are not enough to handle the facts. Thus, NUM and N occupy two distinct positions in structure (96) in Italian/Spanish, but this is still not adequate to obtain the existential interpretation according to Delfitto & Schroten (1991:159): "no lexical determiner corresponding syntactically to a D-category [...] is present in [(96)] with the function of projecting the particular restriction on the domain of quantification expressed by N into the class of sets corresponding to the whole DP." They assume that "quantifying in" can only take place if NUM is in D as in (97). But since it is eventually the number affix that ends up "acting as a 'plural' quantifier and providing the correct quantificational representation" (p. 162), it is not at all clear why NUM could not provide the adequate quantification in its position in (96). Claiming that it can only do so in D is a stipulation. Moreover, even this will not be sufficient to account for the French facts, given that "the realization of the number features inside the DP appears to be an exclusive function to the D position in French" (p. 177). So having NUM in D is not enough, it must have moved there. In short, though all the languages under discussion have the two "logically" different elements NUM and N filling two distinct syntactic positions at some level, thus satisfying constraint (95), more restrictions must be added which do not appear to have any independent motivation. Finally, there is an empirical problem with the proposal concerning French. In their notes 1 and 16, Delfitto & Schroten acknowledge that there are some BNPs in French, in particular with the preposition sans and in some verb+BNP constructions such as rendre justice. However, they say that these "are not comparable to 'existential' constructions of the kind we are dealing with. Given their limited productivity, it is plausible to assume that these cases involve specific subcategorization requirements which have to be represented in the lexicon." Though these constructions are distinct in that the BNP does not refer, listing them in the lexicon is not an adequate solution since they do exhibit some productivity. Moreover, BNPs can appear in French
The Omission ofDet 313 in some contexts in which subcategorization is not involved, as we saw in section 2. There are also quite a few contexts in which French BNPs behave much like "existential" BNPs in English, with the atomization effect being induced by special factors (cf. section 3): it is not at all obvious how these cases can be assimilated into Delfitto & Schroten's account in a natural way. Notes 1
Proposals that give preponderance to c-selection in this way are reminiscent of the early
proposal to have the node S dominated by NP when a clause functioned as a subject or an object to obtain a uniform definition of these grammatical relations in terms of NPs only. 2
There is also diachronic evidence which supports these correlations. Wilmet (1986:170) says
that in Old French, plural was overtly marked on N, and that this correlates with the fact that bare plurals were possible, and ADJs were overwhelmingly prenominal. 3
When there is a plural marking on the bare N as in (i), it is a morphological agreement marker,
not a realization of semantic Number.
(i)
Us sont medecins. They are doctors.
4
The N then expresses a negative quality: rat = 'stingy', chien = 'tough on others', vache =
'nasty', chameau = 'brute' (with a lot of variation, as expected of such colloquial expressions). 5
A very similar construction is the identifying coordination as illustrated in (i): the second NP,
which is without a Det, is a synonymic reformulation of the first, so that there is a single referent (Riegel, Pellat & Rioul 1994):
(i)
la semantique lexicale, ou etude du sens des mots lexical semantics, or [the] study of the meaning of words
6
Anne Zribi-Hertz pointed out to me that there may be instances in which some Dets in French
are also unspecified for semantic Number, like some definite DPs used as temporal adverbials:
(i)
a
L'eteje nage. During summer, I swim.
b
Le matin, je travaille. In the morning, I work.
c
Le lundi, Paul court. On Mondays, Paul runs.
314 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
Note that this adverbial use does not simply depend on the Det bearing the morphologically unmarked singular form: some definite DPs marked for plural can be used adverbially:
(ii)
a
?*Les etes, jenageais. During summers, I used to swim.
b
Les matins, je travaillais. In the mornings, I used to work.
c
Les lundis, Paul court. On Mondays, Paul runs.
Note that all these examples are generic in interpretation. Definite DPs may be used generically quite freely in French, whether singular or plural (Kleiber 1981,1985, Wilmet 1986, and the discussion in section 4 below). In both cases, the nominal refers to the totality of the class defined by the N. When the Det is singular as in (iii), the nominal expresses a group behavior or a "role" (Fauconnier 1984): it is the unrestricted totality of men that is involved. (in)
L'homme est raisonnable. Man is reasonable.
With a plural Det, the perspective is individualistic, the greatest part of individuals is involved:
(iv)
Les hommes sont raisonnables. Men are reasonable.
These distinctions were already noted by Beauzee (1767) according to Wilmet (1986). They suggest that the Dets in the adverbial uses in (i) are actually specified for semantic Number, since the nuances generally found in DPs used generically also seem to hold for those cases. Thus, in (ic), in a way similar to / 'homme in (iii), singular le lundi involves the unrestricted totality of Mondays: it is a property of the Kind 'Monday' that Paul runs on that day, so he runs on every Monday. With plural les lundis in (iic), the greatest part of Mondays is involved: it is a property of instances of Monday that Paul runs on those days, so he runs on most Mondays.
The Omission ofDet 315 7
Arnauld & Lancelot (1660: 84) present this as already a well established observation in their
days. See also Guillaume (1919: 297-300). 8
1 follow the usage of Lyons (1977) in distinguishing between reference and denotation.
9
Sentence (54a) is not totally impossible because the context may allow the hearer to reconstruct
a referent to which elk may refer by pragmatic anaphora. In comparison, a sentence like (i) does not easily allow such a contextual reconstruction and so is much more degraded in acceptability.
(i)
#Jean n'a pas de voiture parce qu'elle etait rouge. Jean does not have a car because it was red.
10
Paul Pupier (personal communication) remarks that an invective with a Det can be directed at
the hearer: this conveys that the speaker is distancing himself/herself from the hearer, which fits in well with Curat's observation. 11
We could add to this class of uses the determinerless extraposed nominals in (i). They are
similar to the N labelling the sentence adjacent to it in (56): the nominals are next to the subject, which is the identifiable possessor of these nominals, so that the referent of each nominal is properly identified even without a Det. (i)
Mains dans les poches/Beret sur la tete/Poignard en main, il marchait vers Paul. Hands in his pockets/ Beret on his head/Knife in hand, he walked towards Paul.
12
Though aujourd'hui, hier and demain are often used adverbially, I agree with Curat (1999:239)
that they are nouns, not adverbs, as demonstrated by their ability to be subjects or direct objects: (i)
a
Demain est jour ferie. Tomorrow is a holiday.
b
Vous aviez tout hier pour vous decider. You had all of yesterday to make up your mind.
Sentence (64a) from the text may be interpreted punctually or generically. In contrast, (64b) must be generic. Presumably, punctual interpretations of days of the week are always deictic;
316 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces
therefore, since the Det indicates that lundi is not deictic in (64b), this forces a generic interpretation. See the discussion in note 5. 13
This description of proper names is slightly too general. Some proper names, in particular
those attributed to human beings, are often reserved to individuals of one or the other sex, with corresponding morphological alternations in some cases, such as Denis (male) vs Denise (female). Moreover, a proper name "usually" names a referent directly, but a proper name may be conceptualized as denoting many individuals named that way and may also be used generically, as in Mickeys are usually short guys and Les Michel sont souventpetits. Note that, as predicted, Number is then required and that it is marked on the N in English, but on Det in French. 14
Proper names of surfaces are also without a Det when they are used with the preposition en: en
France, en Asie. The contrast between en and dans, which both express a container-content relation, is well known and extends to common nouns:
(i)
a
en voiture by car, *en la voiture, *en une voiture
b
dans une voiture in a car, dans la voiture, *dans voiture
See the discussion in Curat (1999:284-288). 15
However, as shown in (i), the names of surfaces delimited in terms of physical rather than
political criteria, such as the names of seas, deserts, oceans, rivers, take a Det in English.
(i)
*(the) Pacific, *(the) Sahara, *(the) Mediterranean, *(the) Saint-Lawrence, *(the) Seine
Note that these proper names are also very often used with a common noun acting as a classifier, as in (iia), in contrast with the names of surfaces in (68) which are not used with classifiers (see (iib)), even when they are used as labels on a map (though the Det is then absent). This particular way of referring with classifiers may be what forces the presence of a Det. (ii) a the Pacific Ocean, the Sahara desert, the Mediterranean sea, the Saint-Lawrence river b (*the) France (*country), (*the) Texas (*state), (*the) Ontario (*province)
The Omission of Del 317
Some names of cities, like New York City and Quebec City, very often appear with a classifying N. It seems that the classifier City is part of the proper name in these cases, most likely to distinguish these cities from the homonymous state and province where they are located. 16
My translation of: "un seul determinant amalgame les referents et ecrase les traits de
COMPLEMENT ARJTE et d'OPPOSITION, avec deux on perd le trait de COMMON AUTE" (Curat 1999:319). 17
If ou is interpreted not as a disjunction but as a conjunction (whether they be officers or
soldiers, they all hated the task), the sentence becomes acceptable since there is then enumeration and saturation. This conjunctive interpretation of ou is often forced by the context. For instance, a sentence like (i) would normally be considered false if doctors could give out prescriptions but dentists could not (following Partee et al. 1990:104).
(i)
Un medecin ou un dentiste a le droit d'emettre une prescription. A doctor or a dentist has the right to give out a prescription.
18
The examples are all plural because the singular is archaic in this construction.
19
This analysis of the existential reading of weak indefinites shares the intuition of authors such
as Kleiber (1981), Galmiche (1986), Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca (1996): they assume that sentences that take existential readings are event sentences, in the sense that they describe a process and only indirectly introduce an individual in the discourse. 20
Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca do not discuss why there should be a correlation between Space
localization and existential interpretation. This does not appear to be fortuitous however, given that Space localization is also involved in existential constructions such as there is Jf and ily aX. As indicated by Bouchard (1998c), Space localization is a means to express existence. 21
The way of analyzing Psych predicates in Bouchard (1995) avoids a problem with the Space
localization approach of Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca (1996): sentences such as those in (89) are actually grammatical. As Jennifer Ormston pointed out to me, they just require a bit more context, as in (i).
(i)
John really loves Mary only in Paris, where the bustling crowds make her calm placidity charming.
318 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 22
However, Chierchia (1998) says thatBNPs are possible as subjects of Kind-selecting
predicates when they do not require well-established Kinds:
(i)
Qui, ragazze in minigonna sono rare. Here, girls in miniskirts are rare.
BNPs are also acceptable in the left periphery of the clause if they are in a focus position with a contrastive stress (ii) or in a Clitic Left Dislocated position (iii): I will not discuss these here.
(ii)
POLLO io voglio, non pesce. CHICKEN I want, not fish.
(iii)
Soldi non ne ho. Money not of-them have-I I haven't got any money.
In general, the bevaviour of BNPs in Italian seems to be subject to great variation and therefore my proposal must be seen as tentative until the facts are clarified. Chierchia (1998) remarks: "In Italian bare arguments are allowed in certain contexts. However, their occurrences do not appear to be frequent and are linked to a somewhat 'elevated' or 'literary' register (with the exception of a few more common quasi idiomatic phrases). The facts concerning their distribution are controversial, and this in itself can be taken as evidence of a somewhat marked status that even relatively acceptable occurrences of bare arguments have." Delfitto & Schroten (1991) give examples of BNPs in subject and object position in Spanish and say they behave like the corresponding Italian examples. I do not know if the facts are clearer in Spanish. 23
Delfitto & Schroten (1991) suggest that the declension class suffixes of Spanish discussed by
Harris (1991) have similar counterparts in Italian and that such elements as the final vowel in libr-o are true Number affixes. They take this to be the same Number marking as the one found on N in English and on Det in French. However, the fact that Number marking always appears on both the N and the Det in Spanish and Italian suggests that they code different information. See the discussion of their proposal in the appendix below. 24
In arguing against the analysis of Longobardi (1991) based on existential quantification,
Delfitto & Schroten (1991:160) report that sentence (i) "is easily assigned the interpretation
The Omission ofDet 319 according to which Gianni has been a bookseller only for five minutes [...] In this interpretation, the sentence is true even though Gianni has not sold any books."
(i)
Gianni ha venduto libri solo per cinque minuti. Gianni has sold books only for five minutes
This fits well with my analysis of weak indefinites, according to which the evidence relevant to evaluating the truth-value of a sentence with a weak indefinite may involve singular individuals, but a weak indefinite does not refer to such entities since no atomization is involved: a weak indefinite only indirectly introduces an individual in the discourse.
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Adaptive Grammar 321
6
ADAPTIVE GRAMMAR "If our mental modules can be adapted to a variety of purposes, then their individuation may be rather tricky.[...] The point is that the human mind exhibits a marvelous combination of specialization and adaptability." Thomas Wasow (1995: 593)
1. THE BROAD PICTURE There is an interesting aspect of looking at a well-studied construction in a well-studied language like French over a very long period of time. This is the kind of construction by which we can take a measure of how much analytical tools have evolved by looking at what they tell us about this construction, and compare how insightful they are about it. So consider how the tool 'Move' stands with respect to its precursors in its account of adjectival modification in French. This is an oversimplification, of course, since both the views of the precursors and the uses of Move are extremely varied. But my goal is to make a broad comparison in order to identify the aspects of the tool Move for which improvements may be readily at hand. Scholars as diverse as Roubaud, Diez, Blinkenberg together provide us with remarkable descriptions in diversity and precision of almost all the properties I have mentioned in chapter 2: detailed semantic differences between prenominal and postnominal uses of many ADJs, diverse semantic types of ADJs like intensional, predicative, restrictive, relational, scalar, processual, the scope of double prenominal and double postnominal
ADJs, the ambiguous scope in ADJ-N-ADJ combinations, diverse sandhi
phenomena, the No Complement restriction on prenominal ADJs, semantic factors like whether the ADJ expresses an inherent property of the referent or how complex the N is, phonological weight, the effects of definiteness, of participial morphology, or of frequency of the ADJ.
322 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces In contrast, if some scholars read only movement analyses of adjectival modification, they would learn several variations on formal means to describe a small subset of these properties, restricted mainly to the positioning of the ADJs and some not very accurate correlations with their interpretation. They would know much less about adjectival modification than if they had read only earlier studies.1 It could be objected that while precursors may have a quantitative advantage over movement analyses about ADJs, movement analyses are qualitatively better, more explanatory. But we have seen this is not the case, that movement is barely descriptive. More on this in section 3 below. Despite the importance of the ontological shift brought about by Generative Grammar, a close comparison of the results obtained in a previously well-studied construction like adjectival modification shows that the central tool of movement does not represent a significant advance over its predecessors in its description of the facts and has not yet attained the true level of explanation it aims at. The number of constructions and languages covered by movement analyses is considerable, but the detailing of the facts is actually poorer than what is found in traditional predecessors for the case at hand. Another way to measure the progress of an analytical tool is to compare the proposals made in the early stages of its use to account for some data with proposals made several years later. In the case of adjectives, we saw in chapter 2 that the [+/-preposed] feature on some ADJs in Cintas (1969, 1972) has been replaced in current analyses by checking features on N or ADJ whose only role is also to trigger movement. In both early and late proposals, key structures and features are ad hoc: they correlate with a distributional fact, but their sole purpose is to encode this fact. Thus, we saw that both Bernstein (1993) and Cinque (1994) implicitly acknowledge that they have no explanation of adjectival modification, just a description of some of the most superficial properties. This poor progress of movement analyses in their explanation of the facts is not restricted to this construction. Movement theory has not succeeded in going beyond description in half a century, not because we haven't quite gotten there yet but are on the way, but because description is in its design and it cannot achieve explanation because it does not rely enough on the external properties to determine what should be considered as axiomatic. The initial state of a human being is defined too narrowly: it fails to take into account substantive properties of the physiology and cognition which determine what is a possible language. In particular, the exclusive role attributed to linearization, i.e., to coding by fixed positions, distorts the approach to syntax and forces it to introduce convoluted tools that barely restate the facts.
Adaptive Grammar 323 As a consequence of adopting a grammar of isolated specialization, progress in the generative framework has taken the form of reducing redundancy in the theory (formal simplicity) and constraining how operations may function (functional simplicity). This will be illustrated by a brief survey of the evolution of the movement operation in section 2. We will see that this form of progress only produces a limited improvement of the theory and that qualitative progress can only come from a broader notion of simplicity, which limits what processes can be formulated. Though much redundancy has been eliminated in the framework over the years, section 3 argues that two central notions of a movement analysis are still not optimally parsimonious in current approaches, i.e., the operation Move itself and the locality conditions that come with it. In section 4, I show that we obtain a more parsimonious analysis of the facts described by these two notions if we rely on logically anterior properties, and that the resulting theory explains the facts by causally relating them to externally motivated properties. Sections 5 and 6 show that the theory also provides a strong external grounding for variation in language in all its facets. Thus, Saussurean variation derives from legibility conditions imposed by physiology and usability (section 5.1). Variation in the placement of items internal to a language—as in Wh-constructions—is not the result of a movement operation: movement is not just an apparent imperfection as argued by Chomsky (1999, 2000, 2001), but a true shortcoming since the external motivation for it does not hold up under scrutiny, whether this motivation is based on computational efficiency, on distinguishing between two types of semantics, or on empirical sources such as agreement, expletives and Wh-insitu. Instead, I argue that the various placements of items follow from the parsimony of the logically anterior properties (section 5.2). Section 6 shows that variation across languages with respect to order requires several unjustified stipulations in a model that relies on a universal basic order and a movement operation, and that tools such as the Linear Correspondance Axiom (Kayne 1994) are not really motivated on an external basis; on the other hand, the variations observed across languages are exactly as predicted by the model based on logically anterior properties. Finally, section 7 discusses the problems raised by learnability. I show that the Epistemological problem and the Credit problem (Dresher 1999) do not arise in the adaptive model proposed here, and that the problem of the poverty of stimuli derives entirely from the way of looking at the data and disappears in a more parsimonious approach to the facts. Inquiries into perfecting the computational system over the last decades have set the stage for an important advance in explanatory adequacy. In particular, the importance of taking into account the precise effects of the interface properties on the theory has emerged very strongly. I propose to trust this conclusion thoroughly: since Internal Language is founded in human beings, we should
324 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces push this biological stance to its full consequences. As I said earlier, the brain in which the Lsystem is represented also contains a conceptual system with its own properties, and this brain is set in human bodies that have particular sensorimotor systems that determine the kind of form which can participate in the L-system. The L-system would not have the properties it has if this other aspect of the brain or the physiology of humans were significantly different. A more direct link with the empirical basis of the interfaces involves a notion of universality which is fundamentally different from the one behind a theory based on a particular mode of coding, such as fixed positions. Whereas the latter stipulates that a particular mode of coding is a property which all languages have, I take as a universal the choice among the modes of coding which derive from unavoidable properties of the SM system of human beings. While there is a necessity to encode semantic information into some form accessible to the SM system (otherwise language is not usable among speakers), there is no necessity that diverse modes of coding in a form be receded into a particular one (an odd idea in itself). If I am correct, universality should not be sought in receding all modes into a particular one, but in discovering the properties of the general computational process compatible with all four modes of coding. Similar considerations hold for variation arising from the CI interface: when there is more than one way to conceptualize some notion, two languages may differ in which of these conceptualizations they grammaticalize. The theory is ripe for us to stop taking refuge in lists of innate principles and taxonomies of features and functional categories. In order to have a theory of language that produces logical or causal relations that are informative, that allow us to understand why things happen as they do, and anticipates new facts, we must shift from a Generative grammar that searches among formal systems to an Adaptive grammar that searches among logically anterior properties the effects they may have on the language system. Adaptive grammar says that there is no need to assume humans evolved language-specific elements different from anything found in biology or brain sciences, since all is already there in humans and is just adapted to another purpose. It is well established in biology that there are frequently structural limits imposed by features evolved for other reasons. That is the kind of feature that Adaptive grammar looks for in properties which are logically anterior to language and which directly determine many, maybe all, properties of the Faculty of Language. This approach allows a qualitatively important step in the progress of the theory.
Adaptive Grammar 325
2. PROGRESS IN GENERATIVE GRAMMAR AND SIMPLICITY Any theory of language faces two general problems: to find a way to describe the data of particular languages, and to explain how speakers attain the system of their language given the initial state of a human being. There is a tension between these two tasks. The descriptive task typically requires that we elaborate additional theoretical tools. On the other hand, explanation in science usually comes from the generalization and simplification of the tools: by reducing the vocabulary of the theory, we constrain rule formulation, we limit what processes can be formulated. The goal is to discover the general properties that underly the descriptive tools and to elaborate a theory based on them without losing descriptive adequacy.
2.1 Progress in Generative Grammar A brief survey of the evolution of Generative Grammar shows us such a tendency towards generalizations with respect to three broad types of tools for syntactic analysis, namely, phrase structure rules, movement rules and locality conditions. In the early years (50s and 60s), phrase structure rules were specific to each category and subcategory for each language, such as distinct VP expansions for transitive and intransivitive verbs, in English and in German. Movement transformations were specific to each construction in each language, such as Question Formation, Relativization, Clefting, Passive, in English and in French, some of which were present in a language but absent in others, such as Cliticization. Locality conditions were also construction or rule specific, such as the Wh-Island Constraint, the Complex NP Constraint and the Coordinate Structure Constraint. The 70s and early 80s were the years of the broad generalizations. X-bar theory and the lexicon replaced phrase structure rules. Move Alpha was the sole movement transformation, since what moved where and when could be deduced from independent principles. Locality conditions were found to have common properties and could be unified under broad principles such as Subjacency and the Empty Category Principle. Moreover, some highly specific principles were shown to fall under more general and independently motivated ones. For instance, in early trace theory, the fact that movement is generally "upward" was made to follow from a local c-command condition on a
326 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces trace assumed to be an anaphor: this condition is independently required to account for the restrictions on the relation between a lexical anaphor and its antecedent. As the properties underlying the descriptive tools were steadily generalized, it became clear in the 80s that notions such as 'construction' and 'rule', which were used in the early descriptive stage and were inherited from the linguistic tradition, actually have no theoretical status and are only taxonomic artefacts. This set the stage for the Minimalist Program, which puts to the forefront the question of the "perfection" of language. How close can we get to a theory of Language that would make use only of notions that are conceptually necessary? To find out, a concerted effort is directed at eliminating all elements that are superfluous. Thus, phrase structure is reduced to its bare minimum. Language minimally requires lexemes and an operation to combine them, so bare phrase structure only has the array of elements from the lexicon introduced in the numeration and the operation Merge: labels for nodes must be taken from this array and labels such N', N", V, V", etc. have no theoretical status. The operation Move, which in the 70s and 80s was defined as the combination of Merge, Deletion, and introduction of a trace, is also pared down in the Minimalist Program. Thus, as Chomsky (2000) observes, introducing a trace violates the Inclusiveness Condition, which states that no new features are introduced by the computational system. Moreover, Deletion is also not optimal, since there is a simpler "copy theory" of transformational grammar which resorts only to Merge. Chomsky (1999) (which was actually written after Chomsky 2000) eventually subsumes the displacement operation under a combination of Merge, Mark, Agree and Pied-Pipe. Mark identifies some Probe H by means of an uninterpretable feature. This feature must be eliminated by Agree under matching. One way to achieve this is when "an active goal G determines a category PP(G) (Pied-Piping), which is merged in Spec-[H], yielding the displacement property" (a Goal being an element in the domain of the probe with matching uninterpretable features). Thus, both the notions of Chain and Multiple Merge constructing chains are reduced to terminological conveniences. As for locality conditions and cyclicity, they can be subsumed under the notion of Phase and the Condition on Phase Impenetrability: (1)
Condition on Phase Impenetrability In phase cp with head H, the domain of H is not accessible to operations outside cp, but only H and its edge
Adaptive Grammar 327 A Phase contains the elements in active memory and therefore accessible at a given point in the derivation. Chomsky assumes that a Phase "should determine a natural syntactic object" and that "the simplest and most principled choice is to take SO to be the closest syntactic counterpart to a proposition," that is, a VP with all theta-roles assigned or a full clause. As for a notion that reduces the search space like c-command, it can be derived from the composition of the elementary relations Sister and (Immediately-)Contain, which themselves obtain from Merge. This tendency towards generalizations and simplifications does not hold only for theoretical tools as in the cases just discussed. We also find similar concerns with regards to the structure of the model, in particular regarding the levels of representation. For instance, Chomsky (1995) argues that the level of D-Structure should be eliminated because the information it provides for interpretation is recoverable from LF. Another facet of this tendency to simplification can be seen in the attempts to link analyses to interface properties and to eliminate elements that do not have this kind of external motivation. An example of this is the proposal to eliminate the categories AGRS and AGRO (Chomsky 1995, section 4.10). These seem to be irrelevant at both interface levels SM and CI, so should be eliminated. A second, more general, attempt to provide a link with interface properties resides in the hypothesis that parametric variation would be restricted to the lexicon. All observed linguistic variation is reduced to choices of essentially morphological and phonological features in the lexicon. Summarizing, Generative Grammar has progressively sought to generalize and simplify its model in order to obtain a "cleaner" theory. This evolution falls under a general notion of formal simplicity.
2.2 Formal Simplicity Formal simplicity reduces the theoretical tools on the basis of theory-internal considerations. Its main manifestation is reduction of redundancy. This aspect of formal simplicity is fairly readily appraisable and it receives considerable attention in the Minimalist Program. However, reduction of redundancy is only a secondary implementation of the metatheoretical use of simplicity and economy. Eliminating redundancy is secondary in the sense that it does not really constrain rule formulation: it just removes one formulation which is equal in power with another that is maintained. Therefore, there is no reduction in the power of the theory, in what could be
328 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces formulated in the theory, because the formulation that is maintained can express what was expressed by the formulation that has been removed. For instance, consider the fact that the level of D-Structure can be eliminated. D-Structure presents an array of items from the lexicon in an X-bar format from which the computation proceeds. This information is recoverable at the level of Logical Form, so it is indeed possible to have this technical work done at a level other than D-structure. But the main reason to have the work done on a level distinct from the surface level in earlier proposals remains: Logical Form, by means of movement operations and traces (or similar elements), provides a level of representation in which some elements are interpreted in positions other than the surface positions in which they appear. This assumption of 'displaced interpretation' is the main motivation to have a D-Structure or Logical Form level distinct from surface structure. In short, once D-Structure is eliminated, the theory has the same expressive power as it had before. Similarly, the elimination of AGRS and AGRO does not necessarily affect the expressive power of the theory. Under the AGRS/AGRO analysis, some data were analyzed as movements of the object and subject triggered by features of these two categories. Once AGRO and AGRS are removed from the theory in Chomsky (1995, section 4.10), the data are then analyzed as a movement triggered by a [+strong] feature of a v in the VP shell of Larson (1988), and a [+strong] feature of T, respectively. Additional verbal heads which are semantically and phonologically empty are also introduced in the VP shell to allow for the generation of multiple adverbs. To assume "lexical" categories like these or second order features (such as [-interpretable], [+strong] or noninherent categorial features), all of which are not manifested at the interface levels, is just as inconsistent with an optimal minimalist approach as assuming functional categories that are not manifested at the interface levels. So in this case, the redundant elements AGRS and AGRO are not eliminated, but replaced by other elements which are just as irrelevant at the interface levels. The proposal to restrict variation to morphophonological features of the lexicon also has little effect on the expressive power of the theory, because here too the operative features are pseudomorphophonological features such as [+strong], or noninherent, uninterpretable features. These features have no effect at either interface. The only thing these features do is encode whether movement is overt or covert. They only have computational effects and their motivation is entirely computational. Therefore, in this approach, variation is not tied to the satisfaction of interface conditions in an optimal way: it appears to be an irreducible imperfection of language. In some cases, reducing redundancy can have more tangible effects than simply providing a cleaner theory. Less redundancy may help state some generalizations in a simpler way or make
Adaptive Grammar 329 them more transparent because their effects are not spread over two or more components. One well-known case where elimination of redundancy greatly improves on the explanatory power of the theory is the introduction of X-bar theory, which eliminates the redundancy between lexical subcategorization and phrase structure rules. As a result, the endocentricity of syntactic structures is explained rather than simply described: the categories of phrasal nodes are not invented at will, but derive from elements which are inescapable, i.e. the terminal nodes labelling the words of the sentence. The proposal of Chomsky (1995) that it is not terminal nodes that project but the features of the actual words make this even more attractive. So no material can be introduced in the structure which is not strongly motivated by the lexical items present in the sentence. Assuming that phrase structure consists only of Merge and elements of the lexicon constrains the expressive power of this component, thus contributing to explanatory adequacy. However, this restrictiveness holds only if great care is taken in postulating what elements appear in the numeration and can be merged as heads in phrase structure. Otherwise, restrictiveness can easily be lost. For example, Bare Phrase Structure (and also its ancestor X-bar) disallows an NP node from exclusively dominating an S, as was postulated in some early generative studies to express the fact that S often has the distribution of an NP. The view now is rather that constituent-selection is an artefact of semantic-selection, i.e., of semantic properties of the head (following the seminal work of Grimshaw 1979). But an unconstrained use of functional categories can duplicate the effects of NP-over-S and even lead to a dramatic increase in these effects: any major category can be made "identical" to any other category by assuming that both are dominated by the same functional projection at some level. For instance, the events or states introduced by verbal expressions and nominal expressions are situated in time; so are the properties attributed by adjectival expressions and the relations indicated by prepositional expressions. This could be seen as evidence that they all have a Tense projection in syntax. But a Tense phrase common to all these categories is no more informative about the facts than a general statement such as "events, states, properties and relations hold in time." Moreover, these phrases also represent the opinion of someone, so we may assume that an Opinion phrase is part of their structure. And so on. If we multiply functional heads with no surface content, then an analysis that is still technically endocentric allows a surface X to form a constituent having the category of any of the numerous functional categories that can be imagined. This practically brings us back to the situation that prevailed before the adoption of X-bar theory. In short, formal simplicity does not provide a more restrictive model if a component of the theory—such as the numeration of functional categories—is left unrestrained and nullifies the
330 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces effects of formal simplicity. Moreover, reduction of redundancy is not a very fruitful aspect of economy because it is essentially a corrective device. If a field of research had reduction of redundancy as its main activity for some time and did not produce much new empirical understanding, it would make little progress.
2.3 Functional Simplicity
Functional simplicity is another form of economy which has received much attention lately, due to the importance it is given in Chomsky's influential Minimalist Program (though of course functional simplicity has been highly consequential in various other linguistic approaches for quite some time). Economy is given a functional role: it constrains how operations of the theory function. Economy is not used from a metatheoretical stance to constrain what is part of the theory, but rather functions as a mechanism internal to the theory to insure that particular analytical tools—in most generative proposals, movement transformations—are limited in their application. For example, in Chomsky (1995), the shortest move condition incorporated in the definition of Attract and the principle of Last Resort have for effect that shortest derivations and those with the least steps block less optimal derivations; similarly, the Inclusiveness Condition of Chomsky (2000) blocks less optimal derivations in which an additional tool introduces traces. (2)
a
Attract: K attracts F if F is the closest feature that can enter into a checking relation with a sublabel of K.
b
Last Resort'. Move F raises F to target K only if F enters into a checking relation with a sublabel of K.
(3)
The Inclusiveness Condition: No new features are introduced by CHL.
Propositions like these reduce the options of rule application. Fewer derivations need to be considered by a learner, thus potentially contributing to the primary goal of explanatory adequacy.2 However, this is only a potential contribution towards that goal: constraining rule application effectively reduces options only if the system as a whole reduces the choices available to the learner, and if the reduction is significant (i.e., the reduction is such that choices are actually quantitatively or qualitatively reduced in a way that has an impact on learnability). It is of little use
Adaptive Grammar 331 to have a restricted component of Grammar if other aspects of the system cancel out those effects. For example, the notion of closeness in the definition of Attract is defined in terms of c-command:
(4)
Closeness (Chomsky 1995: 358) P is closer to the target K than a if (3 c-commands a.
Since c-command is itself dependent on the categories present and projecting in the structure, it is crucial to have a precise formulation of what counts as a category and when it can be introduced in a structure, in particular elusive functional categories that have little substantive content. In the absence of constraints on the formulation of what are possible categories, it is always possible to void the effects of a constraint on rule application such as closeness. For instance, suppose that some analysis predicts that a local relation should hold between A and B in a certain structural configuration, but that the relation actually does not hold in a certain language. It is possible to postulate that a functional projection intervenes between A and B, blocking the relation. Or conversely, if the relation is predicted not to hold but actually does, a functional projection (or an adjunction structure) can be assumed which provides a bridge between A and B. So even with conditions which are restrictive by their definition, the theory as a whole may be quite permissive if the loose postulation of categories allows us to conveniently get around those conditions. Similarly, which definition of closeness one adopts crucially affects how a condition such as Attract functions. For instance, consider the structure (5) given to a transitive verb construction in Chomsky (1995).
Assume that W is the position in which the Obj moves to agree and get Case. A "simple" reading of the structure based only on c-command has the Subject in Spec of V closer to W than the object of V. Under this interpretation of 'closeness', Attract prevents the Object from moving to W in
332 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (5). But a different definition of closeness, such as the one devised by Chomsky (1995:199), has the Subject and Object equidistant to W, thus allowing the movement of the Object. So what the constraint admits actually depends entirely on other elements of the system. Similarly, the Inclusiveness Condition can easily be evaded by assuming that some empty categories are in the lexicon and can be introduced in the numeration of the derivation of a sentence like What did John say that Bob ate. Instead of having a derivation with external Merge of what in the object position of ate, and then internal Merge of what in Spec of the matrix Comp (to simplify, I disregard intermediate steps), the sentence could be derived by external Merge of what in Spec of Comp, and external Merge of an empty category as the object of ate. The presence of the empty category can be motivated both on the grounds of theta theory and of what constitutes a legitimate object at LF (the operator what requiring a variable). So the effects of the Inclusiveness Condition can be circumvented by introducing the relevant empty category in the numeration rather than by the operation of movement. The way to insure that Inclusiveness does actually have effects is to submit it to general simplicity, i.e., to show that in such sentences, a numeration without the additional empty category derives a structure which allows the Wh-phrase what to be related directly to the verb ate. The analysis of Chomsky (2000) based on occurrences does (see section 3.1 below), as well as my analysis based on extended relations in section 4.1.3 This situation holds in general for locality conditions: their effects can all be easily nullified in a theory that assumes notions such as covert functional categories, movement transformations (possibly covert) and a covert level of LF, where principles of theta, binding and Case theory apply. For instance, consider the simple case of binding of anaphors. Assume that it is subject to a locality condition which states that the anaphor must be c-commanded and coindexed with the closest antecedent. A sentence with a reflexive pronoun in the position of the direct object at surface level, as in (6), may have several different structures associated with it, depending on the choice of functional categories and movement triggers. (6)
John shaved himself.
The sentence-form could be grammatical in several languages, but for different reasons. Thus, the subject John could be in the Spec of different functional categories in various languages, but as long as it is the most local antecedent that c-commands the anaphor himself, the sentence is grammatical. On the other hand, the sentence-form in (6) could be ungrammatical in several other languages. This ungrammaticality would "demonstrate" that, in these languages, the sentence has
Adaptive Grammar 333 an LF structure in which the surface subject does not c-command the surface object: for example, the object may be raised above the subject at LF, attracted by an extra functional category. In that case, the sentence is ruled out and the language is expected to have just the opposite of English, namely direct objects that bind reflexive subjects. If no binding at all is possible, it can be assumed under this view that the VP raises at LF, so that neither subject nor object c-command the other. This is legitimate and always possible in a theory that has covert functional categories, covert movement and a covert level of application of some principles. Given any sentence and any judgment of grammaticality based on binding, theta, Case, it is always possible to get an LF structure that will rule the sentence in or out, whatever is required. The theory faces a serious problem of restrictiveness: the link between the interpretive representation and the surface form can vary arbitrarily.4 To put it simply, given any structure, it is always possible to get some element in position A to move to position B. It may take many "constrained" steps, but overall, the system always allows it. The only consequence of adopting the new notion 'covert contentless functional category trigger' is that the important differences between word orders of languages are obscured. The trigger controlling the movement is determined by the response itself; there is no independent and objective method of justification with respect to either of the interface levels, the articulatoryperceptual and the conceptual-intensional. Any functional category or feature should be very strongly motivated and shown to improve explanation, not just be a convenient and expeditious descriptive tool. A strong motivation is required because of the loophole that functional categories may introduce in Phrase Structure, which is very similar in nature to the ill-fated "performative" elements postuled in the upper structure of sentences in Generative Semantics. Yet introducing new triggers of this type has become a very frequent activity for some minimalists. This is a strong indication that the core of the theory is in need of some revision. One could counter that the additions to the vocabulary of the theory are justified, that the functional categories proposed, as well as the position in which they appear with respect to one another, are independently motivated on interpretive grounds. Some functional categories do appear to be well motivated, such as Tense and Comp. But most are not. For instance, in his account of the serialization of adjectives in nominal expressions, Cinque (1994) assumes that all ADJs are generated in the Spec of different functional categories depending on the class of the ADJ. His structures contain functional projections of categories such as Quality, Size, Shape, Color, Nation, Speaker-oriented, all of which would be motivated because there are adjectives that express semantic properties belonging to each of these categories. However, we saw in chapter 2
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Adaptive Grammar 335 good since the sentence becomes "a statement about the speaker's uncertainty regarding the embedded proposition." Several arguments have been presented against representing illocutionary force or presuppositions of sentences in their syntactic structure. Sadock (1975) argues that performatives are not rules of grammar, but of conversational logic. Anderson (1971) discusses the famous performative higher clause 'I say to you' from Ross (1970) and shows that systematic description of the facts in syntax alone is impossible. Jackendoff (1972: 243-245) shows that "the semantic variable in the focus assignment rule must be assigned with respect to the semantic interpretation of the sentence disregarding the syntax." The focussed element must be replaced by a proper variable: if an argument is focussed, we need an argument variable; if a predicate is focussed, we need a predicate variable, and it must have the same valency as the focussed predicate. But it need not match the syntax. For example, the focussed element ARREST is a two-place predicate in (10), and so is the predicate LEER AT in the continuation, but in syntax, the first is a transitive verb while the second is a V+P combination:
(10)
(Jackendoff s (6.68)) Did the cop ARREST Bill? No, he only LEERED at him.
Several objections like these were leveled against the details of some proposals, but the main objection against representing discourse and pragmatic notions in syntax is that, as more and more of these notions are considered as part of the domain of linguistics, linguistic theory itself becomes so encompassing that it is unwieldy: it is too unconstrained and too vague. The following passage is illustrative: "We have found that one cannot just set up artificial boundaries and rule out of the study of language such things as human reasoning, context, social interaction, deixis, fuzziness, sarcasm, discourse types, fragments, variation among speakers, etc. Each time we have set up an artificial boundary, we have found some phenomenon that shows that it has to be removed. That is not to say that there are no boundaries on the study of linguistics. I only suggest that at this point in history the boundaries are disappearing daily, and one should not be too surprised if the domain of the field continues to expand" (Lakoff 1974: 178). But then the theory is open to so many notions in such a vague way that it is left with very little explanatory value. As Chomsky (1979: 150) comments, "[i]f all that is put forward as a theory is that there exist relations between some kind of representations of meaning and of form, then it is
336 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces difficult to argue against that." In addition, in order to be able to relate surface forms to such varied elements in the interpreted structure, the theory has to be virtually unconstrained. Chomsky (1970) points out that such an open theory makes it possible to simulate rules of semantic interpretation in the syntax, by generating constituents of arbitrary structure in the base, claim that they are associated with the desired semantic property, then use a filtering transformation at the desired point in the derivation to match these arbitrary structures with the surface structure. Not only is syntax weakened, but Kempson (1975) argues that semantics also loses its predictive power if any speaker-relative concepts like intentions or assumptions are included in a grammatical statement. The general position of the objectors to Generative Semantics is that, although all those phenomena have something to do with language use, only a subset of the elements affecting use have effects on Grammar. We just saw that triggering theory suffers from the same degree of lack of constraint in the discussion of (6). Though each step looks constrained, the system as a whole is not when we take into account the full power of the combination and iteration of the operations allowed, plus the liberal introduction of structural elements headed by functional categories. The relation between surface structure and interpreted structure is unconstrained all in all since the combination of overt and covert categories and rules makes it possible to relate any surface form to any covert interpreted structure. As Bach (1977: 139) indicates, "It is pointless to argue about whether or not a simplification in one part is possible or desirable without considering the effects of the simplification on the other parts, and without some notion (or guesses) about what the other parts would look like there is not much hope of coming to any conclusions." In short, functional categories that convey notions of discourse and pragmatics are not independently motivated on interpretive grounds because most proposals are vague about the actual interpretation of the elements being introduced. For instance, as indicated in Bouchard (1998a: 176) regarding the use of functional categories in the analysis of ADJs, "in order to account for the actual interpretations of various ADJ-N and N-ADJ combinations, an analysis that places the ADJs in the Specs of functional categories [...] must indicate what it means for an ADJ to modify each of these functional categories, and must provide rules that relate this to the interpretation of the N. Until we are provided with these rules, attributing the meaning differences to different functional categories simply postpones the discussion of the semantic/selectional properties, and leaves unaddressed the core of the issue of compositionality." This criticism of lack of interpretation holds quite generally for syntactifications of semantic properties: see for instance Partee et al. (1990: 338) on the analysis of quantification of May (1985).
Adaptive Grammar 337 On the whole, if insertion of functional categories or triggering features is not adequately constrained, the systemic restrictiveness of conditions such as shortest moves or shortest derivations is extremely low, to a point where little empirical content is left and the conditions do not effectively reduce the learner's choices. The construction-specific rules of the early days of transformational grammar are replaced by construction-specific functional categories or features that trigger movement. In short, functional economy has no substantial effect without a more general notion of simplicity which constrains the categories, features and processes that can be introduced in the theory.
2.4 General Simplicity
General simplicity restricts a theory strictly to elements deemed necessary and sufficient. By reducing the "vocabulary" of the theory, simplicity constrains rule formulation: it limits what processes can be formulated. Grounding the theory strictly on elements deemed necessary immediately raises two questions: (i) Why do we value so much such a restriction to necessary elements? (ii) By what criteria do we determine which elements are necessary? There is a traditional answer to the first question: to any theory which seems adequate for some domain, it is always possible to add components which play no role in the explanatory coverage of the theory. This should be avoided because it obscures what is really going on. A simpler theory is also generally more convenient to use. The answer to the second question is more delicate. Elements deemed necessary are essentially observational propositions that are considered self-evident across a community of scientists, with also the analytical tools determined by these self-evident observational propositions. An observational proposition is made unfalsifiable by fiat and it is assumed that "there exists at the time a 'relevant technique' such that 'anyone who has learned it' will be able to decide that the statement is acceptable" (Lakatos 1970: 106, citing Popper 1934), hence the consensus in a scientific community. The community considers it convenient to overlook the limited verifications to which these propositions may be submitted and considers these propositions as generally valid, axiomatic: the sciences to which the propositions could be subjected are assumed to be logically anterior to the community's field. The most successful theories of these "anterior" sciences are given an "observational" status and are used as extensions of our senses: these theories are not regarded as theories under test, but as unproblematic background knowledge, by convention (cf. Lakatos (1970: 106-107) for an illustration of the
338 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces frequent use of such conventions in hard sciences). These "observations" rest on theories which are the object of other sciences, and these sciences will not consider them to be axioms, but more likely theorems to be derived. In linguistics, one observational proposition that scholars rely on extensively is that 'words' must appear in a temporal order. From this proposition, it is argued that many phrasal structural properties can be derived (Tesnieres 1959, Kayne 1994). This is a strong kind of external motivation because it is based on logically anterior properties, and I rely on it extensively. However, I depart from the prevailing view and assume that temporal linearization and the structural constituency it derives do not have an exclusive status in grammar. The mapping of meanings is not established with just one mode of expression in a perceptual form, but with all types of such modes that could be paired with meaning units or relations. Such a nonreductionist view allows a much simpler homomorphism for the cases that are highly problematic for a phrasal-structural analysis, as we will see in section 6. A nonreductionist view calls for a shift in what is considered to be "a fairly direct" mapping in linguistic theory. In the prevailing view, the mapping of meanings into forms in the language faculty is based on universality seen as narrow uniformity, i.e., uniqueness of modality of representation for all languages. A particular perceptual means of coding is singled out— temporal linearization (i.e., Juxtaposition)— and its modelization provides the inventory of analytical tools of the theory. A mapping is then considered "fairly direct" if it makes use of the least possible tools in this inventory. However, there are no principled reasons why that particular means of coding is singled out: it is ultimately selected on a priori grounds. In the nonreductionist view, the inventory of analytical tools of the theory is not aprioristic, but determined on the basis of properties logically anterior to linguistic theory. Universality is not narrow uniformity: the four modes of coding we saw in chapter 1 are the universal basis common to all languages because we have a common physiology from which they derive. There is no cost to these analytical tools with respect to good design because they derive from the initial conditions. In this way, we rely strictly on what is deemed by the linguistic community to be selfevident properties, determined by logically anterior sciences. So some criteria can be given to determine what is independently motivated, and hence what constitutes a "simple" analysis, one based only on such properties.5 General simplicity and formal simplicity differ in an important way from functional simplicity: the former pertain essentially to constraining rule formulation, whereas the latter involves restrictions on rule application. This distinction is not new, of course: it arises in all sciences, and is discussed
Adaptive Grammar 339 in any basic introduction to epistemology. In linguistics, the difference corresponds essentially to the one made by Postal (1972) between the two notions of 'elaboration' (see in particular his note 7, p. 163-164). A first form of elaboration expands the class of descriptive devices: this kind of elaboration is what general simplicity and formal simplicity aim at constraining. A second form of elaboration restricts the class of structural descriptions or the class of rules by adding constraints to the theory. For example, the functioning of transformational theory has been constrained over the years by adding to it various types of constraints, such as Ross's various constraints, or Chomsky's Subjacency, the ECP, or the Last Resort and Closeness as discussed above. Constraints on a tool are necessary because theories are typically stated initially in an overly general form. As I indicated above, this may restrict the theory, if everything else is kept constant. There is always a tension between the two kinds of elaborations, since restrictions on rule application are typically done by adding theoretical devices. However, as we saw in section 2.3 on functional simplicity, constraining rule application does not on its own insure that the theory as a whole is restrictive: a system is effectively restricted only if rule formulation is constrained by general simplicity. Thus, if all things could be maintained equal elsewhere in linguistic theory and the data could be accounted for without transformations and their constraints, the framework of linguistic theory would permit a much narrower variety of possible grammars. To have no such tool as a movement transformation, without compensating additions to the rest of the system, is necessarily more restrictive. Pushing it to the extreme, certainly that no tool at all is most restrictive: the system can't do anything. In the next section, I show that the operation Move and its locality conditions are residually nonminimal: these analytical tools have no external motivation coming from logically anterior properties of the SM or CI interfaces, nor from general properties of a computational system. Identifying these nonminimal residues will provide valuable indications to construct a more parsimonious and explanatory theory of the "displacement" phenomena in section 4.
3. NONMINIMAL RESIDUES In this section, I make a detailed survey of the notions of displacement and locality in the later Minimalist Program (Chomsky 1999, 2000, 2001). My goal is to identify, and ultimately eliminate, the nonminimal residues contained in the implementations of these notions.
340 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 3.1 Displacement Assume with Chomsky (1999, 2001) that displacement is not implemented by Merge, Deletion, and introduction of a trace, but rather by Merge, Mark, Agree and Pied-Pipe. So a sentence like (1 la) has the derivation in (1 Ib):
(11)
a
A proof is likely to be discovered.
b
A proof is likely [a proof to be [discovered a proof]]
A proof is merged as the sister of discovered under Pure Merge:
(12)
Pure Merge: Pure merge in theta position is required of (and restricted to) arguments.
The embedded infinitival T is marked by an uninterpretable feature (such as EPP) which "selects" a Spec with a matching feature in an active Goal: in (11), this forces a proof to Merge in the Spec of the infinitival T. A similar marking also forces a proof to merge in the Spec of the matrix T. Agree deletes the matching uninterpretable features. The properties of chains formed by sequences of traces of previous analyses can be recovered by the occurrences of the displaced element, where an occurrence of a is defined as a sister of a. Under this analysis, there are three occurrences of a proof in (lib): is likely to be discovered, to be discovered and discovered. Sequencing is not required to distinguish the different occurrences, since occurrences can be properly distinguished by relying on the fact that a higher occurrence of a properly contains lower ones. Though this implementation of displacement is more parsimonious than its predecessors, some of its tools—Agree, Spell-Out, internal Merge, Mark, occurrence and Pure Merge—are not maximally minimal. Agree: Agree is a deletion operation, and we may search for a more optimal theory which resorts only to Merge. Spell-Out: When an element is merged more than once as in (1 Ib), Spell-Out takes place in one of the positions. This is nonoptimal in three ways. First, this use of Spell-Out is a form of deletion, since it determines that elements in some positions are not pronounced. Second, Spell-Out cannot operate in a purely cyclical manner, since displacement would not be possible: to get displacement, a "natural condition" must be added which states that the edge of a phase does not have to undergo Spell-Out. Third, we must determine in which position Spell-Out takes place.
Adaptive Grammar 341 Chomsky (1999, 2000) says that we can determine that the element is spelled out at its highest occurrence "under the simplest assumptions." However, this may be begging the question because there are assumptions which are arguably "simplest" but which lead to different results. For instance, we may consider that the most parsimonious theory is the one that stipulates nothing about Spell-Out: the phonological features must be spelled out for recoverability, but any occurrence is a suitable site, so that there would be three alternatives for the phonological realization of a proof in (lib). Another possibility is to assume that a syntactic operation only affects syntactic material, so the phonological material is left in the position of Pure Merge, i.e., as sister of discovered. In short, as it is, a theory with internal Merge, i.e., remerging, must stipulate which instance is pronounced. Internal Merge: We have already seen in section 2.3 of chapter 1 that internal Merge is very different from external Merge: it not a primitive operation since it is always an instance of remerge, and it is not accounted for in terms of an interface condition. Internal Merge also requires stipulations to obtain results that obtain directly for external Merge. For instance, a simple condition like the fact that (3 must be merged to the edge of a has to be stipulated for internal Merge, whereas for external Merge, this edge condition follows from the interface properties of sequencing of sounds. Mark: This operation introduces uninterpretable features which are not part of the lexical array. Therefore, these features are similar to traces in that they violate the Inclusiveness Condition. Occurrence: The notion of occurrence allows the recovery of dependencies which were expressed by traces forming chains. It is said to be an improvement over traces because traces violated the Inclusiveness Condition, since traces introduce new features. Although an occurrence is not introduced in the structure like a trace is, it nevertheless violates the spirit of the Inclusiveness Condition since it results from adding a specific interpretation of some structural parts to the computational system. Therefore, the notion of occurrence is not optimal. Pure Merge: (12) is not optimal because it is a stipulation. Moreover, it reintroduces the notion of constituent-selection. Pure Merge says that it is not enough to satisfy the semantic-selection holding between an argument and its predicate: this selection must be a particular instance of constituent-selection. This conflicts with the parsimonious view that constituent-selection is not a primitive of the theory but derives from semantic properties of the head. Summarizing, Agree, Spell-Out, internal Merge, Mark, the notion of occurrence, and Pure Merge are all less than optimal. Moreover, these additional tools are all introduced in the theory exclusively because of the assumption that there is a displacement phenomenon in language.
342 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces 3.2 Locality
The locality of displacement also does not follow from independently motivated properties. In order to describe this locality, two additional theoretical tools must be assumed which serve no other purpose and just stipulate the results: the Phase and the Condition on Phase Impenetrability. Consider first the concept of a phase. The proposal is that a derivation makes a one-time selection of a lexical array (a numeration). A phase is a syntactic object derived by the choice of a subarray selected for active memory. Chomsky (1999:36) says that assuming such subarrays reduces the computational burden. But as he acknowledges, the conceptual arguments are not decisive. Note that the nature and functioning of the "active memory" is far from obvious. More crucially for my point, a "strong phase"—a phase that is a potential target for movement—is not just "the simplest and most principled choice": it is not the closest syntactic counterpart to a proposition, such as a VP with all theta-roles assigned or a full clause. Rather, strong phases are projections that are features of T remains intact because the expletive is incomplete. Therefore, T agrees with the remote goal a man carrying a lantern to delete these features of T (and also the case feature of the NP which he assumes is uninterpretable). In (49b), a man carrying a lantern can check all the uninterpretable features of T directly. The semantic difference between the two sentences cannot be attributed to an interpretable feature of the head T, therefore, seems to say Chomsky, the feature(s) of T licensing the presence of the subject must be uninterpretable. But this does not follow: even if the feature of T licensing the presence of the subject is not responsible for the meaning difference, that does not mean that this feature must be uninterpretable. This brings us
Adaptive Grammar 369 back to the discussion of agreement above: the agreement feature that licenses the presence of the subject may be uninterpretable in the sense that it is not paired with a meaning unit, but it may be interpretable because it expresses a meaning relation. So there is no direct or indirect motivation to resort to uninterpretable features here. If the licensing feature expresses a meaning relation between the subject and T, this means that there carries a meaning in (49a), since a meaning relation only holds between meaning-bearing elements. There are good reasons to believe that this is the case. Note that Chomsky's analysis has features to specify the position of there and the agreement of T with the non-subject NP, but it does not explain why the NP appears where it does, why the expletive is present, nor how sentences like (49a) get their particular interpretation. In fact, the discussion spanning from Chomsky (1995) to (1999) to (2000) expands at great length on the mecanisms employed and how we should understand them, but ends up adding nothing to our understanding the facts: it simply repeats the obvious fact that the NP agrees with the verb instead of the subject there. Bouchard (1998c) discusses constructions that have a there subject in English and similar constructions in French: (50)
a b
There is a man outside, II y a un homme dehors. It LOG have a man outside
These constructions are presentational if the NP in the coda is definite, and both presentational and existential if this NP is indefinite. I argue that their meanings are obtained compositionally, that nothing particularly special has to be said about them. Sentence (5 la) is compositionally identical with (5 Ib): an indefinite NP is predicated of the subject in both cases. (51)
a
There is a Santa Claus in the play,
b
John is a Santa Claus in the play.
If we look at sentence (49a) itself and not at some logical paraphrase of it, what is peculiar is that a locative subject has an indefinite NP predicated of it. Then we determine what the locative refers to in this construction—a mental rather than a physical space.29 If we compute what it means for the noun phrase a man carrying a lantern to be predicated of a subject there which is a locative referring to a mental space, we obtain the presentational/existential reading in a fully
370 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces compositional manner (see Bouchard 1998c for details). In this analysis, it is not an accident that a locative is used to express existential quantification in many languages and that the NP whose existence is being asserted is predicated of this locative. As for the agreement between T and the NP, it follows directly under the Coherence Condition (39): T agrees with its subject there (underspecified for cp-features) and the NP, like all predicative NPs, also agrees with there. A fully compositional analysis of existential constructions is very plausible, requiring neither movement nor uninterpretable features. Therefore, these constructions do not provide empirical motivation for uninterpretable features.
5.2.5 Wh in-situ. A third empirical argument presented to motivate uninterpretable features is that "the semantic properties of in-situ vs. displaced wh- are not plausibly expressed as properties of the interrogative head" (Chomsky 1999: 33). The analysis of in-situ and displaced Wh-phrases is detailed in Chomsky (1995:289-292). He assumes that an interrogative clause is headed by a Comp which has a Q feature. This feature is interpretable, so it does not have to be checked. In a language with displaced Wh-phrases such as English, checking is triggered by a Q which is [+strong]. It is this [+strong] second-order feature which introduces uninterpretability in the analysis. Being uninterpretable, the [+strong] feature must be eliminated, in this case by insertion of a Wh-feature in its checking domain. This can be done by Merge—of whether in the Spec of Q or by adjoining //to the Q-head— or by Move—of a Wh-phrase in the Spec of Q or by raising Infl to Q (in which case the checking feature is not Wh but V; this can only take place in root clauses). The cases are illustrated in (52) and (53), with (53b) getting the interpretation as (53c). (52) (53)
a
I wonder [Cp whether Q [he left yet]]
b
I wonder [CP [Q if Q] [he left yet]]
a
[cp [Q did Q] [JP John give a book to Mary]]
b
(guess) [CP which book Q [IP John gave to Mary]]
c
(guess) which x, x a book, John gave x to Mary
In a language that allows a [-strong] Q, no checking takes place since both Q and Wh are interpretable. The Wh-phrase remains in-situ. If the language has only the interpretive options of English, the in-situ construction is unintelligible. But languages commonly have interpretable insitu Wh-constructions. "They must, then, employ an alternative strategy for the construction Q[...wh-...], interpreting it, perhaps, as something like unselective binding" (Chomsky 1995:291).
Adaptive Grammar 371 This analysis therefore assumes that there are two differences between constructions with displaced Wh-phrases and constructions with in-situ Wh-phrases: they differ in value for the feature Strong of Q, and they differ in the interpretive options that are available—the English type of options or unselective binding. The second parametric difference is sufficient to account for the facts without appealing to uninterpretable features. For instance, we can assume that displacement or in-situ is totally free in syntax. The English type of interpretation is only compatible with a Spec-head relation between a Wh-phrase and Q; conversely, the unselective binding interpretation only occurs when there is agreement at a distance with Q. Therefore, a language which only has the English type of interpretation must have the Wh-phrase in Spec,Q in its syntax, and a language with the unselective binding interpretation must have the Wh-phrase in-situ. A language like French allows both interpretations, so it may have either syntactic construction. Therefore, given the assumptions of Chomsky (1995) about the two options for the interpretation of Wh-phrases, it is quite plausible to relate different Wh-interpretations to different syntactic configurations without having recourse to uninterpretable features. Of course, if we set up the displacement property as being triggered by the deletion of an uninterpretable feature, then one of the syntactic options requires an uninterpretable feature. However, this is not independent motivation for uninterpretable features, but begging the question. Moreover, not only is it plausible that the distinction can be made without appealing to uninterpretable features, but there is evidence that the difference between the semantic properties of a Wh-phrase in Spec,Comp and those of an in-situ Wh-phrase derives from logically anterior properties concerning the SM means used to express the semantic relation. To see this, we must precisely identify the properties of form of the constructions, their properties of interpretation, and the correlation between the two. There are three basic types of in-situ Wh-constructions. First, it is very commonly found in languages that in questions involving multiple Wh-phrases, only one may occupy the Spec,Comp position and the others are in-situ.
(54)
Who bought what where?
I will not discuss this case here because it is not dependent on particular properties of form or of interpretation, but rather arises from a restriction on the number of Wh-phrases in Spec,Comp.
372 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces The second type of in-situ Wh-construction is found in languages such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean. These languages typically have a Q-particle appearing in Comp (Han 1987, Cheng 1997, Tsai 1994, Boskovic 1997, Cheng & Rooryck 2000), as shown for Korean in (55).
(55)
chelswu-ka
mues-ul
po-ass-ni
Chelswu-NOMINDEF-ACC see-PAST-Q a
What did Chelswu see?
b
Did Chelswu see something?
The particle ni marks the sentence as being interrogative. Without «/', this sentence is interpreted as the declarative 'Chelswu saw something'. The sentence with ni can be interpreted either as a Wh-question or a yes/no question. As indicated in Cheng & Rooryck (2000), the sentence is not ambiguous because there is an intonational difference between the yes/no and the Wh variant. Under the Wh-interpretation, the intonation peak is on the Wh-word; with a yes/no question interpretation, either Chelswu or the verb carries the peak. The Comp on which ni appears indicates the scope that is attibuted to mues when it is interpreted as a Wh-phrase. In terms of the different ways to give a perceptual form to a semantic relation discussed in chapter 1, this marking by a particle is an alternative allowed by our physiology to the Juxtaposition strategy used by English. There is no reason to assume that a Wh-phrase which is in-situ and has its scope determined by a marking such as Korean ni is interpreted differently than a Wh-phrase juxtaposed to a projection of Comp as in English. Moreover, the fact that these two options exist follows from the logically anterior properties of our physiology.30 The third type of in-situ Wh-construction is exemplified by French. It differs from the previous type in that there is no Q-particle to mark the clause as being interrogative. French in-situ Whconstructions obligatorily have a particular rising intonation: this rising intonation is also found in intonational yes/no questions as in (56), that is, questions solely identified as such by intonation and without inversion or the question formative est-ce que (see Cheng & Rooryck 2000, among many). (56)
Jean a achete un livre? Jean has bought a book?
Adaptive Grammar 373 Intonational Wh-constructions and intonational yes/no questions also share the property that they only apply to root clauses: they never get interpreted as indirect questions. Thus, in (57), the speaker is asking whether Jean said that Guy bought a book. The sentence cannot be interpreted as Jean said whether Guy bought a book. Similarly, (58) is interpreted with the Wh-phrase having root scope as indicated in the translation: it cannot have the interpretation that Marie said what Guy has bought.31
(57)
Jean a dit que Guy a achete un livre? Jean said that Guy bought a book?
(58)
Marie a dit que Guy a achete quoi? What did Marie say that Guy has bought?
Another important property is that there is an interpretive difference between in-situ Whconstructions and "regular" Wh-constructions in French. As noted by Chang (1997), the in-situ Wh-constructions are associated with a strong presupposition that an event of the type described by the sentence has taken place. For instance, in (59), the question in this form indicates that the speaker assumes the event that Marie bought something: the question only pertains to the detail of what exactly she bought. That is why negative answers such as hen are not appropriate for such in-situ Wh-constructions because a presupposition is expressed that something was bought.
(59)
Question:
Marie a achete quoi? Answer:
??Rien
Marie has bought what
Nothing
On the other hand, Wh-questions with the phrase in Spec,Comp as in (60) are neutral and do not have a strongly presupposed context, so that rien is a possible answer.
(60)
Question:
Qu'est-ce que Marie a achete?
Answer:
What has Marie bought?
Rien Nothing
Cheng & Rooryck (2000) point out that the same contrast is found between intonational yes/no questions and inversion or est-ce que questions. Thus, (61a) is a neutral question, whereas (61b) strongly presupposes that the hearer is going to cook tonight.
374 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (61)
a
Est-ce que tu cuisines ce soir? Are you cooking tonight?
b
Tu cuisines ce soir? You are cooking tonight?
Chang (1997) mentions other restrictions on French in-situ Wh-constructions, and I believe these also plausibly derive from the strong presupposition found in the constructions. Thus, negative questions as in (62a) are not very felicitous (Chang uses the notation # to indicate that the sentence strongly tends to be interpreted as an echo question): this may follow from the fact that it is odd to ask for a detail of an event that the speaker assumes has not taken place. Questions with a modal as in (62b) are also odd, presumably because a modal is not strongly enough presuppositional to match the very strong presupposition expressed by the intonational question. Finally, quantifiers can render an intonational question quite odd, as in (62c), plausibly because in such a structure the values of the object are established in relation to the values of the wide-scope quantified subject (thus, in Every student met someone, a different value is attributed to someone for each value of every student), so it is odd to question values that are supposed to be established.
(62)
a
#11 n'a pas rencontre qui? He NE has not met who
Who hasn't he met? b
#11 peut rencontrer qui? He can meet-INF who? Who can he meet?
c
#Tous les etudiants ont rencontre qui? All the students have met who Who did all the students meet?
The facts to be explained about in-situ Wh-constructions are (i) why it is possible to express the illocutionary force of a question by a special intonation as well as by putting a tensed V in a position close to Comp; (ii) why it is possible to express the scope of a Wh-phrase by placing the Wh-phrase in Spec of Comp, by marking Comp with a particle, as well as by giving the whole sentence a rising intonation; (iii) why intonational questions only have a root interpretation and
Adaptive Grammar 375 never express indirect questions; (iv) why there is a strongly presupposed context with intonational questions. It is possible to give an answer based on syntactic features to the first question, but it is not very informative. For instance, Cheng & Rooryck (2000) suggest that, in intonational questions with no displacement, the intonation is represented as a yes/no question morpheme attached to Comp in overt syntax, with a SM spell-out in the form of a rising intonation. But there is an incoherence in associating a modulation which extends over a whole utterance with a position in a syntactic structure: these are two elements of a different nature, one suprasegmental, the other positional.32 As for V raising to express the illocutionary force, it is possible to say that an abstract morpheme with a Q-feature attracts the tensed V outside of IP. But this just replaces the descriptive statement 'Tensed V before the subject is interpreted as a question' by another descriptive statement 'Qmorpheme triggering interpretation as a question attracts Tensed V before the subject.' As for the scope of the Wh-phrase, it can be argued that there is a Q-feature in Comp that attracts the Wh-phrase in Spec,Comp in all three cases: the Wh-phrase is attracted overtly in the first case, covertly with Q realized by the particle, and covertly with the Q realized by the intonational morpheme. All three cases then have a representation somewhat like (53c) at LF. Concerning question (iii), under this view, the reason why intonational questions only have a root interpretation is that the postulated intonational morpheme is a root morpheme, which just restates the facts.33 As for the strongly presupposed context of in-situ Wh-questions, Cheng & Rooryck (2000) just say that it is the same as in intonational yes/no questions because the same intonational morpheme is active in both constructions. This observation that a strongly presupposed context is found in both cases in which rising intonation triggers a question interpretation is correct; but it does not explain why there should be such a strongly presupposed context. In the model of Adaptive Grammar, there is nothing surprising in the fact that physiological means to express the illocutionary force of a question vary among languages. Though rising intonation and juxtaposition of tensed V to Comp are very different on the surface, they are two equally valid means to encode this meaning. Moreover, why these particular means are the ones used may not be accidental. In the case of the rising intonation, Vaissiere (1995) and Lofti (2001) observe that intonational rises cross-linguistically signify incompleteness, whereas intonational falls are associated with completeness. For instance, in French and English, items in a list have a rising intonation (represented as < in (63)) to indicate that the enumeration is not completed, until the last item which gets a falling intonation that signals completeness.
376 Adjectives, Number and Interfaces (63)
a
II y avait Paul
