Table Of ContentDownward Entailing and
Chinese Polarity Items
Polarity phenomena are pervasively observed in natural languages. Previous
studies on Chinese polarity items are mainly in line with the non-veridicality
approach. This book, however, employs the downward-entailing hypothesis as its
analytical foundation, and argues that downward entailment is the only licensor
for different kinds of Chinese polarity items, and non-veridicality is neither a
necessary nor sufficient condition and thus offers inferior explanatory power
compared with the former.
To begin with, it lays the groundwork for this research by presenting a brief
introduction to polarity phenomena and reviewing the existing relevant theories.
Then it addresses the status of the commonly used element d ou in Chinese.
Specifically, it applies the tripartite structure to the studies of dou, and examines the
role of d ou in licensing the polarity items. Moreover, it investigates the properties
and behavior of d ou with respect to modality. Based on the analysis above, it
observes that non-interrogative w h- indeterminates in Chinese can be licensed in
the restriction domain of a necessity operator. Also, the non-uniformity of three
Chinese polarity items, i.e., s henme, na- CL, and r enhe , is scrutinized within the
downward-entailing framework.
This book will appeal to scholars, teachers and students in the field of linguistics,
especially in the areas of formal semantics and generative grammar. Researchers
and engineers in cloud computing and big data who are seeking help from
linguistic contributions to meaning and logic will also benefit from it.
Li Chen is an Assistant Professor in the School of Humanities, Shanghai Jiao
Tong University. Her research interests lie in syntax, formal semantics and
psycholinguistics.
Frontiers in Applied Linguistics
Series Editor: Kaibao Hu
Professor of Translation Studies and Dean of the School of Foreign Languages,
Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Frontiers in Applied Linguistics focuses on the development of applied linguistics
in the Chinese-speaking world. Although extensive researches have been carried
out in the field of applied linguistics, most studies have primarily concentrated on
Indo-European speakers. This series is expected to fill the void. Each volume in
the series will address different issues, and strike a balance between methodologi-
cal and theoretical discussion on empirical researches into applied linguistics in
the Chinese context.
Titles in this series currently include
English Transitivity Alternation in Second Language Acquisition
A n Attentional Approach
Yuxia Wang
Quotation and Truth-Conditional Pragmatics
Xiaofei Wang
Downward Entailing and Chinese Polarity Items
Li Chen
A Study of Academic English Genre
Xiuyun Lei
For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/Frontiers-
in-Applied-Linguistics/book-series/FAL
Downward Entailing and
Chinese Polarity Items
Li Chen
First published 2018
by Routledge
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© 2018 Li Chen
The right of Li Chen to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
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All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
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without intent to infringe.
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ISBN: 978-1-138-57681-0 (hbk)
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Contents
Acknowledgements vi
List of abbreviations viii
Introduction ix
1 Polarity theories and polarity phenomena 1
2 Non-veridicality approach and the challenge from
dou sentences 27
3 Tripartite structure and dou 58
4 Downward entailment approach 67
5 Dou as a necessity operator 85
6 The non-uniformity of Chinese polarity items 98
7 Conclusions 114
References 117
Index 123
Acknowledgements
This book could not have been completed without the help and support of many
people, who are gratefully acknowledged here.
A t the very first, I’m honored to express my deepest gratitude to my supervi-
sor, Prof. Pan Haihua. I could not have worked out the ideas expressed in this
book without his guidance and support. He has offered me valuable insight,
suggestions, and criticisms with his profound knowledge of linguistics and rich
research experience. He is always willing to discuss ideas with me anytime he is
available – and even when he is quite busy, he spares time for me. His patience
and kindness are greatly appreciated, and his wisdom has set a wonderful example
for me to follow as I become a real linguist. I have learned from him a lot, not only
about book writing, but also about professional practice.
I also want to express my gratitude to many teachers, colleagues, and friends
in the Department of Chinese, Translation, and Linguistics at City University of
Hong Kong. I’m grateful to Dr. Lee Po-lun and Prof. Hu Jianhua, whose patient
and meticulous guidance and invaluable suggestions were indispensable to the
completion of this book. Their strong support and encouragement gave me confi-
dence and motivation to work out the final version of this project. I also benefited
a lot from the assistance of Dr. Jiang Yan, who gave me many detailed comments
and suggestions on earlier ideas related to the present book during his course. I am
also grateful for Prof. Xu Liejiong, whose important comments and suggestions
shed much light on my thoughts.
I wish to extend my thanks to Prof. Lu Jianming and Prof. Shen Yang, who
introduced me into the world of linguistics. They are always ready to help me
whenever I have difficulties and questions. Thanks also to the scholars who
helped me during my studies in Hong Kong. In particular, I would like to thank
Mr. Tom Lai and Dr. Gerner Matthias for helping me become a tutor and giving
me insight into my future career.
I am no less indebted to my fellow students at the Department of Chinese,
Translation, and Linguistics, and to all the friends who have accompanied and
supported me, in particular Wang Yuxia, Liu Huijuan, Lu Shuo, Feng Yuli,
Wuyun, Cui Yuzhen, Ling Feng, Zeng Li, Peng Gongguan, Liu Chong, Zhang
Xin, Li Jian, and Wang Xia. Thanks to them for sharing their viewpoints and
Acknowledgements vii
experience of study as well as life with me. I am also grateful to Caitlin Keenan
and Li Fengyuan for their editorial guidance.
S pecial thanks to Zhou Yingbo for tolerating my ill temper during the writing
of this book. I would also like to express my deepest love for my mother. She
believes in me when I find it difficult to believe in myself. For her love, I feel so
happy and strong wherever I go and whatever I do.
Abbreviations
DE Downward Entailing
DW Domain Widening
EPW Existential Polarity w h- phrase
FC Free Choice
FCI Free Choice Items
LF Logic Form
NEEC Non-Entailment-of-Existence Condition
NP Noun Phrase
NPI Negative Polarity Item
PS Polarity Sensitive, Polarity Sensitivity
PSI Polarity Sensitive Item
SDE Strawson Downward Entailing
UE Upward Entailing
UG Universal Grammar
VP Verb Phrase
Introduction
P olarity phenomena are pervasively observed in natural languages. Polarity items
are so-named because of their sensitivity to the negative or affirmative property
of the sentences they occur in; this is known as ‘polarity sensitivity’. Two main
theoretical approaches have been proposed to analyze polarity phenomena cross-
linguistically. First, the downward entailment approach argues that polarity items
are sensitive to the monotonicity of the sentence containing them (cf. L adusaw,
1979; Kadmon and Landman, 1993; Lahiri, 1998; Kratzer, 2005; C hierchia, 2006,
among others). Second, the non-veridicality approach holds that polarity items
are sensitive to the (non-)veridicality of the sentence containing them (cf. Zwarts,
1995 ; Lin, 1998 ; Giannakidou, 1998 , 2001 , among others).
In line with the second approach, previous studies on Chinese polarity items
have treated non-veridicality as the primary polarity licensor. This approach is
elaborated in Lin (1998 )’s n on-entailment-of-existence condition , Li (1992 )’s
non-positively-fixed truth condition , and a reformulation of these two pieces of
work in terms of n on-veridicality and i ntensionality , presented by Cheng and
Giannakidou (2005 , 2013 ). The present study reanalyzes the relevant Mandarin
Chinese data, and compares the two major approaches and their applications in
the study of Mandarin polarity phenomena. Based on this assessment, I argue for
a downward entailment approach to Mandarin polarity items. I further demon-
strate that non-interrogative ‘s henme NP’, ‘ na +CL +NP’, and ‘r enhe NP’ are only
licensed under this condition, and that non-veridicality is neither a necessary nor
sufficient condition for licensing polarity items.
T o rebut the non-veridicality approach, this book also scrutinizes the co-occurrence
of the polarity items and dou-a common pairing in Mandarin that does not appear
to be subject to the constraints of veridicality or non-veridicality. Adopting a tri-
partite structure account as an analytical tool, this book treats dou as a universal
quantifier that introduces a tripartite structure along the lines proposed by Pan
(2006 ). Under this approach, all the various interpretations of dou receive a uni-
fied account; the differences between them are reflected in the diverse mapping
mechanisms that can apply between the sentence components themselves and the
structural configuration of the tripartite structure’s restriction domain and nuclear
scope. The downward-entailing property of the restriction domain of dou’s tripar-
tite structure allows the co-occurrence of dou and polarity items to be accounted
