7 Determiners
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Giuliana Giusti
Abstract
This chapter introduces the reader to the intricate syntax and semantics of determiners highlighting common properties and dimensions of variation across Romance languages, with particular attention to Ibero-Romance (Catalan, Brazilian and European Portuguese, and Spanish), French, Italian, and Romanian and some of their regional dialects. It focuses on definite and indefinite articles, including null articles in so-called ‘bare’ nouns, as well as demonstratives and possessives. It claims that their grammatical status cannot be unified under a single category. It deals with the mandatory, optional, or impossible co-occurrence of these elements, the position they take with respect to one another and the other elements of the nominal expression, that is the noun, adjectival modifiers, and prepositional or genitival complements. It describes the major semantic ambiguity displayed by definite and indefinite articles. It presents the different positions and forms of demonstratives and possessives. In doing so, it provides language-specific diagnostics to distinguish strong, weak and clitic forms that are found across all types of determiners.
Abstract
This chapter introduces the reader to the intricate syntax and semantics of determiners highlighting common properties and dimensions of variation across Romance languages, with particular attention to Ibero-Romance (Catalan, Brazilian and European Portuguese, and Spanish), French, Italian, and Romanian and some of their regional dialects. It focuses on definite and indefinite articles, including null articles in so-called ‘bare’ nouns, as well as demonstratives and possessives. It claims that their grammatical status cannot be unified under a single category. It deals with the mandatory, optional, or impossible co-occurrence of these elements, the position they take with respect to one another and the other elements of the nominal expression, that is the noun, adjectival modifiers, and prepositional or genitival complements. It describes the major semantic ambiguity displayed by definite and indefinite articles. It presents the different positions and forms of demonstratives and possessives. In doing so, it provides language-specific diagnostics to distinguish strong, weak and clitic forms that are found across all types of determiners.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Manuals of Romance Linguistics V
- Table of Contents VII
- Abbreviations XI
- Introduction 1
-
I. Romance word classes: theoretical and historical foundations
- 1 Theoretical foundation for a classification of words 13
- 2 How to classify words 41
- 3 Word classes in the history of Western grammar 69
- 4 Parts of speech in the Romance grammars of the Renaissance 97
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II. Word classes in the major Romance languages
- 5 Nouns 117
- 6 Adjectives 147
- 7 Determiners 177
- 8 Pronouns 207
- 9 Quantifiers 237
- 10 Negation and negative expressions 265
- 11 Verb classes 297
- 12 Auxiliary verbs 325
- 13 Grammatical categories of the verb 345
- 14 Verbal categories expressing syntactic dependencies 367
- 15 Adverbs 401
- 16 Focalisers 431
- 17 Modal particles 449
- 18 Prepositions 471
- 19 Conjunctions 499
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III. Word classes in smaller Romance varieties
- 20 Word classes in Occitan 527
- 21 Word classes in Sardinian 549
- 22 Word classes in Romansh 575
- 23 Word classes in Ladin 607
- 24 Word classes in Northern Italian dialects 633
- 25 Word classes in Southern Italian dialects 661
- 26 Word classes in Romance-related Creoles 689
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IV. Romance word classes and their interfaces: new horizons
- 27 Word classes and psycholinguistics 725
- 28 Word classes and learner varieties 743
- 29 Word classes and corpus linguistics 769
- 30 Word classes and neurolinguistics 797
- 31 Exploring the behaviour of connectives within a textometric perspective 819
- Index 843
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Manuals of Romance Linguistics V
- Table of Contents VII
- Abbreviations XI
- Introduction 1
-
I. Romance word classes: theoretical and historical foundations
- 1 Theoretical foundation for a classification of words 13
- 2 How to classify words 41
- 3 Word classes in the history of Western grammar 69
- 4 Parts of speech in the Romance grammars of the Renaissance 97
-
II. Word classes in the major Romance languages
- 5 Nouns 117
- 6 Adjectives 147
- 7 Determiners 177
- 8 Pronouns 207
- 9 Quantifiers 237
- 10 Negation and negative expressions 265
- 11 Verb classes 297
- 12 Auxiliary verbs 325
- 13 Grammatical categories of the verb 345
- 14 Verbal categories expressing syntactic dependencies 367
- 15 Adverbs 401
- 16 Focalisers 431
- 17 Modal particles 449
- 18 Prepositions 471
- 19 Conjunctions 499
-
III. Word classes in smaller Romance varieties
- 20 Word classes in Occitan 527
- 21 Word classes in Sardinian 549
- 22 Word classes in Romansh 575
- 23 Word classes in Ladin 607
- 24 Word classes in Northern Italian dialects 633
- 25 Word classes in Southern Italian dialects 661
- 26 Word classes in Romance-related Creoles 689
-
IV. Romance word classes and their interfaces: new horizons
- 27 Word classes and psycholinguistics 725
- 28 Word classes and learner varieties 743
- 29 Word classes and corpus linguistics 769
- 30 Word classes and neurolinguistics 797
- 31 Exploring the behaviour of connectives within a textometric perspective 819
- Index 843
