Although much is a frequently occurring word of many uses, not much research has been done on the different types of much as a negative polarity item (NPI). Therefore, in this study, the NPI...Show moreAlthough much is a frequently occurring word of many uses, not much research has been done on the different types of much as a negative polarity item (NPI). Therefore, in this study, the NPI tendency of two different types of much were compared: differential and adnominal much. Generally, research shows that much tends to be an NPI, whereas differential much prefers non-negation over negation contexts. Thus, the hypothesis is that there would be a strong tendency towards adnominal much occurring as an NPI, whereas differential much would not be an NPI. From the British National Corpus (BNC), 500-instance samples were analysed, and later compared with BNC searches for specific instances (that much, very much, etc.) in order to confirm their validity. These results were divided into NEG – in which negation took place – and POS – in which (implicit) negation did not take place. The results showed that NEG differential much only occurred in 5% of the instances, whereas NEG adnominal much occurred in 28% of the instances. When both much types were combined with modifiers (i.e., very much, that much, so much, etc.), they mostly occurred in a POS context. The bare adnominal much instances – without any modifiers – are almost equally divided among NEG (100) and POS (109) instances. Overall, the NEG instances did not have a preference for a certain genre in comparison to their POS counterparts. The results imply that differential much is not an NPI, whereas adnominal much may have a tendency to occur in NPI contexts.Show less
The present thesis investigates how West-Frisian expresses low quantities or amounts. The thesis provides evidence in favor of a claim made in Hoekstra, J. (2000) in a reaction to Doetjes (1998)....Show moreThe present thesis investigates how West-Frisian expresses low quantities or amounts. The thesis provides evidence in favor of a claim made in Hoekstra, J. (2000) in a reaction to Doetjes (1998). This claim states that the West-Frisian quantity expression in bytsje ‘a bit’ is compatible with mass nouns as well as count plurals. This is due to an ambiguity inherent to this West-Frisian quantity expression such that it can have a meaning similar to a bit as well as few/little. Similar to counterparts of this quantity expression in related languages such as English, Dutch and German (resp.: a bit, een beetje and ein bisschen), the mass-only restriction applies to West-Frisian in bytsje in its reading similar to a bit as well. In the reading similar to few/little on the other hand, West-Frisian in bytsje does not adhere to the mass-only puzzle as proposed by Doetjes (1998), instead, in bytsje is compatible with count plurals as well as Hoekstra, J. (2000) states. In those cases, as Hoekstra, J. (2000) states and data collected for the present paper shows, the West-Frisian quantity expression in bytsje seems to range from being ambiguous between having a negative and a positive reading and having only a probable negative reading. This compatibility of in bytsje (a bit) with count plurals is hypothesized to be related with the disappearance of the simplex low-degree quantifier min (few/little) in contemporary West-Frisian. Furthermore, through comparing the properties of three distinct West-Frisian quantity expressions (in bytsje ‘a bit’, net folle ‘not many/much’ and in pear ‘a few’) the ambiguities for substituting min for in bytsje are laid bare. Based on these arguments, the present thesis claims that the simplex quantity expression min has been replaced not only by in bytsje and net folle as Hoekstra, J. (2000) proposes, but also by in pear to account for these ambiguities. A language analysis seems to indicate that each quantity expression in West-Frisian has its own distinct role in the quantity system of this language which provides evidence that while in bytsje is compatible with count plurals, this compatibility shows a highly limited distribution.Show less
