Two types of wh-exclamatives

Abstract

We study a particular aspect of the semantics of matrix wh-exclamatives. In particular, we focus on the relation between fairly straightforward morpho-syntactic properties of such structures and the kind of scalar meanings they express. We identify two types of wh-exclamatives: two distinct types of structures with two distinct types of scalar meaning. Languages differ with respect to which wh expressions serve in which of the two types.