Restructuring Taiwan Southern Min <i>ū</i> “HAVE” in Adjectival Predicate Constructions

Abstract

It has been widely discussed that Taiwan Southern Min ū “HAVE” (hereafter TSM ū “HAVE”) allows adjectival predicates as its complements, such as Kaka ū suí “Kaka is beautiful”. Besides, TSM ū “HAVE” in this kind of construction is analysed as an emphatic-assertive marker; however, there are quite few studies concerning whether it can select any adjectival predicates as its complements or has any restrictions. I hence investigate whether TSM ū “HAVE” has any restrictions by five tests: (a) mono/disyllabic adjectives, (b) reduplicated adjectives, (c) degree adverbs, (d) comparative morpheme khah “COMP/more” and (e) measure phrases with adjective phrases. Finally, I claim that TSM ū “HAVE” cannot select closed-scale adjectives, non-predicative adjectives and the reduplicated adjectives as its complements. Also, TSM ū “HAVE” is incompatible with degree words, which express the intensified readings, whereas the comparative morpheme khah “COMP/more” can repair those ungrammatical sentences by means of denoting a comparative reading. Finally, the adjectival predicates can be modified by measure phrases like Mandarin Chinese. In conclusion, TSM ū “HAVE” actually cannot select any types of adjectives and it does have the restriction incompatible with the intensified degree adverbs.