A Null Definite Clitic for Some Bare Singular Count Nouns in English

Abstract

In English, some location-denoting count nouns are realized with bare singular forms, allowing for three different interpretations such as activity, kind and deictically-definite readings. Syntactically, their forms are peculiar, in that count nouns in general in this language cannot be bare, needing to be encoded with an indefinite or definite determiner. In the previous analysis by Stvan (1998) and Harley (2009), incorporation in the conception of Baker (1985) is proposed to capture their peculiar syntactic properties. The reason behind the bare use of the location-denoting nouns at issue is, according to this incorporation-based analysis, that they need to undergo incorporation in syntax. Showing that this analysis is not tenable, we go on to provide an alternative analysis for the bare use of the location-denoting nouns in question. Particularly, we suggest that both activity and kind readings of such nouns are syntactically analogous to mass nouns that come with a ‘zero’ article. On the other hand, a deictically definite reading of those nouns in fact come with a definite determiner that is phonologically suppressed and changes into a clitic.