The Syntax of Event‐Internal and Event‐External Verbal Classifiers

Abstract

When a classifier occurs with a numeral and an event‐denoting expression, it is used as a unit to count events. The classifier is called a verbal classifier if the event‐denoting expression is verbal, although the classifier itself is not verbal. This paper argues that a numeral and a verbal classifier have a spec‐head relation, and the verbal expression is the complement. The proposal explains a number of syntactic generalizations of verbal classifiers in Mandarin Chinese. Like a frequentative adverb such as twice, a verbal classifier expression is either event‐internal or event‐external. The two types of classifiers have different possible positions in the language. The position contrasts are explained by different heights of the projection headed by a classifier. Theoretically, on the one hand, this research unifies the syntax of nominal and verbal numeral classifiers; and on the other hand, it explores the syntactic distinctions between event‐internal and event‐external verbal classifiers.

Classifiers in Event and Nominal Plurality in Mandarin

“…Zhang, 2013). As for an event CLv, a similar representation has been recently proposed (Zhang, 2017;Kim, 2019); furthermore, these recent studies proposed that a CLv and a CLn share the same core structure, as schematically illustrated in (13). 13) In ( 13), the CL head can be realized as either a CLn or a CLv.…”

“…Although significant, this proposal does not straightforwardly apply to a Mandarin type language. Mandarin pluralizes an event or an occasion by means of a verbal classifier (e.g., Zhu, 1982;Chao, 1986;Deng, 2013;Zhang, 2017). An example of event pluralization is illustrated in (4) (pluralization of an occasion will be detailed in section 3).…”

“…Rather, a plural event in the language seems to be countable. In fact, it has been proposed that the role of CLvs (as well as nominal classifiers) is more specific than a pluralizer of an event that appears on the verb found in other languages such as Chechen (see (3a)) or Kaqchikel (see (1b)): a CLv has a role of counting (e.g., Deng, 2012;Zhang, 2017;Kim, 2019). Considering the fact that a nominal in Mandarin is also countable by a nominal classifier (as will be detailed in section 3), event and nominal plurality in Mandarin seem to be in parallel by being countable, as recent studies suggest (e.g., Deng, 2013;Kim, 2019).…”

“…However, this view of counting is rather simplified, and does not provide an account for what 5) Different names are used for different verbal classifiers. In Zhang (2017), for instance, an event CLv is termed as an internal CLv and an occasion CLv is termed as an external CLv. However, I refer them as an event and an occasion CLv for ease of exposition.…”

“…As shown in section 3.2, the CLv bian (see (8a)) can appear with accomplishment only. Zhang (2017), it is shown that a CLv is a head that takes a VP complement. See Zhang (2017) for evidence that a CLv is a verbal head.…”