Non-neutral interpretation of adjectives under measure phrase modification

要旨

This paper shows that a measure phrase and pos are not necessarily incompatible, contrary to the conclusion reached from the study of English. I propose that a measure phrase appears in a projection lower than the one that hosts pos, on the basis of the detailed investigation into Japanese adjectival structures featuring a measure phrase, structures that have not received proper attention in the past. I also provide compositional semantics that allows the co-occurrence of a measure phrase and pos, together with an account of why English and Japanese differ in this particular respect. Furthermore, the analysis proposed in this paper alters the view on the morphological profile of adjectives in Japanese. The new perspective presented is supported by cross-linguistic data.