Zhi-{Yao, You} ‘Only-{Need, Have}’

On two conditional connectives in Mandarin

Bibliographic Data

ID20394653
AuthorsAlexander Wimmer (0000-0002-5128-1936, corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume31
Issue3
Pages401-438
Publication date2022-09-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of East Asian Linguistics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0925-8558 • E-ISSN: 1572-8560
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s10831-022-09243-5
OpenAlexW4297023056
LanguageEN
Citations received6
References cited37

This paper offers a compositional take on two internally complex conditional connectives in Mandarin, zhi-yao ‘only-need’ and zhi-you ‘only-have’. While the former conveys the antecedent proposition’s minimal sufficiency , the latter conveys its necessity for the consequent proposition to come true. Both connectives will be treated as pairing an exclusive particle, zhi , with a modal, an assumption that is less controversial for the necessity modal yao than for you , which will be treated as a possibility modal. Accepting this treatment, however, we have two connectives that openly differ in modal force. While the surface order will be preserved for zhi-you , an inversion will be shown to lead to better results for zhi-yao . In both cases, a possible extension to monoclausal uses is considered

Linguistics · Mandarin Chinese · Modal · Proposition · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies · Mathematics · Natural Language Processing Techniques · Philosophy · Psychology · Social Psychology · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation

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