Evidentiality, Alethic Modality and Temporal Modifiers: The Case of Benlái vs. Yuánlái in Mandarin Chinese

Evidentiality, Alethic Modality and Temporal Modifiers: The Case of Běnlái vs. Yuánlái in Mandarin Chinese Abstract In this paper, I re-examine yuánlái2 ‘it turn out that’, for which Wu (2012a) proposes a tem- poral semantics. Revising the temporal se- mantics proposed, I also argue that yuánlái2 is evidential and simultaneously denotes alethic modality. Following Portner’s (2009) idea on the semantics of alethic modality, I propose the following: (i) yuánlái2 presents a proposi- tion which is undetermined with respect to the truth value at a time in the past of some refer- ence time but which is true at the reference time, and (ii) this temporal semantics follows from an epistemic modal base, while the or- dering source is empty. The second point guarantees that yuánlái2 is evidential (depend- ent on the epistemic modal base) but presents a fact, rather than an inference or conjecture, because of the empty ordering source. This proposal potentially separates evidentiality from epistemic modality. 1 Introduction Evidentiality has attracted the attention of many linguists in the last two decades, e.g. Aikhenvald & Dixon (2003), Cornillie (2007), Diewald & Smir- nova (2010), Faller (2002, 2006), de Haan (1999, 2001), Matthewson et al. (2007), Murray (2017), Palmer (2001: 35-52), Peterson (2010), Simon- Vandenbergen & Aijmer (2007: 24-39), Willett (1988), etc. There have been quite some studies on eviden- tiality in Mandarin Chinese (hereafter, Chinese), as well, for example, Hsiao (2015), Hsieh (2008), Tang (2010), Tantucci (2013), L. Yang & Tian (2015), Y. Yang & Yap (2012), among many more. Furthermore, these studies on evidentiality in Chi- nese either focus on pragmatic issues, e.g. Hsieh (2008), L. Yang & Tian (2015), and so on, or deal with evidentiality and modality, for example, Hsiao (2015), Tang (2010), and so forth. Tantucci (2013) is special in that it deals with evidentiality and the experiential guò. One point that does not attract much attention is the potential interaction between evidentiality and temporal modifiers. Temporal modifiers are modi- fiers which describe the temporal location of a nominal head or a situation, such as yuánlái, běnlái, yǐqián, etc. Wu (2012a, 2012b, 2014a, 2014b, 2018a), Wu & Kuo (2012), and so on, examine different temporal modifiers and their syntac- tic/semantic behavior. Wu & Kuo (2012) inspect běnlái carefully and propose a temporal semantics. Roughly, when běnlái presents a proposition, it indicates that the proposition is true at a time in the past of a refer- ence time but not true at the reference time (= the speech time under unmarked circumstances). Wu (2012a) compares běnlái and yuánlái and argues that the essential difference between běnlái and yuánlái lies in the ways how contrast is satis- fied: běnái allows for one-way contrast, as pointed out by Wu & Kuo (2012), but yuánlái two-way contrast. That is, for běnlái, a proposition is true at a time in the past of a reference time, but not true at the reference time, whereas, for yuánlái, a prop- osition can be true at a time in the past of a …

Content truncated to 500 words