To appear in NLLT Functional Projections of Nominals in Japanese: Syntax of Classifiers

Japanese allows the numeral+classifier combination to appear in a variety of positions in relation to the head noun. This paper argues that it is necessary to posit at least four functional projections above NP (#P, CaseP, QP, and DP) and massive phrasal movement of such functional projections in order to provide a principled account for the structural diversity of the numeral+classifier combination in Japanese. New evidence from minimizer expressions and pseudopartitives, which have not been systematically investigated before, is brought to bear on details of the analysis. Japanese is an excellent testing ground for exploring the nature of the noun-related functional projections, because some of them, such as #° and Case°, are argued to be overtly realized (#° as a classifier and Case° as a case particle).