Cheng-Yu Edwin Tsai｜ Three Types of Nominal Tautologies

2022/09/24

Abstract: Nominal tautologies such as War is war and Boys will be boys have been extensively discussed in the literature, but corresponding tautological constructions in Mandarin appear to be largely underexplored. In this talk, I will first introduce basic semantic and pragmatic properties of English nominal tautologies, and then discuss in some detail three related forms in Mandarin, namely “A shi A,” “A jiu shi A” and “A jiu A.” It will be proposed that the key components underlying the meaning of the three constructions are (i) anaphoricity to some question under discussion and (ii) exclusion of alternatives, but through different mechanisms: “A shi A” utilizes contrastive topic interpretation, whereas in “A jiu shi A” and “A jiu A” the scalar focus marker jiu is the overt operator that interacts with relevant alternatives. Moreover, I will suggest that, contrary to much current literature on jiu, jiu is not only scalar but also modal, and the modal dimension of jiu is crucial to the semantic analysis of both “A jiu shi A” and “A jiu A.” The talk will lastly draw a brief comparison with previous formal accounts of jiu, and comment on how Mandarin nominal tautologies may shed light on the formal analysis of their English counterparts.