TY - JOUR
T1 - Proximity, polarity and scalarity
T2 - A semantic study of approximative sentence-final particles in Cantonese
AU - Po-lun Lee, Peppina
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2023/10
Y1 - 2023/10
N2 - This paper studies the semantics of Cantonese approximative sentence-final particles mat1zai3 ‘MATZAI’ and gam3zai3 ‘GAMZAI’, which have their meaning predominantly determined by the polarity of the proposition. I argue that polarity sensitivity of mat1zai3 and gam3zai3 is due to their semantics as scalar operators, with their interpretations governed by two components. The proximal component requires the realization of the proposition come close to the proposition prejacent to mat1zai3 and gam3zai3 to be true. The polar-minimal component not only reverses the polarity of the prejacent proposition, but requires the proposition to mark a point in a minimal or small interval from the low-end or the high-end of the scale. Adapting a scalar model, the close relation of mat1zai3 and gam3zai3 with polarity can be accounted for by the two semantic properties encoded in polarity items in relation to the informative value. Approximatives require scalar ordering from top-end/high-end to bottom-end/low-end, or from bottom-end/low-end to top-end/high-end of the scale, in order to satisfy the requirement of giving high informative value. The scalar analysis is preliminarily extended to English approximatives to provide a unified analysis under a scalar model for approximatives in natural language.
AB - This paper studies the semantics of Cantonese approximative sentence-final particles mat1zai3 ‘MATZAI’ and gam3zai3 ‘GAMZAI’, which have their meaning predominantly determined by the polarity of the proposition. I argue that polarity sensitivity of mat1zai3 and gam3zai3 is due to their semantics as scalar operators, with their interpretations governed by two components. The proximal component requires the realization of the proposition come close to the proposition prejacent to mat1zai3 and gam3zai3 to be true. The polar-minimal component not only reverses the polarity of the prejacent proposition, but requires the proposition to mark a point in a minimal or small interval from the low-end or the high-end of the scale. Adapting a scalar model, the close relation of mat1zai3 and gam3zai3 with polarity can be accounted for by the two semantic properties encoded in polarity items in relation to the informative value. Approximatives require scalar ordering from top-end/high-end to bottom-end/low-end, or from bottom-end/low-end to top-end/high-end of the scale, in order to satisfy the requirement of giving high informative value. The scalar analysis is preliminarily extended to English approximatives to provide a unified analysis under a scalar model for approximatives in natural language.
KW - Approximatives
KW - Cantonese
KW - Polar-minimal component
KW - Proximal component
KW - Scalar particles
KW - Scale preserving and reversing inferences
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85171431390&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.lingua.2023.103595
DO - 10.1016/j.lingua.2023.103595
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85171431390
SN - 0024-3841
VL - 294
JO - Lingua
JF - Lingua
M1 - 103595
ER -