Indirectly Determined Comparison and Difference: The Case of Japanese

Indirectly Determined Comparison and Difference: The Case of Japanese Toshiko Oda Tokyo Keizai University 1-7-34 Minami-cho, Kokubunji 185-8502 Tokyo, Japan toda@tku.ac.jp Abstract When making comparisons, Japanese allows somewhat sloppy comparisons. In Japanese, ‘Taro’s grade is better than Hanako’ means Taro’s grade is better than Hanako’s grade. Also, when referring to a difference, ‘Taro’s opinion is different from Hanako’ in Japanese means Taro’s opinion is different from Hanako’s opinion. Such collocations are widely observed in the language. This paper argues that comparison constructions and ‘different’ constructions are calculated in context- dependent manners in Japanese. In doing so, I will apply Hohaus’s (2015) framework of the ‘indirect strategy’ of degree comparison to phrasal comparatives and ‘different’ constructions in Japanese. 1 Introduction This paper is concerned with the phrasal yorimo- comparatives and ‘different’ constructions in Japanese such as the following. Intuitively, (1) compares Taro’s grade and Hanako’s grade, and (2) means Taro’s opinion is different from Hanako’s opinion. However, what appears on the surface in both cases is only Hanako.1 ‘Hanako’s 1 I will use the following abbreviations in this paper. Gen = genitive case marker; Top = topic marker; Acc = accusative case marker; Nonpast = nonpast tense; RC = relative clause; Lit = literal translation grade’ or ‘Hanako’s opinion’ never directly appears. Yorimo-comparative in Japanese2 (1) Taro-no seiseki-wa Hanako-yorimo Taro-Gen grade-Top Hanako-YORIMO ii.3 good.Nonpast Lit. ‘Taro’s grade is better than Hanako.’ ‘Taro’s grade is better than Hanako’s grade.’ ‘Different’ in Japanese4 (2) Taro-no iken-wa Hanako-to Taro-Gen opinion-Top Hanako-with tigau. different.Nonpast Lit. ‘Taro’s opinion is different from Hanako.’ ‘Taro’s opinion is different from Hanako’s opinion.’ These examples are somewhat unexpected, as their English equivalents never mean what the Japanese sentences mean. 2 Yorimo adopted in this paper is interchangeable with yori. Both are normally translated as ‘than’. Nevertheless, there are some exceptions where only yori is allowed. See Sawada (2013) for details. 3 Yorimo is normally glossed ‘than’. However, I will simply gloss it as ‘YORIMO’ throughout the paper. Later in Section 3 I will argue that it is an equivalent of compared to in English. 4 Tigau ‘different’ in Japanese is a verb. (3) #John’s grade is better than Mary. (4) #John’s opinion is different from Mary. One may assume syntactic deletions of ‘-’s grade’ or ‘-’s opinion’ in the Japanese examples. (5) Taro-no seiseki-wa Hanako-no-seiseki- Taro-Gen grade-Top Hanako-Gen-grade- yorimo ii. YORIMO good.Nonpast ‘Taro’s grade is better than Hanako’s grade.’ (6) Taro-no iken-wa Hanako--no-ikien- Taro-Gen opinion-Top Hanako-Gen-opinion to tigau. with different.Nonpast ‘Taro’s opinion is different from Hanako’s opinion.’ However, these are unlikely options. In (7), no ronbun ‘-’s paper’ is deleted in the second sentence, and it is ungrammatical for the intended interpretation, in sharp contrast to the commonly observed NP deletions exemplified in (8). Deletion of ‘-’s paper’ (7) Taro-wa Jiro-no ronbun-o yonda. Taro-Top Jiro-Gen paper-Acc read *Hanako-wa Maki-no ronbun-o yonda. Hanako-Top Maki-Gen paper-Acc read ‘Taro read Jiro’s paper. Hanako read Maki’s paper.’ NP deletion (8) Taro-wa Jiro-no ronbun-o yonda. Taro-Top Jiro-Gen paper-Acc read Hanako-wa Maki-no ronbun-o yonda. Hanako-Top Maki-Gen …

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