Valence and Atomic Number

Abstract

The semantic basis and morphosyntactic reflexes of Kiowa-Tanoan noun classification are perspicuously captured in a system with three bivalent number features: [±singular], [±augmented], [±group]. Privative analyses of the same facts require, inter alia, features without semantic motivation, syntactic mechanisms that violate Inclusivity, and feature annotation reminiscent of bivalence. The semantic atoms of number are, therefore, bivalent.

Descriptive and explanatory markedness

“…On the one hand, as indicated above, in the discussion of Jemez, they have been argued to be used for noun classification in Kiowa-Tanoan (Noyer 1992, Harbour 2005. In a not unrelated vein, they have been argued to be used for syntactic differentiation of varieties of mass nouns and to measure phrases (Watanabe 2007, Tsoulas 2008, and Harbour 2007.…”

“…Harbour (2005Harbour ( , 2007, where it was shown for Kiowa-Tanoan that such conflicts regularly arise owing to use of number features both for noun classification and number and that they have numerous detectable consequences throughout the morphosyntax. Now, in that earlier work, the meaning of such conflicts of such specifications was not addressed, as they only arose as a result of Agree, that is, at loci of phonological, not semantic, interpretation.…”

“…Silverstein (1976) made an early attempt to maintain this position, though, interestingly, he was unable to do so completely (pp. 199, 227-228 Noyer 1992, Harbour 2005 Another common idea is that there is a correlation between lack of markedness and zero exponence (Benveniste 1966, Silverstein 1976, Cysouw 2003, inter many alia). Zero for third person and zero for singular number are taken to be instances of this.…”

A compounding analysis of plural reduplication

“…In this paper, I argued that Japanese reduplicated nouns are antonym compounds that have two opposite values of number features. Based on Harbour (2011), I proposed that two opposite values yield an uninterpretable valued number feature on the top node of a reduplicated noun. Uninterpretable features do not have any semantic import, and the proposal predicts that reduplicated nouns are similar to bare common nouns in the sense that they do not bear the singular-plural distinction.…”

A monoradical approach to some cases of disuppletion

“…Adapting Harbour's (2007Harbour's ( , 2011 The root in scissors (and all other pluralia tantum nouns) has property (3a). 6 The fact that this noun is necessarily plural is implemented by (3b): 7 (4) The structure of pluralia tantum nouns 8…”