Abstract
ABSTRACT In Spanish, combining an indefinite plural article and a cardinal number leads to an approximative interpretation similar to that provided by approximators like ‘approximately’. In this paper, we advance a syntactic and semantic analysis of these structures. We show that the construction shares a number of properties with structures containing explicit approximative elements, so it justified to assume that a particular constituent contributes the approximative meaning. We propose that an approximative morpheme Approx is combined with the cardinal number; the morphological realization of this morpheme is as the plural affix on the indefinite article. We advance a denotation for Approx, and elaborate the necessary assumptions on the functioning of numerals for our analysis to work at a general level.
Highlights
Spanish indefinite articles exhibit agreement in both gender and number with their NP complements.(1) a
Whatever the semantic contribution of the indefinite determiner unos/unas is, it affects the denotation of the cardinal number, while the interpretation of the nominal remains constant; in other words, the indefinite seems to function semantically as a modifier to the numeral rather than a head that takes the nominal phrase as a complement
As pointed out early in the article, the construction exhibits two unexpected traits for a structure headed by an indefinite determiner: first, its meaning is unexpected from the standard semantics associated to indefinite articles; second, the approximative interpretation is restricted to the cardinal, despite the fact the determiner is supposed to be combined with the whole NP
Summary
Spanish indefinite articles exhibit agreement in both gender and number with their NP complements. Unas mujeres vinieron hoy INDEF.PL.FEM women came today ‘Some women came today.’. D. Unos hombres vinieron hoy INDEF.PL.MASC men came today ‘Some men came today.’ 2. Whatever the semantic contribution of the indefinite determiner unos/unas is, it affects the denotation of the cardinal number, while the interpretation of the nominal remains constant; in other words, the indefinite seems to function semantically as a modifier to the numeral rather than a head that takes the nominal phrase as a complement.
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