A special construction with só 'only': interaction between focus and quantification and signalling of noteworthy quantities
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1590/1678-460x202541366117Keywords:
só (only/alone), semantics, pragmatics, quantification, focusAbstract
This paper scrutinizes a special value of the polyvalent operator só ‘only / alone’, which we will term focus-and-quantification- só , where a phrase restricting a domain of quantification is focussed, as in the sentence só ontem recebemos mais de mil queixas ‘yesterday alone we received over a thousand complaints’. We will start by distinguishing this value from other values that só can have. Subsequently, we will explore the grammatical conditions - both syntactic and semantic-pragmatic - in which this value emerges: binary structure of the predication, presence of quantification in a non-focussed constituent, ontological diversity of the focussed entities or sets, absolute adjacency between só and the focussed expression, possibility of making alternatives explicit via certain adverbial adjuncts. Strictly pragmatic aspects, central to the interpretation, are also addressed; the constructions at stake always signal the presence of a noteworthy quantity ( more than a thousand [complaints], in the case above), exceeding a certain expectation, or a contextually determined value. This work takes a formal semantics approach to meaning and uses both constructed data and corpora data.
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