Scope and the structure of bare nominals: evidence from child language
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Ana T Pérez-Leroux
Abstract
The special semantic characteristics of bare nominals (nonspecificity and lack of scopal interactions) are best explained in terms of an approach that views these not as full DPs, but as minimal nominal projections containing an internal pro argument. The evidence from child language suggests that such aspects of the interpretation of bare nominals are readily accessible in children's grammar. Thirty-six English-speaking children participated in a controlled comprehension study comparing their interpretation of sentences with quantifiers involving both the bare noun construction and full DPs. Children seemed to readily understand the interpretive differences between the two structures, suggesting that the presence or absence of a determiner is a sufficient trigger for the acquisition of such construction.
© Walter de Gruyter
Articles in the same Issue
- Optimality, markedness, and word order in German
- Duplex negatio non semper affirmat: a theory of double negation in Bavarian
- Two types of question and existential quantification
- On the function and distribution of the modifiers respective and respectively
- Complex words in complex words
- Scope and the structure of bare nominals: evidence from child language
- Book reviews
- Publications received between 2 June 1998 and 16 June 1999
Articles in the same Issue
- Optimality, markedness, and word order in German
- Duplex negatio non semper affirmat: a theory of double negation in Bavarian
- Two types of question and existential quantification
- On the function and distribution of the modifiers respective and respectively
- Complex words in complex words
- Scope and the structure of bare nominals: evidence from child language
- Book reviews
- Publications received between 2 June 1998 and 16 June 1999
