Nouns and Noun Phrases - University of Macau Library

Pre-determiners 951
I. Bare al and noun phrase types
Pre-determiner bare al cannot occur in singular count noun phrases, regardless of
the grammatical gender of the noun, but does readily occur in plural noun phrases
headed by definite determiners like the plural article de ‘the’, the plural
demonstratives die/deze ‘these/those’ and the definite possessive pronouns; see
Subsection II for a discussion of bare plurals.
Table 1: Pre-determiner bare al in noun phrases headed by a count noun
DEFINITE
ARTICLES
DEMONSTRATIVE
PRONOUNS
POSSESSIVE
PRONOUNS
SINGULAR [±NEUTER] PLURAL [±NEUTER]
*al de stad/het huis
all the town/the house
*al die stad/dat huis
all that town/that house
*al deze stad/dit huis
all this town/this house
*al mijn stad /huis
all my town/house
al de steden/huizen
all the towns/houses
al die steden/huizen
all those towns/houses
al deze steden/huizen
all these towns/houses
al mijn steden/huizen
all my towns/houses
In passing note that in older stages of the language, pre-determiner al could modify
singular nouns; cf. Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal, lemma al. Some relics
can still be found in Van Dale’s dictionary of Dutch: al de stad ‘the whole city’, al
de vloot ‘the whole fleet’ and al de wereld ‘the whole world’, but in present-day
Dutch heel ‘all/whole’ is normally used in this context; cf. Section 7.2.2.1, sub I.
Although pre-determiner bare al normally precedes plural noun phrases, it
cannot be combined with pluralia tantum like (16a), or with formal plurals like
(16b-d) that denote a conventionally fixed unit. Note that (16d) can be used when
the individual islands of the Antillean archipelago are quantified by al, not on the
intended reading in which the Antilles is seen as a unit. Section 7.2.2.1, sub I, will
show that in this respect al is the exact opposite of the pre-determiner heel.
(16) a. *al de hersenen/tropen
all the brains/tropics
b. *al de kerstdagen (zat hij te zeuren)
all the Christmas days sat he to nag
c. *al de Verenigde Staten
all the United States
d. # al de Antillen
all the Antilles
‘all the individual islands of the Antilles’
Pre-determiner bare al also occurs in non-count noun phrases, in a position
linearly preceding the definite article, the demonstrative or the possessive pronoun.
Substance nouns and mass nouns behave the same way, as the examples in Table 2
show. Note that the judgments are not affected by the gender of the noun. This is
only shown for the substance nouns.