Nouns and Noun Phrases - University of Macau Library

Binominal constructions 631
III. Definiteness of the complement of van
Since the partitive construction refers to a subset of a presupposed set, the
complement of van must be definite. This predicts that the indefinite determiner
zulk(e) ‘such’ cannot occur in the partitive construction. As is shown in (157), this
prediction is indeed borne out; the noun phrases following van only have a typereading
and in that sense resemble the pseudo-partitive reading.
(157) a. een paar van zulke studenten
a couple of such students
b. een kilo van zulke aardappelen
a kilo of such potatoes
c. een glas van zulk bier
a glass of such beer
d. een stuk van zulke kaas
a piece of such cheese
e. een school van zulke vissen
a shoal of such fish
4.1.1.6.3. Conclusion
This section has discussed the partitive and pseudo-partitive construction. It has
been argued in 4.1.1.6.1 that the pseudo-partitive construction is actually a regular
QC, albeit that the projection of N2 is a nominal disguised as a van die N phrase
with a spurious preposition van. The partitive construction, on the other hand, is a
noun phrase headed by an empty noun followed by a partitive van-PP. Due to the
fact that the empty noun may function as the N1 of a QC, the partitive construction
may have the same morphological shape as a pseudo-partitive construction. Section
4.1.1.6.2 therefore discussed some properties of the spurious nominal van die N
phrase that are helpful in distinguishing the two constructions.
4.1.2. Non-quantificational constructions: een soort boek ‘a kind of book’
Example (158) shows that binominal phrases need not be quantificational. These
non-quantificational examples typically involve the noun soort. As in Section 4.1.1,
we will refer to the first noun (soort) as N1, and to the second noun as N2.
(158) a. deze/die soort aap/apen
this/that species [of] monkey/monkeys
b. dit/dat soort auto/auto’s
this/that kind [of] car/cars
c. een soort appel/appels
a kind [of] apple/apples
‘an apple-like thing/apple-like things’
We will see in this section that the three uses of soort in (158) differ in certain
respects: in (158a), the noun soort is clearly used as a referential expression and the
binominal construction refers to a contextually determined species of monkey. This
is less clear in the other two uses: example (158b) has a type reading in the sense
that it refers to a set of cars that resemble a certain car/certain cars that is/are under