Quantifier měi and two types of verbal classifiers in mandarin Chinese

Abstract

This paper discusses the quantifier měi in Mandarin Chinese, especially its co-occurrence with two types of verbal classifiers (Cl V ), which individualize event-denoting expressions at phase level, such as xià, and at occasion level, such as cì, huí in terms of verbal plurality in the framework of Cusic [1]. The sequence měi-Cl V can appear in two types of structures: (i) měi-V-Num(eral)-Cl V and (ii) měi-(Num-)Cl V , and both require the co-occurrence of an adverb, jiù or dōu in the sentence. It is claimed that according to the co-occurrence with the adverb, jiù or dōu, the měi-quantification over VPs involves different types of pairing relation between měi-Cl V -N/VP and the VP after the adverb.