A study of anaphoric non-specific object drop in Cantonese: Classification and derivation

Abstract

There were numerous studies on anaphoric object drop in Chinese (see Chao 1968: 312, Li and Thompson 1981: 657, Wang 2002: 201, Matthews and Yip 2011: 973, Tang 2015: 141, among many others). By reviewing widely-discussed anaphoric object drop in Chinese, this paper points to the fact that anaphoric non-specific object drop appears not to be well-studied while this type of object drop is also characteristic of Cantonese. The aim of this paper is twofold: first to classify anaphoric non-specific object drop in Cantonese; secondly to study how it is licensed in the simplicity of its theoretical machinery, as compared with the counterparts in English. Based on type of object dropped, anaphoric non-specific object drop can be further classified into three sub types: (A) anaphoric non-specific existential, (B) anaphoric generic and (C) anaphoric nonspecific attributive. As for its derivation, anaphoric non-specific object drop can be valued from an antecedent, and it is with a referential variable. Anaphoric non-specific object drop in Cantonese is argued to be derived by NP-ellipsis, stranding a null determiner. The overall aim of this paper is, from both the syntax and semantics perspectives, to shed some lights in understanding anaphoric non-specific object drop in Cantonese.