On The Semantic Types Of The Plural Markers In Yichun Gan Chinese

This dissertation is on the semantics of plural markers under the split analysis of four types of plural markers in Yichun Gan dialect.Following Moravcsik(2003)and others,In Chapter 1,I established a framework for the description of plural nouns and the framework consists of seven semantic parameters naming Types of nominals,Enumeration,Cohesion,Ranking,Numeration,Reference and Inclusive-exclusive reading.We then discussed the distinction between additive plurals and associative plurals as well as cumulative plurals and group plurals.We aimed to develop a framework to explain the different behaviors of the English bare plurals,Chinese bare plurals as well as four types of bare plurals in Yichun Gan dialect and to figure out the semantic function of plural markers.From Chapter 2 to Chapter 5,I discussed the 4 plural markers in Yichun Gan dialect respectively.In Chapter 2,the group plural ?? has two distinct pronunciations ?? 1[t(?)i21 ko0]and ?? 2[t(?)i21 ko44]and they represent two different types of group plurals.One is the conventional group marker ?? 1[t(?)i21 ko0],whose group meaning is part of the presupposition and from the lexical meaning of the phrases and the other is the conversational groups ?? 2[t(?)i21 ko44],whose group meaning is from the group operator brought by the context.As a group operator,??applies to a plural definite and groups the members as a whole.The syntactic place of[t(?)i ko]is higher than D(eterminers)so it will not compete with the Cl(assifiers)to occupy the Div0.As a result,the Classifiers and plural marker[t(?)i ko]can co-occur within a noun phrase.In Chapter 3,I compared the marker[li0](?)with[t(?)i21 ko44](??)and found that although they are both definite,they vary in many aspects."X-[li0]" can be modified by adjectives and it can also function as a predicate and a bound variable while "X-[t(?)i21 ko44]" cannot.Following Dechaine&Wiltschko(2002),"X-[t(?)i21 ko44]"can be defined as a pro-DP and "X-[li0]"a pro-?P.We argued that "-[li0]"functions as a maxmality operator which applies to the participant of a conversation and the output is a maximal plural individual relevant to the context.Chapter 4 discussed the plural marker[ka34 fo0](??).It is an associative plural marker under the definition of Lv Shuxiang(1985)and Daniel&Moravcsik(2005).However,its syntactic distribution and semantic interpretation is more like the English additive plural-s rather than typical associative markers as in Moravcsik(2003).We then argue that it is not the referential heterogeneity but cohesion or group reference that defines the nature and typology of plurals.In Chapter 5,we discussed the diminutive plural marker[tsi?5](?).[tsi?5]is a diminutive marker in Yichun Gan when the diminutive meaning was canceled under certain circumstances,the plural meaning then merged.In other languages,diminutives can function as classifiers to divide mass nouns to individuals.We then argue that the plural meaning of "X-[tsi?5]”comes from the division function of diminutives,like the function of English plural inflection-s(Borer 2005).In Yichun Gan,the classifiers are for numerals and the diminutive plural is for bare nouns.In the conclusion part,we classified the four plural markers into four types according to their references.[X-tci21 ko0/44]/and[X-li0]are argumental plurals as they can both function as definite arguments independently.[X-t(?)i21 ko0/44]is a strongly argumental plural marker and[X-li0]a weak one.On the other hand,"X-[ka34 fo0]"and "X-[tsi?5]”are predicative plural markers because they can function as predicates but not definite arguments."X-[ka34 fo0]" is a strongly predicative one because it cannot be used as an argument independently while "X-[tsi(?)5]" can be an indefinite argument but not a definite one.Under this classification,we can make a unified analysis towards different behaviors of the four bare plurals as well as English-s and Chinese-men(?),which are weakly predicative plural and weakly argumental plural marker respectively.Last but not least,I investigated the plural markers in other Chinese dialects and the framework developed can also work in other dialects.