Pure unaccusatives with Hoo I in Taiwan Southern Min

Abstract

In Taiwan Southern Min, pure unaccusatives, which do not demonstrate causative alternation, can occur with hoo 7 i 1 to denote adversity. In the literature, hoo 7 is considered to have various usages including verb, causative marker, passive marker, etc. This paper proposes that hoo 7 in the hoo 7 i 1 pure unaccusative construction serves as an adversative marker. This hoo 7 is obligatorily followed by the pronoun i 1 , which is expletive and nonreferential, and may occur in the overt or covert form. The hoo 7 i 1 sequence functions as an optional adjunct and is used to denote adversity. The hoo 7 i 1 construction must occur in a sentence denoting change of state; thus, a resultative verbal complement or a resultative clause is often used in the hoo 7 i 1 construction. However, verbs/compounds that denote change of state can also satisfy this semantic requirement, and in this case, no extra resultative elements are needed.