Wh-Conditionals in Vietnamese and Chinese: Against Unselective Binding

Bruening, Benjamin; Tran, Thuan

doi:10.3765/bls.v32i1.3440

Cited by 6 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…As pointed out by Bruening & Tran (2006) and Crain & Luo (2011), however, 3) One might argue that these sentences are irrelevant, because the existence of yaoshi rules out the possibility that these sentences are not bare wh-conditionals. Notice, however, that wh-indeterminates are present both in the antecedent and consequent clauses.…”

Section: Wh-conditionals and The Novelty Conditionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Nature of Indeterminate Expressions in Chinese and Korean: Focused on Wh-phrases in Conditionals

Chung¹,

Park²

2019

Lang. Res.

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In this paper, we argue that indeterminates in so-called bare wh-conditionals of Chinese are not ordinary indefinites but wh-indefinites. Thus, they are subject to overt ATB-fashion wh-movement, with its tail copy ultimately being realized rather than being licensed via unselective binding by the universal operator, as proposed in Cheng and Huang (1996). We ascribe the co-varying interpretation between the two wh-indefinites in the two antecedent and consequent clauses to the property of the covert form of subordinate conjunction, which can only unify identically interpreted conjoined elements. On the other hand, Korean wh-indefinites are not subject to overt wh-movement but enter into Agree with the Q marker for their licensing. Thus, in the Korean counterpart of bare wh-conditionals, the wh-indefinite in the antecedent clause is referred back to by the anaphoric expression in the subsequent clause that serves as an E-type pronoun, such as a demonstrative (plus the wh-indefinite) or a null argument. It is to be underscored that, owing to the lack of overt wh-movement, the two wh-indefinites in Korean cannot be anaphorically linked via ATB wh-movement.expressions are often called indeterminate expressions. In the current work, we study the featural properties and the licensing mechanisms of such indeterminate expressions in the two languages, comparing their behaviors mainly in conditional constructions and furthermore in wh-constructions in general.We are going to make the following claims. First, contra the generally accepted view, Chinese indeterminate expressions (at least sometimes) undergo overt movement to be licensed as [+wh] interrogative elements (cf.

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Section: Wh-conditionals and The Novelty Conditionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Nature of Indeterminate Expressions in Chinese and Korean: Focused on Wh-phrases in Conditionals

Chung¹,

Park²

2019

Lang. Res.

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“…To explain the multiple occurrences of wh-forms in a wh-PVC, Bruening and Tran (2006) claim that the two wh-forms realize two copies of a movement chain from one clause to the other. Since the two wh-forms can both surface at thetapositions, the movement is not an operator movement.…”

Section: The Movement Copy Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Pairing Degree-WH Clauses in Mandarin

Zhang

2021

Studies in Chinese Linguistics

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In Mandarin, if two-degree wh-question-like clauses are combined, the wh-phrases do not have a question reading. This paper argues that such a paired-wh declarative is an equative comparison construction, like the as…as equative in English, and the first clause denotes the standard of the comparison. Such declaratives, like a degree comparison construction, are derived by the occurrence of a comparison quantifier, and predicate abstraction applies to each clause. The paired wh-forms are the variables. This research shows that Mandarin does have degree quantificational comparison constructions, and it is possible for both clauses of a comparison construction to have a wh-form.

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Correlatives

Lin¹

2020

The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Semantics

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Correlative constructions exhibit many interesting syntactic properties and give rise to various semantic interpretations. This chapter reviews the existing analyses of correlatives in the literature, comparing their merits and disadvantages. Crosslinguistically, single correlatives may be base‐generated at the surface position or originate within the correlate DP and are moved to the left‐adjoined position later in the derivation. Multiple correlatives seem to be always base‐generated at the left‐adjoined position. Semantically, single correlatives receive a definite interpretation by means of a maximalization operation or the iota type shift. The semantic composition of multiple correlatives is more difficult and complicated but the strategy is to employ a mechanism as close to the one used for single correlatives as possible.

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Wh-Conditionals in Vietnamese and Chinese: Against Unselective Binding

Abstract: N/A

Cited by 6 publications

References 11 publications

The Nature of Indeterminate Expressions in Chinese and Korean: Focused on Wh-phrases in Conditionals

The Nature of Indeterminate Expressions in Chinese and Korean: Focused on Wh-phrases in Conditionals

Pairing Degree-WH Clauses in Mandarin

Correlatives

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