Telicity features of bare nominals
Henriëtte de Swart
Paris, Oct 2010
Bare plurals and telicity
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Mary ate an/the apple in/*for an hour. [telic]
Mary ate apples for/*in an hour.
[atelic]
Mary ate the apples in/*for an hour.
It took Mary an hour to eat an apple/*apples.
He continued to eat #an apple/#the apple/apples.
English bare plurals lead to atelicity (unbounded
process), most other nominal arguments to
telicity (event with inherent endpoint).
Entailment relations
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Mary was eating apples  Mary ate apples.
(cumulativity: parts of an atelic situation are of the
same nature as the whole).
Mary was eating an apple/the apple/the apples -/->
Mary ate an apple/the apple/the apples (parts of a
telic situation are not of the same nature as whole).
Mary ate the apple, #but she didn’t finish it.
(culminated telic event requires completed object)
Mary ate apples, but she didn’t finish them.
Iterative durativity/bare habituality
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John found #a flea/fleas on his dog
for a week.
John repairs #a bicycle/bicycles.
Every day, John repairs a bicycle/bicycles.
Sg indefinite does not allow multiple event
reading, even if one object is involved per event;
no bare habituality.
Sg indef OK under quantifier scope.
Aspectual composition
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Semantics of nominal argument determines
aspectual nature of VP (S).
Verkuyl (1972/1993): [±SQA] feature on NPs
Krifka (1989): quantized/non-quantized objects.
Mapping objects
events/path structure.
Quantized object maps onto quantized event/
bounded path (Mary ate an apple)
Cumulative object maps onto cumulative event/
unbounded path (Mary ate apples)
Quantized and cumulative reference
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QUA(P) =def ab [P(a)  P(b) (a  b)]
(extension does not extend to proper parts).
CUM(P) =def ab [P(a)  P(b)  ab 
ab [P(a)  P(b)  P(ab)]]
(extension contains at least two objects, and
is closed under sum formation)
Definitions apply to events and objects ~
mapping relation (Krifka 1989).
Iterative durativity
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With count noun interpretations, cumulative
reference requires plurality (Scha 1984).
Van Geenhoven (2004, 2005): pluractionality
explains combination of accomplishment/
achievement with for-adverbial: bare plural
distributes internal argument over events.
Bare habituality
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Fereira (2005): HAB operator is plural definite.
De Swart (2006) on bare habituality: bare plural
behaves like dependent plural on set of events.
Unicycles have wheels.
John repairs bicycles.
EeventXind is a bijection; one-one relation
requires cumulativity.
Inherent telicity
The dog ate up a/the cake
that I baked for the party.
 The dog ate up the cakes/
*cakes I baked for the party.
He drank up (all) the water/*water in the tap.
Particle verb inherently telic: mapping from
object to event requires object to be
quantized  incompatible with bare
plural/mass noun.
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Role of thematic relation
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Thematic relation between dynamic verb and
object: mapping requires incremental theme.
He pushed the rock/rocks for/*in an hour.
He pushed the rock up the hill for/in an hour.
(object does not measure out event: spatial path
requires optional directional argument).
He loved his cat/cats for/*in many years.
(stative verb does not induce event structure).
Cross-linguistic support (Spanish)
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Escribió dos artículos en/*durante tres meses.
He wrote two articles in/*for three months.
Escribió artículos *en/durante tres meses.
He wrote articles *in /for three months.
El zorro siguió matando gallinas/*varias gallinas
The fox continued killing chickens/several chickens.
Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca (2003), Dobrovie-Sorin &
Beyssade (2004).
Cross-linguistic support (Italian)
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Ha stirato molte camicie in due ore /
*per due ore di seguito.
He ironed many shirts in two
hours/*for two hours.
Ha stirato camicie *in due ore / per
due ore di seguito.
He ironed shirts *in two hours/for
two hours.
Dobrovie-Sorin & Laca (2003).
Broadening our view
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Do bare plurals in all languages lead to
atelicity? If so, why? If not, why not?
What about bare singular (count) nominals (in
languages in which they occur)? Predictions
about telicity?
If we want to investigate the telicity features of
bare nominals, where do we start?
Bare nominal semantics
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BN: nominal without a determiner ~ no info
about quantity, discourse reference.
Intuition: bare nominals convey (covertly) what
is not expressed (overtly) by determiners
(cf. Chierchia 1998, blocking).
What features of the language come into play in
determining the aspectual nature of
configurations with bare nominals?
A typology of bare nominals
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Cross-linguistic variation in the semantics of
bare nominals correlates with variation in
number marking and article use.
Number: sg/pl distinction leads to BS/BPl
distinction ~ investigate number neutrality.
Article use: definite/indefinite article blocks
definite interpretation/discourse reference.
De Swart & Zwarts (2009, 2010): OT typology.
OT typology of number/articles
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*FunctN: Avoid functional structure in the
nominal domain (markedness constraint).
FPl: Parse sum reference in the functional
projection of the nominal (faithfulness constr.)
FDef: Parse dynamic uniqueness by means of a
functional layer above NP.
Fdr: Parse a discourse referent by
means of a functional layer above
NP.
No sg/pl, no articles: Mand. Chinese
*FunctN >> {faith constraints number, articles}
 Wò kànjiàn xióng le.
[Mandarin Chinese]
I
see
bear Asp
‘I saw a bear/bears.’
 Gou juezhong le.
Dog extinct Asp.
‘Dogs are extinct.’
 Gou hen jiling.
Dog very smart.
‘The dog/dogs are intelligent.’
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Induced telicity in Mandarin
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Wo he-guan le tang.
I drink-up asp soup
‘I drank up the soup/*soup.’
Wo mai-zhao le shu.
I
buy-get asp book
I
managed to buy the books/*books.’
Sybesma (1999): RV construction requires
definite/specific interpretation of bare nominal.
Telicity features of Mandarin BN
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BNn:  quantized (‘indef’, ‘specific’, ‘definite’),
 cumulative (‘unbounded plurality’)
No blocking of form/meaning combination:
telic/atelic interpretation for number neutral BN.
Sg/pl distinction, no article: Slavic
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FPl >> *FunctN >> {faithfulness constraints
definiteness/discourse reference}
On ot-krylperf
okno.
[Russian]
he open.past.perf window.acc
‘He opened (the/a) window.’
Petja čitalimp
stat’i/literaturu
Peter read-imp-past.sg. articles/literature-acc
‘Peter was reading articles/the articles/
literature/the literature/read articles/literature.’
BS in Slavic semantically singular
BSs in Slavic languages
have atomic reference:
complement of BPl
BS
under bidirectional
optimization (Farkas &
de Swart 2010).
at
sum


BPl 



Bare habituality with BPl
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Cumulativity of count noun depends on plurality
(Scha 1984) ~ no cumulative interpretation for BSs.
Petja čitaet
lekcii v universitete [Russian]
Peter read-IMP-pres lectures in university
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‘Peter gives lectures (is a lecturer) at the university
Petja zavtra čitaet
lekciju v universitete
Peter tomorrow read-IMP-pres.3sg lecture in university
‘Tomorrow, Peter is giving (will give) a lecture at
the university’
Borik (2002: 140).
BPl definite/indefinite in Slavic
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Petja pro-čital
stat’i/literaturu
Peter perf-read-past.sg articles/literature-acc
‘Peter read the articles/the literature’
No definite article, no competition: BPl
underspecified ~ adapts under contextual
pressure to define inherent endpoint by
taking up definite/specific interpretation: Filip
(1999), Piñón (2001), Gehrke (2008),..
Perfectivity induces telicity
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Piñón (2001): Perfective prefix requires
quantized (not cumulative) object.
Czytaći: Imp(Read) = yxe [Read(e,x,y)]
Prze-czytaćp: Perf(Imp(Read)) =
PQe[Q(e,xe’[P(e’, xe” [Read(e”,s,y)])])
 x[CUM(Q(xe’[Read(e’,x,y)]))]
 y[CUM(P(xe’[Read(e’,x,y)]))]]
PQ[CUM(Perf-Imp-Read(P )(Q))]
Slavic BS/BPl and telicity
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BSs:  quantized (‘indef’, ‘specific’, ‘definite’)
 cumulative
BPl:  quantized (‘specific’, ‘definite’)
 cumulative (‘unbounded plural’)
Sg/pl distinction, no article: Hindi
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FPl 0 *FunctN >> {faithfulness constraints
definiteness/ discourse reference}
anu botal/botaleN ika TThaa kartii hai
Anu bottle/bottles collects
[Hindi]
‘Anu collects bottles.’
Dayal (2009)
aNgaN me kutta bhaunk rahaa hai
yard in dog bark
prog pres
‘The dog/a dog is barking in the yard.’
BSn (number neutral) underspecified for definite
Telicity features of BS in Hindi
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Anu-ne tiin ghanTe meN/tak kitaab paRhii
Anu-erg three hours in/ for book read
‘Anu book-read in three hours’ = exactly one book
‘Anu book-read for three hours’ = one/more books.
Anu puure din cuuhaa pakaRtii rahii
Anu whole day mouse kept-catching
‘Anu kept catching (different) mice the whole day.’
Telic/atelic interpretation for both BSn and BPl. Acc
case ~ quantized interpretation, Dayal (2009).
Telicity features of BS/BPl in Hindi
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BSn:  quantized (‘indef’, ‘specific’, ‘definite’)
 cumulative (‘unbounded plurality’)
BPl:  quantized (‘specific’, ‘definite’)
 cumulative (‘unbounded plurality’)
Overlapping constraints lead to ‘weak’ contrast
between BSn and BPl: no restriction to atomic
reference for BSn.
BSn tolerates cumulative reference ~ allows for
iterative durativity.
Definite article (Hebrew)
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{FPl, Fdef} >> *FunctN >> Fdr
ra’iti kelev. hu navax/ #hem navxu
I-saw dog. It barked/ #they barked
‘I saw a dog. It barked/ #they barked.’
novxim klavin.
Bark dogs ‘Dogs are barking.’
Doron (2003). Strong contrast sg/pl ~ BS has
atomic reference: BSs. Fully discourse
referential. Restricted to indefinite
interpretation under bidirectional optimization.
BS in Hebrew semantically indefinite
Blocking by DefSg
restricts BSs in
Hebrew to indefinite
interpretation.
Idem for BPl
(non-definite only)
BS





DefSg 


Telicity features of Hebrew BS/BPl
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hu kara sefer be-ša’a/ be-mešex ša’a
he read book in-hour/ for
hour
‘He read a book in an hour/for an hour.’
(weak telicity features, no cumulative reading)
hu nipeax balonim bemešex šaa
he blew balloons for an hour
hu nipeax et ha-balonim tox 5 dakot.
he blew acc the balloons in 5 minutes
Cabredo Hoffher (2009), Yitzhaki (2003)
No iterative durativity for Hebrew BS
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Lack of plurality blocks iterative
durativity/bare habituality of Hebrew BSs
John me’ašen sigariya
John smokes cigarette
 John is smoking a cigarette (episodic)
 John smokes cigarettes (habitual)
Cabredo Hoffher (2009)
Telicity features of Hebrew BS/BPl
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BSs:  quantized (‘indefinite’)
 cumulative
BPl:  quantized (‘specific’, ‘definite’)
 cumulative (‘unbounded plural’)
Definite and indefinite article: Brazilian
Portuguese, Papiamentu, Norwegian
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Fdef >> {FPl, Fdr} 0 *FunctN
Tem criança na sala.
There is child in the room.
E ela está/elas estão ouvindo
[Braz. Port]
And she is/ they are listening.
Munn & Schmitt (1999). Strong contrast
bare/definite: BS/BPl indefinite.
Weak contrast BS/BPl ~ number neutrality: BSn
Weak contrast BS/SgIndef: both disc. ref.
Telicity features of BS/Sl
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Ele leu *novella/ uma novella em uma hora
He read *novel/ a
novel in an hour.
Eu matei iguana/*un iguana por duas horas.
I killed iguana/*an iguana for two hours
‘I killed iguanas for two hours.’
[BrPort]
Mi a mata yuana/#un yuana pa dos ora largu
I past killed iguana/#an iguana for two hour long
‘I killed iguanas/#an iguana for two hours.’ [Pap]
Telicity features of BS/SI
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Number neutrality licenses cumulativity ~ bare
habituality.
João fuma cigarro
João smokes cigarette
‘João smokes cigarettes.’
Munn & Schmitt (1999), Schmitt & Kester
(2007): strong aspectual constrast BS (atelic)/
SgIndef (telic) in Braz. Port, Papiamentu. Why?
Telicity features of BS/BPl
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BSn:  quantized (‘indefinite’)
 cumulative
BPl:  quantized (‘specific’, ‘definite’)
 cumulative (‘unbounded plural’)
Def/indef article (Romance, Hungarian)
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{Fpl, Fdef, Fdr} >> *FunctN
Morphological sg/pl contrast, def/indef sg, and
bare/indef plural (depending on discourse role
plural morphology, cf. Farkas & de Swart 2003).
Strong contrast BS  everything else: BS does
not satisfy Fdr ~ restricted to constructions with
‘weak’ discourse referentiality features: object
position of ‘have’ verbs, bare predication, bare
coordination, bare PPS..
Number neutrality of BS
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Busco pis. Un a Barcelona i un a Girona. [Catalan]
look.for-1sg appartment. One in B. and one in G.
‘I’m looking for an apartment. One in Barcelona
and one in Girona.’
Espinal & Mcnally (2010)
Mari belyeget gujt.
[Hungarian]
Mari stamp-acc collect ‘Mari collects stamps.’
BS in Romance/Hungarian number neutral: BSn.
Farkas & de Swart (2003): number defined for
discourse referents, not for thematic arguments
(DRT). Weak referentiality ~ number neutrality.
Bare singulars with ‘have’ verbs
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Spanish, Catalan, Romanian: fairly liberal use of
bare singulars in object position of ‘have’ verbs,
cf. Dobrovie-Sorin, Bleam & Espinal (2006),
Espinal & McNally (2010).
Lleva sombrero. [Sp] / Porta barret. [Catalan]
wears hat
wears hat
‘(S)he wears a hat.’
Ion are casă
[Romanian]
Ion has house. ‘Ion has a house.’
But: mostly stative verbs  no telicity effects.
Dynamic verbs: telicity?
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Ha buscat pis #en una setmana /durant una setmana.
has looked.for flat in a week /during a week
‘(S)he has looked for a flat for a week.’
[Catalan]
Ha buscat pisos #en una setmana /durant una setmana.
has looked.for flats in a week / during a week
‘(S)he has looked for flats for a week.’
Ha buscat un pis en una setmana / durant
has looked.for a flat in one week / during a week
‘(S)he has looked for and found a flat in a week.’ /
(S)he has looked for a flat for a week.’
Espinal & McNally (2010): bare sg atelic ~ different from
both sg indefinite and bare plural. But is this enough?
Accomplishment verbs: telicity
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Encontraron aparcamento (en diez minutos) [Sp]
Found
parking
(in ten minutes)
‘They found a parking place in ten minutes
Espinal (2009): there could be more than one
parking place if more than one driver (NN).
Telic interpretation of bare nominal possible, at
least with certain verbs. Espinal (p.c.): BSn must
be aspectually inert (property interpretation).
No iterative durativity in Spanish
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[Context: Lola left the Netherlands and moved to
Spain, but felt homesick for a long time.]
Lola se consiguió (un) novio holandés durante el
primer año. (= one boyfriend, relationship lasted for
one year).
[Mex. Spanish]
Lola se consiguió novios holandeses durante el primer
año. (= several boyfriends throughout
the period of one year).
Lola found herself Dutch boyfriend/
a Dutch boyfriend/ Dutch boyfriends for
the first year.
Note: Not all Spanish speakers like the
BS in this environment (Espinal p.c.).
No iterative durativity in Catalan
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En Joan va trobar *puça / puces en el gos
det Joan past find flea/ fleas
in the dog
durant una setmana
for a week
Espinal (p.c.)
‘Joan found fleas on his dog for a week.’
*Els nuvis
han comprat anell
the bride and groom have bought ring
els uns als
altres
the ones to.the others.
Espinal (2010)
Bare habituals with BPl
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Limpio *coche/coches.
[Spanish]
clean car/cars ‘I clean/am cleaning cars.’
Mata
cucarachas (non-inclusive reading)
kills.3.sg roaches
‘She kills roaches.’
Laca (1990): contrast between bare plurals and
definite plurals in object position of generic
statements.
Espinal (2009): BSn infelicitous (not a ‘have’
verb).
Bare sg and telicity in Romanian
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Dobrovie-Sorin, Bleam and Espinal (2006):
restriction to ‘have’ verbs/‘prototypical’ objects.
Ion şi-a
compărat casă în doi ani.
Ion sedat-has bought house in two years
‘Ion has bought a house in two years.’
*Ion şi-a
compărat casă timp de doi ani.
Ion sedat-has bought house time of two years
Telic interpretation compatible with bare sg, at
least with certain verbs.
Romanian for-adverbials
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Maria si-a trantit (un) prieten olandez timp de un an. M.
refl-has banged (a) boy-friend Dutch time of one year
‘Maria got herself a Dutch lover for one year’
(=one boy-friend, relationship lasted for one year)
Maria si-a tras (tot) iubiti olandezi timp de un an M. reflhas (tot) lovers Dutch time of one year.
‘Maria kept getting herself Dutch lovers for one year’
(=multiple lovers over a period of one year).
Gianina Iordachioaia (2010, pc)
Iterative durativity/bare habituals
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Ion vinde motociclete/*motocicleta.
John sells motorcycles/*motorcycle
‘John sells motorcycles.’
Anul trecut, cand a tinut cainele in casa, Maria a
Year last, when has kept dog.the in house, M. has
(tot)
gasit purice/purici in pat timp de cateva zile.
(all-PO) found flea/fleas
in bed time of few days
'Last year, when she had her dog in the house, Mary
kept finding fleas in the bed for a few days'
Gianina Iordachioaia (2010, p.c.)
Collectivity vs. iteration in H.
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Ma delutan szaraz levelet szedtem ossze a haz korul.
This afternoon dry leaf gathered together the house around
‘This afternoon, I gathered dry leaves around the house.’
Ma delutan szaraz leveleket szedtem ossze egy-es-è-vel
This afternoon dry leaves gathered together one-by-one
a haz korul
[Hungarian]
the house around
‘This afternoon, I gathered dry leaves one by one around
the house.’
Number neutrality in object position ‘collect’ verbs, but no
iterative durativity. Dayal (2009).
No iterative durativity in H
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
János (*egy hétig) bolhát talált a utyáján.
John(*one week-till) flea.acc found the dog-3sg-on.
John found some fleas on his dog (on one
occasion).
[Hungarian]
Not: John found fleas on his dog for a week
(iterative durative reading), Bende-Farkas (2001).
Number neutrality in Romance/Hungarian does not
lead to atelicity via plurality (no cumulativity).
Telicity features of BS/BPl in
Romance/Hungarian

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
BSn:  quantized (‘indefinite’, ‘definite’)
 cumulative (‘unbounded plurality’)
BPl:  quantized (‘specific’, ‘definite’)
 cumulative (‘unbounded plural’)
Def/indef and sg/pl contrast do not apply to
non-referential arguments (require dr).
Cumulative BSn requires (dr) plurality for event
distributivity: not available for BSn in Romance/
Hungarian.
Recap: role of number in telicity


*FunctN >> FPl or FPl 0 *FunctN leads to
number neutrality ~ BSn  cumulative 
atelic, iterative durativity/bare habituality
(Mandarin Chinese, Hindi, Braz. Portuguese)
FPl >> *FunctN leads to atomic reference for
BSs ~  cumulative  telic, no iterative
durativity/bare habituality (Slavic, Hebrew).
Recap: role of definite article


*FunctN >> Fdef makes definite/specific
interpretations available for both BS and BPl ~
 quantized  telic interpretations available
with BS and BPl (Mandarin Chinese, Hindi,
Slavic).
Fdef >> *FunctN restricts BS/BPl to indefinite
interpretation ~ BPl  quantized  atelic
interpretation only for BPl (Hebrew, Brazilian
Portuguese).
Recap: role of indef. article


In Brazilian Portuguese, Papiamentu indefinite
sg competes with BSn ~ BSn  quantized 
atelic interpretation only, iterative durativity/ bare
habituality OK. Why?
Fdr >> *FunctN: BS restricted to non-referential
position, number and definiteness irrelevant, but
no asserted plurality. BSn  cumulative  quasi
telic interpretation verb driven, no iterative
durativity/bare habituality (Romance,
Hungarian).
Telicity features of bare nominals
across languages



OT typology of number morphology and
article use: competition.
Form/meaning distribution under bidirectional
optimization: bare nominals take complement
meaning of overt marking.
Number neutrality and definite/indefinite
articles (or lack thereof) crucial for telicity
features of bare nominals in a language.
Project Info


Weak referentiality: bare nominals at the
interface of lexicon, syntax and semantics
(2008-2012).
http://www.hum.uu.nl/medewerkers/b.s.w.lebr
uyn/weakreferentiality/index.htm