Formal Approaches to Semantic Microvariation: Adverbial ...

A QAD sentence with réunir is only grammatical in a context in which there were
multiple occasions of ‘bringing together’. In particular, they are most felicitous in
matchmaker-type contexts, such as (29).
(29) Pendant ma
During my
longue
long
carrière
career
d’entremetteuse,
of matchmaker,
j’ai beaucoup réuni de
I have a lot reunited of
personnes
people
‘During my long career as a matchmaker, I have brought together a lot of
people’
This sentence is most felicitously uttered in a context where there are many events of
me bringing together two people at a time. Whereas CQ sentences strongly disprefer
being used in a context in which there are not many participants per event, QAD sentences
must be interpreted this way if interpreting them any other way would result in
a single event context.
Finally, that QAD is adverbial quantification can be seen by the fact that QAD is
impossible in stative contexts. Obenauer (1994:121) observes that QAD is impossible
with a stative verb like posséder ‘to own’ (30), and Burnett & Bouchard (2008) show
that, in Standard French, QAD is impossible in existential constructions (31).
(30) *Jean a beaucoup possédé de chevaux
Jean has a lot owned of horses
(31) *Il y a beaucoup eu de personnes chez nous hier
It there has a lot had of people at us yesterday
Note that CQ is possible with both stative verbs and existential predicates.
(32) Jean a possédé beaucoup de chevaux
Jean has owned a lot of horses
30