Rajesh Bhatt gave the following colloquium talk at Rutgers University on Friday, January 25.
Title: Many or More
Abstract:
Most Modern Indo-Aryan languages lack dedicated degree morphology. Comparative constructions are typically marked by a marker like the Hindi-Urdu `zyaadaa'/`adhik', which is often absent is adjectival comparatives. It is however required in non-adjectival comparatives. Earlier work that has identified this marker as the comparative degree head is unable to handle this asymmetry. I argue that `zyaadaa/adhik' does not by itself encode comparative meaning; it merely makes available a degree variable. I will show that this conception of 'zyaadaa' allows for us to handle a number of environments where 'zyaadaa' does not contribute a comparative meaning. The actual meaning of comparison I will take to be introduced by a covert comparative operator. Like the covert negation assumed in treatment of negative concord, this covert comparative operator needs to be licensed. It can be licensed by 'zyaadaa' or by the standard marker (the -se ‘than’ phrase). I will end with an examination the cross-linguistic grammaticization of comparative markers in the context of Schwarzschild's proposal for Hebrew `yoter'.
