March 25, 2005: Koji Mineshima, Quantification and Indeterminate Pronouns

In this talk, I will discuss a semantic analysis of Japanese quantificational phrases built from indeterminate pronouns (eg. `dare', `dono-gakusei') and the particle `mo'. One of the puzzling properties of this type of quantificational phrases is their scope-taking ability: `genuine' quantifiers (eg. subete-no gakusei), when embedded in a complex noun phrase, can take scope outside of the noun phrase, whereas indeterminate-mo QPs cannot. Some other puzzles arise from constructions in which indeterminate pronouns are separate from `mo' (`dono-sensei-ga susumeta hon-mo') and those containing multiple indeterminate pronouns (`dono-sensei-ga susumeta dono-hon-mo). Based on the idea of Hamblin semantics for indeterminate pronouns (Kratzer and Shimoyama 2002), I provide a compositional analysis of these constructions. This proposal is couched in a type-logical setting incorporating semantic operations over alternative sets.

Kratzer, Angelika and Junko Shimoyama (2002) Indeterminate pronouns: the view from Japanese. Proceedings of the 3rd Tokyo conference on psycholinguistics, Y. Otsu (ed.), 1-25.