Nouns and Noun Phrases - University of Macau Library

1038 Syntax of Dutch: nouns and noun phrases
Of the four different readings we have discerned for post-determiner heel (cf.
Section 7.2.1.2), only one is readily available for geheel; the phrase de gehele taart
in (272) strongly prefers a totality reading for gehele, although a purely adjectival
interpretation may be marginally available as well.
(272) A semantic comparison between post-determiner heel and geheel
de hele taart de gehele taart
adjectival cake that has no slice missing + ??
totality cake in its totality + +
degree quite a cake + —
negative polarity that (blasted) cake ... at all + —
That gehele can sometimes have a purely adjective reading is clear from a fixed
collocation like gehele getallen ‘numerals that are not fractions’. That we are
dealing with purely adjectival geheel in this case is clear from the fact that geheel
combines with the plural count noun getallen: just like quantificational heel,
quantificational geheel normally cannot combine with plural count nouns.
In what follows we will illustrate the ban on degree and negative polarity
readings for post-determiner geheel with reference to the types of examples used in
our discussion of the semantics of post-determiner heel in Section 7.2.1.2. The
discussion will show that the semantic contribution of geheel is mainly that of
totality quantification; replacing heel by geheel in contexts where it does not have
the core semantics of totality yields ungrammatical outputs.
For degree-heel, the difference with geheel can best be illustrated with
reference to the triplet in (197), repeated here as (273) with gehele given as an
alternant for heel. We see that only the third intonation contour, corresponding to
the adjectival “complete/total” interpretation, is acceptable with geheel; the two
other degree contours are impossible with geheel.
(273) a. een hele/*gehele verZA—meling [high degree]
b. een HEle/*geHEle verZAmeling [“quite” degree]
c. een HEle/geHEle verzameling [adjectival: “complete”]
Accordingly, in examples of the type in (193), repeated as (274), heel does not
alternate with geheel. Note that (274c) is marginally possible with geheel when it
contributes totality quantification; the intended reading here is that of high degree.
(274) a. Dat is een heel/*geheel gedoe.
that is a whole hassle
b. Dat is een hele/*gehele toer.
that is a whole tour de force
c. Ze maakten een hele/ # gehele scène.
they made a whole scene
d. Dat was een hele/*gehele opluchting.
that was a whole relief
‘That was quite a relief.’