AP Cleftability

Abstract

Clefting as a syntactic process is widely applicable to NPs and PPs but not to APs and VPs. However, in certain discourse contexts and structural configurations, APs can become more cleftable. Of special interest are colour terms and predicational APs, whose cleftability varies in different contexts. With regard to colour terms, Heggie’s (1988) nominal analysis fails to capture neither the distinct adjectival features of colour terms nor those colour terms that are morphologically marked with overt adjectival affixes. Alternatively, this paper proposes a nominality analysis that examines the extent to which colour terms and other APs exhibit nominal features rather than treating them as categorically nominal. A generalized Nominality Principle is then proposed, and predicational APs further examined in terms of cleftability and contextually generated specificity. It is found that predicational APs become more cleftable if (i) the predicate has a restrictive modifier, which provides the cleft focus with an exclusive meaning; (ii) the cleft focus has a strong, contextually generated contrastive reading; and/or (iii) the clefted AP exhibits nominal properties structurally. Finally, AP cleftability is also found to be constrained by interaction between specificity and syntactic complexity.