| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立交通大學 === 外國語文學系外國文學與語言學碩士班 === 97 === This thesis studies the special usage of ge in the V ge XP construction, such as chi ge fan ‘have a meal’ and chi ge gouyin ‘eat to one’s heart’s content,’ and with particular focus on the interpretation of ge. Initially, since ge does not allow the preceding numerals, it is argued that ge is different from the generalized classifier ge, which individuates a single unit of nouns for counting. In other words, ge in the V ge XP does not function like an individual classifier. If such an account is correct, then what is ge? What kind of meaning does ge contribute to the V ge XP construction?
In this thesis, the assumption regarding the syntactic representation of ge is based on Doetjes’ (1997) analysis of quantification and selection. I propose that ge is a degree quantifier (i.e., DQ), due to the facts that, like a DQ, ge gradually changes from a classifier denoting a specific quantity, or a unit, to a degree quantifier denoting an uncertainty quantity. Furthermore, I propose that ge is a head, selecting phrases composed of categories with [+N] feature, such as nouns and adjectives.
From the semantic point of view, based on the research of Kennedy and McNally (2005), adjectives have scales and degrees. According to Doetjes’ (1997) definition, nouns also have scales. I then propose that each XP has its scale and ge indicates the minimal part on the scale of the XP, such as the degree scale of adjectives or the quantity scale of nouns. Thus, a trivial reading is derived.
This study concludes that ge is a degree quantifier selecting nominal arguments syntactically, and ge denotes the minimal part of arguments in the scale of degree or quantity semantically. The contribution of this study is to provide a unified syntactic and semantic analysis of ge in the V ge XP construction.
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