A Constraint-Based Lexical Approach to Floating Quantifiers

In this paper, I present a new nonderivational analysis of the so-called "floating" quantifiers (FQs, hereafter) in English and Korean within the framework of Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG). 2 I show that FQs do not move from place to place, arguing that English FQs are adverbs modifying verb phrases whereas Korean FQs are complement NPs. I review a derivational approach to English FQs, classical and conventional, revealing some of their problems in Section 1. Then I proceed to propose my own constraint-based, lexical approach to English FQs in Section 2.1. In Section 2.2, I discuss some consequences of the lexical approach, especially involving certain different behaviors of FQs in Tough, Raising, and EQUI constructions. In Section 3, I treat Korean (and some Japanese) data, and attempt to improve upon [1] and the relevant part of [2] on some particular details, while supporting their basic theoretical merits. After some discussion of parametric differences between English and Korean, Section 4 concludes the paper.