Chinese comparatives
Commentary on clausal vs. phrasal analyses
This article aims to make a contribution to the
recent debate between the phrasal and clausal analyses of Chinese
comparatives, focusing on Lin
(2009) for the phrasal approach and Liu (2011, 2014), Hsieh (2017) and Erlewine (2018) for the clausal approach. I show that
problems such as lack of independent support for the rule of
backward predicate deletion, subcomparatives, embedded standards and
verbal comparatives remain difficult challenges to the new clausal
analyses and that counter-arguments against the phrasal approach do
not necessarily hold. To the contrary, a fine tuning of Lin’s
original phrasal analysis of bi not only avoids an
important criticism made by Liu
(2011) but can be extended to analyze verbal-comparatives
in a way that the clausal analyses cannot.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Recent analyses of Chinese comparatives
- 3.Challenges to the clausal approach
- 3.1Problems with comparative deletion
- 3.2Problems with subcomparatives and embedded standards
- 3.2.1Liu’s (2011)
new answer and its problems
- 3.2.2Hsieh’s (2017)
solution and its problems
- 4.3Erlewine’s (2018)
account and problems
- 5.Remarks on arguments against the phrasal analysis
- 5.1Arguments based on complex predicate constructions
- 5.2Erlewine’s (2018)
Arguments based on movement chains
- 6.Liu’s (2011) arguments
against Lin’s (2009)
analysis
- 6.1
Rang-constructions
- 6.2Reason clauses
- 6.3Object comparison in multiple standard comparatives
- 7.A Revision of Lin
(2009)
- 8.Conclusion
-
Notes
-
References